Baptism

With my realization that I have only been a believer for a year now I decided it would be appropriate to get re-baptized as a true follower of Christ. At our church they have those who are going to be baptized give their testimony to everyone. The first time I experienced this was when Jason got baptized and it was so powerful and encouraging to hear other testimonies. So this past Sunday, I was able to stand before the church and give my testimony as well as get baptized knowing full well what it means to submit my whole life to Christ.

Here is my testimony:

I have claimed to be a Christian since I was around 8 years old when I was baptized and made my statement of faith in front of my childhood church. Even though I attended church all through high school, by the time I got to college my lifestyle was not lining up with the faith I was proclaiming. My entertainment choices, language, dependence on myself, need for success, desire for worldly possessions, and my relationships were indistinguishable from those of the secular world.

It wasn’t until my first year of marriage that I began to slowly see that my life was not God-glorifying. Through reading books like "Sacred Marriage" and "Love and Respect" I caught some glimpses of my selfishness and aversion to submission in my marriage. I was still a long way from understanding true biblical submission but this was seemingly my first step towards a different way of living. After the birth of our first child, I decided I wanted to stay at home--God used this realization, combined with my husband’s transitioning job, to bring us from California to Fort Worth, Texas. With this move came some big surprises and changes in my life. Not only was I living far from my family, but my husband was unemployed, we were living with my older brother, and I found out I was pregnant with my second child. In the midst of this seeming chaos God was doing His work of regeneration in my husband. I soon noticed the drastic change in my husband as he started selflessly serving his family for the first time.

With my husband leading the way I started desiring what he had and decided to follow his example of spending time in the Word. Up until this point I had never understood Hebrews 4:12 where it says that "the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart." This is exactly what happened to my heart the more time I spent reading the living word of God. I started realizing how short I was falling on almost everything. I quickly saw that I had been living the life of the fool in Proverbs and was far from the wise man described in its verses. For the first time in my life I started to see that I was mastered by sin.

Finally understanding the weight of my sin and seeing the impossibility of trying to keep all of God’s commandments, for the first time I truly realized my need for a savior. I know I cannot be good or holy on my own and I realize how undeserving I am to have Christ pay the penalty for my overwhelming sin. I am humbled every day to know that God’s grace was given to me when He sent His son to die on the cross in my place. I have been washed clean through the blood of Christ so that I may stand before my holy God on the day of judgment, clothed in Christ’s righteousness, without sin.

By the grace that has been given to me I have been submitting more and more to the Bible and with this submission has come freedom from sins that had kept me in bondage for many years. I now rejoice in my privilege to keep my home and take care of my husband and children. I rejoice in the hard work that God has given me in my life and I rejoice in serving the community of believers with my time and gifts. I rejoice that God is allowing me to see my daily sin and I rejoice in the freedom that comes from daily repentance. I rejoice that God has removed my heart of stone and given me a heart of flesh (Ez 11:19).