This Sunday I am getting baptized! I am so incredibly excited to listen to God and publicly declare my faith! For years my nerves kept me from taking this important step, but I finally am jumping into what is uncomfortable. As I was sitting in service this fall watching one of the previous baptism services, I started wondering why I had never really taken the plunge.
In middle school I was pretty much the shyest, most quiet girl you knew. Basically, being in front of an entire church congregation would most likely have scared me literally to death. High school I started to become less introverted, but unfortunately my eating disorder began to control my life. Being constantly bombarded by degrading thoughts and feeling farther from God than ever before, I thought He would be too disappointed in me to take this very valuable step. So, I avoided it. And truly, I needed to work through this crucial season to make my faith my own.
Through every season I never felt good enough to be baptized. I placed all the pressure on myself and made it about “when i…” And that is the issue!
Until recently I did not recognize that this was the root of my fear. I always assumed I was just beyond introverted, but again I find myself struggling with control. In my mind I assumed that there was some way I could make myself worthy enough to deserve baptism. Basically, my sin nature and human pride convinced me that I would earn the right to take this step. The funny thing is, my sin nature is what is preventing me from ever, in all the time I have on this earth, earning the right.
Pastor Chad was preaching on this a few weeks ago. He said that when we insert “when I…” into a sentence we limit what we will do or accomplish. We start deciding that when I do this perfectly I can do something for God, when I get to this point in my life I will do what God has called me to do… and too soon we never do what God has called because we are so focused on trying to make it to these perfect points on our own. The challenge is converting “when I…” to “when God…” Once we learn to make this crucial step, the whole world is changed because as humans there is nothing and there will never be anything we can do to be deserving of anything God gives to us or calls us into - our only qualification as Christians is relationship with Him.
Therefore, it was completely illogical for me to assume that I had to earn baptism, waiting until I cleaned up my life and God felt closer than ever before to act in obedience to His calling. For baptism is our showing that we recognize our brokenness and need for God, and taking our declaration public so that we might be held accountable and show that we are dying to our sinful self and by God being brought back to a new life.
It is a picture of our salvation. And it is all by the grace and mercy of God, not our striving.
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