I love baptisms!
I used to love baptisms back in the day when I only understood them as a personal commitment to follow Jesus, but now I love them even more with my newfound Reformed understanding.
Baptisms represent so much more than a personal faith. When we are baptized, the Holy Spirit seals us into God’s covenantal family. An adult baptism, for example, is like a contract to be part of a family, whereas an infant baptism demonstrates God’s amazing grace bestowed upon someone who has done nothing to deserve mercy.
With this complete understanding of baptism, our faith becomes so much more than personal. It becomes a communal faith, which better explains how we are created in the image of a triune God, who is made up of three co-equal persons in a relationship of love.
This is good news! It means that we don’t have to travel alone on our personal journeys of faith. It means that together we reflect God’s image of love to a weary and broken world, and we all know how desperately the world needs to see love in this crazy environment.
This summer has been full of baptisms for me. I had the joy of baptizing two adults and two children in a local river, and then I was blessed to witness the baptism of two children — one in Ireland and one in another state. How cool is that? Six new members reflecting the image of God to the world.
And it’s all because of God’s amazing grace.
Grace and peace,
Parson Larson, 2025
The Parson's Parlor 