For Wilshire Baptist Church
Do you remember your baptism? On Sunday, the church universal observed the Baptism of the Lord, and at Wilshire we were invited to dip our fingers in a bowl of water and recall our own baptism as we departed the sanctuary. It’s a wonderful tradition, rich with meaning and reflection. But what if you don’t remember your baptism because you were an infant? Or what if you don’t have a baptism to remember?
My memory of my own baptism is mostly that of a shy kid, standing sideways in the baptistry with the pastor standing behind me. And on the other side of me? I didn’t dare risk a glance, but in my peripheral vision I could see and feel hundreds of people staring up at me from the pews. I don’t recall the plunge under the water, the rising for air, or any of that; I only recall the feeling of being watched.
I also have some recollection of the series of events that led me to the baptistry. Apparently, I said something significant in Sunday School that led to a visit with the pastor and my name placed on the church calendar for baptism. A dozen years later, in a class at Baylor on the history of Baptists, I heard Dr. Glenn Hilburn refer to that sequence as “being run through the dipping vat.” That description probably was influenced by his raising in rural Louisiana where cattle were plunged into deep, chemically treated water to kill ticks and other parasites. But it also may have been influenced by a focus in many Baptist churches of getting folks baptized and added to the membership rolls in large numbers. And there was some feeling of that at the time I was baptized – that heads were being counted.
Baptists historically have viewed baptism as a symbol and not a seal, and yet something about that experience bound me more tightly to a spiritual life; what happened in the water that day was just the beginning of a lifelong swim through this invisible thing we call faith.
More important, that baptism in water helped prepare my mind and spirit for the baptisms of fire that life would inevitably bring: the unexpected tragedies and sorrows, the mistakes and missteps of my own making, the disappointments and disasters that might cause someone to give up.
Back in the day when I was baptized, when young kids like myself walked down the aisle to profess their faith, there also often were young adults who would come down and “rededicate” their lives to the Lord. I always wondered: what happened to them that caused them to need or want a second march down the aisle? And I wondered if someday I too would stray off the path and want or need an update to my profession?
I think that must have been a phase or a fad of the 1970s because we rarely see that anymore, and I never felt the urge to walk down the aisle a second time. But in my mind and deep in my heart, I’ve done that many times – sometimes for what I’ve done, but more often just for something that has happened that has caused me to say in my own head, “Yes, I do still believe. And no, I can’t make it on my own.”
Not baptized yet, or don’t recall your baptism? Even if you’ve never waded into a baptistery or been sprinkled or dipped, you’ve likely found yourself at that place where you’ve had to make a decision to go it alone or trust in a God you can’t see. I believe that every time you’ve made that decision to trust, you’ve been baptized in the spirit. Every moment like that is a baptism to remember and renew.