No Greater Joy |

My oldest daughter, Lauren, was saved on June 8 of this year. She had made a profession of faith when she was six, but had doubted it a lot since then. I was so excited that she got it settled during our revival meeting this past summer. We were thrilled and relieved that her doubts had been put to rest. It was one of the happiest days of my life!

On September 5, I was blessed with another one of the happiest days of my life! That night, during the Lord’s supper, my son, Mitchell, sweetly trusted Christ through tears of repentance. He wept as our church family came to him after the service and hugged his neck. He had been talking to Lauren about it, and she encouraged him to get it settled. What a joy my children are to me! I am beginning to feel the power of the verse “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.” 3 John 4. I hope and pray that this joy gets multiplied as my children grow and as the younger ones begin to understand the truths of the Gospel. I pray the Holy Spirit convicts them and draws them while they are young. A life lived for Christ is a life with few regrets.

On October 24, 2010, we held a baptismal service at church and saw three precious souls baptized and join the church. My Mom was able to join us for this special day. The night before, Mitchell caught some sort of stomach bug. He was so afraid it would keep him out of church the next day. We prayed and asked the Lord to do a healing work on him so he could be there, and the Lord healed him! He awoke the next day feeling great!

Here are few photos of this very special day for us.

My beautiful mom with the baptizees. 😉

Nana with some of the kids.

Lauren right before getting dunked.

Lauren, post dunking. 🙂

Here’s Mitch, right before the plunge.

Here he is, all wet. When it was over, he said “That was so much fun!”

To be clear, there is no magical power to the baptismal waters. Baptism doesn’t save a person; but it is an important step of obedience. Christ does all the saving. Just think, if we believed that baptism saves, then that puts the power of saving in the hands of a mortal man, or in simple H2O. That would mean that John the Baptist “saved” Jesus? No way! Jesus saves! Baptism is a statement that says, “I believe the Gospel and I want to live, as best I can, like Christ.”

I couldn’t help but take a quick trip down memory lane as I sat in our choir loft, poised to snap the above photos. I traveled back in time to my own baptism. I was 15 when my pastor, Bro. Ken Graham, baptized me. I remember my dad, seated in the choir loft in his gray pen-striped suit, waiting with legs crossed, to snap some pictures of me. My camera is digital, his used 110 film. The cameras are very different, but I have a feeling the joy he felt was just the same as mine.

Blessed beyond measure,
Valerie