Well, let's continue this morning, our series of messages that we've been doing since the first Sunday of January on the subject of, why do we do the things we do? We've been talking in the last five or six weeks about a number of practices in the Christian church. Some of these practices are unique to our church. They may not apply to every church. But what we've been doing is helping us to understand why we do some of the things we do so that we can be intelligent people here at UPC. And today, we are going to touch on a subject that is probably in this series anyway, the most controversial issue yet. It's the issue of, why do we baptize babies? I know that a lot of you wonder about that. Every time we have an infant baptism up here, a lot of you think, hmm, not sure I agree with that. Not sure why they do that. And so I want to walk you through why we baptize babies. And actually, the question is larger than just baptizing babies. Because what we really are dealing with here today is why do we baptize the children of believers? It's not just babies, it's the children of believers. Why do we and many other churches practice that? Now look, everybody here agrees that people who believe in Jesus Christ ought to be baptized, right? I think if we did a quick poll, should believers be baptized? Everybody would say, absolutely, yes, they should. After all, didn't Jesus teach us to baptize believers when he said go therefore into all the world, making disciples of all nations and baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. So that is a commonly accepted practice, the baptism of believers. The question we're wrestling with today is what about those believers' children? Should they be baptized too? And as I said, that's one of the most controversial issues in the church. It has divided Christians all down through the centuries. Many people, as you know, say that only people who have actually repented personally of their sin and trusted in Jesus should be baptized. While Presbyterians and other denominations say that baptism can also include the children of those who have repented of their sins and trusted in Christ. Personally, I've been baptized twice. I was baptized as a baby in a Presbyterian church and when I was in college and became a Christian and understood the gospel, I wanted to be baptized again and I went to a Baptist church and I was baptized again. So whoever is right, I'm covered, I'm safe, and it's okay. But nevertheless, I have come, my own journey, I have come to embrace the practice that we do here at UPC of infant baptism. I've come to understand that and to accept it and to actually be a fan of that. You may not, but it's important that you understand why we do what we do here at UPC. Let me just make sure you understand one thing before I go any further. We're not talking here today about a cardinal doctrine of Christianity. I want you to know that this is something about which good people differ. They have, they do, they will, probably until Jesus comes back and I don't expect to convert, quote, unquote, anyone here in one sermon. Although that would be wonderful, maybe I would, but I don't expect to, besides my concern today is really bigger than proving infant baptism. What I hope to accomplish today with you, at least in initial form, is to get us thinking and get us talking and get us pondering the fact that children both in the Bible and in the church are very, very important. The importance of children in the Bible and in the church is something that I really will hope that you see between every line of our study this morning. Well, perhaps it will help if I begin then by telling you four reasons that we do not have for baptizing babies. Four things that we don't believe so that you make sure you understand that's not what we're coming from. The first reason that we do not baptize babies is we don't baptize them because we think that the water of baptism washes away original sin or that the water of baptism saves a child. It doesn't. There is only one way to be saved. Let's be clear about that. It's through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. It's not by being baptized. Secondly, we don't baptize babies because we think baptism is necessary for salvation. It is not. The thief on the cross went to heaven without being baptized and so can you if you're trusting in Christ and Christ alone. Thirdly, we do not baptize babies because it's simply a Presbyterian tradition. The fact of the matter is it's a practice that goes all the way back to apostolic times. There are writings that show that infabaptism was the practice of the apostolic church. But at the end of the day, that is still not why we do it. And fourth and finally, we don't baptize babies simply because God thinks babies are cute. It's not because God just loves little babies. Yes, it is true that God loves children. Jesus when he was here welcomed little children into his arms and blessed them even when other people said they didn't want them around. But still, those facts alone are not enough to support baptizing children. So why do we? And many other churches around the world baptize the children of believers. We do it simply because we believe the Bible teaches it. No, I don't have chapter in verse. Wish I did. Wish I could say, aha, that's where it says thou shalt baptize your children. We don't have chapter in verse. The fact is neither side has chapter in verse. Both views are built upon good and necessary inference from looking at scripture all from cover to cover. And that's where I'm coming from today. I believe the Bible teaches it by good and necessary inference. Let me show you why I say that. And if you let me all pretend that I'm a lawyer this morning and begin with exhibit a turn with me in the Bible to Genesis chapter 17. The book of Genesis is the first book of the Bible. It's easy to find. And we have Bibles around us underneath the chair. Pull that out and turn to page 14. If you don't have your own Bible Genesis chapter 17. I'm going to read verses one through 14. As we begin our study of why infant baptism Genesis 17 one through 14. Listen carefully. This is God's holy word when Abram was 99 years old. The Lord appeared to him and said, I am God Almighty. Walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers. Abram fell face down and God said to him, as for me, this is my covenant with you. You will be the father of many nations. No longer will you be called Abram. Your name will be Abraham. For I've made you a father of many nations. I will make you very fruitful. I will make nations of you and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come to be your God and the God of your descendants after you. The whole land of Canaan where you are now an alien, I will give you as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you and I will be their God. Then God said to Abraham, as for you, you must keep my covenant. You and your descendants after you for the generations to come. This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you. The covenant you are to keep. Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to undergo circumcision and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you. For the generations to come, every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner. Those who are not your offspring, whether born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male who has not been circumcised in the flesh will be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. That's God's word. So what have we learned from that series of scriptures? Six things. Let me run through the list. The first thing we heard in Genesis 17 is that God made a covenant with a 99 year old geezer named Abraham. What is the covenant? We talked about it briefly with the children. A covenant is a solemn agreement made by one person to another. It is a bond. Someone is called it a bond in blood. That's how inviolable it is. It is a pledge made by one person to do certain things for another person. That's what a covenant is. Second thing we see in that passage is God calls it an everlasting covenant. You see that in verse 7, it's an everlasting covenant. Thirdly, in this covenant God made a number of promises to Abraham. And one of those promises was that he would not only be Abraham's God, but the God of Abraham's children as well. In verse 7, God says to Abraham, I will be your God and the God of your descendants after you. Fourth thing we see in that passage is that Abraham was expected to keep that covenant. He was expected by God to walk before him in faith and in integrity. Fifth thing we see is that as a sign of being in covenant with God, Abraham had to be circumcised, verse 11. And then sixth and finally, not only was Abraham to be circumcised, but it says in verse 12 that he was to circumcise. His little baby boys at the age of eight days as a sign of the fact that they too were in covenant with God to be an uncircumcised male, in fact, according to verse 14, was such a serious offense against God that he was to be cut off as a covenant breaker, cut off from his people. So those are six things we learned, six truths from Genesis 17. And here's what it boils down to, that God's covenant with Abraham included Abraham's children. Abraham's kids were part of the covenant community. These little eight day old baby boys who didn't know what was going on, right? They're just eight days old. They couldn't believe in God. They couldn't repent of their sin. They weren't old enough to understand those things. And yet nevertheless, God said for Abraham to circumcise those little eight day old boys to mark them out as children of the covenant by virtue of the faith of their father and mother Abraham and Sarah. Now see, no one denies that. So far we're on common ground. Nobody denies that. Baptists and Presbyterians alike, if you want to categorize them, know that children of the Old Testament period were included in the covenant of grace. But here's the question we need to wrestle with today. What happened to that covenant? What happened to that covenant that God made with Abraham? Did it disappear when Christ came on the scene? Did everything change with the new covenant so that now we're in a new day? Now it's every man for himself. Every person individually needs to repent and be saved before being included in the covenant. That's the question with which we need to wrestle. And I want to turn now to exhibit B. Hold on to A. Let's move on to exhibit B and turn with me in the Bible to the book of Galatians. Way back in the New Testament now, as we cross over into the new covenant, Galatians chapter three, it's on page 1152 of the chair Bible there, 1152. In Galatians chapter three, verses six through nine, we are given a good answer to the question, what happened to the old covenant? Did it disappear? Did it fall by the wayside? Did it leave the scene with the coming of Christ? Galatians 3.6 says Paul writing says, consider Abraham. He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Understand then that those who believe, we might say those who are Christians, those who believe are children of Abraham. The scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham, all nations will be blessed through you. So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. Do you see it? Do you see the answer to my question? What happened to the old covenant? The answer is that the covenant God made with Abraham is still in effect today. You and I believeers in Jesus, those who believe the gospel are called in verse seven, children of Abraham. You and I believeers in Jesus are called in verse nine, those who are blessed along with Abraham. In other words, we inherit the promises given to Abraham our patriarch. Verse 29 of this same chapter puts it very nicely. Galatians 3.29 it'll be on the screen. It says, if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. How many of you have sung that song Father Abraham before? Remember in vacation Bible school or Sunday school? Father Abraham had many sons and many sons had. I'm not going to make a fool out of myself. That's the song. We were singing a song about being the descendants of Abraham, the very people that God promised Abraham that he would have the many descendants that were so numerous they were like the stars of the sky. We are those very people. We are included in that. We stand in the same stream as Abraham did. You and I have Abraham as our great great great great great times many granddaddy where some of those very descendants that God promised Abraham. So what does this mean? It means that there is a single covenant that over arches the Bible and stretches from Genesis to Revelation and beyond. Ever since the fall of Adam into sin there has been one covenant that God has used to reach out to a fallen people and to redeem his own to himself. One covenant, not two, it has united the old and new testaments and it's still in effect today like God told Abraham. What did he say? He said it is an everlasting covenant. It's not going to drop out of existence. He's still using it in the present day and we call this covenant the covenant of grace. What a wonderful name for the way God deals with lost people through the covenant of grace and throughout the Bible you see this covenant slowly unfolding kind of like a rose from Abraham's day down through Isaac and Jacob and Moses and David and through the time of the prophets and then over into the New Testament when Christ instituted the new covenant. That same covenant of grace is still unfolding still getting bigger still getting better and still winning people into the family of God today and when you put your trust in Jesus Christ you come under the same umbrella of God's covenant love that Abraham did the umbrella of the covenant of grace you inherit the promises given to Abraham. So what does it say about your kids? What it says about your kids is that they too are part of the covenant of grace. It says in Acts 2.39 look at the screen. Acts 2.39 Peter's preaching on the day of Pentecost and he says to these people who are there the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off for all whom the Lord our God will call. When Peter's Jewish heroes heard him say that the promise is for you and your children they knew exactly what he was talking about they were steeped in covenant theology they knew that what Peter was referring to was the same covenant that God gave Abraham and the promise that God gave Abraham was the same one Peter reiterated that God would be a God to Abraham and to his descendants after him. See here's the thing and let me now take the threads that I've been throwing around and see if I can tie them all together. If Abraham's children belong to the covenant of grace which they did and if that covenant is still in effect which it is and if that covenant is still in effect then our children are partakers of that covenant just like Abraham's children. And if Abraham's children received the sign of the covenant then our children should receive the sign of the covenant to what is that sign of the covenant now that Christ has come it's no longer circumcision. Circumcision has been replaced by baptism. Baptism is a better sign than circumcision of the covenant of grace better for at least two reasons. Baptism does not discriminate on the basis of gender and more importantly baptism is bloodless. See there's no more reason for the shedding of blood in the Church of Jesus Christ. Blood has been shed once for all by Christ himself on the cross. So baptism as I was telling the kids is a symbol that is so far superior to circumcision and represents the cleansing from sin that comes when one trusts in Jesus Christ. The coming of the Holy Spirit and the initiation into the Church of Jesus Christ. Now look I know this is a lot for some of you to digest. Perhaps for you this is brand new thinking perhaps you've never been told these things before but here's the main thing I want you to get right now. The children of new covenant believers stand in the very same relationship to God that children of old covenant believers did. Nothing essentially has changed in the way God views the children of those who love Him. They have the same status that the children of old covenant believers had. God looks upon them with favor. They are members of the covenant community. Now that doesn't mean that they are saved. Children who have been baptized still need to repent of their sin personally. They still need to understand and grasp the gospel and respond in faith to the offer that Jesus Christ gives them but it does mean that they are special to God. They receive blessings that non-covenant children do not receive. What blessings you ask? Blessings like this. They are exposed to the gospel. They are prayed for by their parents and by other people at church. They have godly examples to learn from. They have pastors and Sunday school teachers and youth workers and mentors. They participate in worship. They sit under the preaching and teaching of God's word. They witness the sacraments. They get discipline. They are given opportunity after opportunity to respond to the gospel in faith. Those, my friends, are huge, huge blessings and they are part of the covenant of grace into which God draws children through virtue of the faith of their parents. The common dad and people of UPC, I've got to say this, that the children of our church are bona fide members of the covenant of grace and the community of faith and should be treated as such by every one of us. That's exhibit B. Hold on if you will then to A and B and let's tie it all together with exhibit C. Exhibit C is this. If you see through the Bible for any time at all, you are going to see a pattern begin to emerge. You are going to begin to see a principle at work. There are many such principles. There are many such patterns. But one of the patterns that you are going to see in the Bible is that grace tends to run in families. Grace tends to run in families. Now there are exceptions to that principle as there are too many principles. There are exceptions. God often plucks people up out of a non-Christian family and begins a new stream of Christian faith with a new believer. So you may have been raised in a not Christian home. But overall in the Bible there is this repeated pattern that I'm going to refer to today as the representative principle. The representative principle. You see it embedded in many stories in the Bible. I could show you a number of them but because of time let me just focus on three. Let me give you three examples of how you see in the Bible. Grace running in families. The representative principle. Let's talk first about Noah. Noah, back in Genesis chapter 6, the one thing we're told early on about Noah is that he found grace in the eyes of the Lord. We're not told at all that any of the other members of his family loved God followed after God feared God or whatever. Noah was a God-fearing man though. But when the flood came, the water rose, the ark was built. Noah went into the ark but so did his whole family. His wife, his sons, and his sons' wives all benefited from the covenant umbrella of God's love even though it was only Noah, apparently, who followed after God. That's the representative principle. Another Old Testament example I could give you is that of Rahab. Rahab is mentioned in Joshua chapter 2. She's also listed in the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11. Rahab in her former life had been a prostitute but somewhere along the way she'd heard about the God of Israel and she'd become a God-fearing woman. When the Israelites were about to go into the city of Jericho and take it over, Rahab hid the spies and for her good deed she asked that Israel spare her of destruction when the Israelite army came into Jericho to sack the city. Well, not only did they spare Rahab but were told in Joshua chapter 6 that they also spared her entire family. Once more, you have one believing person and yet the whole family comes under the umbrella of God's covenant love as the representative principle. Third and finally is a New Testament example, the wee little man named Zacchaeus. You remember Zacchaeus? He climbed up in a sycamore tree and when he saw Jesus coming, Jesus looked up at him and told him, I'm coming to your house today, Zacchaeus took him to his house, he ended up repenting of his sin and embracing the gospel. And here's what Jesus said to Zacchaeus. Look at this, it's in Luke chapter 19 verse 9, it's on the screen. Jesus said to Zacchaeus, today salvation has come to this house because this man too is a son of Abraham. Now we're not told that Zacchaeus was married and had a family but it's interesting that the Holy Spirit wants us to see that salvation came, blessing came to the house. Even though we're only told and highlighted about the faith of Zacchaeus. So there are other examples too but I think these three will help you to understand what I mean by grace running in families and one man or woman representing the home in terms of faith and covenant blessing. In all of those instances, the whole family was blessed because of the faith of one person. God works, you see, in households. Now if you still need convincing, let me show you an amazing verse. In fact, if you're a parent in the trenches today, if you are rearing children today, I can think of hardly any verse that could be more encouraging than this one. It's found in 1 Corinthians chapter 7. Let me set the stage for you a little bit. 1 Corinthians chapter 7 is a chapter in which Paul the Apostle is answering a series of questions that the Corinthian Christians had now that they had become Christians. One of those questions concerned marriage, divorce and remarriage. And the question that many of the Corinthians were asking was, hey, I'm a Christian. Paul, my spouse is not a believer, so am I justified in getting a divorce. And Paul wrote back and said, no, you shouldn't divorce unless that person wants to leave voluntarily. Then that's okay. But unless he or she does, you must not seek to separate from your unbelieving spouse. And here's why 1 Corinthians 7.14 for the unbelieving husband has been sanctified through his wife and the unbelieving wife has been sanctified through her believing husband. So you understand that what he's saying is that if you're married to a non-Christian, you need to stay married because God sees your unbelieving spouse in a different light because you are a Christian. That unbelieving husband or wife is actually sanctified, and that doesn't mean saved. It means that he or she is viewed in a special way by God. He or she is under that umbrella of God's covenant love that I was talking about earlier. But then look how the verse ends. Paul says otherwise your children will be unclean, but as it is they are holy. I don't see any other way to interpret that verse then to say that when you as a mom or dad believes in Jesus Christ, God looks at your children as holy. Again, it doesn't indicate that they are automatically saved just because you're a Christian, but they are special. They are set apart. And that can be nothing more than what we're talking about earlier that the covenant with Abraham is a covenant that spreads not only through the believing parents, but unto their sons and their daughters. Can I tell you something personal? I've told you a little bit about my journey with this issue. When I was thinking about becoming a preacher, I knew that I was going to go to this Presbyterian seminary in St. Louis called covenant theological seminary. And as I was preparing to go and all the way to there, I said, I don't know how in the world I'm going to be a Presbyterian. I do not believe in infant baptism. I didn't. It didn't make sense to me at that time. But I became one who advocates infant baptism because the light bulb came on when as a seminary student, somebody showed me that in the New Testament there are at least four instances of family baptisms. Household baptisms. And I wish I could show you all four. Let me show you, but two of them, two instances in the New Testament in which whole families were baptized at once. And yet in both cases, the only people that were told were believers was one parent. Let me show you this. They're both in Acts chapter 16. In Acts chapter 16, Paul and his buddy Silas are on a missionary trip through Asia. And they happened to go to a city called Philippi, which was in Macedonia. And in Philippi, they meet this woman named Lydia. Lydia was not a believer at first. She had heard about God, but she wasn't a believer until Paul and Silas shared the gospel with her. And she became a Christian. And it says in Acts 16, verses 14 and 15, these words, the Lord opened Lydia's heart to respond to Paul's message. When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. If you consider me a believer in the Lord, she said, come and stay at my house. Notice that the Holy Spirit seems to put a highlight upon the fact that it is Lydia's faith in Christ that brings blessing to the whole home. She's the one who became a believer. She says, if you consider me a believer, come and stay at my house. And she and the members of her household were all baptized. That's the representative principle. Grace runs in families. And the second instance that I'll share with you is in the same chapter of the book of Acts chapter 16. It has to do with a man. We're not told his name, but he was by trade a jailer. And he also lived in Philippi. What happened was that Paul and Silas were thrown in prison and they were miraculous released. And the Philippian jailer was worried about what would happen to him. He falls down before Paul and Silas and says, what must I do to be saved? And in Acts 16, verse 31, Paul's response is to the Philippian jailer believe. And that was a singular verb, you know, in Greek, there are all these different senses. They said, you singular must believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. You and your household. Interesting that Paul would add what I think is an Abrahamic promise to the offer of salvation. You will be saved and you and your household. And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. But then look at the rest of the stories here on the screen. It says that he, the Philippian jailer, took Paul and Silas the same hour of the night and washed their wounds. And he was baptized at once. He and all his family, the whole family was baptized. Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them. And he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God. Now you'll notice that I quoted this verse from a different translation from the one most of us are holding in our laps. It's the English standard version. The reason I did that is that it is a more accurate way of translating Acts 1634. The NIV is a little misleading. It almost makes it sound like everybody in the home believed the gospel. But the truth is that that is a singular verb too. That last line there. And he rejoiced along with his entire household that he, that is the Philippian jailer, had believed in God. One man believed the whole family was baptized. Now I realize that these verses don't say that there were little children in the family. I realize that. But isn't it reasonable to suppose that there were? If there weren't babies in these two homes of Lydia and the Philippian jailer, do you at least see the representative principle that on the basis of one person's faith covenant blessing comes to the whole family? So it seems rather clear from these stories and from the other examples I've given that this same representative principle that applied to Abraham and the Old Testament applies to Christians in the New Testament that when there is a believing parent, the children are in the covenant of grace too. And instead of being circumcised as a sign of being in the covenant, they are given the better sign, the New Testament sign of baptism. Well, there's a lot more that I could say about infant baptism. And I know that I didn't answer every question that you have. I'm sure there are different strands of questions you're thinking and how does this fit and how does that fit. And I know that many of you've been taught otherwise. I realize I'm sort of throwing a lot at you has been very technical. But hopefully that what I've said today is enough to at least help you see why we practice infant baptism and get you started on figuring the whole thing out for yourself because it is a very important issue particularly for those of you who are parents or who anticipate one day being parents. So let me wrap up with some application. How can you and I as members of UPC apply this sermon? And I've come up with several things I want you to think very seriously and hard about. The first thing in order to apply this sermon is this. If you don't understand the things that I've said today, don't worry, I can understand that you might not understand. And if you don't even agree with some or all of what I've said, here's what I'm asking you to do. Keep studying. Keep reading, keep praying. Ask God to show you what He wants you to know about this issue. We may in the long run come to different conclusions. I suspect that many of us will. But it's always good to study these things out. The second thing I would say for you to do. And I know we're running a little bit long. So give me about five extra minutes today. I've got to finish this little part of application. If you're a believer in Jesus and you've never been baptized, you need to be baptized. I said earlier, it's not essential for salvation. And that's true. But you need to be baptized because it is the biblical way to show forth your faith. So I would encourage you if you've never been baptized and yet you are a Christian, sign up for the next discovery class soon. We're going to be having another one and we'll take you through that. We'll acquaint you with what we as a church believe in where we're coming from. And we'll see to it that in that process of membership, you will be baptized. The third thing I would say is that if you're a believer in Christ and you still have unbaptized children still living under your roof, I would just simply ask you to give serious consideration of what we've talked about this morning. You still may not agree, but I would say that you need to be thinking about it because a whole host of godly and good people down through the ages have felt this way about baptism. If your children are older like fourth or fifth grade, let me take them through the Communicants class just to give them a grounding in the things of God and you might think then as a result of that of having them join the church and have communion. If they're in middle school or high school, let them go through a membership class that's taught by either clay or mat and they would love to do that for you and with you. The fourth thing I would say, how to apply this sermon, you moms and dads out there specifically talking to you, I beg you, teach your child the importance of being a part of the covenant community. Baptism is just the beginning, there's a lot more involved, teach your child how important it is to be an active part of the covenant community here at UPC. As early in life as possible, your child needs to learn to enjoy Sunday school and worship every week. You should expect that of them. You expect all kinds of things of your children don't you, things that you know are good for them to do, even things that are boring to do. You insist that they be faithful with those things because they're good for them. You take them to soccer practice, you take them to piano lessons, you make sure they're in school and on time for school. You make them make sure they eat healthy foods, right? And all kinds of things like that. Why is church any different? Is it honoring God on the Lord's day and learning God's word more vital to their soul and their eternal destiny than all those things put together? Thank you, I'd agree that they are. We have here at our church a 9 o'clock service during which Sunday school is offered for all ages in the other building every single person could attend a Sunday school class at 9 o'clock. And then we have, of course, this service during this service, we have a nursery in the other building. We have a program for children all the way up through grade 2. All we're asking is that if your child is in grade 3 and up, you consider that they are ready to participate with us in the worship service. I think it's a very important thing for you to consider doing. And finally, I would say this to all of us, let's be good God parents to the covenant children of UPC. Every time that we baptize a baby, one of the things I ask the rest of the congregation to say is, do you promise to support these parents in the Christian nurture of this child? I suspect almost everybody says, yes, I will. That's an obligation that we are committed to because we treasure the children of UPC. So that's why we work in the nursery and teach Sunday school and pray for children and families and set a good example for other kids in the church. And that's why we tolerate and are patient with them in worship. And that's why we hug them and give them a pat on the back and love on these kids because they're covenant children. And God thinks they're awfully special. On your way out today, you have an opportunity to buy a book. It's called Parenting in the Pew, guiding your children into the joy of worship. And we've talked about this book before. I would just, again, promote it. I think it's a great book to sort of emphasize some of the principles that I've mentioned this morning. You'll see it on your way out that door, Phil and Gigi Metzger are going to be selling them. There are 10 bucks. A good investment in your family. You know, as I wrap up here, I've grown to love the practice of infant baptism. I have. I've told you where I've been. I've now embraced it fully. Every time I baptize a baby or a little child, I see the gospel. I see the gospel. Every time I baptize them, I think of this that Jesus sets his love on people who don't love him and who don't even know how to love him. I think of the fact that Jesus died on the cross for people who are helpless and who cannot help themselves. Perhaps there is no better way to illustrate the covenant of grace than the baptism of a little child who can do nothing more than receive. If you're a Christian today, that's what you did. You did nothing more than receive. Thank the Lord for the covenant of grace and the covenant sign. Let's pray. Father, I know that this is a lot of stuff for people to think about and take home with them today. And I just pray that we will hear you. Let us hear you. Lord, the parents in our church let them hear you. If I've mistated, misspoke in any way, let them hear you. If Presbyterianism is not 100% biblical and we know it's not, Lord, let us hear you. And we pray that we will be a church where the covenant of grace is loved, is appreciated, is honored. And wherever we stand about this issue of baptism, wherever we fall down on that issue, Lord, may we be a church where children are nurtured and discipled and loved and esteemed and prized until the day that these little sons and daughters become our brothers and sisters. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.