10/31/20 FAVORITE BAPTISM MEMORIES #6 — Baptizing people of very different ages, genders and sizes also presented some unique challenges for me.

One Sunday I had to baptize an extremely large woman. The top front edge of our baptistry had a clear plexiglass front about 15 inches high. Ordinarily the pool was filled to 8-10 inches from the top. As she descended the steps into the pool, I suddenly noticed that the water was within a couple of inches from the top. So I tried my very best to immerse her as slowly, gently and carefully as I could. But she struggled and thrashed as I tried to raise her back up. A huge wave of water gushed over the top and splashed over onto the men in the back row of the choir! Sure, SHE was baptized, but I and nearly all the men in the choir just got all wet!

10/30/20 FAVORITE BAPTISM MEMORIES #5 — How much water does a baptismal pool hold? How much does that water weigh? And, most important, how do you know if the structure you built is strong enough to support such a pool?

One weekend we were preparing to baptize several folks on Sunday morning. Later Saturday night one of my deacons called me at home in a panic. He said we had to postpone those baptisms. As they were filling the pool, suddenly the floor around the baptistery CAVED IN, sending tons of water onto the choir area and podium and also in the church basement below.

Several weeks passed. By the time we had the baptismal area rebuilt and reinforced, we had several more people needing to be baptized. Glory to God!

10/29/20 FAVORITE BAPTISM MEMORIES #4 — After our icy baptism adventure, I asked the church leaders to “fix it.” A few days later, they told me they had taken care of it.

As I prepared to enter the pool, I noticed steam billowing off the surface. As I stepped into the water, I almost screamed out in pain. The water was (nearly) BOILING HOT! I am quite hot-natured and a heavy sweater. As sweat poured out of every pore in my body and my glasses fogged up so completely I was nearly 100% blinded (after that I always took off my glasses before baptism), I tried to conduct the ordinance with some semblance of dignity. But as the toes of each candidate touched the surface, they drew back with a gasp. I told each one to take a deep breath—surely they could stand it for a few seconds. Somehow we all got through it, clean as a whistle, and red as a beet all over!

Turns out, my men had purchased a heater for a cattle feeder. It was basically a giant electrified horseshoe, with not much of a temperature control. After that we tried to postpone baptizing in the winter until freezing weather had passed. Whew!

10/28/20 FAVORITE BAPTISM MEMORIES #3 — The land on which our church was built had been donated by the farmer who owned all the adjacent property. And the facilities were 50 years old when I first arrived to be their pastor. Not surprisingly, lots of its features were not exactly “up to code,” shall we say. People continued to be saved, praise the Lord; so we were baptizing regularly. And it seemed that nearly every baptism was a new challenge and adventure.

Once, in the dead of winter, 3 or 4 new believers were anxious to be baptized. That Sunday morning as I stepped into the water, I immediately noticed that it was FREEZING COLD. My feet were nearly numb and the rest of me was, perhaps literally, advancing to hypothermia. The very first candidate was a young lady. As I took her hand to help her down into the water, she gasped, “Pastor Ed, are you OK? You’re BLUE all over!”

I turned to the candidates assembled on the stairs, just out of view of the congregation. I told them that they only needed to be in the freezing water for a very few seconds—they would be OK! But I was NOT too sure about ME! I think my teeth had stopped chattering just in time for me to preach.