Abd_Yesua_alMasih
Puritan Board Junior
This is a question I have been wondering about for a long long time; when did I become a Christian/gain salvation? Sorry for the length of the post... btw I am 18 now. If this is the wrong topic to post this in then please tell me. I couldnt think of any place that was better.
It is problematic when telling someone your testimony if you do not know the turning point and I wondered if someone could help me out if I gave a brief life overview.
To start off with a differ a tiny bit in theology from most of you it seems and while I certainly would not call myself Charismatic I do not see how you can justify miracles, prophets etc... being finished with the passing of the apostles. By my reading of the scriptures I see the apostles preparing the church for the future once they are gone and how to correctly use prophecy, tongues etc... That said I believe the modern charismatic movement has gone too far. Where I come from there is a lot of emphasis on healing among some groups. They forget that even Jesus did not heal everyone and it is not a certain promise. Quiet simply I believe if our prayer is not inline with Gods will it will not be done. My mum, who has not got the most medically perfect body ever struggles a lot with people who only pray for her to be healed and not the 101 other things she might want to be prayed for (I mean these people have lives to you know...)
There is also a certain problem when people rely on 'prophecy' to enhance their understanding of the scriptures and theology. As said on this board before they are lazy as they do not want to get into the Bible and read it for themselves and study it. If my reading of revelation is correct I would conclude that Gods 'revelation' to man is finished. He is not going to tell people something they could learn by opening up the bible and reading. God speaking to modern man I believe is only in the context of things not in the Bible... hard to explain. An example: a youth leader who I have been influenced a lot by was once walking down the street praying in his head when he heard an audible voice to go talk to a certain person on the other side of the road. This certain person was a huge, bulky gang member type person. The youth leader would never have talked to him if it wasn't for the voice that told him to. He went up to the man and said "umm... excuse me, God told me to talk to you." The man burst out crying as he had prayed that morning that God, if he were real, would reveal himself to him. (His life was down on the rocks)
I myself can say that if I had not been praying at a certain time a very special person to me could now be dead or in some serious condition or mental state. I can not go into detail because friends might see this but the key point was I was listening to God and I believe I was told to say something to this person who unknown to me was do something at that moment that was *ahem* stupid to say the least. If my text message had not arrived at the time it did everything could be different.
Now you may understand where I am coming from... if you don't then you might as well stop reading
sorry for this becoming a bit long.
Well I grew up in a Christian family and from as long as I remember I was taught about right from wrong and salvation. According to my parents I became a Christian when I was five but I hardly remember it. I remember only when I was little feeling at one point desperate to know if I was a Christian and whether I had been saved and if I died would I go to hell. I knew about sin etc... but was proud (I was a 'Christian' and others weren't - a holier than thou attitude)
When I was 14 something really odd happened. People think I was mad so I tend not to tell people about it. Either I have a mental illness or I am a liar most secular people would say. Anyway I was one day sitting in class when I was struck with so much information I was left gasping. It was like a revelation but it had a more Satanic topic... (Sorry to skip ahead but I established afterward when talking with an old couple this was solely the work of some satanic force.) I was thrown into a state which could only be closely compared to depression. I feared for my life. Everything changed from that second on. I was confused and I did not know what happened to me. I slept with my light on (as if that would save me) and I deeply feared anything spiritual. I would be overcome with fits of terror where all I wanted to do was curl up in the living room around other people. A few months later I want to an Easter Camp put on by Baptist Youth Ministries. It was there this really all came to a head. I heard things and saw things - I was terrified and I did not really know what was happening. I shared this with a few leaders who kept their eyes on me but they were young and had no idea about what to do. I finally talked to someone who when they became a Christian had been told simply that psalm 119 would be very important in their life. I had been reading psalm 119 since this had all happened - I did not know why - I was pulled to it you could say. Anyway something had caused this person to remember this that morning etc... long story is we went to an old wise couple and they prayed about it and told me they felt this was satanic etc... blah blah blah, this is getting long...
Long of the short of it is that night during the service I was looking for my friends - I heard a voice 'come sit alone with me' I said 'go away Satan you suck' and bingo every depressing feeling and everything was torn from me. I felt brand new as if a great weight had been lifted from me. I was overtaken by the love of God, not really because of his grace (as I 'believed' that since I was young) but because he had saved me from his state which had been terrible and confusing. I was baptised within 2 weeks and by the end of the year had read the entire Bible. While I believe I knew about sin and grace, it was not a major issue for me. I confessed my sins to God and asked for mercy but I am not sure if this was when I became a Christian or not.
A year later I began to a long slow fall into a different ideology which soon was spiralling out of control. I had heard about communism and slowly began to believe it. As I fell into this spiral I struggled with the fact I was Christian but supported a non-Christian group. Throughout that period of was battling with contradictions. I soon settled on 'socialist' and began becoming very anti-American, which I am ashamed to say. It is a dark past and still haunts me how close I got to the edge. Then September 11 happened and I will not even go into details about the joy that brought me. The day before even I drew a picture of a city in ruins, namely crumbled building. I 'prayed' it would come true in America. I was horrible. I was out of control. I was beaten up for my beliefs and I do not blame them.
The next Easter I was less Communist and now certainly what I called socialist as it allowed me to be "Christian" but I was swelled with hatred and I did not even have to see an American to hate them. I went through my contact lists and blocked every single American on them.
That Easter an old woman who I really respected talked about how evil these people were who I had sympathies for and how horrified she was at what happened in New York. It was like the last straw that broke me. I realised how my beliefs made no sense and I realised how much of a monster I had become. I went to my youth pastor who hardly knew me and told him everything. He prayed with me and overnight I changed my life. To this day I am still ashamed of what I was like and how close I got to doing something stupid.
A year later I was influence again by a speaker who was speaking on prayer and spending time with God, reading, praying, worshipping etc... I remembered what I had been like when I first loved God as such when I was 14. I was determined to spend 3 hours a day in prayer, Bible study and worship a day. I carried this on even through exam etc... I grew amazingly fast in maturity. Since then I have not changed much as in big events, but have been going onward and upward once more. I fell back from 3 hours a day at the end of my last year of school basically because with such a heavy workload I didn't have 3 spare hours and you could call in rebellious. I am now 18, left home and have been full on for in my University study Politics and focusing on the Middle East. I am now have set aside for God only one hour as life is busier but in reality I often spend much much more time just no in long periods.
So from my story, when did I become a Christian? There could be 3 options. 1) Before I was 14, 2) When I was 14, around the time I got baptised, 3) When I realised how evil I had become and began moving onward and upward.
It is problematic when telling someone your testimony if you do not know the turning point and I wondered if someone could help me out if I gave a brief life overview.
To start off with a differ a tiny bit in theology from most of you it seems and while I certainly would not call myself Charismatic I do not see how you can justify miracles, prophets etc... being finished with the passing of the apostles. By my reading of the scriptures I see the apostles preparing the church for the future once they are gone and how to correctly use prophecy, tongues etc... That said I believe the modern charismatic movement has gone too far. Where I come from there is a lot of emphasis on healing among some groups. They forget that even Jesus did not heal everyone and it is not a certain promise. Quiet simply I believe if our prayer is not inline with Gods will it will not be done. My mum, who has not got the most medically perfect body ever struggles a lot with people who only pray for her to be healed and not the 101 other things she might want to be prayed for (I mean these people have lives to you know...)
There is also a certain problem when people rely on 'prophecy' to enhance their understanding of the scriptures and theology. As said on this board before they are lazy as they do not want to get into the Bible and read it for themselves and study it. If my reading of revelation is correct I would conclude that Gods 'revelation' to man is finished. He is not going to tell people something they could learn by opening up the bible and reading. God speaking to modern man I believe is only in the context of things not in the Bible... hard to explain. An example: a youth leader who I have been influenced a lot by was once walking down the street praying in his head when he heard an audible voice to go talk to a certain person on the other side of the road. This certain person was a huge, bulky gang member type person. The youth leader would never have talked to him if it wasn't for the voice that told him to. He went up to the man and said "umm... excuse me, God told me to talk to you." The man burst out crying as he had prayed that morning that God, if he were real, would reveal himself to him. (His life was down on the rocks)
I myself can say that if I had not been praying at a certain time a very special person to me could now be dead or in some serious condition or mental state. I can not go into detail because friends might see this but the key point was I was listening to God and I believe I was told to say something to this person who unknown to me was do something at that moment that was *ahem* stupid to say the least. If my text message had not arrived at the time it did everything could be different.
Now you may understand where I am coming from... if you don't then you might as well stop reading
sorry for this becoming a bit long.Well I grew up in a Christian family and from as long as I remember I was taught about right from wrong and salvation. According to my parents I became a Christian when I was five but I hardly remember it. I remember only when I was little feeling at one point desperate to know if I was a Christian and whether I had been saved and if I died would I go to hell. I knew about sin etc... but was proud (I was a 'Christian' and others weren't - a holier than thou attitude)
When I was 14 something really odd happened. People think I was mad so I tend not to tell people about it. Either I have a mental illness or I am a liar most secular people would say. Anyway I was one day sitting in class when I was struck with so much information I was left gasping. It was like a revelation but it had a more Satanic topic... (Sorry to skip ahead but I established afterward when talking with an old couple this was solely the work of some satanic force.) I was thrown into a state which could only be closely compared to depression. I feared for my life. Everything changed from that second on. I was confused and I did not know what happened to me. I slept with my light on (as if that would save me) and I deeply feared anything spiritual. I would be overcome with fits of terror where all I wanted to do was curl up in the living room around other people. A few months later I want to an Easter Camp put on by Baptist Youth Ministries. It was there this really all came to a head. I heard things and saw things - I was terrified and I did not really know what was happening. I shared this with a few leaders who kept their eyes on me but they were young and had no idea about what to do. I finally talked to someone who when they became a Christian had been told simply that psalm 119 would be very important in their life. I had been reading psalm 119 since this had all happened - I did not know why - I was pulled to it you could say. Anyway something had caused this person to remember this that morning etc... long story is we went to an old wise couple and they prayed about it and told me they felt this was satanic etc... blah blah blah, this is getting long...
Long of the short of it is that night during the service I was looking for my friends - I heard a voice 'come sit alone with me' I said 'go away Satan you suck' and bingo every depressing feeling and everything was torn from me. I felt brand new as if a great weight had been lifted from me. I was overtaken by the love of God, not really because of his grace (as I 'believed' that since I was young) but because he had saved me from his state which had been terrible and confusing. I was baptised within 2 weeks and by the end of the year had read the entire Bible. While I believe I knew about sin and grace, it was not a major issue for me. I confessed my sins to God and asked for mercy but I am not sure if this was when I became a Christian or not.
A year later I began to a long slow fall into a different ideology which soon was spiralling out of control. I had heard about communism and slowly began to believe it. As I fell into this spiral I struggled with the fact I was Christian but supported a non-Christian group. Throughout that period of was battling with contradictions. I soon settled on 'socialist' and began becoming very anti-American, which I am ashamed to say. It is a dark past and still haunts me how close I got to the edge. Then September 11 happened and I will not even go into details about the joy that brought me. The day before even I drew a picture of a city in ruins, namely crumbled building. I 'prayed' it would come true in America. I was horrible. I was out of control. I was beaten up for my beliefs and I do not blame them.
The next Easter I was less Communist and now certainly what I called socialist as it allowed me to be "Christian" but I was swelled with hatred and I did not even have to see an American to hate them. I went through my contact lists and blocked every single American on them.
That Easter an old woman who I really respected talked about how evil these people were who I had sympathies for and how horrified she was at what happened in New York. It was like the last straw that broke me. I realised how my beliefs made no sense and I realised how much of a monster I had become. I went to my youth pastor who hardly knew me and told him everything. He prayed with me and overnight I changed my life. To this day I am still ashamed of what I was like and how close I got to doing something stupid.
A year later I was influence again by a speaker who was speaking on prayer and spending time with God, reading, praying, worshipping etc... I remembered what I had been like when I first loved God as such when I was 14. I was determined to spend 3 hours a day in prayer, Bible study and worship a day. I carried this on even through exam etc... I grew amazingly fast in maturity. Since then I have not changed much as in big events, but have been going onward and upward once more. I fell back from 3 hours a day at the end of my last year of school basically because with such a heavy workload I didn't have 3 spare hours and you could call in rebellious. I am now 18, left home and have been full on for in my University study Politics and focusing on the Middle East. I am now have set aside for God only one hour as life is busier but in reality I often spend much much more time just no in long periods.
So from my story, when did I become a Christian? There could be 3 options. 1) Before I was 14, 2) When I was 14, around the time I got baptised, 3) When I realised how evil I had become and began moving onward and upward.
and please forgive me for failing to address you first. I believe I am guilty of a thread jack. 
