Favorite Thing - Salvation

It's Sunday and I'm inspired to write about my most favorite of favorite things: Salvation!

Now, before you stop reading (I know, you've "heard this a million times before" or you just don't agree), I would encourage you to read on. I'd like to tell my story. I can at least guarantee that it's a pretty interesting one.

Where do I start?

Well, I grew up going to church with my family. It was the kind of church that almost my (dad's) whole family went to. My parents were married there as well as many other family members over the years. We would spend Sunday afternoons at my grandparents house after church and visiting aunts, uncles, and cousins who all lived in the area. I was confirmed as a church member around the age of 14(?) . The things that I most remember learning/hearing about the Bible were memorizing the books of the Bible, memorizing the Lord's prayer, and a sermon given by our pastor which required the congregation to respond with "uh-huh" at various intervals after he would say, "You've got the right one with Jesus" (during the Pepsi "Right One Baby" era). Other than that, I don't remember anyone talking about the concept of being saved or the concept of being a sinner (not that anyone didn't, if they did, I just don't remember it). I think my beliefs about God, Heaven, and Hell at the time can be summed up like this:

If you're a "good" person, you'll go to Heaven (good meaning not a murderer, rapist, etc.).

It's important to know and recite the Lord's prayer, Apostle's Creed, and benediction during the church service.

I really can't remember anything else right now.

Note: I realize that family members that went to this church with me may be reading this. I just want to emphasize that this is an account of my experience. I realize that I was young and may not remember things the way they really were. I just think that it's important to tell how things were for me so I can better explain how I came to be where I am today.


My brother was confirmed about a year after me, and then my family pretty much stopped going to church. Without going into too much detail, I would say that there are various reasons why that happened (possibly some that I'm not even aware of...I was only a young teenager).

Anyways, this happened to be a pivotal time in my life. At 15, I lost my virginity. It was a horrible experience. However, it did not keep me from living a promiscuous lifestyle. It was also around this age when I began to try smoking. By the time I was 16, I had several more partners, was smoking weed, and drinking alcohol regularly. I hated going to school (even though I was good at it). Most of my friends were older than me and by 17, I was staying out all night, partying, etc. I ended up in a really emotionally bad relationship from the time I was 17 off and on until I was 21. Of course, this didn't keep me from finding more guys during our break-ups. By the time I was 21, going to bars had lost it's excitement. I had been going to them for several years by then and it wasn't pretty. My drinking had escalated to a point where I didn't feel like I had a "good/fun" night unless I left drunk and/or with a guy.

*This is getting hard to write. I feel so ashamed and vulnerable right now. I feel like I'm fighting a battle just to write this publicly. Although I have shared this story many times before, it still hurts just as bad to think about all of the horrible things that I went through.

At 21, I met Jon. We began exclusively dating a couple of months after we met. Although I had toned down my party lifestyle by then, I was still a little wild for his liking. He asked me to stop drinking and going to clubs with my friends. I remember thinking that if I wanted him to stop doing something for me, I would hope that he would respect me enough to do it. So, I stopped drinking and going to clubs with my friends. Wow, did that ever cause problems! Suddenly, I was being brain-washed? That's what they were saying.

Jon was a pretty moral person. He grew up in a Biblically solid church and knew a lot more about the Bible than I did. He also had some very good Christian friends that he was still in contact with when we met. He even worked for one of them. Anyways, Jon and I started talking about the Bible and our beliefs.

I can remember one time when we were in the car and he asked me if I thought I was a Christian. I told him that I did. He told me that the word Christian itself means to be Christ-like. He then asked me if I thought that Jesus would have been doing drugs, getting drunk, and sleeping around like I was. I was SO MAD!!! How dare he question my "faith"! Well, what ended up happening was that I began to question my "faith". We talked about reading the Bible together. I thought, why not? It's not like it would hurt anything. However, that's all we did was talk about doing it.

On another occasion, we were sitting and talking, and Jon asked me that if I were to die that night, did I think I would go to Heaven? I said yes. He said that he believed that we would both go to Hell. I told him that although I didn't agree, if he really felt that way, maybe he should do something about it.

A few weeks after that, Jon's friend who he had previously worked for called to say that he had tax info. for Jon and asked if he could come over to get it. I went with him. We sat at the dining room table in this guy's house and he was just talking to us about his day. He told us about a conversation that he had with someone about time. He said that time was explained as a line and that your life was like a dot on that line. The meaning being that life is very short. He also talked about how the Bible says that not everyone who believes in God will go to Heaven (Matthew 7:21-23)http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+7&version=NIV. (Another passage that supports this that he didn't mention is found in James 2:19 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=James+2&version=NIV).

I left there in shock! I never heard such a thing before! The thing is, his friend was in no way trying to preach to me. Like I said, he was just telling us about a couple of conversations that he had that day. Anyways, I went home and found the only Bible that I could find (a kid's Bible) and tried to start reading it. I started in the beginning of Genesis, but felt like I wasn't really understanding it. However, this time I just couldn't shake the feeling that something really wasn't right. I had heard of getting "saved", but didn't know what it really meant. All I knew is that I was beginning to think that I needed to do it!

Because Jon and I had talked about the subject several times, but never did anything about it, I was reluctant to bring it up again. I thought that if I told him that I was finally serious about this whole Bible thing, that it would scare him away. I spent several weeks trying to figure out what to do. Finally, one night, I called him and said that I wanted to read the Bible, and that I thought I needed to get saved and that if he wanted to do it too, that would be great, and if not, maybe his friend could help me. Thankfully, he felt the same way! He had been seriously thinking about it and didn't want to scare me away either! So, I bought a Bible and we began reading 5 chapters a day beginning in Matthew (Jon's suggestion). I had SO MANY questions about what I was reading! We talked every night about what we read. Jon told me that if I wrote all of my questions down, I would find some of the answers as I read more. He also talked about needing to pray and ask God for forgiveness. Forgiveness? By this time, I was convinced that I was a sinner (even though I hadn't read anything that directly said so yet). I now had 2 new problems. First, I didn't believe that God could forgive me for everything that I had done wrong. Second, if God could forgive me, I didn't deserve it.

After a couple of weeks of reading and talking about the Bible, I decided to ask for God's forgiveness. It was at night and I was in my room. I felt so inadequate. I didn't think that I knew how to pray. So, I just started asking God to forgive me for the things that I knew in my heart were wrong. I was bawling. My whole life changed that night.

The next day when I talked to Jon, I said, "Guess what I did last night?". He responded with, "Guess what I did this morning?"!!! We both got saved within 24 hours of each other! Without trying to, we changed our relationship and our lives immediately. Although I had already stopped drinking, smoking, and doing drugs, Jon and I were intimately involved and I had the "mouth of a sailor" until that point. No one told us to change. We just did. We just wanted to live lives that were pleasing to God.

Oh, to tell you everything that happened after that could fill a book! I will tell share a few things that happened since then (10 years ago now).

After much prayer, Jon asked me to marry him in the beginning of his senior year of college. We lived in a ministry house for Christian college men near MSU. Jon was the house director for 5 years. We faced many challenges there as newlyweds and as house-directors. God protected us from homeless people who threatened Jon's life and who physically harmed residents in the house. When Jon got in a car accident and his car was totaled, the Lord provided a car through someone at our church. When it was our time to leave the house and get our own home, the Lord showed us who He wanted to take over the ministry where we left off. A couple of years ago when Jon was offered a job that required us to travel and sell our house, the Lord provided a buyer willing to pay more than we did for it in a down market. After 6 1/2 years of not having any children, God provided us with a child through adoption.

These are only a few examples of how God has worked in our lives. Not everything has been all "rainbows and butterflies" since that night in my room, but when I did go through trials, God has always seen me through them.

The Bible says that everyone is a sinner (Romans 3:23 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+3&version=NIV).

The Bible also says that our payment for sin is death, but that salvation is a gift (Romans 6:23 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+6&version=NIV).

The Bible says that even though we're sinners, God loves us (Romans 5:8 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+5&version=NIV).

Finally, the Bible tells us how we can accept this gift of salvation (Romans 10:13 and 10:9 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+10&version=NIV).

In Romans 10:9, it talks about believing with your heart. That is so critical, I think. I spent years having a head-knowledge that God existed, but until that night in my room, I never had a heart knowledge. That's what changed everything. :)

*If my story has touched you, and you realize that you want/need to be saved, please don't hesitate to do something about it. I would absolutely love to talk more about it with you. I think all of my "followers" are friends with me on Facebook. Send a message to my inbox if you don't want to post anything here.

Blessings to everyone!