Encouraged by baptism

God granted me the privilege of experiencing a real "wow" moment on Sunday evening.

Five people were baptized at the conclusion of our Sunday evening worship service; three kids and two adults. It was truly an emotional time.

The kids included siblings -- brother and sister -- and another little boy. Our pastor referred to the kids as "little brother" and "little sister," which brought some tears to my eyes. I'm sure both sets of parents felt the same emotions as I did, although probably much, much stronger.

Witnessing these baptisms also caused me to think of my own little guy, my son Joel. While we have shared the gospel with Joel and explained it to him, he has not yet expressed faith in Jesus Christ. We keep praying and will keep sharing the gospel with him.

In the week leading up to the baptismal service, we talked with Joel about what baptism is and what it means. He asked about it since his usual Sunday evening kids program was postponed this week due to the baptismal service.

All week long the verse from Proverbs 22:6 kept nagging at me. It reads, "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it."

I didn't realize why that verse kept coming to my mind until Friday. My wife, Jolene, received a phone call from Joel's teacher that afternoon saying that he and several other students had caused a ruckus in class on Thursday and Joel had gotten himself into more trouble on Friday.

After hanging up with my wife, I headed to Joel's school to speak with his teacher and principals to get the scoop on what happened. It was a good talk. We really appreciate his teacher and the principals; good people.

When we got home, Joel and I had a long talk about his little "adventure."

Part of our conversation included me having the chance to share two verses of scripture with him: Proverbs 22:6 and Colossians 3:20.

I explained that in Proverbs 22:6, God is telling parents that their responsibility is to teach their kids how to live the way God wants them to live.

After explaining the Proverbs verse to Joel, we read Colossians 3:20, which states, "Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord."

We talked about obedience and what that means. We talked about being obedient to God and how to please God. We talked about the importance of being obedient to his parents and teachers and other people that Daddy and Mommy trust to watch over him. We also talked about the fact that he would need to be disciplined for his disobedience at school.

There were a lot of tears, but it was a good time.

Which leads me back to Sunday evening's baptismal service.
Our pastor explained that baptism is a sign that believers have committed to being obedient to Jesus Christ by placing their faith in Him as Savior. Seeing those three kids express their faith in Christ and obedience to him publicly through baptism was indeed encouraging.

So we will keep trying to practice what Proverbs 22:6 mandates by explaining the gospel of Jesus Christ to Joel and keep praying that he will place his trust in Jesus as Lord and Savior. And we look forward to the day when Joel will -- like those three kids at church on Sunday evening -- publicly express his faith in Jesus Christ and obedience to Jesus in the waters of baptism.