A Visit from Dr. Rogers

Our pastor, Dr. Rogers, came to visit us at our home this morning. Tomorrow Jaden is getting baptised and Dr. Rogers wanted to come over and spend some time with Jaden and show him what was going to happen and to pray with us. I thought that was a great idea! Hopefully Jaden will do OK tomorrow and it will be somewhat familiar for him because of the "practice" session today!

When we first told Jaden that Dr. Rogers was coming over to our house, he was SO EXCITED!!! We quickly realized that he thought we were telling him Mr. Rogers was coming over!!! And Jaden loves Mr. Rogers' TV show! Then we explained that our pastor was coming and showed him a picture of him so he wouldn't act disappointed when it wasn't Mr. Rogers at our door!

Interesting side note here: Mr. Fred Rogers was actually a Presbyterian pastor in the Pittsburgh Presbytery at the same time that our pastor, Dr. Michael Rogers was when he was a young pastor in western PA! So for a time they were in the same Presbytery although our pastor said they never actually met each other.

Back to Jaden's baptism, it has taken us a year and a half to get to this special day. We first started attending Westminster Presbyterian Church back in September 2007. Over the months that followed, we studied more and more about reformed theology and the doctrines of grace. Some things that we have always believed have been challenged as we began reading the Bible in a new light. Both of us have bachelor degrees in Bible from a Bible college and yet we continue to learn and grow in the Word of God and it is an exciting journey! One of the areas that our understanding has changed has been the sacrament of baptism.... moving from credo-baptist to paedo-baptist. What helped us to understand what we now believe is the biblical application of baptism is an understanding of covenant theology. It is like puzzle pieces that all fit together! I won't try to write an in-depth explanation here, but I have linked a couple of good articles about baptism on this page. Also the monergism site that I have listed is an excellent place to go to understand reformed theology.

So tomorrow is the big day... Jaden will be baptised as a three year old! I guess you could say that he is twice blessed! He was dedicated at 6 months at our former church! It will be a special day for us as this will be a visible sign and seal of God's covenant of grace. No, this does not save Jaden. There is nothing magic about the water sprinkled on his head. Rather it is a visible marking of Jaden being included in God's covenant people. We hope and pray he will one day put his faith in God and we will teach and instruct him in the ways of the Lord. What an awesome responsibility we have. Yet, it is not our efforts that will save Jaden. (Thank goodness!!!) It will only be through God's grace and His grace alone.