Thursday, June 18, 2009

Q&A for Parents on the Sacraments

This document, The Sacraments: Questions and Answers for Parents, is an appendix from a manual for new/prospective members at Covenant Life Church in Gaithersburg, MD, entitled Starting Point: Our Journey Together at Covenant Life (92-page PDF). The whole thing looks enormously helpful.

I found the 3-page Q&A helpful--both biblically and practically. Here are the questions (the numbering in their document is off, as the #6 is missing in their file):
  1. What is a sacrament?
  2. What is baptism?
  3. When should a child be baptized?
  4. What is a believable profession of faith?
  5. Does God save young children?
  6. What is the role of the parent in evaluating a child’s readiness to be baptized?
  7. If my child said a prayer and invited Jesus into his heart, isn’t that enough to be baptized?
  8. What is the Lord’s Supper?
  9. How do baptism and the Lord’s Supper differ?
  10. When should a child receive the Lord’s Supper?
  11. Should unbaptized children take the Lord’s Supper?
  12. What do I say to a child who thinks he is converted if I don’t think he is ready for baptism or the Lord’s Supper?
  13. Are there any problems with waiting too long to baptize a truly converted child?
  14. If I have a child who is unbaptized but receiving the Lord’s Supper, how do I go about removing this privilege?
  15. Why not baptize infants?
  16. What do I do if my child was baptized as an infant?
  17. What if my child was baptized at an early age, and now I don’t think he was really converted until later; should he be baptized again?
  18. What is the role of the church in evaluating a child’s readiness to be baptized and receive the Lord’s Supper?
HT: 9Marks Blog