Free Stateless by Alan Gold

scrupulous about his cleanliness by bathing in the river when he could.
    What caused him doubt, though, was that he was being told by Abimelech that this ceremony would enable him to be reborn. He was already born.
    Abram pondered the word ‘reborn’ and all that it might entail. Reborn as a follower of Jesus? Would he still be Jewish? Abimelech had called it the ‘New Judaism’ but Abram wondered what that meant. The man had spoken of how many Jews were ‘converting’ to be free of the control of the priests and their laws but the very idea of ‘conversion’ to something else appeared so very foreign to the lad.
    Either you are or you are not. In the old days, when the Jews controlled their land, many people converted to being Jews, and their whole body was immersed in the water of the mikveh as the final act. But since the time of the Romans, nobody converted to being a Jew – who would want to? And, in turn, the priests and rabbis had no interest in converting anyone. Yet these followers of Jesus seemed to be passionate about the idea of changing who people were. He couldn’t work it out.
    Perhaps he should run away, as he’d run from the High Priest’s house. But he was still weak from the illness, and these Jews had been kind to him. And perhaps this ceremony would benefit him, make him stronger, able to complete the task which Rabbi Shimon had sent him to Jerusalem to perform. Yes, he thought, he would go through the ceremony of baptism, and see what happened afterwards.
    It was at midday that Abram walked with Abimelech and Elisheva through the tiny village. They were slowly joined by other people from the community. No one spoke; they simply fell in beside and behind, walking with them toward the river.
    Abram was afraid. The seal was still clenched tight in his fist from the night before when he feared that Abimelech mighttake it from him. He did not know what would happen at the baptism other than he would have to be covered by water and could not take the risk that the seal would be lost in the current.
    His eyes darted about him as the procession moved slowly out of the village and down the hill. He looked for a place to hide the seal, some place safe he could secrete it and return for it later, someplace which was marked and which he could remember. Finally his eyes landed upon a large stone marker, a milestone that was etched in Roman numerals showing the distance of the road. The milestone had a collection of Roman letters that he could not read but one stood out, an X, and Abram knew that this would be a mark he could remember.
    With quick thinking, and before they could pass by the milestone, Abram moved his right foot too far over in front of his left and forced himself to trip and stumble to his knees directly in front of the marker. He pushed his hand out in front of himself to catch his fall, but in that hand was the stone seal. With the weight of his fall he pushed the seal as far into the sandy earth as he could.
    Almost immediately Elisheva bowed to his side to help him up. ‘Are you alright, Abram? Are you hurt?’
    â€˜No. I am fine. I just tripped,’ Abram said softly but it was loud enough for Abimelech to hear.
    â€˜And so did our Lord Jesus trip and stumble as he carried the cross.’ Abimelech reached down to help Abram up but before he rose, the lad took one last opportunity to push the stone seal deeper into the sandy dirt at the foot of the milestone and offered a silent prayer that it was well hidden.
    As he was helped to his feet, Abimelech whispered into Abram’s ear, ‘It is the old ways that make you stumble, my son. You walk towards a new life and your old life still clings to you,wanting to drag you down. But we shall not let it . . .’
    Abimelech gripped Abram’s arm so hard his nails dug into his flesh. ‘You will be baptised. You will be one of us. It is the only way you can be