In Water We Grow-

In water we grow, secure in the womb,

and speechlessly know love’s safety and room.

Baptizing and blessing, we publish for good

the freezing, caressing safekeeping of God.

In water we wash: the dirt of each day,

its trouble and rush are carried away.

In Christ recreated by love’s cleansing art,

self-will and self-hatred dissolve and depart.

In water we dive, and cannot draw breath,

then surface alive, rebounding from death.

Our old self goes under, in Christ dead and drowned.

We rise, washed in wonder, by love clad and crowned.

In water we dwell, for by its deep flow

through blood-stream and cell, we live, think, and growl.

Praise God, love out-flowing, whose well of new birth

baptizes our knowing, and waters the earth.