Y’all, my heart is so full today, bursting with pride and love and gratitude. Because Emerson got baptized this morning! To make it even more special, my brother-in-law, her Uncle Bo, is the children’s pastor at our church, so he got the privilege of baptizing her! And I was on the worship team today, so I had a very up-close view of the whole thing.
I knew I was going to cry watching this, but when Bo started speaking about her, he said this was the first time he’s gotten to baptize a family member, and I just lost it at that!
Today we baptized 12 people, about half of those were children and youth. It was so special. During almost every baptism at GC, right after the person is dunked, while they raised back up, the worship band launches straight into part of “I Thank God,” that says, “Hell lost another, I am free, I am free!” And it always makes me so happy and emotional. Watching Emerson today, and singing that hell won’t get my baby girl, was almost too much for me to handle! I cried right there on stage, and kept having to wipe away tears.
Grammy, Papa, Grandmommie, and my mom’s bestie “Aunt” Jane & her husband also joined us at church this morning to watch Emmie’s baptism. We also had Miss Ary grab Addison from preschool and bring her over to watch too, although she spent the majority of the time with her little hands covering her ears, because it was too loud for her tiny ears.
Emmie changed into a pretty dress after church, and we took a few family photos, and then we headed to Milano’s Pizzeria for lunch with the whole fam. Uncle Keith and Aunt Suzanne weren’t able to make it to our church this morning, but they did meet us for lunch afterwards. It was chaos as always, but it was a great way to celebrate our sweet girl, making this huge step in her spiritual journey!
You can watch our whole service on YouTube here (I led a couple of songs this morning), and see all the folks who got baptized (which comes at the end of the service), but I’m also going to try to insert some videos here (gotta go wake up my IT guy who fell asleep on the couch with Addie…). Jeff took a video of Emmie getting baptized, and my friend Jill took a video of me watching Emmie get baptized, and I thought that was really sweet too.
After lunch, we all immediately took a nap at home, and then woke up right in time to head back to church. Tonight was the first night of Connect Groups this semester. So we had dinner at the church with everyone, and then started up our new group, studying 1st Corinthians, led by Meg & Bo, and two of our other friends Brent & Renae. Didn’t take anymore pics tonight, but we took enough all morning & and at lunch! I still need to do a few chores to get ready for a new week, but the girls are both asleep and in bed now, and then I’ll grab a little snack and work on my puzzle before bedtime.