When I was around 8 years old, I "accepted Christ" and was officially "saved." I can remember that day clearly because it was probably the most anti-climatic experience of my life. I guess one day I was tired of being left out of this spiritual existence that all the adults were always going on about and I decided it was time. So I knelt down, said the typical rehearsed "I'm a sinner and please Lord take my sin away" blah blah blah prayer and that was that.
Absolutely nothing changed. No angels descended from heaven to congratulate me. I wasn't suddenly enlightened with all of this information about God and love and how to be a good Christian. I didn't even feel any different. I didn't understand. What did I do wrong? This is what I had seen and heard about. This is what those alter calls at church were about. You go and kneel before God and accept Him and then everything feels better and more wonderful than before.
I was so scared. Something must be wrong with me, I decided. I had always been taught that when you're saved you know it and you don't have any doubts. So therefore, I must not be saved. Every single night for a long time I prayed the same prayer before I went to sleep hoping I would way up one morning and feel like a Christian.
"Dear heavenly Father, I know I'm a sinner and I believe in you and please forgive me for the things that I've done wrong. Amen."
I thought maybe if I went to the front of the church and knelt down and prayed it would work. But I was too afraid of what my parents would say about that. I thought they would ask me what I was doing and yell and make fun of me so I never did.
I just kept saying that same prayer every night. Hoping that it would work. Hoping that if something were to happen to me that I would be saved and I would go to heaven. I was terrified that I would never be able to be a true Christian but even more afraid to tell anybody how I was feeling.
There was one day when I was very upset. I felt lonely, I felt lost, and I cried to God to please just take the pain that I was feeling away because I didn't know how to handle it on my own. And it went away. Just like that. Which, you know, was pretty darn surprising to me. So I was saved!
In hindsight, of course, I was saved all along. I was saved from the very first moment in my life that I believed in Jesus Christ. Now I don't know at what point exactly that was...but it was before the age of 8 when I recited a prayer someone wrote for a gospel tract. God was with me that entire time. And I just didn't realize it because I had never really tried to talk to Him before. I was so worried about this salvation business and doing it wrong that I had never thought to just "be still and know." I didn't think He would listen to me until I was "saved." I didn't think He would be around until then. I also didn't think He would listen to me if it was about something stupid. Or what if I wasn't supposed to be saved? What if I was one of those people who He already knew was going to hell so he wasn't even going to bother.
These are the kind of doubts that kept me up at night. For a really long time. And it's sad because Christianity is not supposed to be like that. I'm not blaming anyone...but the reason I felt that way was because salvation was not explained to me correctly. It scared me and confused me. It seemed like something children couldn't understand, although we were supposed to. It was so much pressure and politics. I didn't even want to talk to my parents about it because I felt stupid.
8 year old me was confused and terrified by religion.
17 year old me is confident and fulfilled by my relationship with Jesus Christ.
Don't let religion get in the way of your relationship with God. If you know and believe that Jesus is your Savior, you're saved. If you feel His presence in your life, you're saved. You don't need to kneel before the alter or recite a prayer. You don't need to have this eye-opening experience in the moment of acceptance. If you know that you can't do it on your own and you want to know Jesus in your heart, all you have to do is believe. He's already there. God is always there. All you have to do is let Him in.
I know that I am saved not because I am a "perfect Christian." Not because I never do anything wrong. But because God is there for me when I need him. Because I can see him in my life, in the people around me, and in the beauty of the things that He has created. I can feel Him in my heart comforting and guiding me. Have I pushed Him away. Ha. Yes. Yes I have. I've ignored Him and I've been let astray. But He is always there.
Because He promised in Hebrews 13:5, "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee."
That's God's word completely untouched and untainted by the politics of men and their religion. And there's nothing terrifying about that.
Straight from God Himself
If you don't know what to do to be saved/if you're wondering if you "did it right":
"For God so loved the
world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in
him should not perish, but have everlasting life." ~ John 3:16
"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:" ~ Ephesians 2:8
If you feel like you're too unimportant/why would God care about you and your problems:
"And he spake this parable unto them, saying, What
man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not
leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is
lost, until he find it?" ~ Luke 15:3-4
"Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows." Matthew 10:29-31
If you don't know how you can make it through life. If you're terrified, lost, confused, helpless...remember that with God all things are possible. You can't do it alone, but you are NOT alone. And with if God is for us, who can stand against us? My personal favorite John 16:33:
"These
things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the
world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome
the world."
