Just be a good person.
Go to church.
Believe in Jesus.
Don’t get pregnant outside of marriage.
This is what I was raised to believe. I grew up going to “church” any time the doors were opened. I always believed in God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit. And I constantly lived in fear, questioning if I was truly saved. Wondering if I died would I really be with God or would I be in Hell. I dreamed of being a wife who stayed home, took care of her husband, had as many babies as the Lord gave me, homeschooling them, cooking, tending to the home. I even loved long dresses and the idea of modest dress.
But the world around me told me that all of that wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. I was supposed to go to college, have a career, send my children off to someone else to teach snd raise them, stick them in front of the television and fill them full of toxins and chemicals and let my husband take care of himself.
So I did it…I dressed like everyone else. I went to church and believed. I went to college and got a degree. But my heart was never in it and I couldn’t figure out why. I did all the things I was “supposed” to do(except get a career and send my children off to some stranger to raise them) and still battled within myself that something was missing. I was miserable….so miserable I battled deep and dark depression for as long as I could remember.
I read my Bible and I prayed and I felt even more confused and lost. Nothing made sense. I couldn’t understand why God’s Word told me that….
“For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.”
— 1 Corinthians 14:33….
and yet I was still so empty and confused.
I couldn’t understand why I constantly questioned if I was really born again and would enter heaven when i had prayed the “sinners prayer” too many times to count and constantly cried out to God to help me find Him. After all He promises
“And you shall seek Me, and find Me, when you shall search for Me with all your heart.”
Jeremiah 29:13
I couldn’t figure out why there seemed to be this constant battle in my spirit between submitting to my husband and being his help meet. Why was I constantly exhausted and searching for an opportunity to get a break from my husband and children even though I was living the dream that I had dreamed from the beginning. Why was I seeking Him and not living in obedience to what he calls me to be as a born again woman of God?
“The aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as becomes holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things; That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.”
Titus 2:3-5
I couldnt figure out how we were supposed to look different from the rest of the world if we dressed the same way the world did and watched the things that the world did. How did we look different if we did all the same things that the world did and just added in believing in Jesus?
“Wherefore come out from among them, and be you separate, says the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing: and i will receive you,”
2 Corinthians 6:17
“In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; but (which becomes women professing godliness) with good works.”
1 Timothy 2:9-10
“You believe that there is one God; you do well: the devils also believe, and tremble.”
James 2:19
“Who knowing the judgement of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.”
Romans 1:32
Those were just a few of the things I constantly battled…one day, Lord willing, I will go through the others.
30 years, 3 small children and a marriage that hit rock bottom and shattered and having been basically excommunicated from what I thought was a true family of saints…..as I once again cried out to God “why is this so hard? What is wrong? What is missing? Why can’t I find you? Why is my world falling apart and I feel further away from you than I ever have?? I don’t understand it, God!! I give up!! I give up on trying to figure it all out!! You do it, God!! You show me!!! I don’t care what anyone else says! I only care what you say!! I’m not going to compromise any more!!! I want Your word and Your truth alone to guide me”….I dug into my Bible even more and things began to change.
“But seek you first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you. Take there fore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for itself. Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof.”
Matthew 6:33-34
I can’t pinpoint the exact day or time….it was more of a process for me. But I started reading the Word for what it said. I decided that what I had always done, based on what I had always been taught, wasn’t working so I had to have faith like a child and allow the Word, the Holy Spirit, to change me.
“And Jesus called a little child to Him, and set him in the midst of them, And said, Verily I say to you, Except you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
Matthew 18:2-3
“But the anointing which you have received of Him abides in you, and you have need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teaches you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it has taught you, you shall abide in Him.”
1 John 2:27
My husband came home and we began to rebuild. We had no one. Except the Holy Spirit and each other. We tried to look for a church that followed the New Testament without compromising and couldn’t do it. In the mean time we just started reading the Bible at face value and deciding that maybe, just maybe, it meant what it said and didn’t need anything or anyones personal interpretation added in. After all….
“Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.”
2 Peter 1:20-21
I learned what it meant to be “born again.”
“Blessed is the man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, not stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in His law does he meditate day and night.”
Psalms 1:1-2
A born again daughter saint delights in the word of God rather than squirms when it is read or talked about. She craves the Word. She wants to be consumed in it and is willing to let it change her. Even though that change can be uncomfortable and makes her look and behave differently that the world.
A born again daughter of God looks different than the world in the way she dresses and even interacts with the people around her. A born again daughter of God is willing to sacrifice those worldly pleasures such as entertainment, fancy clothes, wealth, etc., and embraces her role that God ordained for her. She wants to share the truth with everyone she sees, without hesitation.
I began to repent of my past self and let the Holy Spirit change me from the inside out. I am far from perfect but I know, without any doubt that I don’t have to question my salvation any longer. I know that my past self is dead, I am made new in Christ and as long as I continue to seek first His kingdom and allow the Holy Spirit to guide me and shape me…as long as i repent when i fall short and do my best to keep His commands….nothing can separate me from Him. I no longer have that battle inside. I am still learning and striving to understand and fulfil my role that God has given me as a born again saint. My prayer is that my testimony encourages you on your journey and challenges you to seek Him with your whole heart.
Our testimony is powerful…
“And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives to the death.”
Revelation 12:11