“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20
Baptisms
I was baptized on November 14th, 2020, at 9:00 PM.
Grace Community Church, the church that Word of Life partnered with this year to provide an on – campus fellowship experience, made an announcement early in the fall that they would be performing baptisms. The rest of my siblings had already been baptized, even though I was the oldest, so I decided that this was the perfect opportunity to take my faith public. I signed up. When the night came, I wasn’t nervous. I got changed when Pastor Greg announced that he would be starting the baptisms soon, then waited in line with a couple other “baptees.” We walked down to the front, got baptized one by one, then walked to the back, dripping wet and surrounded by students clapping for us and cheering us on. This was all really cool, but I don’t think the weight of what had just happened really hit me until I had changed into my dry clothes and went back out into the main lecture room of the JWC. Apparently, more students had made last minute decisions to get baptized. Instead of just the five or six people I went down with, ten people had gotten baptized. Then fifteen. Then twenty. By the end of the night, over forty students had been baptized by Pastor Greg. While I stood there with the rest of my fellow students, welcoming these new “baptees,” I realized the commitment we had all just made – the public declaration of our identification with Jesus Christ. I felt a sudden sense of closeness with the people around me, some of whom I didn’t even know, that I had never felt before and haven’t felt since. My experience at Word of Life has been filled with similar bonding experiences – Snowcamp, Reverb, summer camp, even service assignments. Even though some of those things were not available to us this year at Word of Life, God provided us with an even more special opportunity – baptism into the body of Christ.
Word of Life Bible Institute | 51
Made with FlippingBook - Online Brochure Maker