Death. Burial. Resurrection.
That is what we celebrated in our baptisms this weekend at Trailhead Church: the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. He paid the price - we reap the benefit. So we celebrate.
And that's the way God wants it - Jesus was our substitute. He died our death under our judgment. He was crushed under the weight of our guilt and shame. He was immersed in our death because of our sin.
And then he rose again. The payment was complete and a new morning of forgiveness and life had dawned.
And we celebrate.
To be clear, we don't celebrate our obedience or good fortune. That's in there - but what we really celebrate is Jesus himself. We celebrate his love, his grace, his forgiveness, his initiative with us, his mercy, his work. We celebrate his performance for us, not our performance for him. We rest in the peace of God because Jesus made peace with God for us. We don't just celebrate what he has done - we celebrate him.
And so we are baptized - not to earn his favor, but because he earned it for us. We go through the symbolic motions of dying and being buried by being immersed in water. As we come up out of the water, we symbolically rise again in his new life, dripping with his righteousness. Covered. Forgiven. Cleansed. The water is just a symbol - but what a powerful, grace-filled symbol. It is full of joy because it points us back to the reality of who Jesus is and what Jesus has done.
This weekend we had five followers of Jesus scheduled to be baptized in obedience to his command. During the sermon, though, I invited anyone who had believed in Jesus but had not yet been baptized to celebrate with us - and jump in! We thought we had everything ready for people to respond spontaneously - the baptismal, towels, dry clothes, even underwear to be baptized in, but we weren't fully ready for the response we received. We ran out of clothes. We used every towel. And when it was all over, we ended up baptizing 17 followers of Jesus. It was awesome.
As a community, we had tears and laughter and freedom and joy - because we have Jesus.
That is what we celebrated in our baptisms this weekend at Trailhead Church: the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. He paid the price - we reap the benefit. So we celebrate.
And that's the way God wants it - Jesus was our substitute. He died our death under our judgment. He was crushed under the weight of our guilt and shame. He was immersed in our death because of our sin.
And then he rose again. The payment was complete and a new morning of forgiveness and life had dawned.
And we celebrate.
To be clear, we don't celebrate our obedience or good fortune. That's in there - but what we really celebrate is Jesus himself. We celebrate his love, his grace, his forgiveness, his initiative with us, his mercy, his work. We celebrate his performance for us, not our performance for him. We rest in the peace of God because Jesus made peace with God for us. We don't just celebrate what he has done - we celebrate him.
And so we are baptized - not to earn his favor, but because he earned it for us. We go through the symbolic motions of dying and being buried by being immersed in water. As we come up out of the water, we symbolically rise again in his new life, dripping with his righteousness. Covered. Forgiven. Cleansed. The water is just a symbol - but what a powerful, grace-filled symbol. It is full of joy because it points us back to the reality of who Jesus is and what Jesus has done.
This weekend we had five followers of Jesus scheduled to be baptized in obedience to his command. During the sermon, though, I invited anyone who had believed in Jesus but had not yet been baptized to celebrate with us - and jump in! We thought we had everything ready for people to respond spontaneously - the baptismal, towels, dry clothes, even underwear to be baptized in, but we weren't fully ready for the response we received. We ran out of clothes. We used every towel. And when it was all over, we ended up baptizing 17 followers of Jesus. It was awesome.
As a community, we had tears and laughter and freedom and joy - because we have Jesus.
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