I Love to Baptize People

We baptized Ruthann Nearons in her own swimming pool on Sunday afternoon, July 12. She and her husband, Pen, made it like a party by serving us hotdogs and hamburgers afterwards around the pool. Baptism is a celebration of a new life. Baptism means a lot to us Baptists.

We baptize those who are mature enough to think clearly about choosing to give their lives to following Jesus. We baptize believers in Christ as a way of symbolizing that they are making a personal choice to trust Jesus to save them and giving themselves to following him. We baptize by immersion under water because Jesus was baptized that way, because every baptism in the Bible is by immersion, and because it is a great way to act out the meaning of salvation. Romans 6:4-5 describes it this way:

Don't you know that all who share in Christ Jesus by being baptized also share in his death? When we were baptized, we died and were buried with Christ. We were baptized, so that we would live a new life, as Christ was raised to life by the glory of God the Father. If we shared in Jesus' death by being baptized, we will be raised to life with him.

When we go under the water, we die with Christ. When we come up out of the water, we are raised from death to our old life in order to live a new life with him. This is where we express our faith in Jesus not only as the one who will give life to us after we die, but also as the one who will give us life while we live. He will give us the power to change and live a new life.

What does this new life look like? Paul describes it when he lists the fruit of the Spirit of Christ in Galatians 5. “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”

I love to baptize people, because when we baptize them we are helping them to say, “I am giving my whole life to Jesus Christ. I’m changing. I’m growing. I am becoming a person more and more capable of having and passing along to others love, joy, and peace. I’m going to live that way in this life and the next.”

I also love to baptize people because dipping people under water is, quite frankly, a lot of fun.

What Teenagers Need from Us

I write as I am preparing to go to our retreat for our youth at Epworth By The Sea on St. Simon’s Island, GA. My prayer for this time with 8 youngsters who have been attending our Wednesday night youth meetings is that the Bible study, the fellowship, and the fun will convince them of God’s love and purpose for their lives.

I have been asked to teach them about the spiritual armor Paul talked about in Ephesians chapter 6. He says that we are in a fight to the finish against the Devil and all his angels. We are up against far more than we can handle on our own. This is the way the Message translation puts his instructions that I want to communicate to our youth. “Take all the help you can get, every weapon God has issued, so that when it's all over but the shouting you'll still be on your feet. Truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. You'll need them throughout your life. God's Word is an indispensable weapon. In the same way, prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare.”

I have had many conversations over the years with parents about the struggles their teenage children were going through: feeling uncertain of their worth, engaging in risky behavior, experimenting with alcohol. Our church wants to help teenagers to defend themselves against the Devil’s campaign to destroy them. They need the love of Christ from us. They need to believe deeply that God loves them and has a purpose for their lives. They need us to teach them how to love others. They need us to teach them by our example and our words how to live responsible lives.

Blessings at New Hope

I meet every Thursday morning with a group of pastors. It is our tradition to talk to each other about “burdens and blessings” and then close with a prayer for each other. Last Thursday, I talked about how grateful I am for the blessings of faithful servant leaders. Thinking about church members serving our church faithfully gives me encouragement. I will list a few. This is not an exhaustive list, because there is not room to list them all, and because New Hope members are out there being faithful in ways that I cannot see. But here is my limited list.

Erma and Garfield Dreas are preparing our Wednesday evening meals with such good care.

Elaine Hardy is keeping our bulletin board up to date, keeping our book corner supplied, editing our newsletter, “Connections,” and helping us to get committed to Bible study.

Bill Batchelor is chairing our church council with attention to the details of typing up the agenda for the meetings, setting dates for the church to receive reports and recommendations, and making sure that all appropriate concerns are given time to be heard at the meetings.

Betty Myers is chairing our deacons with attention to how our members and friends are being called or visited by their deacons so that we are constantly strengthening the ties of caring that bind us together.

Leesa Holloway is leading Vacation Bible School workers to get ready to teach and love children when they come to us in a couple of weeks.

Our staff is steadily serving: Dennis Bucher in worship planning, worship leadership, and solo singing; Armand Melnbardis in providing accompaniment and beautiful instrumental music for worship; Cheryl Secunda is preparing the next event to teach and love children and youth, drawing them in with her caring and constancy; Vernon Buchanan is cleaning, arranging, repairing, and improving our buildings and grounds.

These folks are representative of the self-giving that makes our church go. I am grateful to God for New Hope. I am going to close by borrowing and adapting Paul’s words in Romans 1:8, “I thank God in the name of Jesus Christ for all of you. I do this because people (all around the Port Orange area) are talking about your faith.”

Being the Family of God

The Lord’s Supper reminds us that we are the family of God. When we come together around the Lord’s Supper, we draw closer to each other, because we know that what God has done for all of us. We owe it to God to be a healthy family.

We know that on the night that he was betrayed into the hands of those who would kill him, “Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it and gave it to his disciples.” In John’s Gospel he had already told them, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” He was telling them and us, “You will find love, strength, and fulfillment in your relationship with me and with each other.” We symbolize our relationship with God and with each other by serving each other the bread. Jesus feeds us all and brings us together.

“He took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.’” The cup of grape juice is the color of blood, which is life. It draws us into communion with Jesus who gave his life for us. We are his people. He loved us enough to give his life for us. “This is how we know what love is,” wrote John, “Jesus Christ laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for each other” (1 John 3:16).

The covenant in the blood of Jesus brings about a relationship between God and us. We fulfill the covenant from our side by accepting his love for us and loving him back by doing what he tells us to do.

This is the day after the Fourth of July. As we thank God for the freedoms we have in America, let’s commit ourselves to leading people to turn to God as we know him in Jesus, and to turn away from the false gods of pleasure, power, fame, and selfishness. The sins committed in worshiping those false gods are destroying our country. We can best serve America by being a healthy church full of people who love and obey the true and living God and lead by example.