This is a conversation I had with a homeschool mom who was doubting her salvation. I could not tell her she was saved because...well, maybe she wasn't. You have to be careful not to comfort people into thinking they're saved when God might be trying to show them they're not. We can get in the way of a serious rescue operation that God is trying to accomplish and ruin the whole thing! It's always best to show people truth even though it may not feel good or alleviate their troubled heart. So many people e-mailed this woman and alleviated her fears through "soft" words and "pats on the back". I refused to do that! To this day, there's absolutely no evidence that this woman is truly born again.
Here's what she wrote me:
I am scared like you have no idea. I'm freaking out.... I believe in Jesus and God and I want nothing more but to please Him but am I doing enough? AM I good enough to go to His feet? I haven't been saved by a church in front of people. I begged for God to save me in my house by myself. I have not lived a christian life all my life. I'm a no good person if you look back at part of my life. I was mean and lied to my parents all the time back then. I'm not sure if I'm saved. I beg for forgiveness all the time and still can't shake my guilt from all my ways. I have a fear of God and feel bad for it. What if I'm not good enough and go to hell? I'm giving my self a panic attack. To be saved do you need a man of God to save you? How do I do better here? I try so hard for my kids and husband and all around me and I still feel like I fail. Am I going crazy here or is there hope?
My response:
This matter of salvation is very serious. I'll not pat you on the back and say, "It's okay, honey. We're all sinners." In our society today, there's hardly a person who is not somewhat familiar with the concept of sin and salvation. The great spiritual plague of the day is that most will admit they are sinners, say they "believe in Jesus" and then go on their merry way claiming to be a Christian when, in fact, they really don't have a clue what the Bible says about it. Hence, we have hundreds of thousands of false professing "Christians" out there who have no assurance, no direction and no real salvation. I was one of those.
For years, I claimed to be a Christian, but in reality, I didn't have a clue. I went to church, read my Bible, wore Christian publicity T-shirts and even trained to be a Christian radio DJ. I led people to "my" Jesus, was selected to be the next leader of my college Bible club and was commonly referred to as "the Girl From the God Squad". I attended E-free, Assemblies of God and a Lutheran church throughout my life and in all that time, I never understood the Bible, never heard the gospel and was not a true Christian.
One spring day I'd had it. I knew something was wrong and as I was driving down the road, I said to God, "I don't know where you are, Lord. I feel like you're on the other side of the world! If you could draw a line for me and show me where on that line you are and where on that line I am, I'd appreciate it!"
Later in the fall I had come across a church brochure and thought to myself, "This is God showing me where he wants me to go!" So I went to this church and begged the pastor there to show me what I had to do to get close to God and have a REAL relationship with him. He told me I needed to be baptized by immersion (now keep reading because this is not at all where the story ends!). I was assured by the other folks in the church that once I came up out of the water, I would be a new person. God would shower his power upon me and I would have visions, see angels, speak in tongues, hear unearthly music and somehow I would be swept into a mystical relationship with God Almighty. I was so excited! I couldn't wait to get truly close to God. So, I went to the church, got my baptism robe on, went down into the water with such anticipation and hope and when I came up out of the water -- voila! -- I was wet. And that is all...beside being very, very angry! I knew I'd been lied to. Nothing happened. I spent the rest of the evening with a half smile on my face as the church folks celebrated my "salvation". I left the party early and never went back.
I was devastated and begged God to reveal himself to me. I even wrote letters to him.
Shortly after, I was walking through the commons at the University and saw a familiar face. It was the little Indian man from one of the campus ministries. I stopped to talk and get information. We shot the breeze a few minutes and I pretended to be super-Christian but once the hall cleared, I removed the mask and asked the guy, "Why does it seem like God is on the other side of the world?"
The little man smiled at me with the warmest eyes I'd ever seen and asked me to come sit down with him. Then he did something no one had EVER done for me. He opened the Bible and put it in my hands and said read these verses. I read... and for the first time since the day I asked the Lord to show me where I was on that line and where he was on that line, I KNEW!!!
It was the most wonderful day of my life up to that point. The frustration, the wondering, the waiting was over. I knew at last where I was in relation to God and let me tell you what I found out that day: I wasn't even ON THE LINE. I was beneath it. Waaaaayyyyy beneath! And God? He was waaaaayyyy above it! I knew I wasn't saved.
The little Indian man shared with me many more verses and I realized, not only was I not saved, I was a sinner. No, wait! Please understand...I don't mean I was a sinner. I mean, I was a SINNER!!!!! All of a sudden God's Word opened my eyes to what I really was and it was UGLY! It became very apparent to me that I had DEEPLY offended a holy God and I was LOST, HELL-BOUND, and in BIG TROUBLE. So the best day of my life was also the scariest. I knew I had to be saved.
Over the next couple months I attended Bible studies and went to a sound Bible preaching church where the Lord showed me more of my sin and dealt with me through the preaching of his Word. I struggled a little with some false teachings that prevented me from fully understanding how to put my faith in God, but he broke through all the confusion and on the night of March 6, 1995, I went out to my car (for total privacy) and asked God to forgive me and save my soul. I put my complete trust in his Son for the payment of my sin and to rescue me from eternal damnation. My salvation was real and all these years later, I am so happy to be a real Christian and I KNOW IT.
God wants us to have assurance of our salvation but more importantly, he wants us to get the real deal...true salvation and not an imitation. If you're not perfectly sure you're saved, you may not actually be saved, even though you desire to do right and be a good Christian, as I had. It's not a bad thing for a person to examine themselves. God wants us to KNOW if our salvation is real or just a cheap fake. The way to do that is to read God's Word and compare our lives to it.
Let me direct the reader to this page for further study... www.discoverthebible.org
Here's what she wrote me:
I am scared like you have no idea. I'm freaking out.... I believe in Jesus and God and I want nothing more but to please Him but am I doing enough? AM I good enough to go to His feet? I haven't been saved by a church in front of people. I begged for God to save me in my house by myself. I have not lived a christian life all my life. I'm a no good person if you look back at part of my life. I was mean and lied to my parents all the time back then. I'm not sure if I'm saved. I beg for forgiveness all the time and still can't shake my guilt from all my ways. I have a fear of God and feel bad for it. What if I'm not good enough and go to hell? I'm giving my self a panic attack. To be saved do you need a man of God to save you? How do I do better here? I try so hard for my kids and husband and all around me and I still feel like I fail. Am I going crazy here or is there hope?
My response:
This matter of salvation is very serious. I'll not pat you on the back and say, "It's okay, honey. We're all sinners." In our society today, there's hardly a person who is not somewhat familiar with the concept of sin and salvation. The great spiritual plague of the day is that most will admit they are sinners, say they "believe in Jesus" and then go on their merry way claiming to be a Christian when, in fact, they really don't have a clue what the Bible says about it. Hence, we have hundreds of thousands of false professing "Christians" out there who have no assurance, no direction and no real salvation. I was one of those.
For years, I claimed to be a Christian, but in reality, I didn't have a clue. I went to church, read my Bible, wore Christian publicity T-shirts and even trained to be a Christian radio DJ. I led people to "my" Jesus, was selected to be the next leader of my college Bible club and was commonly referred to as "the Girl From the God Squad". I attended E-free, Assemblies of God and a Lutheran church throughout my life and in all that time, I never understood the Bible, never heard the gospel and was not a true Christian.
One spring day I'd had it. I knew something was wrong and as I was driving down the road, I said to God, "I don't know where you are, Lord. I feel like you're on the other side of the world! If you could draw a line for me and show me where on that line you are and where on that line I am, I'd appreciate it!"
Later in the fall I had come across a church brochure and thought to myself, "This is God showing me where he wants me to go!" So I went to this church and begged the pastor there to show me what I had to do to get close to God and have a REAL relationship with him. He told me I needed to be baptized by immersion (now keep reading because this is not at all where the story ends!). I was assured by the other folks in the church that once I came up out of the water, I would be a new person. God would shower his power upon me and I would have visions, see angels, speak in tongues, hear unearthly music and somehow I would be swept into a mystical relationship with God Almighty. I was so excited! I couldn't wait to get truly close to God. So, I went to the church, got my baptism robe on, went down into the water with such anticipation and hope and when I came up out of the water -- voila! -- I was wet. And that is all...beside being very, very angry! I knew I'd been lied to. Nothing happened. I spent the rest of the evening with a half smile on my face as the church folks celebrated my "salvation". I left the party early and never went back.
I was devastated and begged God to reveal himself to me. I even wrote letters to him.
Shortly after, I was walking through the commons at the University and saw a familiar face. It was the little Indian man from one of the campus ministries. I stopped to talk and get information. We shot the breeze a few minutes and I pretended to be super-Christian but once the hall cleared, I removed the mask and asked the guy, "Why does it seem like God is on the other side of the world?"
The little man smiled at me with the warmest eyes I'd ever seen and asked me to come sit down with him. Then he did something no one had EVER done for me. He opened the Bible and put it in my hands and said read these verses. I read... and for the first time since the day I asked the Lord to show me where I was on that line and where he was on that line, I KNEW!!!
It was the most wonderful day of my life up to that point. The frustration, the wondering, the waiting was over. I knew at last where I was in relation to God and let me tell you what I found out that day: I wasn't even ON THE LINE. I was beneath it. Waaaaayyyyy beneath! And God? He was waaaaayyyy above it! I knew I wasn't saved.
The little Indian man shared with me many more verses and I realized, not only was I not saved, I was a sinner. No, wait! Please understand...I don't mean I was a sinner. I mean, I was a SINNER!!!!! All of a sudden God's Word opened my eyes to what I really was and it was UGLY! It became very apparent to me that I had DEEPLY offended a holy God and I was LOST, HELL-BOUND, and in BIG TROUBLE. So the best day of my life was also the scariest. I knew I had to be saved.
Over the next couple months I attended Bible studies and went to a sound Bible preaching church where the Lord showed me more of my sin and dealt with me through the preaching of his Word. I struggled a little with some false teachings that prevented me from fully understanding how to put my faith in God, but he broke through all the confusion and on the night of March 6, 1995, I went out to my car (for total privacy) and asked God to forgive me and save my soul. I put my complete trust in his Son for the payment of my sin and to rescue me from eternal damnation. My salvation was real and all these years later, I am so happy to be a real Christian and I KNOW IT.
God wants us to have assurance of our salvation but more importantly, he wants us to get the real deal...true salvation and not an imitation. If you're not perfectly sure you're saved, you may not actually be saved, even though you desire to do right and be a good Christian, as I had. It's not a bad thing for a person to examine themselves. God wants us to KNOW if our salvation is real or just a cheap fake. The way to do that is to read God's Word and compare our lives to it.
Let me direct the reader to this page for further study... www.discoverthebible.org