Miss Nora’s children’s ministry was quite successful in helping the boys and girls understand how to become Christians. Twenty of the youngsters prayed to invite Jesus into their hearts. Pastor Jerguson was ecstatic. That’s the most decisions ever in one day of ministry at the church. Yet the concern of how to baptize so many in one service quickly overtook his excitement. Grady and Goober heard him expressing his concern to Miss Nora.
“We think we can help you there, Pastor J,” Grady said.
“Well, Grady, I thought we decided not to let you boys back into the baptistry after what happened last time with Miss Francine.”
“No, this time we won’t even get in the water,” Grady said.
“Okay, what’s your idea?”
“Toss, dunk, toss,” Grady answered.
“Huh?”
“You get in the water,” Grady said. “Goober gets on one side and tosses a kid to you. You catch him and dunk him in one motion. Then when you bring him up, you toss him up to me on the other side. I’ll hand him to Miss Nora to dry him off. It’s a no-brainer.”
“I have to admit, you two might have a workable idea there,” Pastor Jerguson said.
At the baptismal part of the service, all the parents were present. It was a full house. Goober lined up all the children and told them to keep moving toward him. Pastor Jerguson was standing in the water explaining that they would be doing things a little differently today. Grady positioned himself to catch the wet and slippery kiddos. Miss Nora piled up a stack of clean towels to wrap each child in when Grady handed one to her. This was one well-organized plan.
Everything was going just fine. The precision of tossing, dunking, tossing and drying was incredibly smooth, until Little Missy Willows latched onto Goober’s neck and wrapped her legs around his waist. When he tried to toss her to Pastor J, he found himself going, too.
Grady yelled, “Look out Pastor J!” Pastor Jerguson turned around just in time to see the full-sized body lunging toward him with Little Missy strapped on his stomach. He grabbed them both at the same time and all three went under. The splash created a huge tsunamis that flooded the entire choir loft.
As soon as Little Missy hit the water she let go of Goober and was thrashing around in the tank. Grady jumped in and she latched onto his neck. He waddled out and up the steps toward Miss Nora who pealed her off him and wrapped her in the last towel.
The other two came up sputtering. Goober quickly waded to the side and disappeared up the steps. Pastor Jerguson looked for Grady. He, too, was gone. He smiled toward the congregation and called on Willie Bob to lead the closing prayer, while he went after Goober. But Goober and Grady were out in the truck and leaving the parking lot by the time he got out of his totally water-filled waders and began following the wet trail.
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