Were You Baptised?

[OnceConvinced]

I just thought it would be interested to get other people's opinions on what it was like when they were baptised. Did you feel it was a supernatural experience? Did you feel that God had touched you? Did it change you?

 

I was baptised when I was 15 or 16. I can still remember the building clearly and the baptismal pool. I remember after being baptised the pastor asked me how I was feeling. I said something like "Cool". But only really because I felt I had to say something like that. I do admit that after coming out of the water, with the music playing and others around me, there was something a little surreal about it, but apart from that, I didn't feel any different. The music may have stirred me a little, but definitely nothing more. I didn't feel any different later on and it definitely didn't change me.

 

The main thing I remember is a couple of dicks from school being there and me being embarrassed about them seeing me and one of them saying, "Did you enjoy your swim?"

[NotBlinded]

I don't remember...I was a wee little baby.

[RHEMtron]

Me too... i was raised Catholic so i was baptized as a baby.

[white_raven23]

I was never baptized. My parents wanted me to be able to make that choice for myself.

 

The Free Methodist church I attended had a membership drive. The youth group I was a part of were given the pitch....and it sounded good and all, but they required baptism for full church membership.

 

But.....my church didn't have a baptismal tub. We would all have to go to another church (not even a Free Methodist one) in order for the required baptism to take place.

 

 

Now......that seemed like some serious Hooey to me. So I pulled out my bible (good little christian girl then), and NOWHERE in it's pages did it say you had to be baptized to be a christian. And I thought: If my belief and love are all Jesus apparantly needs.....why does this church have the audacity to require MORE?

 

So I decided that "christian" was a good enough title for me...since to be a "Free-Methodist" required more than God needed to be in their club.

[wideawake42]

As a Southern Baptist, I made my "choice" to get baptized at the age of 15. I remember it was the day before school started, my sophomore year of high school. My entire family was there, as well as my boyfriend (despite the fact that he was Church of Christ and usually did not like going to my church). I went with the pastor up through a long hallway and we emerged in the baptismal pool which was to the left of the altar if you were sitting in the pews. I remember trying really hard to have a very spiritual experience, and being a little let down, as the water was lukewarm, and not even a cold temperature was there to give me a bit of a shock. I felt pretty much nothing other than pride for declaring my faith publicly, and that was embarrassing, so I told everyone how spiritual it felt, and yada yada yada. My family and boyfriend all cried, however, and I was presented with a new Bible and a fantastic dinner.

[The Sage Nabooru]

I was baptized.....as a baby. It was 1985. Lutherans do the infant-baptism thing, although strangely we were told that the Catholic Church's practice of infant baptism was another proof of their hell-boundedness. Apparently they weren't doing it "right".

[Knightley]

I was baptised when I was a baby at a Roman Catholic church, the most that I've done is go to mass with my godparents, but I was never confirmed or whatever that is called. You see I don't even care too much to look it up.

 

But back in my former xian life, during my "born again" days, no I never went and got baptised, I thought about it, and got criticised for not doing it, but its not something that I placed much importance on so I gave up on it, and soon deconverted eventually.

[snookums]

Yep.....I finally agreed to do it. I was really, really hassled by my pentie sibling.

 

I didn't feel a thing....and straight afterwards....standing in front of the congregation...dripping wet like a half drowned puppy........I couldn't produce the required 'tongue' utterances. That was funny...the pastor shoved his microphone in my face....& nothing came out of my mouth...he prodded me a couple of times....then said to the audience....."It will come later...I can feel her spirit moving"...

 

WHaaat!

 

The whole thing was so embarrassing! I couldn't fake the 'orgasm' to save myself....

[OnceConvinced]

he prodded me a couple of times....then said to the audience....."It will come later...I can feel her spirit moving"...

 

Isn't it funny how other people can feel the spirit moving, but never you? lol. I guess that was the pastors way of trying to avoid facing the fact that nothing was happening.

 

It's like the guy up front who sences some one in the room needs to come forward for healing or to give their life to Christ and that Christ is telling you "it's you". And when no one does he says something like "Please whoever that person is, see me or one of the elders after the service".

[Dirac]

Oh my god Sage Nabooru, that clubbin' in da car .gif is so funny xD

 

Baptised aged 12, meant a lot, felt nothing. Made no difference to my life, Christian or otherwise. Also had the acute embarrassment of friends watching.

[Lizard]

Three times..remember 2. I got wet. (From the water, get your mind outta the gutter! )

[BTDT]

I think I was 16 or 17 and had been pressured by my parents into doing it, for years. I knew it was the 'right' thing to do, as a commited Christian, but being a shy person, I dreaded the public spectacle of it all. I knew I would be expected to publicly praise the Lord and find really cool spiritual things to say in public, as everyone else always seemed to do afterward. It was just fear of embarassment that kept me putting it off; not disbelief. The guilt of not doing it, as opportunity after opportunity went by, was incredible.

 

What I felt after I did it was just great relief - which in itself could be mistaken for a 'spiritual feeling' or 'being cleansed of sin.' It was relief from the fear of public leading up to it, relief that I no longer had to worry about it anymore, and great happiness at finally pleasing my parents and God and not being a failure in my spiritual life.

 

Nope, nothing whatsoever supernatural.

[OnceConvinced]

What I felt after I did it was just great relief - which in itself could be mistaken for a 'spiritual feeling' or 'being cleansed of sin.' It was relief from the fear of public leading up to it, relief that I no longer had to worry about it anymore, and great happiness at finally pleasing my parents and God and not being a failure in my spiritual life.

 

 

You know this is probably what it is for a heck of a lot of people. Just relief that you got it over with. Particularly if you hate being the centre of attention.

[Minstrel]

Baptised twice. Once right after I got 'saved' (6 years old)... Then again, in my late teens, because I looked back and thought...there's no way my earlier baptism stuck.

Anything supernatural? I was hoping... I had visualized all of Glory breaking open... But, nothing. I think I got aroused, though (terribly embarrassed about it, I might add)...because I was the last guy, and the girls were on the other side, getting ready to make their publication of faith...

Speaking of preachers needing some kind of supernatural evidences with these shows... In the summer of 1980, I returned to a sizable church I had formerly been a part of...and Benny Hinn was on the bill for the evening. The place was absolutely packed (about 4,000), and I got a seat at the end of an outside aisle near the back. Well...Benny's magic started to work, and he was calling people out from all over the place...and then said there was someone (and identified the general area where I was seated) with hip cancer. I thought nothing of it. But, apparently, neither did anyone else...so, a few minutes later, interrupting the rest of his program...he re-addressed us...this time, narrowing it down to three rows (of which mine was one)...and got a little more from God...this time, saying "you may not know it's cancer yet...but, it's in your right hip, and has been giving you a lot of trouble recently"...da da da, da da da... Well, the pain stuff was right...and it had only started about two or three weeks before...and...with him saying it "was cancer", I kind of thought I might ought to do something about it... But, I didn't...thinking, "What if I get up, and someone-else on these three rows actually has hip cancer, and then they don't get up, and end up dying from it"... So I sat. A few minutes later, he broke entirely away from the service and walked down the aisle...listening intently to God...and narrowed it down even further... "It's one of the last three people" (pointing at my end) "of this aisle".

So...I knew I'd been had.

And, I walked all the way to the front... And all the faithfuls who'd been there for the years of my stardom, started applauding and crying - Thank You Jesus! So...anyway... Benny asks me about my problem...I answer...and he says "Jesus is gonna heal you"...and puts his hand on my forehead and gives a huge shove. I had always wanted to be knocked out, by the power of God...and knew this guy was supposed to have the real thing... But...I didn't go down. Not even close. So, he repositioned his body for a greater shove, and this time, caught me by surprise (I didn't expect that kind of dishonesty)... I lost my balance, but didn't fall... And so he asked - "What just happened to you?" I said - "It felt like you pushed me." (unbelievable - the crowd goes wild...because, just like Benny...they know better) He said - "That was the Power of God..." Applause, applause.

So, he decides to give me one more dose... I fully hoped for the real thing...but, again, it was just a little man trying to push me down...and I stood up to the pressure long enough, for him to know that I knew what was going on...and then...(i'm ashamed)...I went down, so he could save face.

So much for baptisms... Sorry I turned the wrong corner, OnceConvinced. Oh...by the way...I'm not dead yet.

[LosingMyReligion]

I was 19 when I got saved and baptized.

 

I still remember the entire thing vividly. I got saved on August 1, 2001. I got baptized two weeks later. The entire two weeks I was petrified because I kept thinking, "What if the rapture comes and I'm not baptized?!" At my church you had to go through each ritual: Confessing to the church you are saved, getting baptized, and taking those crackers and grape juice(blood/body), before you could be saved and goto heaven...Recently I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder...Sooooo, needless to say I was scared shitless for two weeks.

 

So when it finally came time to be baptized I dressed up in all my white sheets, and invited my family and everything. The entire time I kept thinking that this really meant something, and that God was proud of me for doing this...I really and truly believed in it. It wasn't just a joke for me.

So when my pastor put his big calloused and dirty hand over my mouth and nose(I'm Baptist...You get the full dunk treatment...Not having water sprinkled over you as a wee babe. They drown your ass at my old church)I went limp and fell in the water...And I died and rose again in the name of Jesus...Everyone clapped for me and I truly felt that I was apart of something...

 

Needless to say I no longer feel that way...Because it was all a lie.

[Fweethawt]

I was brought up as a Catholic. So yeah, I got baptized.

 

I have fragments of certain memories from when I was a really small child, and I do have one of me being passed around in a church and having water poured over my head.

 

G'head, submit that one to Ripley's if you want to.

[OnceConvinced]

Everyone clapped for me and I truly felt that I was apart of something...

 

Another powerful emotion I'm inclined to think - feeling that you are part of something.

 

 

And, I walked all the way to the front... And all the faithfuls who'd been there for the years of my stardom, started applauding and crying - Thank You Jesus! So...anyway... Benny asks me about my problem...I answer...and he says "Jesus is gonna heal you"...and puts his hand on my forehead and gives a huge shove. I had always wanted to be knocked out, by the power of God...and knew this guy was supposed to have the real thing... But...I didn't go down. Not even close. So, he repositioned his body for a greater shove, and this time, caught me by surprise (I didn't expect that kind of dishonesty)... I lost my balance, but didn't fall... And so he asked - "What just happened to you?" I said - "It felt like you pushed me." (unbelievable - the crowd goes wild...because, just like Benny...they know better) He said - "That was the Power of God..." Applause, applause.

So, he decides to give me one more dose... I fully hoped for the real thing...but, again, it was just a little man trying to push me down...and I stood up to the pressure long enough, for him to know that I knew what was going on...and then...(i'm ashamed)...I went down, so he could save face.

 

There must be so many people with stories like this one. Feeling that you have to go down, that it's expected of you and not wanting to embarrass the guy up front... or yourself!

[paloriam]

I was baptised twice. Neither took. The only thing I felt was embarrassment at being in front of a group of people while wearing a stupid white gown. Never in my life have i felt "the spirit".

[RedFox]

I was baptized as a baby at a Catholic church. There are two baptism candles somewhere. One of them is broken. I thought it was my dead elder brother's candle. I was a kid, so I thought it was broken after he died. But my sister told me that that she found that he wasn't baptized, so they're my younger sister's and my candles. I also found the records of those baptisms somewhere. I wonder if the church has copies of them to inflate their membership numbers.

 

I also went to the baptizing of two kids each at around 8 at a different church and it felt holy to me, like a baptism by proxy because I don't remember mine.

 

I also felt holy after my first communion because my mom asked me if I felt like that and I said yes because it felt good to be finished with it. I don't remember very strong feelings from my confirmation because they didn't grill me about my learnings.

 

When I faked being saved at university in hopes of making the Xians stop bothering me, they continued to bother me by trying to get me to go out for a baptism, but I didn't do anything to let them drag me out to a church.

[Rhia]

Born Pagan, my mother would have rather died than see me baptised, but when I was placed in foster care at the age of 9, the first thing my foster mother did was have "the little pagan child" dedicated to her Assembilies of God church.

 

I was baptised at the age of 14, just after my birthday. It was your typical full dunk with the pastor and the associate pastor there, and when I came up the associate pastor loudly said into the microphone "dunk her again! and this time hold her down!"

 

So yeah, my baptism left me really cold.

[Guest Loghann]

Another Catholic here who was baptised as an infant. I was proud of the fact for a long time (I was really into the Church until I was around 13. I even wanted to be a nun.). When I converted to a Protestant denomination, I really wanted to get baptised again because my 'friends' at my new church had convinced me that Catholocism was evil and that my family probably wasn't saved, yada yada yada. I wanted to be baptised into Protestantism, but my mother wouldn't hear of it. To this day she maintains that her atheist daughter is still a Catholic. Needless to say, I'm considering excommunication.

[Vigile]

I once went to a Baptist church that claimed I needed to be re baptised. It seems the baptism I received at the Nazarene church wasn't good enough for them. They were quite assholish about it, but I refused on principle and changed churches.

[Eponymic]

I remember when I was partially into it at one time, and I was thinking about doing it. But part of me was always like, 'why the heck would I do that? It's so corny! It's so contrived! It's so plastic!!!' So I never did it and have always been glad that I listen to my better senses.

[Realist]

Yes, I was baptised when I was in my early teens. Cannot remember anything special about it except is was bloody cold and I felt rather like an embarassed public exhibition!

[Ex-COG]

I was dunked at the age of 25, in a church baptismal set in the floor to the right of the pulpit. Now, I'm one that does not like water, and was nervous about having my face under water even for a moment. But I trusted that "Jesus" would help me, so I did it. I did tell my pastor ahead of time about my fear of the water, so when he baptised me he dunked me fast--I don't even think the top of my head got wet (oh my, does that mean the top of my head wasnt' saved? ). Baptism wasn't a requirement in the Church of God (Anderson IN), you could be a Christian without it, but it was looked on as being a public witness of your faith, plus an act of obedience. Jesus did it, so really you should, too.

 

I still have a certificate that my pastor gave me soon afterwards. I've always wondered if I should keep it, or toss it. I think it's still stuck between the pages of my old KJV.