A couple of weeks ago I had the joy of baptising my tween-age son. At Beech Hill Church, where I’m the minister, we’re a baptist church. For us that means we don’t baptise babies - we wait until someone can make the decision themselves. It also means that we do baptism by full immersion: a full on dunking all the way under the water. We did it in a large pool in the church’s back garden (we used the river Wharfe once - not recommended!).

For the occasion my son asked me to preach on one of the most famous passages in the Bible, John chapter 3 verse 16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” It’s a verse that sums up the Christian message so well- God’s mission: to save us from perishing and give eternal life. God’s motive: love for the world He made. God’s method: giving His only Son, Jesus, to die on a cross in our place. God’s mandate: Believe.

It’s a simple, timeless message, but one that’s often so misunderstood. We can misunderstand God’s motive and think of him as unloving, harsh or a tyrant. We can misunderstand God mission; as though God is there as a genie to grant our wishes. We can misunderstand God’s method; thinking that Jesus’ death was a tragedy or just a moral example. We can misunderstand God’s mandate; thinking he wants us to try harder or keep some set of rules, or even be baptised, when actually what he’s looking for is faith, trust, belief. A faith that says ‘you can and I can’t.’

It was a real privilege to baptise my son. We managed not to drown anyone or flood the back garden! But it’s more of a privilege that I can take hold of the eternal life which is open to all who will put their trust in Jesus.