Have you ever heard the term: Vital Spiritual Experience? This is a relatively new phrase for me and I didn’t really know what it meant until I had my own vital spiritual experience.
November 4, 2015 was a very pivotal day in my life, although I didn’t realize it at the time. The days and weeks that followed were some of the most painful, but that’s another story.
On November 7, 2015 I walked into my church for the Saturday night service. It was a big weekend for Southeast Christian Church. They had decided to launch a campaign called I’m In, to purge it’s membership at all four campuses, giving everyone the opportunity to be “In” and non-members to join.
Truthfully, the whole thing wasn’t a very big deal to me. The most exciting thing was the fact that my son was playing with the worship team at the main campus where I attend.
The service was good I suppose; I really wasn’t paying a great deal of attention. I had other things on my mind…things that had occurred that very week, things that affected my family and those who were close to me…things that were pivotal in my life.
At the end of the service, Dave Stone, the senior pastor, announced there was to be an open baptism. He invited anyone who wanted to be baptized to stay while closing the service. The band continued to play, as many people left.
I was baptized as a young girl, but I had been thinking about doing so again, especially after the week I had just had, but I was undecided…it felt like a trite thing to do given the circumstances I had just encountered.
Dave came walking up the aisle, shaking hands and pausing to speak to different people. While he was talking to a couple, he and I made eye-contact and that’s was when I decided to do it. We talked briefly and then he escorted me to the baptism area. While I was waiting to be introduced to the volunteer who would assist me, I sent a text to my son who was still playing bass with the worship team simply saying, “I’m going to be baptized”.
The next thing I knew I was in the water with four other people. I was first in line so I took a quick glance around the sanctuary to see if I could see my son, since I hadn’t gotten the chance to check my phone. The band had dispersed and most of the lights were out so I assumed if he hadn’t already left, he was preparing to do so.
After I had dressed and was leaving the building I looked at my phone to see if my son had replied. He texted, “I saw”.
When he arrived home we talked a bit and I said, “I assume you got my text? He told me he hadn’t. He said when the band finished playing, a few of them were sitting around talking and every now and then he would glance at the baptismal. One of the times he just so happened to look over and there I was. My son saw me being baptized.
That was an amazing God-thing for me. It meant a lot to me to know that God orchestrated the tiniest details of that small event in time, just because He knew I wanted my son to see me get baptized. It meant a lot to know someone in my family had observed that act of faith, because although it was important to me that I was baptized again, nothing had changed in my life. All the events that had just taken place, that impacted me and my family, were still there and still needed to be dealt with.
But God, my Higher Power, had my back. I truly believe that a Power greater than myself can restore me to sanity…one day at a time.
Vital spiritual experiences are an important part of that step.
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