I received this question recently in an email, and thought some others might benefit from the answer. Because we come from so many diverse faith backgrounds, its not always clear to everyone why we do what we do. So, here’s the question and the answer by email; names deleted to protect the innocent!
On May 6, 2010, at 12:09 PM:
Have a question. We signed the kids up for the dedication . We were present at a dedication before, we were not members at this time. What exactly is dedicating your children & what does it mean? We have an idea but wanted to make sure we know exactly what this meant before the day comes. If you could please answer that for us..thank you!!
ANSWER:
This is a good question!
We do baby/child/family dedications for several reasons;
1) we don’t observe or practice infant or child baptism. We find no biblical evidence for that. The historical arguments are not sufficient to cause us practice this.
2) there is historical and biblical precedence for entire families committing to follow the Lord.
3) the Bible makes it clear that the head of the family and the parents are required to teach their families to live in the ways of the Lord.
4) the Old Testament practice of circumcision was a physical mark in the body that the males were committed to following God. Specifically, it marked them out as God’s people. Circumcision doesn’t mean the same thing for us, but its a precedent for marking your children early as belonging to the Lord.
So, due to these issues and some key Bible verses, we want to bring our families b4 the church and the Lord to commit that we will raise our children in the fear of the Lord, that we will parent and love our spouses in a Godly way, and that the church is dedicated to supporting the family and its attempts to raise godly children.
Loving our families in Christ!
Pastor Joe