People were on their feet or knees now, bodies convulsing, arms swimming through the air and heads gyrating as if we were part of some ancient Druid ceremony.

“The flames are getting away from you now, sparks are flying out of control. Your tent is aflame and the towels you hung out on the line have caught fire.” Their fire dances become more animated. Everyone is now on their feet and many are dancing wildly, all still facing toward the sun. “Feel the heat on your body. In your body. Traveling through your body. Spreading from your body. Now the flames are raging, going where they will, jumping to the trees near your campsite and from there to the forest. The woods are burning and you are at the center. You are the beginning and the center of all the flames.”

I slowed my pace and my intensity. “The woods have been consumed. Your tent has burned and all that is left is that original campfire. Ah, to burn so brightly, to light so much afire is hard work, even for such a powerful flame. The fire is getting smaller, contracting, satisfied with what it has done. All the big logs are reduced to the smallest ember, glowing but still alive. Do you feel it, collapsing to the original source?”

I stopped guiding them and watched the fire dancers becoming small again, sitting or kneeling, back in the position from which their fire began, still moving but gently.

“The flame that spread from you has come back to where it began,” I said. “It has done its work and done it well. But the heat remains. Turn your face to the sun. Do you feel it? Lift your shoulders high, throw your chest out to catch the warmth. Do you feel it? Although your flame will ebb and flow, God’s flame, the universal flame of God’s love always burns strong. Feel it in silence for a moment until it fills you with confidence that the flame of the spirit is always alive within you and between you. Then stand, put your arms around a brother or sister who burns with the unquenched embers of the Spirit, and share God’s love.”

The hugging and sharing went on for long moments as people moved about, finding one friend after another to whom to pass God’s love, just as the flame of the spirit had spread throughout the woods until all was afire. God’s love moved among the people until it filled all of them, even those who had started out as onlookers and strangers. Even the cops, who had not joined in the fire exercise, joined in the sharing of loving embrace. All joined except Big Walt and his friends. They grimaced as if they had just witnessed a heresy.

As the hugging waned and attention returned to me, I called out in a loud voice, “Can someone say ‘Amen!’”

“Amen!” came back to me as one great voice.

“Can someone say, ‘praise be to God?’”

“Praise be to God!” rang out.

“Thank you for your Spirit,” I said, and the words echoed back to me.

“For your presence.”

“For your presence!”

“For burning in us and between us.”

“… in us and between us!”

“For your unfailing love.”

“ … your unfailing love!”

“Forever and ever.”

“Forever and ever!”

“Amen.”

“Amen!”

The word “amen” had no sooner left the gathering’s lips when a cry of, “look, there!” erupted from a woman near the front of the crowd. I’d never seen her before today. She was pointing, highly excited, to a spot above my head. “A dove!” she cried out.

I looked up and saw what I thought was a gull hanging motionless against a headwind as gulls will do for brief moments before flapping their wings and departing. My first thought was I was lucky it didn’t leave droppings on me. But the woman continued in a powerful voice, “God has shown his favor!” She fell to her knees and I saw the others whispering to each other, heads moving in affirmation, after which many others also fell to their knees before me. I was amused and frightened. But I lifted my arms to them, shaking my head in the negative.

“No, my brothers and sisters. Don’t kneel before me, kneel before God! I am no more anointed or ordained by God than any of you!”

At that, big Walt stepped forward, extending the long reverend’s arms he had used through the years to condemn so many for one fault or another, and in his booming voice called out, “You in fact are not ordained by anyone! In fact your ordination has been revoked. You are not an authorized preacher!”

That was partly true. I had received a letter from my denomination revoking my ordination. But to say I was not authorized? Did he not have eyes and ears? I heard his words loud and clear, the bellowing of the religious establishment, but for the others he might as well have been speaking in tongues. I saw John-John rushing up the stairs, climbing two steps at a time. He reached my side and whispered in my ear that some wanted to be baptized. I glanced over at the three police officers, then back at John-John, and nodded yes.

Again I lifted my arms. “I’m told that some among you, having been filled with the flame of the spirit, also want to be washed in the living waters of baptism.”

“Baptize me! Baptize me!” rang out from a dozen voices.

“Many of you I have already baptized. Once baptized, always baptized,” I said. “We don’t need to do it again.”

But many called out, “not me! Not yet! You haven’t baptized me!”

As I started for the steps, Jerry, who had been watching from the back of the deck, stepped forward and grabbed my arm, tilting his head toward the officers. “You agreed to stay on the deck,” he said between his teeth.

“I’m sorry Jerry,” I said, “ but God accepts no limitations.” I pulled away and with John-John at my side, hurried down the stairs onto the beach, leading the congregation to the water’s edge. And then waist-deep in the warm Atlantic waters I baptized in God’s name all who wished to have their faith strengthened and confirmed. As each rose from the waters, they stepped to the side, eventually forming a semi-circle behind me.

At the end of the line was the woman who had turned a sailing gull into the dove of God’s approval. I asked, “Do I know you sister?”

“Not in person, prophet,” she said.

“Have you not already been baptized?’

“Yes,” she said, “and I have baptized many myself.”

“Then why should you need to be baptized again?’

“Because I had no idea why I was here until I saw you. Now I know God has sent me here. God has many preachers and pastors, but few prophets. Do not deny me, prophet. Baptize me.”

I did baptize her and as she rose dripping with God’s salty ocean water a loud cheer went out from those around me in the water and watching on shore. But it quickly died down as we realized one of the police officers had removed his shoes, rolled up his uniform pant legs and was wading out through the breakers. I watched him coming toward me, a piece of paper in his hand. It was then I noticed my friend Jess, the newspaper editor, also entering the water with his camera, moving to the side as a photographer does, seeking a good angle for his shot. Where had he been until now I wondered?

The officer stopped several feet in front of me, the waves reaching his thighs. He glanced down to see if they had hit the revolver on his hip. They hadn’t. I smiled and said, “I don’t think you need to worry about keeping your powder dry son.”

“Don’t want my weapon or … anything … to be damaged,“ he mumbled.

“Of course. Have you come to be baptized?“

He lifted the paper to eye level and began to read a John Doe warrant. He read the words of an ordinance on permits required for use of the beach by large groups. I recognized him as the officer who was swaying side-to-side, eyes closed, during the earlier spreading of the flame. His face was red, quite obviously not enjoying his task.

“Have you ever been baptized, son?”

He lowered the warrant, speaking under his breath. “I have my duty--”

“I asked if you’ve ever been baptized?”

“No, sir.”

“I feel the desire in you. You want to be baptized now.”

He didn’t speak. The woman who had seen the dove stepped to his side and began whispering in his ear, her hand resting on his head. She kissed him on the cheek and he stared into her eyes. Finally, she turned to me and said, “yes, he wants to be washed clean in the living waters.”

A great cry went out from all the people as if they had witnessed a miracle. I saw the other two officers quickly removing their shoes, rolling up their pants and entering the water. I’d better hurry, I thought. But when they arrived, they gently accepted the young man’s holster belt with his weapon, radio and other tools of his trade. He left in place the badge on his chest and when Jess published his picture the next day of the young officer being lifted from the water, fresh from his baptism, you could see the gleam of the silver metal standing out, reflecting the sun, as the waters streamed from his soaked uniform and his head.

Now he was just one of us, one of God’s people. The dozen who had been baptized joined hands as we left the water. One had been a police officer, another a defrocked pastor, perhaps the same was true for the sister who had stepped forward. I knew several of those wet with the ocean waters. One was a car salesman in her daily life. Two were construction workers who for years had been drinking away the pain of their day’s work. The rest I was unsure of. It didn’t matter. We were all one in God’s eyes as we quietly walked through the shallowing waters to be greeted by our brothers and sisters on shore. We reached the absolute meeting place of water and land, the final few feet of beach where the water runs out, reluctant to go back, inch-deep and transparent, sparkling with light over the white sand. Up on the deck, I saw Jerry and Carolyn standing together. I hoped they were at peace with what had happened. They are the worriers. I know and I understand.

But down at the water’s edge, where the finite reach of land gives way to the infinite of ocean blue, where those who danced with the spirit’s flame awaited with loving smiles those newly baptized into the protection of God’s embrace, we were all at peace. No one made a move to arrest anyone as we marched up the beach. Even the shouts of joy had ceased. For the moment, we were quiet and at peace.