This past Sunday I got baptized for the first time.
During a Bible study series several months ago, I came across a reminder that baptism was a step of obedience. I had buried this fact very far back in my mind when I had started to accept that I would never be worthy. I had been waiting for the day that my desire to live righteously was greater than my proclivity to sin, and tried as I might to overcome my sin nature, I never could seem to measure up. I think of Paul describing his struggle with his own sin nature:
For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. -Romans 7: 18-23
How might I approach God in such a grand state of imperfection? Looking back on the past several years, I think I almost looked at baptism backwards - as though I had to die to myself before being baptized, when in fact, baptism was the very moment to declare that death to self.
Death to self - what a concept. It was another reason why I was hesitant to approach baptism. A part of me was ready to do that and another part of me wondered what that meant giving up. I gave that some thought and considered what it was that I seemed to want to hold on to. Those things were sand in my hand, slipping through my fingers, and not worth holding onto. I was starting to believe that I wanted this, but there was still the worthiness problem.
I never did solve the worthiness problem, and yet, yesterday at the age of 27, I was baptized. Alas, the worthiness problem does not exist. In the last couple of years, and especially in the last several months, God revealed to me that He was not waiting for my perfection, just my heart and my obedience. Time and time again, God uses and rewards imperfect people who demonstrate a heart for God and the choice to obey Him.
Just as you might observe an image without comprehending it at first, I did not register this revelation for sometime. When it finally occurred to me, I knew that I was ready to be baptized.
As I sat through service anxiously awaiting my baptism, the teaching pastor spoke as if directly to me. “This is just the beginning,” he said. Baptism was not the mark of a completed journey in Christian faith - the end game. Baptism was not the magic step of obedience that would perfect me. I would come up out of the water much like I had gone in, having made my desire to follow Jesus known. Life would go on with much of the same struggles, perhaps intensified by this public declaration. This was just the beginning of a walk in a newness of life.
I listened intently, and when my time came, I stepped into the water ready for all that it meant. I was glad to be baptized by my pastor and friend, Kevin. The timing was particularly special since it lined up with Father’s Day. I knew that both my heavenly father and my earthly father were pleased.