"Baptism"

First of all, I want to thank all of you who prayed for our sweet boy this past weekend. God was faithful, as He always is, and He was glorified.  

Saturday I was still concerned as Elijah Brooks was still quite allergy ridden.  On top of that, I discovered that his 1st tooth is just sitting on the surface of his gum waiting to emerge!  However, he was such a trooper and hardly acted as if anything bothered him. He thoroughly enjoyed being the center of attention and it was obvious!  I was just so thankful that he was feeling better...., thanks to God working through all of your faithful prayers. God took such good care of him and of us on this most special weekend.  

I hate that I am so prone to worry.  I lay awake Saturday night just thinking about the schedule for the next morning.  We had 12 people at our house and EB was already hyper because of all of the activity.  I am more flexible with his schedule typically than I was on Sunday.  I felt like I had to be alittle more rigid in sticking with the schedule because he had to be dressed, well rested, well fed (hopefully without spitting up on his baptism outfit), and I had to be dressed and out the door by 10:45.  God is GOOD!!  Things could not have worked out more perfectly.  He followed the schedule without missing a beat (good boy), and we were at the church at 10:50 for the 11:00 service. The baptism was at 11:05, so I knew that there was no room to play around with the schedule.  

Our pastor David, does the most thorough and beautiful infant baptism I have ever witnessed. David cried, Jay cried, and I cried through most of the baptism!  Fortunately Elijah Brooks did not cry!  We were standing in front of a packed sanctuary for almost 15 minutes and he never cried.  He loved just sitting up in his daddy's arms looking around at everyone.  It wouldn't have bothered me if he had cried though because baby's cry and everyone would have understood that.  However, I really didn't want him to cry to do anything else to really call attention to himself because I wanted to hear David's beautiful explanation of infant baptism and I wanted the congregation to also hear it.  I wanted the Lord to be exalted and the central focus, not Elijah Brooks.  God was so faithful!  I honestly don't think there was a dry eye in the church as we all witnessed God's faithfulness to His covenant promises and His covenant children.  When David actually baptized him, he later told me that the water was freezing!!  He wasn't sure how the baby was going to do, but when that cold water hit his little bald head and ran down his face, he just blinked his eyes and started paddling his little feet like a duck and then started smiling at everyone. 

It was truly the most beautiful sacrament I have ever witnessed.  I will always remember the words that David spoke to us and the vows that we took to raise our son in a Godly home and teach him the truths about scripture.  I will never forget the covenant promises made to us and the promises we made to God.   The image of David, our dear precious pastor, pouring water over our son's head will remain with me for the rest of my life.  What a beautiful testimony of faithfulness and mercy we witnessed on Sunday.  (As soon as I have a picture, I will post it).