Baptism Details

I am going to be baptized. For the second time. Sunday evening. 6:00pm. Butler Community Alliance Church. You are welcome to come. It will not be the big event that I had thought it might be. I will share the service with about 20 other people also getting baptized. Maybe that is God's gentle reminder that's it's not really all about me. I am still sure that this is the right time and place for this. Here is my story I am going to share:

My parents, in the custom of their church, had me baptized as an infant, and took me to church faithfully as a child. When I was 17 and trying to decide what to do with the rest of my life I had a theology to base it on. I had memorized the answers to the big questions in second grade. Who made me? God made me. Why did God make me? God made me to know Him, love Him, serve Him in this world, and be happy with Him in heaven. So if I was to serve God, I must first get to know him. As I began to figure out how to get to know God, a friend literally read the four Spiritual Laws booklet with me.

1.God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.

2.Man is sinful and separated from God.

3.Jesus Christ is God's only provision for man's sin.

I knew all of this. But number 4 was something new to me. And it was just what I was looking for—a personal relationship with God.
4.We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord;then we can know and experience God's love and plan for our lives.
So that night in the fall of my freshman year in a dorm room at Penn State I prayed and asked Jesus to be the Lord of my life and began a relationship with Him.

Because I had already been baptized and because it wasn’t necessary for my salvation, I was never baptized as an adult. I grew up, became a pastor’s wife, and served the Lord as I continued to get to know Him.

This last year of my life I have stepped back from ministry and what I discovered is how much God loves me. Whether I serve Him or not. Somehow, I had gone from knowing Him to serving Him and missed the loving Him part. Today I have a deeper understanding of not only Who God is but that I can love because He first loved me. Enough to die for me.

So my desire in being baptized is to declare my love for the God Who made me, loved me, died and rose again for me, and sings over me.

The LORD your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you. He will quiet you with His love. He will rejoice over you with singing.

Zephaniah 3:17

The good news is that since I didn't get to plan the service I will not be singing. But that's okay, because God will be.