Geriatric baptism

Last week we baptized an 88 year-old man. Our Clerk of Session and his deacon wife, also octogenarians, witnessed the sacrament. We performed it during our weekly worship service at a local retirement community. “Jim” (not his real name) had approached me the previous week and said, “I have never been baptized.”

“Would you like to be?” I answered.

He hesitated. He had belonged to the Presbyterian Church all his life without getting baptized. Our denomination is more enamored of rules than the average church; his slipping through that legal crack surprised me. Since we baptize babies his parents would normally have taken care of it. But his father had opposed it. Jim did not say why, but clearly implied` his father did not believe.

But here Jim stood, pondering whether to get baptized. He asked a couple of questions, then said, “I would very much like to be baptized, if you would baptize somebody like me.”

As a matter of fact I can think of few things that honor and delight me more than the chance to baptize somebody like Jim. I have known him for several years. I knew he was thoughtful. I knew he struggled to synthesize his economic conservatism with a big heart for all kinds of people. I knew he carried a heavy burden for something he did in the Navy, but he has never done more than hint at what that was.

We talked about how baptism symbolizes the mercy of God, how our gracious Lord Jesus forgives all who pray for it. I shared my sense of my own sin. Like many aging men, my awareness of my own guilt is growing. All the more do I praise God that I do not have to let that burden of guilt grow until it crushes me. This seemed to matter quite a lot to Jim.

The day arrived. Jim's daughter came. So did his son-in-law. He introduced them with a quivering voice. But when the time came, he steeled himself and stood before a room filled with his generation. I wish I could have bottled the air in there. It was so full of love it would make a healing tonic for many a malady.

Tears came into Jim's eyes as I placed the water on his head. We all cried. We sang a hymn, stood around and talked for a while, and departed into a sunny afternoon.

Every now and then I feel blessed to get to do my job.