i've never been baptized
When i was growing up, church was an essential part of my life. i wish it still was and i know it needs to be...something to work on this year. However, in all of those years going to church multiple times every week, i was never baptized.
When i was very young, i didn't join the church because i was afraid of water. Baptists are dunkers and i was scared to death of going under water. i still don't particularly enjoy it and avoid it when i can. i let that fear keep me from professing my faith and joining the church.
When i got to be a teenager, i decided that i needed to let go of my fear of going underwater and become a member of the church. Of course, going through puberty, i was dealing with a lot of confusing issues at the time and in the privacy of my own room, i turned to God for many conversations and prayers. i knew i needed Him in my life and wanted to share that with the world.
i was on the cusp of joining the church when i let something get in my way. Our minister at the time, who i really don't need to name, told me a bold faced lie. It was the summer after my Freshman year of high school and our youth group went on a mission trip out in our county to work on some repairs of elderly people's homes. i was having a rough time of it during the trip. We were staying in some college dorms and i had a room to myself. Not by choice, but by the fact that no one wanted to share a room with me. In hindsight that's ok, but when there were 3 and 4 guys in each of the other rooms, i did feel left out.
Since i was already feeling badly about myself, might as well throw myself into the work we were there to do. One of the afternoons our minister came by to check on us. i was at the back of the house, scraping some paint around the windows, when he came and started helping me, striking up a conversation. He talked to me about joining the church and i told him that i had been thinking about it a lot. Then he told me that both my Mom and my Grandmother had come to him in his office and expressed their concern that i had not yet joined the church. On the outside, i was polite but on the inside, i was furious. Why hadn't they talked to me about it?
Of course, after the weekend was over, i confronted both of them separately and they both assured me that those conversations never took place. My mom was absolutely furious. i don't know if she ever talked to the minister about his lie, but she told me my relationship with God was my business and to take it at my own pace.
Anyway, that one lie from the leader of our congregation kept me from joining the church i grew up in. i just couldn't be a part of that facade. The next year i learned that the church i'd grown up in and loved my entire life loved you back unless you were a sinner. That was rough, so i never did profess my faith there.
Maybe one day i will find a church that i can do that in.
