I was raised in the church. When I say church, I don’t mean Protestant or Catholic, I mean Christian. We attended the First Christian Church in my hometown, but my real religious education came from bible readings and devotionals at the dinner table every night. In the beginning, it was just listening while Mom or Daddy read but, as soon as we were old enough,we shared the responsibility. We’d take turns reading the scripture or the meditation. Sometimes Mom would do the prayer, at others one of us would read from the Upper Room or Guidepost. I didn’t even realize until years later that everyone else didn’t necessarily perform this ritual.
I was baptized when I was 10 or 11. To be honest, I’m not sure exactly when because it wasn’t a big milestone at our house. It was just part of the routine, like starting school when you were six. My cousin, who was the same age and my best friend, went in at the same time. It was expected…normal. We didn’t even consider what it meant, at the time, we just did it because it was time.
My real conversion came much later in life, but that’s a story being told elsewhere. In later years, I sometimes attended other churches with friends and it was a real shock to find out how restrictive some of them were. Our church teaches that we have a responsibility to study the bible ourselves. To pray and reach out to God and make our own decisions about the right and wrong of living a Christian life. We have no creed to follow unless you consider taking communion every Sunday a creed. As I learned more about our denomination, how it started, what it stood for, my pride in my church became almost sinful. Finally, it just became my history.
Over the next few weeks, I plan to share that history with you. I hope you will find it enlightening and inspirational.
