Jesus is Here

I am sixteen years old.  It’s Christmas time–December 23rd, to be precise.   I am in the car with my boyfriend, Matt, driving to the Santa Rosa stake center. I’m getting baptized tonight. I can’t stop smiling. I feel enveloped in a bubble of peace as deep as that of the first Christmas night. I’m getting baptized tonight!

When we arrive at the stake center, I find that many of my seminary friends are already there.  I am surprised to see so many. People I don’t even know crowd the edges of the room.  It’s my first Mormon baptism. The missionaries have explained the process, but still, I don’t know what to expect. I don’t really know much at all about the details of Mormon doctrine, but I know this: Jesus is here. This is His church. This is my path.

It was my mother who first introduced me to Jesus. She taught me to pray: Now I lay me down to sleep/I pray the Lord my soul to keep. On Saturday nights, my sister and I went to bed with pink foam curlers in our hair, our patent leather shoes–made shiny clean with fingernail polish remover–ready at the foot of our beds.  Military nomads, we attended whichever local Protestant church my parents picked–Methodist, Presbyterian, Congregational. I loved going to church, a few coins for the offering tied up in the corner of my handkerchief. I loved to hear stories from the Bible–Abraham, Gideon, Esther, Mary, Paul. I loved singing: Jesus loves me, this I know/For the Bible tells me so./Little ones to Him belong/They are weak but He is strong./Yes, Jesus loves me!/Yes, Jesus loves me!/Yes, Jesus loves me!/The Bible tells me so. I didn’t just sing the words; I sang to witness that I knew Jesus loved me. Me! I felt Him stir in my soul with my very earliest memories, as if He’d stowed away in my heart when I came to earth.

At thirteen, I became a bona fide Christian. I had studied the materials Billy Graham sent, I had listened and learned and prayed all those years of my early youth. One night, a friend invited me to “Father’s House” where a group of local youth met weekly to praise the Lord together. There must have been some sort of evangelical leadership, but I didn’t need converting, so I paid them little heed, other than to notice quiet conversations in corners, witnessing, praying, tears, joy. What moved me most was the big prayer circle we formed, linking arms, sharing our prayer requests, uniting in faith as we lifted our hearts to heaven. I knew Jesus loved me, but did He know I loved Him? I felt the deep pull of sacred commitment, of covenant. That night, linked in prayer with fellow believers, I closed my eyes and quietly and absolutely gave my heart to Jesus. I accepted without reservation that He was my Savior, that I was lost without Him, that I would follow Him for the rest of my life. Anywhere.

From that day on, I have been a committed disciple of Jesus Christ. I longed for Truth, though, and as my faith in Christ grew, I realized that for me, Protestant doctrine had too many holes in it. I couldn’t make sense of it, beyond the deep reality of Jesus as Lord. So when Matt came along a few years later, with his equally fervent love for the Lord and real answers to my real questions, I knew I had found my religious home. Matt and the missionaries taught me solid Christian doctrine, put the pieces of the gospel together into a framework that I knew would support my deepest inquiries, withstand my fiercest doubt.

And tonight, I’m getting baptized. Someone helps me dress in white, leads me to a chair in the front row. I turn around to see my family walk in, dressed in their Sunday best. I look at my dad and my eyes fill, because I know that he is worried about me. It took him all day to sign the permission form allowing me to be baptized as a minor. The missionaries called midday: Maybe we should wait. And Matt: Do you think we should wait?  That pervasive bubble of peace has been with me all day, though: No. Don’t worry. It will be fine. My family is here because despite their concern, they love me. They are willing to trust that I can see my way to the Savior.

When I enter the warm water, Matt holds his hand out, leads me into position. He raises his right hand and speaks my name.  My spirit floats, like a bird on the water, waiting. I dip into the water and it washes me, washes me clear through–skin and bone and sinew–darkness, grime and sin . Gone. I am gone. There is a moment of utter stillness and I hold my breath in wonderment. He is here, here in the underwater, here in me. And there in the light above.  The water floods behind me as I rise up, drink in the sweet air of new life. My face points heavenward, homeward. 

A short time later, I sit in a folding metal chair, facing my family and friends. Matt’s dad places his hands on my damp head and speaks my name. I hear him say: Receive the Holy Ghost. No one had warned me of this, this wild rush of power that suddenly pours through me from head to foot like a flash flood. I gasp. I hear Matt’s dad speaking, but I am intent on survival, on somehow absorbing this electric, possessive Spirit. Slowly, it settles and I tingle everywhere. He is here, here in the very cells and atoms of my body, here in all the freshly flushed spaces of my soul.

That was 39 years ago. Every year on December 23rd, the magnitude of that long-ago night expands my understanding and my awe. And tonight is Christmas Eve.  Jesus is finally here. As we commemorate and celebrate that long-ago night, may He be truly here for you. Here in your heart, here in your life. Hallelujah! Jesus is here!

How does Jesus show up in your life?