Sermon Central
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The Heizer Creek Baptism
Contributed by Jim Butcher on Apr 11, 2018 (message contributor)
Note: this story happened to me - Jim Butcher of Madison WV.
One of my favorite baptism stories comes from a friend of mine who owns a house on Heizer Creek. He had a nice spot on his property to do baptisms and told the nearby country churches they were welcome to use it anytime, which a few of them did regularly.
One Sunday he came home from worship and a church was there getting ready to do a baptism. My friend quickly parked his truck and hurried down to watch the event. The pastor shared how this woman had been saved that morning and was coming out of a rough background.
The pastor then proceeded to baptize her. Now, at this point, there is an important detail I need to share: it was still relatively early spring and the creek water was cold. Really cold. When the pastor raised the woman up out of the water, she loudly yelled, “Holy. . .” and then proceeded to say a word that is not normally a part of church services.
The pastor handled the situation so well. He said, “That’s alright, folks. She just got saved this morning. The Lord will help her work on that.”
I like the story because it’s a reminder to me that salvation is not for people who have it all together. It’s for people who admit they’re sinners. Certainly there will be some work to do to become more like Christ, but we come to Christ while we are yet sinners, knowing that He meets us there and then begins transforming us into Christlikeness.
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