LENT DAY 14: How Free Is the Grace of God?

 

Day 14 Thursday - Mar 9, 2023; Feb 29, 2024; Mar 20, 2025

See, here is water! What prevents me from being baptized? -Acts 8:36

What’s stopping you? That’s probably a good question for a Christian to ask herself. What stops you from doing _____? Insert whatever you need: going to church, helping this person, praying more, listening to the sermon, reading the bible, take your pick. An interesting way to expose the sinner in us who just loves to not love God and neighbor is to ask what is stopping you, and often finding how often you don’t really have a good answer - certainly not one that would stand up to God.

While we sometimes put hindrances before ourselves and God, baptism shows us how much God removes the roadblocks to get to us. Here is this Ethiopian Eunuch who hears the word of Jesus, and he asks not himself but Philip - the man who has been sharing Christ with him - what’s stopping me? What would prevent me from receiving Jesus further through the Sacrament of Baptism? What he’s really asking is “what’s stopping God?”

The answer was nothing. Immediately they come to a halt and Philip baptizes him. Two chapters later, Peter likewise is in the home of the Gentile Cornelius and he is forced to confess “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality” (Acts 10:34). Nothing was holding God back. And when the Spirit fell on the men in that house, Peter asked, “Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people” (Acts 10:47). Baptism would be the sign that nothing is stopping God.

And so it is with you. Your baptism means nothing is stopping God from getting to you.

How many things there are that stop me, Lord, but nothing stops you. So great is your searching that you have sought me out in baptism. Whatever might have been raised that day to stop you from doing it, you baptized me anyway. And here I am, now your sinful child forever. With so much stopping me, yes Lord, the only way to salvation is that there's no stopping you. Amen.

This post is a part of my daily Lenten devotional on Baptism. You can read more about it here.