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2020-8-9 Caleb Guan Baptism


Whisper Transcript | Transcript Only Page

00:00:00.000 | - Hi, my name is Caleb.
00:00:05.000 | Yeah, as far as I can remember,
00:00:07.400 | church was a really important part of my life
00:00:09.140 | and I don't remember many Fridays,
00:00:11.480 | Friday nights of my life that weren't at church.
00:00:14.040 | I learned a lot about the importance
00:00:15.440 | of reading the Bible in prayer
00:00:17.080 | and that my life was meant to glorify God.
00:00:19.560 | I learned that Jesus Christ died on the cross
00:00:21.200 | and was resurrected, granting mercy on my soul.
00:00:24.800 | These things were things that I really easily accepted,
00:00:27.200 | but they actually meant very little to me.
00:00:29.200 | Before I met the Lord,
00:00:30.040 | there were only a few things on my mind,
00:00:32.440 | mostly being seen in a certain light by my peers
00:00:35.080 | and indulging in the satisfactions
00:00:36.720 | that the world had to offer.
00:00:38.120 | A few months ago, I remember my small group leader
00:00:40.800 | telling me that I was really similar to his wife
00:00:43.200 | because we both didn't care what people thought of us.
00:00:46.720 | I laughed at myself because it's really true
00:00:48.560 | and also very false.
00:00:50.720 | Because growing up in the church,
00:00:53.040 | without knowing God, all I really did
00:00:54.600 | was seek the approval of others.
00:00:56.520 | And usually I wanted people to see me
00:00:58.580 | as someone who actually didn't care.
00:01:00.000 | So it was like, you know.
00:01:02.080 | But yeah, I tried my best in Awana
00:01:03.840 | because I wanted to be ahead of everyone
00:01:05.960 | in memorizing scripture,
00:01:07.600 | but not really because I wanted to know the word of God.
00:01:10.240 | Yeah, the summary of my pride
00:01:12.640 | is that I wanted to be honored and respected by others
00:01:15.160 | while desperately trying to protect
00:01:16.520 | the brokenness that lay beneath.
00:01:18.560 | As good as I looked to the world, it was only skin deep.
00:01:20.840 | I was constantly trying to mask the fear,
00:01:22.560 | weakness, and foolishness with confidence,
00:01:24.880 | strength, and intelligence.
00:01:26.820 | John 3 says that men love the darkness rather than the light.
00:01:30.300 | The darkness had offered security, discretion,
00:01:32.740 | and ways for me to indulge in my wicked desires
00:01:34.660 | without the judgment.
00:01:36.180 | As much as I heard at church
00:01:37.580 | that repentance and accountability
00:01:39.320 | were essential to the believer,
00:01:40.780 | I had no desire to be holy.
00:01:42.620 | To come into the light and have my deeds exposed
00:01:45.180 | was absolutely contrary to my character.
00:01:47.980 | Freshman year of college,
00:01:49.420 | I arrived at Bermuda Community Church
00:01:50.940 | and sat through a sermon on the holiness of God.
00:01:53.740 | There I was compared to a cooler of moldy rice
00:01:56.020 | and I was told that my sin wasn't just distasteful to God
00:01:59.480 | but utterly repelling to his character.
00:02:02.240 | The pastor continued on about some other stuff
00:02:04.400 | but the image stuck in my brain
00:02:06.200 | that I was disgusting to God.
00:02:08.480 | Everything that I spent my entire life
00:02:10.000 | trying to hide from the world is clearly seen by God.
00:02:13.440 | God is not mocked, he's not fooled,
00:02:15.320 | there's nothing that's hidden from him.
00:02:18.080 | And the only rational, logical thing to do
00:02:20.400 | is to throw disgusting things away.
00:02:23.040 | But God, while I was yet a sinner,
00:02:24.800 | ignorant to his love,
00:02:26.100 | sent his son to die for me to make me clean.
00:02:28.400 | That night, I repented of my sins,
00:02:32.160 | trusting that the death and resurrection of Christ
00:02:34.180 | covered my sins.
00:02:35.380 | He's my Lord and my Savior
00:02:37.640 | and I desire to live under his Lordship.
00:02:41.220 | So people ask me why I'm getting baptized now
00:02:42.900 | in our freshman year
00:02:44.560 | and I can plainly see that it is still my pride
00:02:46.500 | that clings so tightly to me.
00:02:47.900 | Now why admit to people that as a middle schooler
00:02:50.900 | I didn't know anything about being saved
00:02:53.540 | or why tell people that I was still
00:02:55.500 | just being a people pleaser?
00:02:57.500 | Deep down, even though I knew that I was not saved
00:03:01.300 | when I was baptized,
00:03:04.480 | I refused the thought of baptism
00:03:06.220 | for the sake of my own ego.
00:03:07.860 | I'm being baptized today because of my desire
00:03:09.520 | to be obedient to the Lord,
00:03:10.900 | it's my ultimate desire
00:03:12.100 | and it's greater than my desire for self-preservation.
00:03:16.700 | I want to glorify God with my life
00:03:18.380 | because of his love for me.
00:03:19.900 | I continue to see the transformative power of God in my life
00:03:23.060 | meaning that he has replaced a heart that wanted self-glory
00:03:27.780 | to a heart that desires his glory.
00:03:30.140 | Desires I never had, deep accountability,
00:03:32.940 | true humility, genuine repentance,
00:03:36.060 | authentic love are now mine through the person of Christ.
00:03:38.960 | Ephesians 4 says to put off the old self,
00:03:43.500 | corrupt their deceitful desires
00:03:45.900 | to be renewed in the mind and put on the old self.
00:03:48.660 | I daily struggle with my old self.
00:03:50.360 | Daily struggle with my old self,
00:03:56.060 | I daily struggle with the desire
00:03:57.220 | for my own personal glorification.
00:03:59.260 | My prayer is that God will continue to discipline,
00:04:01.460 | rebuke and instruct me
00:04:02.740 | and that he will continue to humble me
00:04:04.220 | in my daily walk with him.
00:04:06.100 | All my life before Christ,
00:04:09.060 | I feared that what people would say if they,
00:04:11.300 | what would people think if they saw my sin?
00:04:13.540 | My identity was rooted in the fear of man.
00:04:16.180 | However, God, our holy perfect creator
00:04:18.020 | sees my sin perfectly,
00:04:19.380 | has accepted me and covered me
00:04:22.300 | with the righteousness of his son
00:04:23.900 | in whom I have received my true identity, a child of God.
00:04:26.740 | Ephesians 5, 13 and 14 says,
00:04:31.260 | but when anything is exposed to the light,
00:04:32.820 | it becomes visible,
00:04:33.660 | for anything that becomes visible is light.
00:04:35.760 | Therefore it says, awake, O sleeper,
00:04:37.980 | and arise from the dead and Christ will shine on you.
00:04:40.060 | Thank you.
00:04:40.900 | (audience applauding)
00:04:45.060 | (audience applauding)
00:04:48.220 | - Caleb, you understand when you go into the water,
00:05:05.580 | you're uniting with Christ and his death.
00:05:07.220 | When you come out,
00:05:08.060 | you're uniting with his resurrected life.
00:05:10.180 | - Yep.
00:05:11.340 | - I baptize you in the name of the father, the son,
00:05:14.060 | and the holy spirit.
00:05:15.100 | (audience applauding)
00:05:21.380 | (audience applauding)