For Christians, when we get baptised is probably one of the easiest times we can invite unbelieving friends, family members and colleagues to church, to hear (and see!) the good news about Jesus Christ. With this in mind, I thought it would be great to give visitors something to take away with them to remember what they saw and heard. Hence this booklet! In the booklet I use one question and two pictures to help get people right to the heart of what their friend’s baptism is all about, and how it all relates to Jesus and his gospel.
Here's an extract:
The beautiful feast of life with God begins now and lasts forever. But how do I get into this great feast? Surely I need to get myself home for a good wash. Get out the shower gel. Wash off that selfishness. Then, pop down to Moss Bros or John Lewis for a nice new suit or evening dress. Turn over a new leaf and start to live right. Then I can attend the king’s feast, right? Once I’ve scrubbed away the pride and started to be humble. Then I can get along to the family meal, yes?
No. That’s not the answer that Jesus gives us. Rather, he says he will do everything to make sure we are clean. He will do everything to make sure we’re dressed appropriately for the occasion. Being cleaned by Jesus is the second picture that baptism gives us. The apostle Paul talks about coming to see his own need of being cleaned by Jesus. And he tells us the words of a man named Ananias who spoke to him about Jesus and then told him: Get up, be baptised and wash your sins away, calling on his name. Why will you see so much water? Because that water symbolises the way that Jesus washes us, makes us clean—not on the outside, but on the inside.
And this is where one of the biggest, most practical, most day-to-day questions you and I can ask ourselves comes in: Why did Jesus have to die? Why did God allow his wonderful Son to die a horrible death on a cross? That’s a question I started to ask when I was eighteen. It’s a question I’m still realising the answer to now, at forty-something, and that I expect to keep exploring until I die—and probably beyond!
You can get the book HERE
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Bio: Rich Baxter is Pastor for Outreach at Carey Baptist Church in Reading. He is married to Dorcas and has three lovely children. He and Dorcas love finding out new facts about dinosaurs, Lego and unicorns from their three young children. Rich loves to point others to Christ, and encourage and equip believers to do this—and is amazed that a church pays him to do so!
You can contact him on richard@careybaptistchurch.org.uk He's also on twitter as NotThatRBaxter
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