I remember when I first said something called “the Sinner’s Prayer,” meaning to do the second part of believe and confess with your mouth… He wasn’t on Christian television yet, but I’d been streaming James McDonald sermons at the time, and he did an altar call. He isn’t my cup of tea now, but Thank God for him then, I still think: Many miraculous things began to change in my life at that time.

God the Holy Spirit began to teach me all things. I began to think about God differently. He’d always been big and powerful. But He’d also been far. He’d always been an able God in my mind, but disinterested – in me, that is. I’d always thought of God as busy with more important people with bigger lives and greater value; He was raising those people to prominence, like Mother Theresa. And to be honest, from my perspective, I’d always had other things to concern myself with. Real things. Because, to me, God had also been at least partly mythical.

Looking back, I wince, because I see the painful post-salvation problems and wrong thinking the younger me has ahead of her. For instance, I though Christians were good people. I thought they stood out. I didn’t know they could be normal. Or fashionable… Growing up, I’d known these girls in high school who wore skirts even when they made no sense – during P.E. (gym class), for instance. They said it was for the mysterious reason of being “saved,” and I was given to understand that that had something to do with God. I was not given to understand how. So, I knew 1) Christians dressed conservatively and, 2) were good people.

I also thought all Christians spoke for God. To me, that meant I had to find a church after I was saved myself, and listen to the good people who could speak for God. Then, I would do Whatever. They. Said.

Can you imagine how disastrous were the results of having this strange and ignorant belief system tied to my faith in God?

My husband, who trailed behind me before coming to faith himself, and I were yanked around by the negligent hands of good people, because I believed that works and obedience to church folks was the way to keep us in the grace of God. I thought I could never say, I would love to do that, but I just don’t want to.

Reading a couple of chapters in The Best Yes  helped a little… It took me a lot longer to realize that salvation wasn’t church attendance and Bible study and agreeing to every form of “service” proposed to me and spending all of my time with people who listened to my pastor every Sunday. It’s not that all those things mean you’re not a Christian, obviously, but they don’t mean you are, either: Salvation is life and freedom through faith in the name of Jesus Christ. God has been clearing me up since I came across my favorite Bible teacher on Christian television – through him and others: We are born of God, but not God, which makes us 100% compatible with God (holy, righteous saints, not dirty sinners – in Him). We are also 100% dependent upon God, our Source, because we live THROUGH Him.

Just like me when I started this walk about 6 years ago,  most Christians think of ourselves as being called to sacrifice; we think of doing. When God called us, however, He called us to BE – that is, to be ourselves in Him. We live through God, not just FOR Him (according to a do more, be more theology). To abide means live, trusting (through faith), rather than trying (SEE, John 15.)

God is in us, and we are in Him. We are united with Christ.