The Story of My Faith // How I Became a Christian

Saturday, October 11, 2014

This weekend had a really great start. :)

We got a couple phone calls yesterday that two of our members wanted to be baptized. So, we went to our church building to witness both baptisms. It was a blessing to be a part of both milestones in these new members' lives.

While I was sitting on one of the pews, I felt led to finally write the blog post that I'd been debating to write for quite some time now, but hadn't ever found the right time to. It hit me with a gentle spark of inspiration: You should write that post about your own baptism.

I want to share this full story with you because I feel that my faith is such a strong part of my life. Because I'm a Christian, I believe that sharing my faith and my story is paramount to helping others who may be in need of encouragement, or just want to read the posts of a Christian 23-year-old from Tennessee who happens to write a blog.

This is the story of my baptism, so this post is going to be very personal and go very deep. I hope that this helps you get to know me better, and I hope that it can help or encourage you in some way if you need it.

So, without further ado...here's how I became a Christian.


I'm a member of the Church of Christ. We believe in the authority of scripture, so everything we do is according to His Word, especially when it comes to worship. I have grown up in the Church all my life, but I had not made the commitment to be baptized quite yet.

I remember being afraid to go up in front of my entire congregation, and I remember feeling like I just wasn't ready knowledge-wise to be baptized. I was young, but I did want to be baptized at some point. I just didn't feel ready to do so when I was so young. My family continued to patiently study with me as I asked questions and learned all I could while I was in church and in Sunday school.

Then, on January 12, 2006, my parents and I decided to go see the movie version of C.S. Lewis' The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe at the Franklin Theatre in Downtown Franklin. I was fourteen years old at the time.

When Dad and I had been studying, we had talked about the fact that baptism automatically placed you on the "winning team", when your name was written in the Book of Life in Heaven. In the Chronicles of Narnia series, C.S. Lewis uses allegorical themes to help convey a message to both children and adults alike, and in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, he draws parallels to Christ's death, burial, and resurrection. On top of that, there's an ultimate battle between good and evil.

Guess what? The side of good is the "winning team".

After we saw the movie, Mom and I pulled into our neighborhood, and suddenly, that realization hit me. I wanted to be on the winning team. I knew all that God wanted me to know at that point, and I could learn even more.

I told Mom I wanted to be baptized. And as Relient K's "Who I Am Hates Who I've Been" played on the radio, we pulled out of the neighborhood and drove straight to church.

That very afternoon, my Daddy baptized me. And that was the day I became a Christian and officially joined the Body of Christ, and I've strived to live a faithful life ever since.


I'm going to be blatantly honest with y'all. I was afraid to share this for fear of ridicule. I had been ridiculed in the past for the unconventional nature of how I decided to become a Christian.

But you know what? There are way more positives than negatives to sharing my story. I've been a born-again Christian for eight whole years now, and this story still hits home, even after all this time. Also, I have a blog. I have a platform to share my testimony that I hadn't really ever had before, so I thought, why not?

Plus, this important part of my life has been paramount in shaping who I am.

I decided to transfer to a university my Sophomore year of college so that I could be around people closer to my faith.
I made friends who know and love me, just the way I am, quirks and all, and we all go to church together when we can.
I decided to become an English major in school so I could pursue the books I loved so much, and be influenced by great writers like C.S. Lewis. I also feel very strongly about allegorical themes in literature.
I have been given opportunities after college to pursue my faith through writing and social media.
And I have been given the opportunity to share my faith more closely with you. :)

And I'm so thankful I can do just that.

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