Conversion Stories - Cheryl Repass

"Cheryl Celebrates One Year of Joy!"

"I will be baptized in the year 2000
   because I am a child of god.
We'll sing our songs, we'll say our prayers
   and praise the Lord above.
Now it's time to enter the water,
   my sins will be washed away.
Ty will say a prayer, lightly set me in
   and I'll come up into a peaceful way.
Then that night I'll receive the holy ghost
   he will tell me right from wrong.
My new life has just begun,
   because now I am baptized."

I wrote this poem a few days after my mom gave me permission to be baptized. You see I come from a part member immediate family. My grandma, VaDon Repass, started taking me to church at age 5. Around the age of 7 1/2 I had the desire to be baptized. When I asked my mom for her permission, she said no because I was already baptized Catholic. I knew if I kept asking her I would have to wait till I was 18. But this did not stop me. I still continued to come to church and all the primary activities. Every time I heard there was a baptism, I told my grandma we would have to go. And we always did. Sometimes I would think how great it was to be baptized and how lucky they were to have this opportunity. My grandma would assure me that my time would come. So I continued to be obedient to my parents and just waited patiently. In January of last year for primary sharing time we did a pretend baptism as we talked about how Jesus was baptized. Sister Lindow was planning on having a boy be baptized, but 5 years of waiting came out of me, and she picked me. I was so happy and felt so special I thought of it as my own baptism. I was talking to my mom that Sunday evening and told her about what we had done and how great it was and asked if I could get baptized for real and she said "sure" so I took it as a yes, told my grandma and she setup my missionary discussions and on January 25, 2000 I was baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.