Dear Friends through Christ,
What would you do if given a second chance at life? What would you change or do different? Let’s say your heart suddenly stopped beating and you could no longer breathe; by all practical purposes you have died, and it is time to meet your Maker. Yet, the doctors and nurses keep you alive. Painlessly they insert two tiny stints through your wrist, weaving this probe to the main arteries of the heart, allowing blood and breath to flow again! And just like that, by the grace of God, you are given a glimmer of hope for what is still an uncertain future, but right now, you are alive! What are you going to change or do different?
I thought long and hard about those questions. However, come to think about it, there is really only one thing I can do, only one place to turn. Baptism! That’s right, our Baptism is our only chance at life, for all of us. The apostle Paul writes to the Romans in chapter 6, verse 3, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore, we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”
That’s what am I going to change or do different! I am going to try my best and walk in that newness of life. Now more than ever I will try to put my baptism to use, daily. I am simply going to die to sin, daily. You see, my personality fits quite nicely with Adam and Eve. I, just like Adam and Eve have trouble trusting the promises of God. I always want more. I’m just like all those evil people from the days of Noah, where God teaches before and after the flood, “the inclination of the human heart is on evil, continually.” That’s me, without baptism!
Folks, if it takes a massive heart attack just to get me to quit smoking after 54 years, it is going to take a daily baptism, a daily drowning, a daily death, if I’m ever to come close to being freed from sin. Paul continues in Roman 6:10, “The death Jesus died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So, you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.” So what am I going to do different? I am going to try my best to walk in newness of life and every day try and consider myself alive to God in Christ Jesus, every day.
Sure, a couple of blocked arteries and tons of abuse has made my heart weak, and I must live with these consequences, but the waters of baptism will strengthen and restore my soul to wholeness. It’s the only chance of achieving my goals, by using the gift of baptism, daily.
This coming Sunday, October 6, little Emma Grace will receive this precious gift of Baptism in our presence. If there is one Sunday to set aside earthly concerns, if there is one Sunday for you to consider what you would like to change or do different, this coming Sunday at 10AM would be a good place to start. Here, Emma will be named as a daughter of the Most High and Living God. Here she will be covered with the baptismal waters of God’s grace and then sealed with those beautiful promises. Freedom from sin. Freedom from evil. Freedom from death. Notice Emma receives all these gifts, not by a single thing she has done, for Pete’s sake she’s a baby. All these gifts are free! Now all Emma has to do, all I have to do, all you have to do, is put this wonderful life-giving, wonderful life-saving gift of Baptism to use.
So, what would you do if given a second chance at life? See ya this Sunday!
In Christian Love,
Pastor David Trexler
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