Saturday, January 12, 2008

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit

Tonight, we went to visit my sister and her family. It is about an hour away. My sister was baptized tonight. It is always a powerful display to see someone make that outward confession of what has taken place inside their heart. Of course, she asked Jesus in her heart several years ago.

Tonight she shared that she came to a point in her life where she realized that, yes, she believed in God and in his son Jesus, but that she needed to take that one step further to have a personal relationship with Jesus. So, tonight she wanted to take the next step in obedience to Christ of symbolically washing away the old man and coming back up new in Christ Jesus. (Obviously, the water does not save you or really change you. It is only a symbol; a public confession of what Jesus has done in your heart.)

I was very glad I was able to witness it. Oh, I forgot to mention another cool aspect of this baptism was that her husband was the one who dunked her! How precious it was.

It reminded me of when I baptized my own husband (actually, he wasn't my husband yet). I had a hard time seeing through my own tears. I remember being afraid I wouldn't be able to pull him back out of the water. But it all went fine.

I really didn't want to be the one to baptize him; I wasn't sure it was my "place". I am not sure the Bible gives a definition of who should or shouldn't baptize. Our church encouraged the one being baptized to ask the person who led them to Christ to "dunk" them, or a family member or church leader or mentor. Scott said it was because of me that he gave his life to Christ. I am not so sure of that; I think it was the Holy Spirit. But he really wanted me to baptize him. He said it was important to him. So I agreed.

My sister-in-law and my nephew are planning to be baptized at their church soon. I hope I will be able to witness that too.

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