This evening I had a meeting with the young man whose will be baptised at the Gathering Place on Pentecost Sunday, and the person who will be assisting me in the baptistery.  Having done a 'dry run' in the middle of the vestry (as one does) he said he had some questions he needed to ask... which centred around whether or not he was ready to be baptised, and what it meant for his life-style choices ever after.  With some very helpful input from my colleague, we explored some specific concerns and some more generic ones, concluding that actually the fact that he had these questions was evidence of itself that he is now ready for Baptism.

No-one is ever 'ready' for Baptism.  No-one fully 'gets' what they are doing, what it means, what (if anything) it does, how life will be different or the same afterwards.  We all continue to sin, to stumble and struggle - because we are always God's "work-in-progress".  But the ability to recognise that, to identify that this or that topic or future decision might be affected by me marking my discipleship of Jesus in this profound way, is a sign of being 'ready enough'.

And of course we Baptise people in the context of a faith community - it is not a private ceremony, but a public act, in which we who are witnesses promise to stand with our newly baptised sibling-in-Christ, upholding them as best we can, as they, in turn, uphold us.

I am excited, very excited about our Pentecost service.  I am excited, very excited about how God's Spirit's working in people's hearts and minds is leading to new expressions of faith and commitment.  I am excited because just as we are, God will receive us and bless us.  We're never going to be ready, but we can be ready enough...