January 3rd was my birthday. It was amazing. It was my first international birthday celebration. My team was amazing. The entire squad sang “Happy Birthday” to me at breakfast and treated me to a wonderful surprise dinner.
But there are some other BIRTHday celebrations that I wanted to talk about. January 19th is my BIRTHday too. In 2007 that is the date that I committed my life to Jesus. It was in my dorm room after one of my roommates bought me a Bible for my birthday. And now it is also the date of my baptism.
Let me back up just a little bit. I had been looking forward to Israel for the entire race. I thought that I was supposed to be baptized in the Jordan River. Well when it came time to go to Galilee I was out of money. I asked God, “If you want me baptized in the Jordan, you need to make something appear in the bank account or get someone to pay for me to go.” Turns out He did not want to me to be baptized there.
Fast forward to Kenya. Our contact, Pastor Patrick, took our team to a beautiful waterfall on Tuesday. It was so amazing. Then we went to a smaller part of the river that we could go swimming in. We were wading in the water and I just heard God telling me this is the place you will be baptized. So I walked over to Tamica and told her that I wanted to be baptized in the river. Her reply was “Cool, when are we coming back here?” I said “No, right now.” Then she asked if she should go get Pastor Patrick. I said “No, you do it.” She was completely caught off guard but Dez, from team Sophia, came over and they both baptized me in a Kenyan river that doesn’t have a name. The water was freezing but if didn’t seem to make a difference. So, on January 19th, 2010 I was made a new creation.
