"Membership in the family of God is neither inconsequential or something to be casually ignored. The church is God's agenda for the world. Jesus said, "I will build my church, and all the powers of hell will not conquer it." The church is indestructable and will exist for eternity. It will outlive this universe, and so will your role in it."
- Rick Warren
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Riffing, kind of, off this post by Andrew:
If you're a believer, could you tell us in the comments thread how you came to faith in Christ? Did it happen all in a moment? Was it a process? How did God save you? As far as you know, have you always been a Christian?
Do you remember what it felt like to not be a believer? What drew you towards faith? Has your Christian life seen a good, steady growth in faith and love toward God since you were redeemed, or have you experienced fits and starts, slippings, fallings, and restorings?
What's your story? We'd love to hear it - feel free to expound at length in the comments. Thanks!
(You can read the other posts in this series by clicking here).
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Comments on "Tell Me Something Good #6 - Salvation":
2. Bird
- 12/04/2008 8:14 am CST
In a nutshell, years and years of believing without repenting. Finally, repentance and, then, life. :-)
3. Shrode
- 12/04/2008 8:32 am CST
Darin,
That's a great story!
Bill, no offense, but I think I'm going to share my story over at Andrew's post. :)
4. Bob Sacamento
- 12/04/2008 9:12 am CST
Believed for a long time. Decided to get serious about it in junior high. By the time I was 20, I was a real Pharisee. After driving myself and everybody around me crazy for a couple of years, I decided to mellow out. I became more of a "Corinthian" Christian, if you know what I mean. For several years now, I've been trying to find the balance between the two extremes. I am very good at being a "Pharisee" Christian and very good at being a "Greek" Christian.
After uncountable hours in church, prayer, and Bible study, I still can't find that way of freedom from both legalism and empty pleasure that Paul talks about. It sucks.
I know the title of your post was "Tell Me Something Good," but you also asked "Has your Christian life seen a good, steady growth in faith and love toward God since you were redeemed, or have you experienced fits and starts, slippings, fallings, and restorings?" So I figured I could say this. And I thought maybe someone would have some good advice for me.
5. Julianna
- 12/04/2008 9:13 am CST
I vaguely remember telling people I was saved at 4 or 5 after my cousin/best friend got saved. I eventually realized that no real decision had been made at that point, cause I couldn't tell people what it meant. I just wanted to be like Bonnie, so I said I made a decision too.
The summer of 1990 at VBS the speaker talked about hell. I knew that there was a hell and that was where bad people went, but I didn't realize that anyone who didn't trust Christ as their Savior would go there too. That day I sat in the back of the church auditorium with my pastor's daughter and prayed. Acknowledging that I was indeed a sinner and needed Christ to save me from eternal death to eternal life.
Ok. Ok. Sounds deep for a 9 year old, but I understood. Since then life has certainly not been easy. My parents are not Christians and I often stumbled in my walk through jr high and high school. Wrong friends. Bad decisions. Thankfully, none with long-lasting consequences (God's grace and mercy). My grandma was a Christian and she wanted me to go to a Bible college more than anything, so my sr year I applied. Said I would go for a year just to make her happy and then it was back to Penn State. Well, the Lord gripped my heart in that first semester and although I had to sit out the second semester of my freshman year I went back and finished. Graduating Dec '02. Unfortunately (only for me, not for her) my grandma didn't live to see that. She passed away the week of Thanksgiving that same year - just a few weeks before.
Although I don't remember much of what it was like not to be a believer, non-believers were in my home and I was constantly reminded of what I was saved from. I also have gone through plenty of times where I didn't live the 'Christian life', but the wonderful thing about that is that God never gave up one me and was always there with open arms when I was ready to come home.
6. Roy
- 12/04/2008 2:38 pm CST
Started kindergarden at 5. School used age to hold back subsequent grade promotion. That plus concerns about discipline led unbelieving parents to advance me to next grade by putting me in a Christian school (praise God for providence) where I started 3rd grade. Class required memorization of scripture. (More praise as well as a hint for those working with kids.)
First 2 verses memorized were Acts 4:12, II Tim 2:19.
Acts says, "Neither is there salvation in any other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." While I understood little of the big picture of the Bible's story, being nearly totally ignorant and only 8 yrs old, I did have some clues. "Salvation" and "saved" told me of some big need. No "other name" told me that Jesus was pretty central to whatever was going on. Tho I certainly did not grasp all the implications, I had little doubt about the meaning of "must".
Timothy says, "Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal,'The Lord knoweth them that are his.' And, Let everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity." It would take 11 years and another providential set of circumstances before God opened my eyes to the reality of sovereign grace and the meaning of the first two parts of that verse. But the last part of the verse nailed me. I only vaguely understood 'iniquity', what with 4 syllables and all. But I understood at least a little that I was in a different school partly because of myself. And I had an inkling of myself as a sinner. "Depart from iniquity" came across clearly enough: God had a standard I did not meet.
For a few weeks those verses echoed in the back of my mind. Finally, one day on the playground, I left a kickball game to find my teacher. I asked her to explain the verses. I don't recall the details. But I do vividly remember (over 50 yrs ago) coming to understand that Jesus loved me even tho I was not lovely. I do remember the light bulb coming on, the 'aha experience' as that message overwhelmed me with surprise, with joy, with belief.
I had and have no doubt that from that time I belonged to Jesus. As I grew and understood more of the scripture (especially subsequent to realizing the truth of sovereign grace), I more clearly understood the implications of salvation as God's work in me. More and more clearly I realize that he deserves all the praise, all the glory, that in spite of my sin and failure, he clings to me that I might cling to him.
Thus I understand experiencially and can recall a time I was not a Christian, a transition when I became a Christian, and a long time as a Christian where I have faced a continual war against sin. The picture of battle in Eph 6 makes sense, especially when getting to the part where the battle is much bigger than me. Reflecting on my history, I can easily see where God has intervened, keeping me from destruction, chastizing and directing. I can easily see God's incredible preserving and unmistakable graciousness. Starts, slippings, fallings (ie, failings), preservings (aka restorings), yes. In all this, while making no claim of having conquered sin and while openly declaring a deep longing for a time when I can do something, anything, not tainted by sin, a deep longing for God to finish, as promised, the work begun in me, I also realize growth in obedience, a deepening longing for "...holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord" (Heb 12:14).
With a view of that even sin's limitations complicating human finitude cannot entirely cloud, I attest to God's caring for me via established means of grace. To the extent that I have obeyed, that, from the human side of the situation, has depended on reading scripture (and memorizing it), upon regular family devotions, upon prayer, upon refusing to let anything continue to keep me from regularly gathering with other Christians to worship God and hear his word proclaimed.
7. Pigwotflies
- 12/04/2008 4:06 pm CST
I grew up in a Christian family and have thought of myself as a Christian for as long as I can remember. My mum reckons the Bible week we went on the summer I was 6 was significant for me in knowing Jesus. I can't really remember. I do remember growing up wanting desperately to know I was saved and committing my life again to God, just in case.
I was baptised when I was 13. That was really important to me. It was also about the time I started going to a different church from my parents (or rather they started going to a different church. Long story, but essentially I stayed in the Anglican church we'd always been in and they joined a house church.). Being baptised was for me partly about showing people that I was a Christian because I wanted to be, not just because my parents were.
In my teens, I loved arguments. I loved to argue a Christian point of view because I knew I was right. I didn't really have much sensitivity or grace though. I went to church (mostly) but it didn't always affect the rest of my life much. I went to various Christian camps which would always get me excited about God and the Bible for a few weeks, but the excitement would soon fade.
The biggest change came when I went off to university. My first term was a shock to me, in terms of the way I found myself behaving. I messed up hugely. I remember trying to have 'neutral days' when I didn't really do anything bad, but didn't do much 'holy' either, or I tried to balance the bad with the good. The best thing that happened in my first term was that I joined the Christian Union. There I met people who astounded me. The way they talked, you could tell that being a Christian affected their whole lives, not just what they did on a Sunday or their views on moral issues. I realised just how shallow my faith was, how little I knew the Bible, how little I knew God. I left uni to go home at the end of term feeling awful. I'd messed up hugely, I couldn't get things I'd done out of my mind and I didn't know what to do.
I can't remember exactly what changed, but I do know that the next term was like a fresh start. I started meeting up with someone to study the Bible together and suddenly it all became new and fresh. Things I'd read in the Bible before suddenly became new and alive and relevant to me. It was amazing! Near the end of that term I was asked to co-lead the college CU group, which amazed me too. God knew how badly I'd messed up, did he really want me to lead people? Such grace!
There've been ups and downs since then, but I'd say my time at Uni was when I really learnt how to live a Christian life. The thing that really struck me was how much other Christians' lives and attitudes demonstrated what they believed. I struggled then and still do with formalised evangelism. Not because I think it's wrong, but because I find it hard. Sometimes it seemed like we were being taught a UCCF/OICCU method of evangelism which consisted of turning every conversation round to Jesus and getting in '2 ways to live' or another gospel outline at any opportunity. That's never really been my style, though I'd admit to making 'not my style' an excuse for not trying.
I wish everything had been steady progress since then. I think it's been more fits and starts. I've had lots of periods of depression, some worse than others. My second year at uni was a pretty dark time, when I felt like God was miles away. The main thing that brought that to an end was being filled with the Spirit and speaking in tongues for the first time. I do wish I'd been taught about the Holy Spirit earlier in my life. I don't remember him being mentioned as a person of God during my time growing up, except in RE is discussions of the Trinity (mostly based around the water analogy). When I first encountered charismatics, when I went to Holy Trinity, Brompton around 1994, I was properly freaked out.
By the time I was at uni, my parents were in a smallish New Frontiers church. I found it hard to keep the link at my old home church while I was away at uni without my parents there all the time. The church I went to in my uni town was Anglican, like my home church, but more alive and more charismatic. (Which occasionally freaked me out too. I remember one Pentecost Sunday sermon particularly, when the preaching about the first Pentecost and how we could know the same power at work in use today left me confused and blank.) I started going to church with my parents again and experienced the culture shock of being in a small church (about 60-80 people at the time) where everyone was encouraged to bring something to the worship, a portion of scripture, a tongue, a prophecy. For someone used to the order of an Anglican service, albeit fairly relaxed ones, it was a bit unnerving. Now, though, I love it! I couldn't go back to being an Anglican (though I will admit to missing liturgy occasionally). I love knowing that God can speak through anyone he chooses, we're all able to hear his voice and know him.
I'm still growing. It's been a tough year. I've been ill and depressed. I've learnt a lot about God's grace and provision and about depending on him. I'm still learning!
That was long, wasn't it? Ah well.
8. Milly
- 12/04/2008 5:31 pm CST
I think that I have always been a believer, I was raised in and out of a church but I don’t think that I have come to know God as well as I should. Since I have decided to divorce my husband my hunger and need has grown. I need Him and I want to know Him better. I had described myself as a child pulling at God wanting more of Him because that’s the way I’ve felt in all of this. He has shown me more and more of who He is and who I am in all of the pain. He has given me strength in getting out of this abusive relationship. I had no idea that I was even in one until he opened my eyes to it, He let me cry for a time then He helped me up and gave me the ability to move my life forward. I feel like I’m new to the God that I know now.
9. Bill
- 12/05/2008 6:28 am CST
Thanks everyone for telling us your story. It's been a blessing (and keep 'em coming!)
10. slink
- 12/05/2008 3:26 pm CST
I have gone to church for as long as I can remember and don't really recall the non-believing life too well. If I had to pick a single moment it would be the summer between 7th and 8th grade when I realized that faith meant more than showing up to church most Sundays. Up until that point I thought that going to church regularly equalled getting into Heaven and that people who didn't do that had no one but themselves to blame. I was in a pretty fundamentalist dispensationalist church at the time and I'm not sure how much of that was their doctrine, how much of that is what they taught despite their official doctrine, and how much of that was solely my fault.
Since that time I would say that I've grown in faith but there have also definitely been struggles and a period of what some people would say was backsliding.
I eventually wound up leaving the church of my youth for a slightly less fundamentalist and much more charismatic church for the great theological reason that they had people my own age there. I eventually left that church because I got tired of emotionally/psychologically manipulative sermons. I was also put off by the fact that no one could be bothered to call me about anything until they started a fund raiser for a new sanctuary. I wound up moving a third time to the Methodists where I have been ever since (approx. 10 years now) but I am constantly plagued by doubts as to whether I should stay put or go to a different denomination.
I'm still in church and I still have faith so I'm counting that as something good.
11. dbd
- 12/09/2008 3:59 pm CST
Pity me on my pilgrimage to Loch Derg!
O King of the churches and the bells
Bewailing your sores and your wounds
But not a tear can I squeeze from my eyes
Nor moisten an eye after so much sin!
Pity me, O King! What can I do with a heart
That seeks only its own ease? Only begotten Son
By whom all men were made, who shunned not
The death by three wounds, pity me
On my pilgrimage to Loch Derg.
And I with a heart not softer than a stone!
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It was the summer of 1983. I was sixteen. My parents needed a vacation - from me. They dropped me off at my older brother's home.
My brother lived in Central Florida just a few miles from what was known as the most aligator populated lake in North America. He planned a day-long fishing trip for the two of us complete with fishing tackle and glorified row boat with a tiny engine.
We made our way to a section of the lake where we were pretty much surrounded by gators - you could see their backs, heads and snouts breaking the water. It looked as if you could have walked to shore stepping from gator to gator. My brother stopped the boat, opened his tackle box and pulled out a Bible. He said, "I want to talk to you about Jesus. If you don't want to hear it, you can swim for shore."
I had always held a belief that God existed. I suppose that my gospel was one of His fairness - that He would look down on me with a discerning eye and see that, for the most part, I was pretty good. I wasn't Charles Manson or Adolf Hitler.
My brother got to the word 'perfect' in his sharing the gospel with me. As good as I might have thought that I was compared to the really bad guys out there, I knew I was far short of perfect. Then he got to the good news - that the perfection of Jesus could be my remedy. I had more questions than he had answers, but that was the turning point for me.
I think the aligators helped. I'd recommend that lake and an old row boat as a great setting in which to share your faith with others.