I love Sunday. I get to go to Church. I didn’t always go. As a matter of fact, I was a good Jewish wife and mother for 27 years. I was frightened out of believing when I was a very young child. I followed the “Church of Ginny” for a number of years until I had a roommate who was Jewish. I started following the holidays and traditions because I loved the sense of family it gave me. I loved God. But I had a fear of Jesus after that scary preacher yelled at me and told me I was going to go to hell. I was six. So, with Judaism, I could have a relationship with God and leave it at that.

I met and married a nice Jewish man. We had a nice Jewish house and celebrated all the Jewish holidays. But there was something missing. I had an emptiness inside that I couldn’t fill with anything…no matter how hard I tried. Finally, five years after my divorce from this still nice Jewish man…I found Jesus. And my world literally was recreated. I was recreated. I changed instantly. I found my happy place.

I’ve been Church hunting since I came to West Virginia. I have attended the church of my youth…my grandparent’s little country church. I visited a Baptist church with a praise team which was decidedly more contemporary than anything else around here but still pretty tame compared to the throw-your-hands-up-in-the-air kind of worship I have become accustomed to in the churches I attend in Colorado. I visited a lovely Methodist church with friends and saw some classmates there. And the past two Sundays, I attended services at a beautiful Methodist church in the historic district. My mom’s cousin is the associate Pastor there and she invited me to come hear her sermon.

Yesterday was the Sunday celebrating the Baptism of Christ. Having grown up in a little country church and after attending contemporary churches, I felt a bit like a fish out of water. There are more rituals in the Methodist church than I remember. It was a lovely service, however. I sat and smiled as I watched and listened to my cousin speak about the “Something More” we are always seeking. I smiled because I remember her as a very young mother attending the little white church on the hill and now here she was in black robes, standing in the pulpit, delivering a sermon in a big stone church with stained glass windows. We both had humble beginnings. We both are widows. We share genes. We share a love for God.

Toward the end of the service, we were invited to come forward to the baptismal font to have the sign of the cross placed on our foreheads with water from the Jordan River, the river in which Jesus was baptized by his cousin John. My cousin, Sue, did the honors. It was a lovely experience for me. I knelt before the pulpit for a bit…without thought of what I would say to God. Instead of many words, I merely felt the warmth of the moment…smiled…and whispered “Thank You.” Sometimes just that is the greatest of prayers.

❤

Painting is entitled “Baptism of the Lord” by Guido Reni