It’s been a weird couple of weeks, y’all. I don’t really know how to explain it all either, but the Lord is working in ways that only He can, removing things from my life and drawing me closer to Him all at the same time.
Around August of last year, the Lord put it on my heart to start helping out with our youth group at church. I had started mentoring a couple of high school age girls and they really made me want to get to know the others too. These kids y’all, especially these high school girls, are changing my life. They’re hungry to learn more about Jesus, they get excited for the sermons on Sunday morning, and the things they say during sermon applications have had me questioning a lot of things in my own life.
Yesterday, for example, our pastor had this one point that stood out to me during his sermon. He talked about how we can make an idol out of God and the gospel. Meaning, although we’re followers of Christ, sometimes we can look at God and the gospel as “What can this do for me? What can I get out of this?”. When in reality, God has already given us everything through His son Jesus. One of our girls last night was talking about this and it threw me for a loop. I had a long night of questioning if I was ever really saved when I thought I was.
I’ve said before, I was saved when I was 16. I’d been angry for years after Mom died and it got to a point that I had to stop fighting God’s call and give it all up to Him. For a while, all was good. I was happier, the anger I held on to seemed to dissolve, and life was good. But things only stayed good for a small amount of time. Something always seemed to come along and I found myself going back to sinful ways over and over because misery loves company, right? I still claimed Jesus and tried to follow Him, but I lived for a long time still thinking that there was no way that He could love me without condition. So I went through seasons of highs and seasons of lows, and then it all seemed to be going well for a longer period than usual. I was starting to really accept who I was in Him, that He saw me as forgiven and loved. But then Nanny fell one night and within two months she was gone. And then I fell into a deep depression. And then I found myself in a season of secret sin and darkness. While I was struggling with all of this, my world around me was spinning out of control. Friends having things taken from them, family on the brink of death, things I’ve only had nightmares about happening to my own father, it was all out of control.
But what I realized last night is that while I can’t pin point the exact moment that I was saved, I can tell you that July 2017 was when I really started to understand what it meant to follow after Christ no matter what. These terrible things were happening to people that I loved, I was hurting with them, but we were able to say through the hurt, “God is good. This doesn’t make sense, but God is still good.”
I don’t know where you’re at in your walk with Christ. I don’t know if it’s all fresh and new and you’re hungry for Him and all He’s doing. I don’t know if you’re in some kind of rut and you’re wondering if you’re going to get your spark again. I don’t know if you’ve found yourself questioning like I have the past little bit. But as a sweet, sweet friend told me today, “I don’t think it matters if you know the precise moment you became a believer. I mean, yeah, there’s value in knowing that and it’s worth evaluating, obviously, but, honestly, as long as you know where you stand with Jesus and are confident in His saving you, your position as a child of God, and what your eternity holds, the specific logistics of when aren’t as important.”
Here’s what I know for sure. Jesus is better. Jesus is my Savior and King. My eternity is secure in Him. While I will continue to grow and learn about Him each day, what matters is that I live for Him with all I’ve got. Will you?
“With my voice I cry out to the Lord; with my voice I plead for mercy to the Lord. I pour out my complaint before him; I tell my trouble before him. When my spirit faints within me, you know my way! In the path where I walk they have hidden a trap for me.”
Psalm 142:1-3 ESV
Beauty in the Ashes 