A New Season

I walked into our bedroom on Saturday night and announced to my husband, "I'm getting baptized tomorrow."
Very surprised, he said, "You?!"

Yes, me.

I gave my heart and life to the Lord in 1995. Karl and I were living in Minnesota while both of our families were on the West Coast. Being so far apart, my then Catholic mother became concerned when our conversations increasingly turned to Jesus, the Bible and church.

With rising panic in her voice she would grill me with questions like, "What kind of church, where do you meet, and how much money are you giving them?"

When I explained we were attending an evangelical church that taught through the Bible she seemed okay. But when I mentioned that we met in a middle school auditorium she completely flipped out.

Immediately her mind was filled with horrific thoughts of Jim Jones, cyanide and Jonestown.

With fear in her voice and concern in her heart, she forbade me to be baptized into another "religion." I had been baptized as an infant into the Roman Catholic church and that was a non-negotiable as far as she was concerned.

But as I continued to attend church and read my Bible, it became clear that the Lord was asking me, "Whom will you follow? Me or your mom? Religion or a relationship?"

I chose a relationship with Jesus. I called my girlfriend that had invited me to church and was discipling me. I explained to her that I needed to get baptized and quick! She invited me over to her apartment which had an indoor, heated pool. With just us and Jesus, I expressed my inward commitment to Him with the outward act of baptism.

He blessed me for it and my walk with Him came to life. I started to understand more of what I read. I craved reading my Bible. And slowly, the Lord poured His healing balm and His abundant grace into the hurts and wounds of my life.

Fast forward to January of this year. This year has been an incredible year of healing and restoration for me. My physical health is the best it has been since I was a very small child. Footholds from things in my past have been removed. I have thrown away so many "records" of who I was before Jesus and reminders of the ungodly life I had lived.

As the trash can got fuller, my spirit got lighter and freer. I feel calm (not typical) and after years of so much introspection, finally ready to turn my attention to others. I feel like my walk with the Lord is actually just beginning.

It has taken more than a decade to prepare me to serve Him. It's taken thirteen years to go through all my baggage. But one by one He got it done. Generational sins that have gripped our family were broken. Every skeleton from every closet was reckoned with. We haven't been just "holding the line" but we've been going in and taking back what Satan has stolen.

It's been a long, hard, good, exhausting, freeing road. Now don't get me wrong. There is still territory to get back. It's going to take years to restore the years the locust have eaten but at least we're in the Promised Land and not out wandering in the desert getting the Egypt out.

I have witnessed both my parents coming to the Lord and getting baptized in 2003. My brother accepted the Lord while in prison. He is out now and taking his first baby steps.
My aunt and cousins have come to the Lord one-by-one. They love Him and serve Him and bring glory to Him.

Both of our daughters have been baptized and love the Lord and are growing in Him. You would think I would be happy, yippy, skippy. Instead, I've been in such a weird place.

I have felt like I don't know what to do with myself. We're in a new season of parenting. My kids don't need me in the same way as they used to. I'm adjusting- slowly and painfully. I'm in unknown territory free from heavy emotional burdens. What exactly do I do with myself?!

He is so faithful. He is showing me that what I do isn't the important thing. It's that I do what I do to bring pleasure to Him. It's real simple. But it's taken me 41 years to get it. I am not defined by what I do, who I know, what I have, or what other people think of me. I belong to Jesus and live to serve Him and do His will. I will blow it and mess up but nothing I can ever do will make Him love me any less. He is the same yesterday, today and forever. It's His blood that has washed me clean and I will be transformed, slowly but surely, to His pure, unblemished character.

So all that is to say I felt like He was calling to the waters of baptism to finally lay to rest the person I was before Him. He is calling me to walk in the newness His blood provided. He's calling me to abide in Him and be available for Him that I might bring glory to Him. Can I get an Amen?

We had our church service out at a ranch today. As soon as service was over, they made the announcement for baptisms. Guess who stripped off his shirt and said, "I'm getting baptized today!"

Here's a hint:

Look at my little guy! All three of our children have announced to the world that they belong to Jesus. For a mushy, mommy heart is doesn't get much sweeter than this...


And here's my moment before-


That water was c-c-cooooold!!


Look I made poor Nana and Papa blubber like babies (and yes I was blubbering pretty good myself!)-


And finally here is me and my boy trying to get warm-


But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed;
we are perplexed, but not in despair;
Persecuted, but not forsaken;
cast down, but not destroyed;

Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. So then death worketh in us, but life in you. 2 Corinthians 4:7-12