The humbling experience of being dunked

Today, I was baptised. It was a pretty cool experience and stirred up some thoughts that surprised me so I thought I'd share. I've been walking with the Lord for about 7 years now, but for some reason had never been baptised. I've been involved in a church for a long time, got a job at a church and even seen dozens of baptisms before taking the plunge (pun very much inteneded) myself. So while I expected emotions to come surrounding the event, I didn't quite know what kind to expect. What I felt, and what surprised me the most was that I felt a little embarassed. Not embarassed about Jesus or anything; I love Jesus. I think He's great, and every day I am falling more in love with Him. I was embarassed, however, because I thought that people would say, "I can't believe you haven't been baptised yet. aren't you going into ministry?" It's weird to come face to face with the reality of how much I've bought into my own hype. A lot of who I am and what I do is about people thinking I'm someone; people thinking I am capable or even that I know what I'm doing. I didn't want to be baptised because I didn't want people to know that I hadn't taken what I considered to be a "beginner step." What was cool though, was that no one said that. I got hugs, and congratulations and people saying it was so great. No one else had bought into my hype and it made me realize that what people love is when we are real. They want us to be authentic. I learned that what I want my life to be about is Jesus, not this image of myself that I've created for others to be impressed with. Today, I was baptised. As a declaration to the world that I am passionately in love with Jesus and that I want to follow Him. Praise God for an opportunity to understand more and more who He is and who I want to be...and that I didn't even get water up my nose.