Hello.  Welcome back to Strength from Grace, a podcast for the young warrior. I’m Michaela Riggins.  As always, I’d like to give a special thank you to Sanctuary Family Farms, and I’m so glad you could join me this week.

I remember the day I chose to be saved as well as I remember what I ate for breakfast . . . well at least as well as I remember on a good day.  I think I may have been maybe around twelve, and I was at my Nana and Pa’s, something that was very common.  My younger sister and I were bickering and fighting, as usual, and Pa told me to come into his office.

Now I don’t know what your household was like, but for us, “Come into my office” meant one of two things. You were gonna’ talk about your feelings, or you were pretty deep in the doghouse. I did not assume that I was going to be talking about my feelings.

I thought I was in for it. I knew Bekah and I had been fighting, and the only reasonable conclusion was that I was dead meat.  My feet felt like cinder blocks, and I moved like molasses as I walked into his office. At this point, God could have struck me dead, and I would have been happier than a tick on a bloodhound. I sat down nearly in tears and Pa goes, “When are you gonna’ get saved?  You’re old enough that the decision is your responsibility.”

When I tell you that my jaw fell to the floor, I mean it literally hung open for what felt like an eternity until I went, “When am I gonna’ get saved? I thought I was in the doghouse!”  Instantly the tension in the room was gone as we both laughed at how far of a leap I had made.  I explained to him that I had been waiting.  At the time, I was mortified that if I got saved too early, I was going to completely screw up and disappoint not only my family, but God.

To an extent I understood what it meant to be saved. It wasn’t something that I could take lightly and just spew off at the mouth. There was a certain way that I was going to have to act, and now that I was at the age of accountability, whether or not I went to heaven, truly was dependent on my choices.

Pa told me that he wouldn’t have asked if he didn’t think I was prepared for it.  He told me how I was right that this wasn’t something to take lightly, and I would have to stop fighting with Bekah (still a work in progress), but he still thought that I was time.

Sitting there in his office we prayed the Sinner’s Prayer together, “Lord, I come to you asking for the forgiveness of my sins.  I confess with my mouth and believe with my heart that Jesus is your son and that He died on the cross that I might be forgiven and have enteral life in your kingdom.  I believe that Jesus rose from the dead, and I ask you to come into my life and be my personal Lord and savior.   I repent of my sins, and I will worship you all the days of my life.”

After this, I was baptized at church.  Before I go any further let me tell you, I don’t how they did it, and I certainly don’t know why, but that water in the baptistry had to have come straight from the polar ice caps. I was so cold!  Once I got out and warmed up, we ate, took pictures, hugged, and overall it was a very good day.

Although I may not have had the typical story of being saved where I just knew that I knew, I don’t think that there truly is a right or wrong way to be saved. When you ask Jesus to come into your life, it doesn’t stop the second that you pray the Sinner’s Prayer. It becomes a choice that you make every single day of whether or not you want to follow Jesus.

We have to make the choice: do we want to live in fear or do we want to trust in God’s planning.  We have to choose to live a life of giving or taking.  We have to decide to actively fight against our flesh or wallow around in self-pity.  We make these decisions every single day.

Being saved doesn’t make our lives magically better or easier.  But by having God come into our life, so many doors open for us.  With him the door to grace is opened, the door to peace is opened, joy, patience, gentleness, meekness.  Even though it may not be a one-time deal.  By taking the first step and choosing to be saved, God joins with us and gives us the tools that we need to live a life worth meaning.

As always, I’d like to say thank you to Sanctuary Family Farms, and I hope you join me on our next episode. Thank you and God bless.