Edward and Bella are amazing friends and Christians. Bella is one of the few people that I really feel comfortable opening up to because we both share a growing faith, but can still laugh and take jokes too far, and just enjoy life together. Edward and Bella have one of those marriages that you can just TELL is so strong and grounded in Christ. They also have a lot of compassion for the youth of their church and truly enjoy leading them. I’ll stop raving, but I want you to understand those things before I tell you this story.
As backstory, Bella did not attend church until she was about 12, but she immediately became interested and involved, and accepted Christ and was baptized, by sprinkling, at 13. Her and Edward met in college, started dating, and she accepted his denomination’s views (one of which was immersion baptism) as they moved forward in their faith journey. Bella knew that her conversion story might be perceived as an issue, but when Edward was interviewing for his first job, it never came up. For the past year, they’ve been working with a small youth group, trying to be deeply involved of the lives of the teens. Three weeks ago, they went to Wednesday night class that only two students were at. Edward had a lesson planned about Psalms, but one of the girls had just gotten some disappointing news and they ended up discussing it for almost all of class.
This girl had applied and interviewed to be a Junior Counselor for a local non-denominational kids church camp. She wound up being turned down for the position for several reasons, one of which was her take on baptism, salvation and the link between. The student was hurt, upset, a little angry. Bella, Edward, and the two girls started talking through this issue. They told her how sorry they were, how unfair it was that in the process of trying to be all-inclusive the camp did, in fact, exclude her because of her beliefs. They talked about what she could say in the interview next year to further clarify her beliefs, etc.
Throughout this conversation, the girl told Bella and Edward three times that she could not understand how people could think differently than her. So after the third time, Bella spoke up and told the girl her faith journey and sprinkling baptism story. They were both receptive, and Bella and Edward talked them through how different churches do baptism, how sometimes churches have baptism celebrations (perhaps once a year), etc. They also said that they believe that full immersion baptism is the best form of baptism and that's what they’d teach people and kids. But they wanted them to understand that there are intelligent Christian people that have been brought up with different beliefs. Edward and Bella encouraged the students to come talk to them if they had any further questions or if their parents did.
A few days later Bella and Edward got an e-mail from an elder of their church, requesting that both of them go to a meeting with the elders.
At the meeting, some of the elders said that, because of her conversion story, they were not assured of Bella’s salvation. Two of them said they felt that “salvation is found in the water.” So basically, they told her (and her husband) that if she died that night, they would not feel assured that she would go to heaven. Even though she had been teaching their kids. Even though she invested time in them and their church. They said that if they'd known about this at the hiring process Edward wouldn't have gotten the job. Edward and Bella expressed that they didn't mean to hide anything from them. If they had felt like they had something to hide, they never would have mentioned it to the youth.
Bella offered to get re-baptized to be completely obedient to the Word and to their leadership, but not for salvation. She explained it to me this way, “At the point when I knew Edward was pursuing being a minister, I knew my history and baptism style might be a problem. I struggled with this. I knew. I knew I was saved. 100%. I had felt the Lord with me, I knew I had the power of the Holy Spirit in me. My life isn't and never was perfect, but I did know that I had the security of the redeeming blood of Jesus.”
The church elders, however, said if Bella wasn’t being re-baptized in order to gain salvation, she wasn't doing it for the right reasons. When the elders said this, Edward said that he believed that Bella’s baptism was relevant and that he doesn't necessarily believe that baptism has to be the point at which one receives salvation, referencing churches that do baptism ceremonies once a year, etc. The elders had a huge problem with both these points.
Edward and Bella left the meeting on a civil note. Two weeks later, they got back to Edward and Bella with their decision to let Edward go.
The grace and compassion that Edward and Bella have maintained through the whole experience has been breath-taking. It’s honestly made me re-evaluate my level of compassion and forgiveness in every area of my life. They have peace, because they have Christ. And because they stuck to their beliefs instead of selling themselves out.
When you run a church…or a life… on legalistic principles, instead of love, NO ONE can ever be good enough.
So please pray. Pray for Edward and Bella. Pray for the elders in their church. Pray that their youth group will ask hard questions that will make the elders, their parents, and the whole congregation think just a little bit harder about what a life in Christ is.
If there’s one good story that comes out of this, though, besides Edward and Bella’s inspiring grace, it comes from one of the students there for the discussion on baptism. Before Bella knew what the final decision on Edward’s job was, she pulled the student aside to apologize and clarify. Bella asked the girl if she had any questions or was confused or upset by hearing Bella’s baptism story.
“No...” the girl said, “And really… even if immersion baptism is the only legitimate form of baptism… how could God expect you to know that, being only 13 and raised in a church that didn’t teach that…?”
Bella and Edward have planted a seed in that church that will grow and flourish in love. And they will plant many more in years to come, in future positions of ministry and leadership.
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