St. Boniface House

I had the privilege of meeting little Abbie the day after her birthday.  That was a rough time for all the M. family, but the Lord dealt graciously with them and with all of us in bringing them through it relatively unscathed, and we are thankful.

That was Abbie’s birthday.  Today is, in a sense, Abbie’s death day.  The apostle tells us that “all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death”.  Baptism signifies not only our regeneration, and the washing away of our sins, and our ordination to the Holy Priesthood in Christ Jesus, and the gift of the pouring out of the Holy Spirit of promise,  but it is also signifies the death of the old man.  Abbie was born united to her first father Adam and bears the guilt of his sin, and must bear his curse.  The wages of sin is death.  But by God’s gracious providence Abigail was also born into God’s covenant family and therefore all the promises of God made to God’s holy ones throughout all history and fulfilled and completed in Christ Jesus belong to her. And so Abigail is going to be drowned in the waters of baptism today, and raised to new life in Christ Jesus.

This is just the beginning, of course, but what a beginning!  The rest of Abigail’s life will, by God’s grace, be the life of a disciple of Christ.  It will be the baptismal life, a life of continual dying to sin, and continual rising to life.  Through the careful instruction and tender discipline of her parents, and especially through the ministry of the church, Abbie will learn to walk closely with our Savior and will heed the call daily, and hourly, and moment by moment to repent of all her sin, and trust in the Triune God for strength to live faithfully as a daughter of the covenant, until finally the death signified in this baptism will fully come, and she will shed this mortal body and rise unto everlasting life, clothed in the imperishable and glorious garment of the righteousness of Christ Jesus.

In baptism God is putting his name on Abigail Grace.  He is declaring her his own.  He is ingrafting her into Christ, head and body.  He is promising to forgive all her sins, and they will be many.  And he is, without giving her any say in the matter, placing upon her the responsibility of covenant faithfulness, and entrusting her to her parents and to this church that she may learn to seek his grace in fulfilling her obligations as a member of God’s family.

Jeremy and Linda, do you…