A recently found confirmation confession written more than 70 years ago reminds us of the importance of our confirmation promises.

My responsibilities
Written by Myrtle Hanson Schlomer

I realize that in confirmation I renew my baptismal covenant, and, of my own responsibility, make the confession and promise made for me by my sponsors in baptism. I understand that while confirmation is not directly commanded, what we do in confirmation is required of all believing Christians, namely, to make confession of Christ and to definitely renounce Satan and sin and take up the cross and follow Jesus.

I realize that confirmation is not simply a matter of form through which I must pass in order to please my pastor, my parents, and friends, but, that in confirmation I am dealing with the God Triune, making my confession of faith in him and a promise to serve him in love because he has saved me. I have this joyful assurance that when I confess my Savior here on earth, he confesses me in heaven, before the Father and the holy angels.

I understand that in promising to renounce the devil and all his works and all his ways, I am not thereby promising never to commit a sin, but, that I am promising not to live in any sin, and to repent of all sin in heart or life, and constantly to seek God's grace to know and to do his will in all things.

I realize that I cannot make this confession and promise without, at the same time, having this steadfast purpose:

To live a daily life of prayer.

To read the Word of God in private.

To hear the Word of God faithfully in public worship.

To attend regularly the Lord's Supper.

To support, by my prayers and by my gifts, the church in its work.

To affiliate myself now with the Bible classes and the other organizations of the church, and thereby serve my Savior.

In every possible way, in daily life, to live for the Christ who has bought me with his blood, and by a holy life to testify of his power to save.

I call on my Savior to help me in all this for I know that only through Christ can I have power to remain faithful until death in my baptismal covenant; faithful to him as my Savior and King, who has by his Holy Spirit, through water and the Word, called me out of darkness into his marvelous light; faithful to him who has promised to bless me in Word and sacrament, to go with me all the way, "till traveling days be ended."

Let us be true to thee, thou God of love and truth,
As we here dedicate to thee our life and youth.
Thine own are we, and thou thy sheep will guide and keep eternally.

Mother's Day was bittersweet last year because we were celebrating it for the first time without the physical presence of my mother. God had called her home to spend eternity with him on Valentine's Day at the age of 87. We rejoiced for her, but we missed her.