MUSKEGON -- Before the sparring, before the forms, before the first kick or punch, there is the pledge.
"I pledge allegiance to the cross of my Lord Jesus Christ," class members recite as they prepare for their weekly session in Kalamazoo's Agape Christian Church.
Only then do they bow and launch into the disciplines of martial arts as students have done for hundreds of years before them.
This is a dojo with a difference.
"Basically Christ is the center," said Wendy Williamson, a 31-year-old second-degree black belt instructor, in describing the class. "My main emphasis is that Christ is the master."
Williamson has heard the misgivings of evangelical Christians who regard karate, tae kwon do, jujitsu and other martial arts disciplines as anti-Christian and rooted in Eastern religions.
Not so, Williamson says.
This is not a casual observation. Williamson has invested a great deal of prayer and soul searching -- not to mention biblical text -- in her conviction that there is no paradox in Christian martial arts.
In fact, she says, the discipline of Christian martial arts qualifies as a bona fide movement.
Williamson -- a Muskegon native who now lives, works and teaches in Kalamazoo -- has chronicled that movement. Her book, "Martial Arts: The Christian Way," is hitting shelves in bookstores across the country.
Shattering misconceptions about Christian martial arts may be somewhat more challenging than shattering bricks or boards. But Williamson says the connection seems less mysterious once you learn more about Christianity -- and about martial arts.
The notion that martial arts are about violence is an idea held mainly by the uninformed, Williamson said.
"People generally don't know very much about martial arts," she said. "They see Bruce Lee on TV, and they think it's about beating people up, but that's so not true."
Nor are the traditional martial arts a form of Buddhism or any other Eastern religion, Williamson said.
"The martial arts are not religions," she said. "They came out of Asia, but they are not a religion. They are just a set of movements for self-defense."
In many teachings, they also include the teaching of such principles as honesty, patience and self-discipline.
Such principles are anything but anti-Christian, Williamson says.
"I often use the analogy of rock music," she said. "For a long time, a lot of people were saying rock music was evil and from the devil.
"But if you change the lyrics, what do you have? A great ministry."
Williamson has been studying martial arts for nearly 20 years. A 31-year-old coordinator for Western Michigan University's Study Abroad Program, Williamson has been honing her skills in the martial arts since she was 12.
She was born in Muskegon and moved with her family to South Bend when she was 5. It was there that her appetite for the martial arts was whetted.
"The whole family signed up -- my mom, my dad, my brother," Williamson said. She was the only one who stuck it out.
"I grew up in a regular old martial arts school, with the emphasis on the Zen Buddhism thing," she said.
When she went away to college, attending the University of Indiana at Bloomington, the criticisms began.
"I started to hear a lot of smack about people being in martial arts and Christian," she said. "They said it was an Eastern religion, it was evil, it was bad."
Nowadays, Williamson has plenty of ammunition to fight back. It begins with the Bible -- with Paul's letter to the Ephesians.
She quotes Paul's instructions for spiritual warfare -- "Put on the whole armor of God that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil" -- and adapts them to her own class.
She says she tells her students, "When you put on your uniform, it's the uniform of purity. When you put on your belt, it's the belt of truth."
In fact, much of the tradition of martial arts lends itself to Christian teaching. There is the Code of Bushido, for example -- a moral code set down for the Japanese Samurai, or fighting knights. It includes such principles as honesty, respect, loyalty, rectitude and valor.
"The difference is that the Samurai thought they could do this through themselves," Williamson said. "Christians try to develop the same things, but through Christ."
Williamson teaches a pair of Christian martial arts classes -- one for children and one for adults. The surprise has been the adult response.
"They really love it," she said. "A lot of them have always wanted to do martial arts, but never had the opportunity."
She said classes are designed not only for physical development, but mental and spiritual development as well.
"As you progress from yellow to black belt, you develop spiritually," she said.
For a while, Williamson's own martial arts development was on hold. She earned her black belt as a 19-year-old. Two years later, she had advanced to the second-degree level.
Ten years later, Williamson is still there, due largely to the life choices and demands. She earned a bachelor's degree at Indiana University and then received her master's degree in counselor education at Western Michigan University.
There followed four years of Peace Corps work in Cameroon and in Ecuador, where she met Francisco, now her husband. They have an 11-month old son, Leo.
And then there was the overriding sense that God intended her to write.
Contributing to the book was the sense of vindication Williamson experienced after returning to the United States. The Internet was in full swing then, and in her searches, she found she wasn't the only Christian martial arts instructor.