A Friend's Experience with Water Baptism

By William Byrnes

The following is a response to a discussion thread on the Friends-Theology newsgroup and is used by permission of the author.

[How is it that Friends might be willing to accept the Eucharist as being valid from a group like the Episcopalians, but not from a group whose spiritual heritage is Friends? It seems to me the real issue is one of finding authentic worship and experiencing the Presence of Christ.]

I've thought long and hard about an answer to your query, hoping that I could say something that would both be healing and that would remain faithful to what I understand Friends' testimony to the ordinances have been since the beginning of the movement. In the final analysis, I can only say that it is often extremely difficult to understand and accept the ways the Lord uses to speak to us, especially when those ways are so seemingly divergent with other Friends or grouping of Friends. We (myself included) come across as crass and offensive and insensitive because the case is simply one of not understanding that God uses different methods for different Friends at different times to convey different lessons that He wants us to learn.

(The following is a story that I have never related in a wider Quaker audience before, and I hope I will not be castigated for what I'm about to share.)

When I was a freshman in college I became involved with a campus ministry that the Church of Christ had by virtue of enrolling in some extension Bible classes it was offering for credit from one of their colleges in Oklahoma City. The campus director and prof of the classes I was taking began to pressure me to make a visit with him and some others to the OKC campus over Spring break and I hesitantly agreed to make the trip. Upon arrival on campus and being placed in the dorm, he and the two dorm mates that I was sharing a room with begin a full-fledged "attack" on me about water baptism. Turning them off and trying to appear as if I were listening to them the Holy Spirit said to me, "Bill, I want you to be baptized tonight as a step of obedience to me—not for any reason anyone else has." As I pondered this to be sure that I was actually hearing the Spirit, the three guys became silent and sat there with me for whatever time it took me to come to the end of my pride and say "yes" to the Father. Having never witnessed a baptismal ceremony before, I did not know what to expect and requested that I be allowed to called the OKC Meeting pastor so that he could do the baptism. Of course this was met with an unequivocal dissent upon their part. Thinking that put the matter to rest, I turned to get into bed when I again unmistakably heard the voice of the Spirit, "Will you be obedient or not?" Not willing to undergo a period of separation from God in my life, I weakly told the men I would allow them to baptize me. In a downtown OKC Church of Christ at 2 AM I was dunked to the bottom of the baptismal font thoroughly expecting to have it done 3 times for each of the persons of the Godhead. When I realized that the one time under was going to be the extent to the exercise I was flooded with relief and at the same time an overwhelming surge within my deepest being to give vocal expression of praise. When I opened my mouth and began to speak what I heard was not English, and the expressions on the three men's faces were of abject horror, as if they were seeing Satan in person. Not knowing at the moment what was happening to me, I quenched the Spirit and stopped speaking and we soon departed for the dorm room. The ride back home the following afternoon I distinctly heard the voice of the Father speak to me saying, "Bill, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. I will be with you even unto the end of the age." It was not until a few days later did I find these words at the conclusion of Mark's gospel.

Many times in the years since when life has been so overwhelming for me that I thought I could not go on, the Lord has brought this experience to memory and I have been strengthened and encouraged that I was not walking the road alone. Several years later it dawned on me that I had experienced what the Pentecostals call the Baptism of the Holy Spirit evidenced in tongues. I have never felt a calling, nor any leading to preach either the water baptism or the Baptism of the Holy Spirit evidenced in tongues. They simply were things for me personally that God decided that I should experience and it has opened me to fellowship with other Christians that I would not normally have found or welcomed.

— Bill Byrnes