It’s been awhile since I’ve written a blog post. For lack of better excuse I have just been uninspired to write anything.
The first week of July I had the privilege of going to church camp in Gulf Shores, Alabama. I took a lot away from this week and am working on applying it to my life. One thing that I really felt lead to do is write out my testimony and share it on my blog. To help understand my testimony I need to explain what I, as a southern baptist, believe. In short, we believe that Jesus came into this world and lived a perfect and sinless life. He then died on the cross for you and me (because we are sinful and imperfect) and three days later defeated death and rose again. He is now a living God. We can have a relationship with him and spend eternity in heaven only if we choose to accept the gift he gives us. To accept his gift we pray, what I’ve always called, the “sinner’s pray”. It is not about the words, but about the heart. To summarize, it’s a prayer that recognizes that you’re a sinner in need of a savior (Jesus), that you believe Jesus is God’s son, and that you are commiting to follow him. After you pray this prayer you can say you got “saved” or “accepted salvation”. The next step is to get baptised. This is just an outward expression to your church and community of the decision you made to follow Christ. If you are interested in more southern baptist beliefs then here is more information: https://www.thoughtco.com/southern-baptist-beliefs-700524 So my story starts off the “basic” way… I was born and raised in a christian home, so church has always been something I’ve been a part of. I could give the “church” answer to any question that was asked and I was a good kid. At some point in elementary school my brother got saved and my mom said, “Kathryn, whenever you’re ready to accept Christ let me know and we will pray about it,”. Immediately I responded saying that I had already prayed the prayer and was saved. The only problem was that I don’t think I had ever actually prayed the sinner's prayer. I convinced myself for a long long time that I had and that I had begun the relationship with Christ. After many many attempts on scheduling a baptism (the baptism pool kept breaking) my brother and I eventually did get baptised together. Growing up in the church I have always known to do the right thing and to stand up for my faith. All the time I had spent in church gave me a whole lot of head knowledge. I knew to invite people to church, I knew to talk to people about God and his love, and I knew all the bible stories. I would try my best to do a quiet time and study God’s word. I would even be caught in the moment at middle school camp and revolution weekend and feel the holy spirit pursuing me. High school camp going into my sophomore year was awful. I felt like I got nothing out of what the speaker was saying and I couldn’t understand why my heart was so hard to what I was hearing. Everyone I knew was getting so spiritually feed and I just wasn’t getting it. I began doubting my faith big time. For many years I was confused about my salvation because I couldn’t remember the date I had gotten save, and there had been no change in my life. After camp that July, I constantly wrestled internally about my salvation. One Thursday morning in FCA there was some body builder that came to speak to us. I couldn’t tell you his name or what he looked like but I remember him talking about salvation. He talked about getting it right, and not waiting. That night I was reading my bible. As I was trying to convince myself yet again that I was already saved, I began crying about how confused and doubtful I was. In that moment after months of questioning I decided that I didn’t need to stress anymore. I needed to stop wrestling with it and just lay it all down at the feet of Jesus. October 22, 2015 I knelt beside my bed and prayed the sinner's prayer. In that moment I felt like a giant weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Instantly I felt at peace spiritually. I had always done the right thing and tried to point people to Christ, but I had always done it out of feeling like I had to or needed to. After fully accepting Christ, doing good things or pointing people to him came as an overflow of the relationship I had with him. It was less of a have to do good and more of a want to. Ever since, life has definitely not been peachy. Many people think that becoming a christian means that all your problems will fade away. I’m here to tell you that that’s not true and it’s cleared stated in God’s word too. I’ve been through some trials, if you want to read more about a major one then read my very first blog post. If I could leave you with two major points it’s that, one) it is not about religion, but it’s about the relationship. Having a genuine and intimate relationship with Christ is more important than following rules. It’s not about the head it’s about the heart. And two) you always have the opportunity to get it right. I have not for a second regretted the decision I made to follow Christ. No matter what you’ve done, he still loves you so much that he died for you. All you have to do is accept the gift he freely gives you. I am always open for any questions anyone has about anything you just read. Feel free to contact me if you need to chat. :)
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AuthorHey, I'm Kathryn. 2018 is gonna be the best year yet, and I'm documenting it here. |