More Than 100 Students Spontaneously Declare Faith and Get Baptized
One of the most beautiful things in life for a Christian parent to witness is when their child gets baptized.
Many Christian parents are very intentional about presenting the Gospel to their children in a way that they can easily understand — they must accept Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior in order to be forgiven of their sins and have a relationship with Him that lasts into the teen and adult years.
The older a person gets, the more of an awareness they have for how desperately Jesus is needed in this fallen and imperfect world.
When Northwood Temple Academy began to witness the moving of the Holy Spirit in the lives of over 100 students, faculty was definitely hesitant to put a stop to the desire those students had for getting saved and baptized.
Many youth ministers are aware that childhood is prime time for salvations to occur in young lives. In fact, researcher George Barna has reported that people who choose to embrace the Christian faith are most likely to do so in their pre-teen years, right around the age of 12, though there are certainly exceptions where age is concerned.
At the same time, Barna has also found that, “In situations where children became mature Christians, we usually found a symbiotic partnership between their parents and their church,” he pointed out.
“The church encouraged parents to prioritize the spiritual development of their children and worked hard to equip them for that challenge,” Barna said.
“Parents, for their part, raised their children in the context of a faith-based community that provided security, belonging, spiritual and moral education, and accountability. Neither the parents nor the church could have done it alone.”
Some parents were thrilled that their children had decided to embrace the Christian faith more fully, and others were unhappy because they wanted to be present for such a major spiritual event in their child’s life. Many parents commented on the Northwood Temple Academy Facebook page post about the event.
Nevertheless, the school recognized the range of feelings among parents, and Renee McLamb, the head of the school, made a point of sending out a letter of apology to parents.
She indicated that a baptism ceremony had been pre-scheduled among a specific number of children that morning, but when the other children witnessed those baptisms, the Holy Spirit began to move in the hearts of the other children, too.
McLamb also said in the letter that it was never the school’s intent to go behind the backs of parents or do anything secretive. It was just a situation in which the students were responding to the presence of the Lord.
She apologized to the upset parents, and also hoped that in the end, everyone would be able to rejoice that the Lord did a miraculous work that day in the lives of so many students.
