I was randomly reading in Romans, looking for a verse about the law, that I actually think is in Hebrews, when I noticed Romans 6: 1-4, speaking of our baptism.  I like to consider the mystery of the Holy Sacraments.  I, obviously, want to concentrate simply on baptism.  What really happens during our baptism?  We all get the drill in the physical but there is a mystery behind the tradition that no one really can put their finger on.  Most of us, particularly in the West, will attest that we have partaken and remained both physically and emotionally rather unchanged.  However, in faith we believe something changes.  That is, God does something, the heavens move on our behalf and it therefore matters... deeply.  However, the how and the why remains a mystery.

I loved my baptism.  It typified me and my spirituality perfectly.  It was unconventional and a bit messy.  What was spoken was nothing different and maybe even fairly traditional.  The difference?  The dirt.

Let me explain, but first a little background:
My family believed in baby dedication verses baby baptism, believing that baptism should be a choice and left until the child was old enough to understand that choice.  The choice being to truly follow Jesus.  Theology left to the side, we roughly believed you needed to at least be a teenager to fully comprehend the implications of baptism.

By the time I was in my early teens I had no desire to follow God.  However, I wasn't ready to be that bold with my family.  I would later, but that is a different story.  At the time, my brother closest in age was getting baptized and my parents asked me if I, too, wanted to get baptized.  My father, the preacher, was to do something in the coming weeks.  I promptly said no and had an argument with my mother who took it personally, thinking I was rejecting them, rather then my faith.  I knew, however, that it would be a lie and one that would have profound spiritual implications that I didn't, nor had the desire, to understand.

Years passed and I continued to live my life, very much like a pendulum, swinging between wanting faith and rejecting it completely.  It wasn't until my early 20s that I started understanding God a bit more.  When I left for my Discipleship Training School, (also a good story for another time), I still had not been baptized, but was still unsure that I was ready.  It seemed like a big step and I always took the decision and weighed it very heavily.  I decided while I was gone that I was ready, ready to take the plunge.  I was ready to say, publicly, that I was ready to follow God, that I believed in Jesus and that I had no desire to return to my former secular self.  Theology aside, I'm glad I waited.  I was so excited to be baptized.

The church I was part of was a Presbyterian Community.  Baptisms in that community were generally done via the sprinkle method.  Nothing against this method but I wanted to be submersed.  I don't really believe that there is a spiritual significance in the difference ways of baptism but I just wanted to be submersed as a symbol to myself that I was going all in.

My pastors, had no problem with this request, spiritually.  The problem lied in the physical, the church didn't own a tub or tank to do my baptism in.  Not to be deterred, we lived by a river.  The problem was that that river happened to be the Potomac.  The Potomac river once was considered so polluted that one of our presidents christened it a "national disgrace."  However, after some research and asking around we believed that we found a spot that would be OK and decided to go ahead.  The night before my baptism my pastor had dreams of flesh-eating viruses.

One of the things I remember most about my baptism was it was fun.  I laughed a lot because things didn't exactly go as normal baptisms go.  We laughed, weren't very sober, and really enjoyed how comical and abnormal my baptism was.  It was unconventional!  I loved it!  I remember looking back thinking that it was a great expression of who I am as a person.  It celebrated me and what God had done in my life, my journey and what He was going to do.  We had to walk so far out to be able to even get water to our knees!  The river bed was slimy and sure enough, when I came out of the water, I was covered in dirt.  Not exactly perfect symbolism of new-ness of life, being cleansed, dying to sin.

It's been a few years since I was baptized.  Some might say the whole symbolism of immersion is taken away when you come out covered in dirt.  However, I think it takes it father.  Although, through our baptism we are partaking in Jesus' death and resurrection, the fact of the matter is this: we're painfully human.  Life is messy.  We forget, we are proud, and we choose to sin regularly, daily and even hourly,  Sometimes, like me, we need to shower... even after our baptism.