In the city of the Laodikaians lived a devout, pure, and blameless priest. To this priest one night the local governor came in urgent haste, pressing him to rise up and baptize his child, whose breath was already beginning to fail. Leaping up right away, the priest ran into the church. But while he was preparing the water and the holy oil the child died, before it could be baptized.
Taking the child, the priest placed it in front of the font and said to the attendant angel, ‘To you, my fellow servant, angel of God, I say: by the authority that Christ gave us to bind and loose in heaven and upon earth, restore the soul of the child in the body until I shall baptize it, lest it depart unenlightened into that age. For my Master and yours knows that I was not careless, but when I was called, I ran straight away.’ When the priest had spoken, the child returned to life. He then baptized it, kissed it, and said, ‘Go, child, into the kingdom of heaven.’ And immediately the child fell back asleep in the Lord.