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“Baptize! Change the Street One Life at a Time!”

2007 Peace Colloquy keynote address
by Jimmy Munson
 

There was this guy by the name of John. You read about him in the Bible, this guy named John. He was different than everybody else—he dressed different, he ate different, he kind of talked different, and I think there were some folks who didn’t really want to be with him, and sometimes folks came just to watch the show. But every place John went his message was the same: “Repent, and be baptized, and prepare you for the coming of the Lord.” His message never changed; it will always the same: “Hey! You need to change your lifestyle, and you need to get baptized because I’m telling you the kingdom of God is coming.” Isn’t that exciting when somebody can say, “Hey, I’ve got some good news for ya. You need to change your lifestyle because there’s something that’s coming that is going to change your life forever. And that thing that’s coming is the Savior of the world.” And so here John is, he’s baptizing folks. And he even tells folks there’s going to come somebody whose shoes I’m not even worthy to tie. And all of a sudden, here comes Jesus, and I don’t know your experience, but my experience is, every time I think I got something figured out, here comes Jesus to just turn my world upside down and to show me that I haven’t arrived, that I still got to look at things a little bit different. And here he comes up to John and he says to John, “John, baptize me!” And John, this bold guy who would walk up to anybody and say, “You need to repent and you need to be baptized,” Jesus walks up to him and says, “John, you need to baptize. I need to be baptized by you,” and John says, “Whoa, wait a minute. No, no; you know, I know who you are.” And what did Jesus say? Did he give him a big theological discussion about baptism? Did he share with him all the truth of the spiritual laws? Nah, Jesus just looked at him and said, “John, baptize me, ’cause it’s the right thing to do.” And what did he do? He baptized him. Why? Because it was the right thing to do. And after Jesus got baptized, a little dove fell upon him, and John heard a witness that calls all of us to have a listen to something. John heard a witness of the voice of God saying, “This is my Son. Hear ye him.” He heard a witness not saying, “This is a good man, be nice to him; this is the son of the carpenter, treat him with respect,” but he heard a witness that he has shared with all of us: “I heard a voice of God saying, ‘This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. Listen to him!’”

Jesus got baptized. He goes out into the wilderness; he gets tempted; he goes to his hometown; he reads the scriptures; he shares his mission; he shares his mission that the Spirit of God has anointed him and that he has to be involved in holistic evangelism for the rest of his life. He had to set the captive free; he go give sight to the blind; he go uplift the poor; and he go preach the acceptable year of the Lord. He’s gonna minister to people, and he’s going to invite them. And what happened? When he shared that experience, they didn’t like it. How many of you have ever shared your experience and found somebody didn’t like it? I’m one that if everybody ever does like [me], I’m probably gonna be really scared. I don’t know how to handle it when everybody’s happy with what I said, you know? Because usually I’m wrong. But God blesses me in my wrongness. Isn’t that neat? Isn’t it neat to work for a Lord and Savior that, even when we’re trying our very best and we still mess it up, that somehow and some way, by his grace, he’ll bless the lives of people? And you know what they wanted to do? They wanted to kill Jesus. So Jesus did a miracle, then, and he left town; he left town, but as a result of that, he went out and he found a bunch of men and he gave ’em an invitation to come and follow him, and that he would make them fishers of men.

Some of you know about the book of Acts. I would say we’ll call it the Book of Conversions, because that’s what the book of Acts is. It’s a book about a bunch of folks getting baptized. You know, they preach a sermon and somebody says, “What do we need to do?” and what does Peter say? “Well, it’s simple what you need to do; you need to repent and be baptized.” And I think they say there were like 3,000 got baptized! Wow! Peter knew how to do it. His message was simple: What do you need to do to come closer to the Lord? Change your life. Realize that there’s stuff in your life that keeps you from being perfect and you need to change your life, and you need to be baptized, and that sets off a thing of a whole lot of people getting baptized.

Now I share that with you just because that’s the Bible message, but what I want to share with you more, guys, is, when I was a little boy—I’ve got to share part of my story—when I was a little boy, I was tongue-tied. My tongue was longer than what it was supposed to be. I guarantee you if you think I’m ugly now, you ought to really see my baby pictures. But I was tongue-tied, I was shy, I walked with a limp, and I never felt that I fit in. Oh, I went to church, and I was a quiet little boy in a little tiny church; most people didn’t even know I was there. And I sat there in that church and one day, some preacher came, and I don’t even remember who he was, but he shared a scripture that we could get baptized with the same baptism that Jesus did.

Now, I want to tell you, as a little eight-year-old boy who felt like I was a freak because I didn’t look exactly like everybody else—I couldn’t talk very plain, I couldn’t run like everybody else, I always felt left out and rejected—here come this guy telling us—you know, I don’t think he was inviting anybody to be baptized that day. I wish he would’ve been; I think he was just using that scripture and happened to mention that you can be baptized with the same baptism of Jesus, and that stirred something inside of me. It’s like, Wow! A little, mentally slow, tongue-tied, crippled little boy, the son of a coal miner in Pana, Illinois, could do the same thing that Jesus did? Dang! Let’s try it! And I got involved in that. I remember when I got baptized—with a bunch of girls—and that wasn’t as exciting as I wanted it to be. But I got baptized, I got wet, and for me it meant something. It not only meant that I belonged to Jesus, but it meant something almost more than that. It meant that there was a family that I belonged to—people who would always try their best to love me, even though I am unlovable; people who had a responsibility to help me, even if I wasn’t like everybody else. And I had a responsibility to try to be the best Jimmy I could be. And I was excited about that.

A few years later, my dad is lying in a hospital, having an open-heart surgery, and I’m frustrated. My girlfriend got broken up with me that week; my dad is in the hospital; my school counselor had told me that I better not go to college ’cause I’m not smart enough—he was probably right. But he told me, you know, I better go join an army or something ’cause I wasn’t smart enough, and everything that week just didn’t seem to go my way. And that was a time in my life when I would read my scriptures and I would hide ’em under my bed, because I didn’t want any of my friends that I thought were my friends, to know that I was cool and I was also a Jesus freak. You know, they just didn’t go along, but I would read my scriptures every night, and I would hide ’em under my bed. And I read my scriptures that night and I was frustrated, because again, I wanted to know, what could a guy like me do? And in the midst of that, a presence fell over my being, and there was no voice, no razzle-dazzle voice, there was just an awareness that in my life, inviting people to be baptized was an important thing to do. Not because that meant that they’d arrived, but it meant that they was invited. You understand that?

Sometime we think baptism means you’ve arrived. It don’t mean you arrived; it means that you heard the invitation, and your hand is shot up in the air, and you said yes to the invitation to get baptized. I knew from that day, guys, that for me to invite people to be baptized was the right thing for me to do. I don’t understand it theologically; I don’t understand it in all the other ways, but I know it’s the right thing to do, and I have been held prisoner and set free by that at the same time. So, for me, guys, baptism is important because the God that I worship called to me, as a teenager and invited me to get involved in that type of ministry.
I have seen since that time that little bit of water change people’s lives. You heard about a couple of them today, and I’m going to pick on them, though, using Brother Derrick. Derrick raise your hand ’cause I’m talking about you, all right? Brother Derrick, he came down to our center in Chattanooga just to play basketball, one of the first things we did at the old bank building. We were down in the inner city and we knew if we had a basketball hoop, they would come. And sure enough, they came. They came to play basketball, and Derrick was one of them, and every time Derrick was there, Derrick would lose his temper and get in a fight. Every time he come in the door, somebody would always get smacked. It was his peace and justice way. And he got sent home a lot.

But then there came that time in his life when others was getting baptized and he wondered, that even though he had a temper, and even though sometimes he got in fights, would the Community of Christ in Chattanooga be a big enough house to let somebody like him come and get wet for Jesus? And he got baptized, and Derrick now is a peacemaker, guys; he honestly is a peacemaker. We talk about Derrick, but oh, there’s still those times that sometime we got to work on his peacemaking style, but he’s a peacemaker. When our kids are upset, when our kids are not understanding a thing, there he is in the middle of ’em. And that’s one of the things—sometimes people wonder if the gospel is worth it— that baptism changes folks. I look at my young brother Derrick, who is one of our leaders now, and I see that he went from that little kid with a basketball that would fight everybody that came in, to a young man now who’s going to do the very best he can to let everybody he meets know that they’re loved. Can I have a “Yo Buddy”?

I wanna tell you about a man sixty years old. A few years earlier, when he got drunk, he had a relationship with a young lady, and as a result of that relationship, an unwanted child came. And he took that young, unwanted child, and learnt to want it, and learnt to love it; and sent it to a church where he thought she could be safe. And the church that he thought she could be safe with was that little church with all the handprints on the bank, where all the people does organized chaos religion; where all the folks sometimes comes in and they get real, and they shed tears. (Sometimes they’re mad.) And he brought her here, and he used to just drop her off. He used to just drop her off. And over the years, it became her time that somebody invited her to get baptized and she got baptized, and her daddy came to watch that baptism, and while he was there, about five folks invited him to get baptized and he didn’t think he was good enough—he was an alcoholic; he had a child that he thought he had in sin; and he just didn’t think he was good enough to be baptized.

Well, the good news in Chattanooga is, guys: One, we don’t allow perfect people at our church. Perfect people have to go down the road, all right? ’Cause we can’t handle it. We don’t know how to handle it. So we invite you to come to church in all your imperfections, with all your opinionated stuff, with all your troubles, with all your burdens, and to join a community that will love you unconditionally. That doesn’t mean they won’t confront you, and there won’t be times that we won’t be mad at each other and we’ll need a little reconciliation. You guys have heard of that before, I think, and that doesn’t mean that. But for John, John got baptized and it changed his life and today, here’s something I want you to know: today, church is going on in Chattanooga because John said—when all of us was coming here—John was the one that said, “Having church here is important. What if somebody comes in for the first time? What if somebody comes in and they need food? What if somebody comes in and we’re not here? We’ll have church, Jimmy, if I have to do it alone.”

Now do you understand the change in that man’s life? A guy who once thought church wasn’t a place where he could be allowed into because he was bad, to now, folks, who said, “We got to keep the doors open to that church no matter what it takes because I’ve been baptized. My life has been changed.” Oooh, John’s not perfect, you know, praise God; none of us are perfect there, and we can deal with that. But John’s life had changed, and not only is he caring for his daughter, he’s caring for other children too, now, that he takes into his home and he teaches them about life; he gives them a place of protection, and he brings them to church so that they can get baptized.

Three little boys in Chattanooga had a mom and dad that were drug dealers. And one day, the police decided to raid all the drug dealers. And when they came to that house, they brought their dogs, you know, those big K-9 dogs that barks, that you like to pet when they’re not on duty? Well, they brought their dogs, and these three little boys’ mom and dad, when they knew the cops was coming, they hid ’em under the bed. They hid ’em under the bed because they thought, maybe if they was under the bed, nothing bad would happen.

Well, when the cops busted down the doors, and they brought in their dogs, where do the dogs go? They went to under the bed. And they barked, and they barked, and they barked, and they tried to get under the bed at these three little boys, and these three little boys was scared to death of those dogs. Mom and Dad went to prison, and those three little boys had to go live with a grandma that has heart problems and is about to die, and they are afraid of everything. They’re afraid of dogs, they’re afraid of policemen, they’re afraid of teachers—they’re afraid of everything.

But through an uncle who got baptized in that crazy little church, an uncle began to bring those three little boys to our little Community of Christ thing, and T.D. and Tyree and Tay started to come, and they grew up, there in that bank building. And when they got old enough to be baptized, they got baptized. And their baptism meant a lot of things to them. It gave them a courage—after they knew that God was with them, after they knew the Community of Christ [was] with them after they got baptized—it gave them a courage to pet a dog for the first time. And that may not be a big thing, but when you’re a little boy, and you never petted a dog, life stinks, you know? And through the gospel, sometimes we want baptism and everything to be so big and so powerful, but for the gospel and for the waters of baptism and through a church family that love ’em, they learnt to pet dogs. They learnt to play ball, they learnt to go to school, they learnt to invite their friends.

A little boy named Jacob got kicked out of four churches and so we had the luxury, guys, that when people get kicked out of other churches, they send them to us. And I’m not joking. We had a bus full of kids pull up in front of our church, and the bus driver walked in and said, “We got a bunch of troublemaking kids that we don’t know what to do. Can we drop ’em off here?” And they drop ’em off here, and they were better behaved than our kids. But Jacob, a little, troublemaking boy, and his brothers and his sisters found a place where they could come, and it was a big enough house where they could be loved. And their whole personality changed; they began to invite people.

We have a van, and one day we went to their house to pick them up, and they ran up to the van, and they knocked on the door, and said, “Don’t leave, I got to invite somebody to church.” And they ran to the door, and they knocked on the door, and this great big guy comes, and he looks up at him, and he’s talking to this guy and I see this guy shaking his head no. Anyway, that day, twelve houses he knocked on. Knocked on twelve houses— a little tiny, big-headed kid knocking on little houses, waiting for one person to finally say yes. And finally, one said yes. Then another said yes. And guys I’m sharing that because they got invited by a neighbor, and now (they’re in Hickson, Tennessee) we have plans to go plant a church because the little boy who nobody else wanted around began to invite his neighborhood.

And I’ve heard a question earlier of what difference can one person make. All it takes is for you to invite somebody. All it takes is for you to believe in somebody. All it takes is for you to walk up to somebody and say, “You know what? There’s something special in my life. It’s not perfect, but it sure has made a difference in my life. Can I share it with you?” And one life at a time, the neighborhood begins to change. Streets begin to change. Communities begin to change because one person cared enough to say to somebody, “I found something that’s special in my life.”

My brothers and sisters, I’ll probably never have the opportunity to talk to all of you again, so here’s my heart: baptism is about the loss. We are so rich, those of us who know that there’s a God that hears our prayers. We are so rich [’cause] we know there are people that when we’re scared, and we’re alone, and we messed up, and we make bad choices, that somebody’ll be there for us. Oh, they may pass judgment on us, but they’ll be there for us. They’ll pray for us, they’ll cry with us, they’ll walk with us, but guys, there’re folks out there that doesn’t know that there’s somebody there for them. I see them every day of my life; it’s my purpose to find those who don’t know there’s a God who really does hear their prayers, that there’s a community that really will love ’em unconditionally, that will go with them on their good days and especially on their bad days.

And I want you to hear that, guys, if we’re going to be a Community of Christ, we don’t be there with people on their good days; they need us on their bad days. That’s when they need us. They need us when we made a bad choice, OK? And guys, baptism is about the loss and about saying to a group of people who don’t think they’re good enough, who don’t think they’ll fit in, you can say to them, “Come and look at us, we’re not pretty. We’re not perfect, but God accepted us, and he’ll accept you. Come and get wet with us!” That’s what baptism’s about; offering to somebody who doesn’t think sometimes that they fit in, to offer them a place where they can fit in with all their imperfections—that they can fit in and they can get wet.

I want us to become better baptizers—not for our sakes. It’s not about growing the Community of Christ—and I love our church, but that’s not what it’s about. What it’s about is finding people who have stuff to offer that will change us sometimes, finding people who need to be invited to come and be a part of us. We got to be inviters. My brothers and sisters, shame on us for not being better at inviting for baptism. Shame on us! If you are a priesthood member and you preach a sermon, and you don’t have somebody that gets baptized and you don’t lift that up—in Jimmy’s world, shame on you. Shame on you. People need to be baptized, not because it adds numbers, not because something magically happens. They need to be baptized because we got baptized. They need to be baptized because Jesus got baptized, and it’s the right thing to do. My brothers and sisters, please, for my heart, for the sake of the lost, pray to God that your baptism spirit will increase. God bless you.