What was your life like BEFORE Christ?
When I was a little girl, I asked
Jesus into my heart, because I was terrified of death, what came after, and
just about everything else a little girl can be afraid of. Nothing significant changed,
but for the next several years, I believed I was saved. In my self-righteous
religion, I worked hard to earn the approval of both God and men, but the Bible
says that, when compared to the glory of God’s holiness, “all our righteous
deeds are like filthy rags.” (Is. 64:6) I may have had the outward appearance of godliness and fooled myself and
others into believing I was a genuine follower of Christ, but as the Bible
describes it, I was nothing more than a lover of self, proud, arrogant,
ungrateful, heartless, a lover of pleasure rather than a lover of God. (2 Tim. 3:2-5)
I believed that I was a Christian
into adulthood, but Scripture would describe the person I was as one who was spiritually
dead. I desired for people to think me a friend of God, but privately I avoided
Him at every opportunity. I feared and dreaded His divine justice, knowing my
sin was great and deserving of it, but I could not understand His grace or
mercy. I knew a lot about God, being raised in the Church, but I did not
seek God and I did not love Him.
How did Jesus Christ CHANGE my
life?
“But God shows his love for us in
that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Rom. 5:8)
“But God, being rich in mercy,
because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our
trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” (Eph. 2:4 & 5)
One moment I was dead in my
trespasses and sin, separated forever from my Creator, and in the twinkling of
an eye, I was made alive, cleansed, forgiven, and set free from the power of
sin, united with my Savior for all eternity. It seems to me that the most glorious, most significant, most
grace-filled moment in a life should be easily remembered and also possibly
accompanied by fireworks.
Mine wasn’t. I don’t know when that
exact moment happened for me, but I do know this…
Over time, the Holy Spirit began softening
my heart to draw me to the Lord in genuine saving faith. At some point along the
way, I began to experience godly sorrow over my sin which eventually led to
genuine repentance (2 Cor. 7:10) I must have confessed with my mouth that Jesus is Lord and genuinely
believed in my heart that God raised Him from the dead. (Rom. 10:9-10) And in that glorious moment, whenever
it was, not of my own works, but because of His great grace, Jesus forgave my sin
and gave me new life in Him.
In the Old Testament, God describes it
like this: “I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within
you. And I will remove the heart of stone… and give you a heart of flesh.” (Ez.36:26) In the New Testament, we are told: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away;
behold, the new has come.” (2 Cor. 5:17)
What has your life been like SINCE
Jesus saved you?
Before I knew Jesus, I would read
Scriptures that say things like – “Delight yourself in the Lord and He will
give you the desires of your heart” – and I would despair of ever receiving any
good thing from God, because I had no earthly clue what it meant to delight in
Him. Now, when I consider who He is and all He has done, in my life and the
lives of others, I cannot help but respond in worship.
Instead of giving me all the selfish
desires my sinful heart could want, the Lord is gradually and graciously
changing my heart to desire the things He wants for me, things that bring Him praise
and me great joy.
Instead of working to earn the
approval of God, I am learning to rest in the sufficiency of His grace, because
in my weakness, He is strong.
Through trials and suffering, I am
learning to rejoice, not in circumstances, but in the steadfast kindness and
unchanging character of God, who works all things for my good and for His own
glory.
Though I fail every day, sometimes
grievously, by God’s grace, I am learning to hate sin and to long for
righteousness...for His Name’s sake.
The longer I am privileged to walk
with Jesus and know the joy that comes from knowing Him and being known by Him,
the more I realize how empty and hopeless my life was before He called me out
of darkness into His marvelous light. (1 Pet. 2:9)
On the day of my salvation, it was
Jesus who began a good work in me, and He promises to continue it until the
work is finished. (Phil. 1:6)
Because of all these things and more,
I am learning that I can say, with Paul, that “to live is Christ and to die is
gain,” (Phil. 1:21) because a life apart from Jesus is no life at all, and because I am
looking forward to the glorious day when I will see my Savior face to face.
Why do you want to be BAPTIZED today?
For me, it all comes down to love,
really. Before Jesus saved me, I didn’t know what it meant to love God, to love
His Word, or to love others the way we’re called to in Scripture. I was
hard-hearted and selfish, and when I did obey, I did it to please others or to
earn their favor or approval. Or praise, like a pharisee.
With this new God-given, "mushy-gushy" heart of mine, I am learning what it means to forget myself, and to treasure
Christ, and to love others. And that is a miracle.
Today, from a heart of loving
obedience, I want to be baptized as a symbol of my once being dead in sin, buried
with Christ, and raised to new life in Him.
I want to declare my love for God’s
people and my church family and ask them to come alongside me and hold me
accountable to living a life that honors the Lord.
And because my heart has been changed
by Jesus Christ, I long to see others come to know Him too. If you believe
God is calling you to salvation, don’t harden your heart but respond in
obedience to Him today. Turn from your sin, receive forgiveness and new life in
Him. He will give you a new heart and He will put His Spirit within you. He
will make you a new creation, and you will be forever changed.
“For Christ’s love compels us,
because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live
should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for
them and was raised again.” (2 Cor. 5:14-15)
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