ClobberBlog | Mormonism, Evangelical Christianity

First Things

“Bridget, God expects us to love Him more than anyone on earth. More, even, than our own parents,” my aunt explained to me gently as I traveled in the car to church with her family. I had only been a Christian for a few months and was attending church with them whenever I could.

I think that the blood must have drained from my face when I heard that. “More than my parents?” I asked in astonishment. I turned my head to look out the window, watching the Washington evergreens sail by as we drove. My aunt’s words seemed monstrous, impossible. There was simply no way I  could ever love anyone as much as I loved my parents. I’m sorry, God, I prayed, I just can’t give you that right now.

I didn’t get the impression that God was angry or disappointed with me. Somehow, I think He knew where I was coming from and was willing to meet me where I was at.

Besides, He had to know that within the span of six years, that was all going to change.

Church

My family continued to not attend church, which meant that my own church attendance was sporadic. I asked my father why we couldn’t go to church with Aunt Joni; he told me that while he believes in God, he thinks God made the world and mostly sits back and watches it now and only occasionally intervenes, and God doesn’t really care what we do with our lives, so he saw little reason to make the 20-minute drive out to Puyallup to attend church with my aunt’s family.

I did attend when I could, but the first two years were awkward. I was too old to be entertained by the Sunday morning kids’ church program and the adult service was long-winded and tedious. Things got better when I completed sixth grade and was allowed to start attending youth group, where the activities were fun and the leaders were kind and compassionate. Even if my church attendance was sporadic, my parents usually did pay for me to attend youth summer camps and winter retreats.

Baptism

It was the summer of 1994 and the Church of the Nazarene knew how to create a memorable summer camp experience. The camp was situated on a beautiful lake in the forests of Washington state and staffed by a group of energetic young counselors from Northwest Nazarene University in Idaho. It had horseback riding, a blob, regular youth activities, and passionate nightly speakers who put fire in my little 12 year-old soul. I often found myself weeping at the altar over their messages, promising to give God just a little bit more of my heart.

The camp also had a shaving cream fight every year, but I only did it for the first year and then decided that shaving cream is just the worst thing in the world to try to get out of your hair. It doesn’t matter how much you shower and shampoo, it will make your hair feel greasy and heavy for days. The next time I attended camp, I sat at the edge of the battle lines and used the fallen shaving cream to shave my long white legs.

They were holding baptisms in the lake on the last day of camp. As the students would get into the water next to the pastors and prepare to be baptized, the pastor performing the baptism would ask the student to explain his or her testimony. The students would briefly talk about their faith in Christ, then the pastor would recite the baptismal formula and lower them into the water.

No one had ever talked to me about baptism before, but I could not remember ever having one, and I couldn’t resist the feeling that it was what I needed to do. I strutted over to my counselor and asked her if I could get baptized. She frowned. “The students being baptized here had parental permission ahead of time,” she said. “We’ll have to ask one of the pastors.”

We went and found a pastor, a short man who was bald on top with curly hair on the sides. I was only 5’5″ at the time and I was nearly as tall as he was. My counselor explained to him that I wanted to be baptized, but I had not gotten permission from my parents ahead of time. He seemed conflicted. He probably wanted to follow procedure, but he did not want to tell me “no.”

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, pulling out a large, clunky, 1994 cell phone, “let’s call your parents, and if they’re home and they give you permission, we’ll do it.”

My mother answered the phone and the pastor began to explain my request to her. After a moment she wanted to talk to me and he handed me the phone. “Bridget, you’ve already been baptized!” she protested.

“I have? When?”

“Your grandfather had you baptized as a baby,” she explained.

This was the first anyone had ever told me about my first baptism. I had certainly never given any thought to the issue of infant baptism and what that meant. “Well,” I said uncertainly, “Can I do it again?”

She hesitated for a moment, then sighed and said it was fine. I handed the phone back to the pastor and they talked for a few more minutes while I waited to the side, then the pastor reported to me that we were going to do it.

I had to wait for the pastor to go change clothes so that he could baptize me himself. In retrospect, I have to wonder if this was because he was taking responsibility for the baptism in case he got in trouble for not getting permission ahead of time or baptizing someone who had already been baptized as an infant.

It wasn’t long before we were descending into the water of the lake together and he was standing next to me, asking me to explain my testimony. I was the last student being baptized. I looked around at all of the counselors and students in the summer camp, all eyes on me, and said, “Jesus Christ gave his life for me, and I’m ready to give my life for him.” They were simple words. Honest words.

I looked to the pastor and nodded to indicate that I was ready. He recited the baptismal formula, and under the water I went.

(Note: I think that the camp where I was baptized was Pinelow Nazarene Park Camp on Loon Lake in eastern Washington, but I’m not entirely certain.