Dedication

Dedication

December 19th, 2021

CCCAG

Scripture: Luke 2:22-40

Introduction

After I got saved one of the biggest arguments I had with my family had to do with what we were going to do with our children when it came to spiritual matters.

I have been raised in a house that was largely a twice a year religious house- Christmas, Easter, and the occasional wedding, funeral, or other religious observance that people were expected to show up for.

One of them involved baptizing babies. Usually in the first 6 months of a child being brought home from the hospital, they would bring the child to the church for the pastor to “baptize into the family of God”. There would then be a party afterward to celebrate this event, and as my uncle said- he is off the hook for Christmas or Easter because he went to church that day.

I don’t think anyone understood the significance of what just happened, but then again they just went with what the church told them to do and that was that.

Infant baptism was something you just did.

However, when I got saved into a more bible believing faith, it was about the same time my daughter was born. I went to my pastor at the time and asked when we should have her baptized and he explained to me what baptism was really about and how biblically it was done after a person made a decision and confession of faith in Jesus Christ as Lord, God, Savior, and king and symbolized following Christ into the grave by being completely submerged in water and rising up out of the water again a new creation in Jesus.

This follows what Jesus taught us in John chapter 3-

John 3:5-7

"I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 7 You should not be surprised at my saying, 'You must be born again.'

So to answer the obvious question- is it required for salvation. Technically if you split hairs, no. If you get saved, and die the next day without being baptized, you still go to heaven.

However, if you have been saved for any length of time and have not been baptized, then I ask why?

Jesus said if you love me you will obey my commands. Baptism is not a suggestion from Jesus, but a command. It’s the public declaration of your new faith in Christ Jesus, and you should be baptized to fulfil his wishes and desire for you.

Again, baptism after making a decision for Christ is the model, and full immersion in water is the way it is done. We make some limited exceptions- for example I led a hospitalized hospice patient to Christ. He had a bone cancer that made moving him out of bed impossible as the risk for bone fractures was too high, so I baptized him through pouring water over his head.

But unless you have advanced osteosarcoma, if you are saved, you should be baptized by immersion.

I say all of that to say this-

This was a huge fight between my mother and I when the kids were born, and she called the church that she hadn’t been too in years, talked to the pastor, and got special permission to baptize the kids in her sink at home. She had the idea that if something happened to them, they wouldn’t go to heaven. Eventually she got saved and learned the right way, but at that time we just let it go.

I had to bring all of that up because I know that many people here came up in faith traditions and denominations that believe in infant baptism.

However, the bible has zero instance of this practice.

It is not found in the writings of the early church.

It’s not found in the creeds or decisions of early church councils.

Paul- the guy who set our faith and practice never talks about infant baptism. He only refers to it in reference to a teen or adult coming to faith in Jesus.

So we in the more bible centered church’s that were formed in the last 150 years or so looked to the bible and found what we should do- child dedication, following Jesus’ example about a month after he was born.

So that bring us to today’s topic- dedicating children.

About 30 days after the events of the nativity, Joseph and Mary make the 12-mile hike into Jerusalem to follow what the law of Moses told them they had to do, and that is what we will focus on today-

Luke 2:22-40

22 When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord 23 (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, "Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord" ), 24 and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: "a pair of doves or two young pigeons."