Lindsay's Autobiography, Vol. 1

A spiritual autobiography, eh?  That’s rather a tall order—the sort of thing that will take more than one sitting to compose.  But I can’t very well justify not getting started, so shall we begin at the beginning?

I’ve been in church since well before I was born.  My parents have been incredibly faithful to the faith they found as adults (in their 20s, but before I or my younger siblings were born), and they made sure to bring us up accordingly.  The church we attended when I was young was, in my dad’s description, “Borderline Baptist”.  You can check them out if you’d like, now that I think about it.  Frankly, I’m actually really impressed by their website.  They seem to have changed considerably since I was there as a youngster.  The fact that they have a picture of a guy with tattoos on the “What We Believe” page means I probably would struggle to recognize the place!  But anyway, here: http://www.redwoodchapel.org/  It was the kind of church/school in which as soon as a kid learned to read, that kid was presented with his or her very own Bible with a highlighted verse the staff thought, in their prescience, would characterize the child’s life.  Mine was Psalm 119:165—“Great peace have they who love your law and nothing can make them stumble.”

My dad was an elder there, so I remember quite keenly being there for both the first and second services every single week (usually going to Sunday school one of those hours), and then coming back for the evening service.  Frankly, the things I remember best are graham crackers and apple juice, and thinking hand motions were the lamest thing ever, even when I was four.  I was also in this great program called AWANA, and crammed tons and tons of Bible verses into my first-grade head.  Most of them are still there, though I thank God on a regular basis for the invention of Google to find their references!

I remember very distinctly where I was sitting in my mom’s Ford Taurus station wagon when I announced to her that I wanted to “ask Jesus into my heart”.  I was four.  She was ecstatic.  We got home, found my dad, and prayed right there on the family room floor that He would come into my heart and be the Lord of my life.

A couple of years later (the time stamp on the video camera says July 23, 1993, which would’ve been the day before my mom’s birthday), I was baptized.  Normally their rule was that a child would have to have completed second grade to be able to truly make a conscious profession of faith worthy of a believer’s baptism.  I was a rather precocious child (still am), so all it took was a meeting with the pastor to convince them my just-about-to-finish-first-grade little self was good and ready to be baptized.  I wanted to “show the whole world that I was a Christian”, believing very much that it was an “outward sign of an inner conversion”.  I probably even used those words.  They asked me what my favorite Bible verse was and, thanks to AWANA, I answered, “Hebrews 13:5b: ‘Be content with such things as you have for He Himself has said, “Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.”’”

I suppose that about summarizes my earliest foundations.  Since we moved halfway through my third grade year from California to Colorado, it’s always seemed easiest to divide the parts of my childhood based on that date (January 9, 1995).  I felt like things were very different once I got to Colorado—not in a bad way, but as one who’s never been particularly fond of change, in a challenging way.  I think that’s the sort of story that will probably need its own post at another time.  Actually, come to think of it, I might need more than two posts to get my whole spiritual autobiography out.  So, in that spirit, I guess feel free to take as many as you need yourselves?

And thanks for taking the time even to read, much less to care!  Realistically, the opportunity and encouragement to write it all down is probably enough for me, but to have the thoughts, prayers, and considerations of others is certainly icing!