Bertha and Her Baptism | Page 6

of life. God only knows the feelings of
parents at such times. What prayers are made in secret,--what vows!
One wrong step may embitter life. A right step may lead to prosperity
and great happiness. I sometimes wish that we could gather our
children together, in some of these emergencies and critical periods of
their lives, and offer up prayers and vows, as parents and friends, in
their behalf. There would not be many meetings more interesting than
these, Mr. Benson. How the parents of such children would love
everybody that came at such times to pray for their children; and what
prayers would go up to God!"
"Can we not have some such meetings?" said Mr. Benson. "Every
parent would like it, I am sure."
Pastor. Well, we do have some such meetings occasionally, I
remember.
"Our minister loves to use parables," said Mrs. Benson, looking at your
mother, "so as to make us understand the meaning better, and
remember it."
"I must ask you to explain," said Mr. Benson.
Pastor. As often as we bring a child to the house of God for baptism,
Mr. Benson, we have such a meeting, if Christians will but understand
it so. We come with the parents, and say, "Lord God, here is this dear
child, with a momentous history pending upon thy favor and blessing.
In all future time, in the critical moments and eventful steps of its life,
or in its early death, or in its orphanage, be thou a God to this child." If
God should to-night, Mrs. Ford, say to you, "I will be Janette's God,"
would you not send her away with a light heart?
"He should have her for life, dear child!" said she; "and I do feel that he
is a God to her."
"He is," said I, "if you have really made a covenant with him about
your daughter."

"I have, sir," said Mrs. Ford.
Pastor. Did the covenant have any seal? Some good people, you know,
think it enough to covenant with God about their children, without
using any special act to mark and seal it. Now it is only in consecrating
children to God that they omit the seal from the covenant. We practise
adult baptism, joining the church, confirmation, and we partake of the
Lord's Supper, feeling the propriety and the use of acts and testimonies
in the form of an ordinance. What seal had your covenanting with God
about your child?
Mrs. Ford. I see it now clearer than ever. As we stood with this child in
our arms, we both said, afterwards, we made a public profession of
religion anew; and, when the minister said those sacred names over her,
I felt more than before that I was having transactions with God about
the child. But people used to say to me, "Why not wait and let Janette
be baptized when she is old enough to understand it?" How little they
knew about it! Just as though, I told them, if I had money to put into the
savings-bank for Janette, I would wait and let her put it in herself (it is
so pleasant to put it in when you know all about it!), instead of laying it
up for her in the funds, and let it count up while she is growing.
Pastor. Those friends who advised you so, think, perhaps, too much of
the ceremony itself, and not so much of what it signifies. Now the
pleasure of being baptized is nothing compared with having God enter
into a covenant in your behalf when you knew nothing about it.
Mrs. Ford. They said to me, also, "What right have you to do it, instead
of letting her have the choice and privilege of doing it herself
hereafter?" I told them that, if we acted on that principle, in the
treatment of our children, there would be a long list of useful things,
which we do for them, to be postponed.
Pastor. We can benefit another without his consent. The question is,
whether it is a benefit to a child for God and its natural guardians to
make a covenant together in its behalf.
Mr. Benson. It surely is so, if God truly is a party to such a covenant.

But where is the proof that he is? That is my trouble. They tell me that
this covenanting with God for a child, and sealing it with an ordinance,
ceased with Abraham, who was a Jew; that it was a Jewish custom,
which died out.
Pastor. Abraham a mere Jew! God's covenant with a believer and his
children a Jewish covenant! Never was there a greater mistake. Paul
tells us expressly it was not so. Get me a Bible, Helen, and bring me a
lamp. I read these words: