I joined the church at the age of five. I well remember how this event occurred. Our church was in the midst of the spring revival, and a guest evangelist had come down from Virginia. On Sunday morning the evangelist came into our Sunday school to talk to us about salvation, and after a short talk on this point he extended an invitation to any of us who wanted to join the church. My sister was the first one to join the church that morning, and after seeing her join I decided that I would not let her get ahead of me, so I was the next. I had never given this matter a thought, and even at the time of my baptism I was unaware of what was taking place. From this it seems quite clear that I joined the church not out of any dynamic conviction, but out of a childhood desire to keep up with my sister.
Was your baptism triggered by sibling rivalry or peer pressure, or was it a more considered step? Give thanks that any baptism, no matter its motives, can be the beginning of a life of Christian witness and service.
Reading from Clayborne Carson (ed) The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr (London: Abacus, 1998), 6.
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