Washed Clean Part 4-A Final Thought
4Paul said, “John’s baptism called for repentance from sin. But John himself told the people to believe in the one who would come later, meaning Jesus.”
5As soon as they heard this, they were baptized in the name of Lord Jesus. 6Then when Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in other tongues and prophesied. 7There were about twelve men in all. (Acts 19:4-7)
There will always be one more.
I had planned on wrapping this series up with my last post. Then Tuesday happened.
On Tuesday, I found out what Jesus meant when He said “the first will be last”. On Tuesday, I was able to assist in baptizing the first one who reached out to me, and he became the last one baptized out here in Poland. Do you remember what I shared in the first post, how I wrote that I had an interested candidate within an hour of hanging the flyers? Well, this mighty man became our last Soldier to be baptized in the Bobr River. I say mighty because he is a massive man. He stands 6’3” and is about 280 pounds of pure muscle. He is a fellow Guardsman in the state of Georgia, works for the DEA in some capacity, and I had never met him until he showed up to join our unit for this deployment. He is a gentle giant and I have truly enjoyed any interaction I have with him out here. I do not know his story, the Division Chaplain got that, but I know he seemed to be carrying a lot of weight on his heart. I am pretty sure I witnessed it being washed away yesterday.
It was in this moment above, when we dunked him under the river. Seeing the water wash over his face; the roll of clear, wild water rushing over his tightly, shut eyes. It was in that moment that I truly felt like I was seeing all his sin washed away. He rose triumphantly from that river ready to walk in his new life with Christ.
Coming out of the water, this Soldier gave the Chaplain (on the left in the picture) an embrace. Then he turned to me and gave me the most sincere hug I felt from any of the Soldiers I was able to baptize. That’s when I realized there will always be one more.
One more broken person to baptize. One more lost soul to save. There will always be one more.
On the walk back to the post, one of the senior enlisted (who has nearly 16 years in the Army) who came out to witness the baptism, said to me:
“For all my deployments and all my rotations, I have never seen Soldiers being baptized.”
The harvest is ready my friends. We just need to get out and do some harvesting. Take them down to the river, and witness them come alive in those waters.
Common Sense Reborn 