The Metamorphosis of an Ambivalent Disciple

The Beginning.

Since as early as the first bible study sessions, I’d known that even if I were to allow myself become a disciple, I wouldn’t remain one for long. But though I was convinced that organized religion was not for me (at least not for the long term), I felt a certain obligation to humor the disciples and to accede to their often-spurious interpretations of the Bible.

Soon, Dan (as I must call him for the sake of prudence), one of the leaders of the campus ministry, began to impress on me the imperatives of immediate baptism. Subconsciously, I knew that baptism would serve to be the seal that would effectively bind me to the church. I knew that once I allowed myself to be submerged in those waters, I would, in effect, be entering a contract.

Being baptized in the Church, you see, was akin to a marriage between the Church and the convert, in which, like with the union between a bride and groom, both are to cleave to each other and become one—eternally. Disengaging myself from the church after baptism, would, I was convinced, not fail to bring its baggage of trauma.

I stalled. I whined that I didn't feel right about being baptized yet, that I was waiting to set my heart right with God, that I was waiting for the right time…

That phrase turned out to be my undoing. Dan countered that there would never be a “right time,” that there could never be a right time, that I had to make this the right time. He seemed desperate for me to be baptized, but I allowed myself to be persuaded by his rhetoric.

Coming Around.

The following Friday was Good Friday—that annual celebration of the death of the Christ, and I had gone to the weekly devotional that was held at the disciples’ Michigan Avenue location. Dan arranged to take me to lunch the next day; evidently, he had to complete the string of pre-baptismal bible studies as soon as possible, and add me to the flock of disciples as quickly. Did Christ not exhort his apostles to make disciples of all nations? Was that not the Messiah’s mandate as he ascended into the heavens? Dan intended to meet that mandate, and he was doing an incredible job of it.

The next day, Dan picked me up from my Lake Meadows apartment at about 4:00 p.m. We then drove to Hyde Park to look for a place to eat and study the Bible. We found an Italian restaurant that suited our purpose, parked the car, and went in. Dan ordered a medium-sized pizza and the waiter brought some bread moments later. Dan sprinkled some cheese on the olive oil he’d poured onto the saucer, dipped a piece of bread in it, took a bite, and said it was good. I tried it, and agreed.

The minister then produced his NIV Bible and began the systemic process of converting me to the faith. I listened, nodded, and answered his questions in the affirmative. I asked a few questions of my own—answers to which were either unsatisfactory or outright evasive. Dan told me that tomorrow was Easter, that Jesus arose from the dead on that day, and that the full implications of that resurrection were beyond the grasp of any single man.

Wouldn’t it be the absolute best thing for me to be baptized tomorrow, to be submerged in water, like Jesus was into the abyss of death and darkness, and to be raised—to emerge, again, like Jesus, into light? I was to contemplate the parallelism: wouldn’t it be all too cool to say that I was baptized on Easter? I silently considered Dan’s modest proposition, and like a hypnotized quixotic (sic), agreed that it would, indeed, be cool to be baptized on Easter.

Though I still harbored reservations about baptism (in fact, I asked him if there was a way around the actual submersion in water; he said no), I neither committed myself to it nor expressed my reservations. We prayed, and he dropped me off at home.

Baptism.

The next day was Easter, and I brought myself, somehow, to go to the Church. I had in my attendance of other baptisms in the previous weeks heard the baptizees (no such word, I know) say they were “fired-up”, “sold-out” to God, and that nothing could be more “awesome!” (The word “awesome”, understand, was at once an adjective and an exclamation). Deep down, I had no such experiences. I was, quite frankly, in a trance, and the most important motivation for continuation on the path of baptism was the sheer novelty of being baptized on Easter Sunday.

After the worship service, I told Dan of my resolution to get baptized. He was ecstatic. He spread the word (you must marvel at the efficacy of word-of-mouth), and arranged, with a few snaps of the finger I think, to have the baptismal bath ready. Everyone was overjoyed. Hugs and congratulatory messages nearly suffocated me.

By the time I arrived at the Michigan Avenue baptismal venue, almost every disciple in the campus ministry was already there and I was greeted with another round of hugs and congratulations. Apparently, I had made the best decision of my life, and everyone was happy for me.

I was asked to go and change into the T-shirt and jogging pants I’d brought for the purpose of the submersion in water, and was subsequently led to a back room where I was to be faced with the final, this-is-it, no-turning-back round of questions. In a solemn ceremony, Dan and two other patriarchs of the Campus ministry asked if I would be willing to be committed to the body of Christ, to attend every meeting of “the body,” and to forever live the life of a disciple. I answered all three questions in the affirmative.

We prayed.

Our emergence from the back room was to rapturous applause and ecstatic cheers. Then began the obligatory flattery about the object of the convention: some said I was one of the most brilliant persons they’d ever met, others, that they’d never seen anyone so willing to study the Bible, and that they were sure I’d make a fine disciple. Others, yet, couldn’t wait to see what God would do with (I imagine they meant “through”) me. Everyone had such kind words that, to tell the truth, I might have cried if I had one less drop of testosterone running through my veins. In all, everyone thought I would make one heck of a disciple.

I was still deep in my trance when somebody led me towards the baptismal bath. I stepped into the bath, waded to the deep end of it, and sat on the raised steps, the water encircling my lower torso.

“Do you believe that Jesus died for your sins and rose from the dead to grant you eternal salvation?” I vaguely heard Dan ask.

“I do.” I said mechanically. If someone had looked into my eyes, they might have suggested that we postpone the event. Though I was sitting in that bath, I was really far away. Deep down, in whatever remained of my consciousness, I was asking myself, what am I doing? Why in the world am I doing this? I certainly wasn’t fired up.

But it was too late to withdraw now. Surely, I did not intend to climb out of the water and declare to these incredibly awesome people that I’d changed my mind about being baptized in their church. To have done so would be to have committed an atrocity, a barbarity, an abomination deserving of eternal damnation!

“What is your good confession?” Dan asked, jolting me out of my reverie.

“Jesus is Lord.” I said as we had rehearsed in the back room. Obviously, that utterance was not, by the most elastic definition of the word, a confession—never mind whether it was a “good” one or not. For my intellectual detachment from the process, I might as well have been reciting the rosary. At any rate, a thunderous applause rent the air as I made my “good confession.”

“I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” Dan said as he clasped his hands over mine, which were firmly covering my mouth and nose, and lowered me, backward, into the water.

I re-emerged to reverberating shouts and applause, and to the beginnings of the refrain, “We love you with the love of the Lord…”—one that I came to understand was, for lack of a more apt description, the induction anthem. (And, really, did they have to qualify the love they had for me, eh?)

As I climbed out of the water, someone wrapped my towel around me, and directed me to the men’s rest room where I dried myself, and changed back into my clothes.

When I returned from the bathroom, it was to another round of by-now-asphyxiating hugs and congratulations. There were two cards that had been signed by about every disciple in the campus ministry, congratulating me on making the best decision of my life.

Epilogue.

It was at this point that I slowly began to emerge from my trance, into the reality of my just-forged commitment. I knew I would eventually joist my way out of it, but I was presently involved in a very intimate relationship with The Church.

And with that, I became a bona fide member of the Church—a membership I was all too willing to relinquish, but all too ambivalent to; a membership that, in retrospect, was a veritable waste of my time and energies; a membership that allowed me to witness a most banal admixture of hypocrisy, conformity, and sycophancy—the like of which I’d prefer not to witness again.

[undated c. 2002 - 2003]