Our church has asked each woman to write her "faith story." Here is mine.
I am so thankful that I grew up in a Christian home with a functional, fun, warm, close family, and was saved as a preschooler. But in some ways it was more difficult to understand the gospel without having consciously experienced life without Him.
Although no one ever said this, I got the idea that Christians don’t sin. I knew that when my parents were saved in their early 20s, they started living very differently than they had in their wild college days. So I didn’t know how to handle my own struggles with sin that intensified when I reached high school and college. Although in retrospect I know they would have been so encouraging, at the time I didn’t want to risk disappointing my parents. So I agonized alone…was I really saved? Why was I sinning? How could I stop?
God continued to be at work in my life: I was surrounded by godly people and went to Bible-teaching churches. And although I was inconsistent, He gave me a strong desire to study His Word and obey Him. A turning point was when I joined Bible Study Fellowship and had real accountability for daily Bible study. Funny how the answers to my questions are always in the Bible…if I just read it! I came to see that the gospel wasn’t just for me when I was saved at 3; I need it every moment of every day!
I am so thankful that I am not saved because of my (insufficient) obedience, but through turning from my sins and having faith in Jesus, that He is God’s Son and died for my sins and was resurrected and glorified. Now God does not see me with all my flaws; but with Christ’s perfection. So when I am dismayed at my own failings I am thankful for their reminder that I am imperfect, which makes my joy in Jesus all the more precious and immediate. My delight in Him fills me with a longing to praise and to please Him. He will make me more holy as I respond to what He has done, focusing on knowing Him and His promises, and not on my struggles.
I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2:20
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Today I was asked to read this to the women's Bible study. I received a lot of positive feedback from women who also grew up in Christian homes. So often testimonies are told almost like fairy tales: "I was living in sin and misery, then Jesus saved me and now I live happily ever after." True! But there is a lot to that "happily ever after."
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