Ummmm… this doesn’t seem to reflect the respect that a serious religious act deserves.
Pastor Steven Furtick took the stage under a single spotlight, and after some coy banter, he reportedly announced that it was “Baptism Sunday,” but that this was “not your Mama’s Baptism Sunday.” At this cue, a giant water slide, stretching from the balcony down to a small pool of water, was unveiled from behind a large curtain as the worship band began performing TLC’s 1994 hit “Waterfalls.”
Those, like Marie Dotwiler, who had been ushered to the new entrance were directed one-by-one into the orange contraption and, with a push, sent hurtling toward the waters of baptism in screaming identification with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The church had hired auctioneers to stand along the sides of the slide and speedily utter the phrase, “I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” as the unsuspecting congregants whooshed by into the pool below.
“Otherwise we can’t count it,” Larry Hubatka told reporters.
There is no biblical prohibition on “speedy baptism”.
However Baptism is usually a part of worship.
Hebrews 12:28
28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe,
Hard to make the case this kind of Baptism is proper “reverence”.
While it is great the Baptism takes place, it can be done with more proper reverence.