It’s not yet 7:00 and I’ve been up almost 4 hours. Not sure why I couldn’t sleep but around 3:00 I woke up and began thinking about today. I was sleeping pretty good until then.
I was thinking about poor choices I made as a teenager and young man. I thought about how some of those decisions have impacted my life in drastic, obvious ways. All the decisions changed my life in one way or another. A few years ago I preached a sermon from the book of Ruth in the Old Testament. I talked about Ruth’s decision to follow Naomi back to Bethlehem, how God used her faithfulness so that she became great-grandmother of King David. That never would have happened if she had not make a few good decisions.
Decisions do make a difference.
But my past is checkered with poor decisions; just a few good ones sprinkled in along the way. Mostly, my poor decisions have been times when I chose to do what I wanted rather than what God desired. That is called sin and it is a terrible mistake.
But I was thinking about today when we will baptize a girl who has placed faith in Jesus Christ, repented of her sins, and confessed Jesus as her Savior and Lord. Because of that good decision her sins are forgiven, she’s been washed in the blood of Jesus so that her black sins stain her no more and God sees her as white as snow.
Her baptism is a symbol of the transaction that took place in her life when she made the decision.
So I couldn’t sleep. Not so much because of my mistakes playing in the cinema of my mind, but because of the memory of my own decision to follow Christ.
It’s hard to sleep when you’ve got so much to look forward to and such good news to share with others.
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