How to Esteem Baptism

Today eight brothers and sisters of ours in Christ will be baptized.

The church often struggles to give baptism its due weight.  I would like to offer two ways you can remember your baptism.

First, we're getting back in the practice of giving out certificates of baptism.  The Kirkpatricks get one today, and if you or your child were baptized recently, you'll get one soon.  In one sense, it's just a piece of paper.  It isn't an indulgence or anything silly like that.  The baptism is the real thing, and your living relationship with Christ.  True, but that's like saying a wedding ring is just a chunk of metal.  The ring won't save your marriage, but it does remind you of it.  So I'd encourage you to cherish the memory and proof of your baptism: keep it with your birth certificates and other legal documents.  Or frame it on the bedroom wall to see every day.

Second, make the date important, like we do for birthdays.  Almost no one knows the date of their baptism, but everyone knows their birthday.  Put it on your calendars.  When it comes around, have a special treat at dinner and tell your children: "this is the day that your mother was baptized."  It's a great time to tell them about how you came to the Lord, the church you were raised or baptized in.  Instill a sense of family and church heritage in this way.  Kids, there was a group of believers like this one that baptized your parents 15 or 30 or 50 years ago.  This is a way to give God thanks for the faith of our fathers.

Doing these things doesn't mean we are trusting our baptism or our heritage to save us - we shouldn't do that.  But we should celebrate God washing us clean, bringing us into His church, as much as we celebrate God bringing us into the world at our birth.  Because the church IS the new world, the new creation, chartered by the Word, constituted by baptismal water, and by bread and wine.