Faith As a Child & Teen
How do I describe my faith as a child and teen? I was taken to church every Sunday morning and Sunday night as well as Wednesday nights. I listened to my Sunday School teachers, and my pastors talk about God’s saving grace through the blood of His Son Jesus, and I believed. At first, I think I accepted out of fear because they talked about how terrible hell is as often as they spoke of the glories of heaven. I listened to a lot of “fire and brimstone” preachers during my formative years, which caused fear to grow inside me. I think I also believed because it seemed to be the thing to do. After all, my mother and grandparents went to church. Only my father stayed home.
The dysfunctional way my family behaved 24/7 also created a lot of confusion in my young mind. In sermons, I learned of my Heavenly Father’s love and mercy for all humanity, but at home, I witnessed and was the victim of belittling hateful speech filled with displeasure, irritation, and rage. When we made mistakes, forgiveness and mercy were the last things offered, if at all. I felt like I didn’t deserve forgiveness and mercy.
Daily, I worked diligently to be good enough to obtain forgiveness and keep it. The churches we attended taught that we could lose our salvation, so I lived in constant fear of doing just that. The words and actions directed towards me at home left me feeling like there was no way I would ever be good enough. As a result, I prayed every day for God to forgive me, but I still lived my life in constant fear that I would lose my salvation. Since mercy and grace were rarely demonstrated to me at home, I did not understand the concept. I was an adult going through counseling before I began to understand grace and mercy.
While attending counseling, I also read several books to help me on my recovery journey. His Image, My Image: Seeing Yourself as God Sees You–No More, No Less, written by Josh McDowell, was key to helping me finally begin to understand God’s grace. On pages 98-99, he states, “We base our attitudes on what we think God thinks about us and not on what He actually thinks about us, which is revealed in His Word.” I learned that I saw God as a harsh punitive God whom I struggled to please because that is how I saw my earthly father. In chapters nine and ten, Josh broke the scriptural facts down so simplistically and beautifully that for the first time in my life, I saw God as a loving and compassionate Father. In the book of John, Jesus states, Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love. (John 15:9 NASB). I had read that verse many times before that day, but it wasn’t until Josh pointed out that “…Christ loves us as much as God the Father loves Him” that I began to understand the depth of His love (106).
I had lived my life fearful of losing my salvation with every mistake I made, but that day, as I read the scripture Josh cited, I began to feel God’s love for me. It was on that day, as I read from Romans, that I began to understand the security of my salvation. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38-39 ESV). I finally understood that God does not want me to live in fear of losing my salvation and that He has provided assurance that nothing will separate me from Him. I began to view my mistakes in a different light. In fact, I actually questioned God’s sovereignty, which is something I would never have done prior to this time.