My Testimony

I don't feel that we Christians tell our testimony often enough. 

I could listen to people's testimonies everyday. I just love it! 

I use to feel my testimony wasn't as top notch or moving as other people's testimonies...

I wasn't a gang banger or drug dealer. I didn't serve time in prison...I wasn't an atheist. 

I didn't come to know the Lord in a bar on a Saturday night....

My testimony started with I was 10. 

It was the summer and my parents were going to Falls Creek with the church as a sponsor. I wasn't old enough to be a student there. I got to go to the sponsors kid's classes. It was wonderful! So much fun from what I remember. About two days into the week, I began to feel heavy. 

I remember saying something to my mom about it one evening. Remember, I wasn't "old enough" to participate as a student there. But I did get to hear the same sermons as everyone else. I felt my parents were there for those kids who was old enough to be there. I didn't want to take away from them. So I didn't bring it back up.

One evening after evening service I was laying on the bottom bunk and just knew for certain I was needing to say "the prayer". The one we all know...It wasn't until we got home from camp that I really started asking more questions to my parents. Once my parents felt that I truly was having a full understanding of this commitment, they called our minister at the time, Tommy Henson. Tommy was gracious to come to the house to speak to me. He informed me that the next step was baptism! I was super excited! So, that's what I did.

I do believe 89% of what people tell me. I'm what you would call gullible...So believing wasn't a battle for me. I could look outside and around me and just know that something more had to do with what I was seeing. Believing in God was not an issue. Too many wonderful things were present to just think they happened. Believing then and believing now, isn't an issue. 

Step through the next few years of me being a Christian...

I was very black and white. There was a major right and a major wrong decision/choice. There wasn't anything in between. I strived for perfection. I was told I was "as perfect as perfect can be". Which has two sides...

1. I really believed I was near perfect

2. I didn't fail at things I tried

This is good and bad context of being taken. 

What I am about to say will be awful to some and you will think I am crazy or it will resemble your feelings. I seriously felt like I was the best of the best. Almost better than most people. Due to the lack of failing.  Anything I tried, I was successful.

I was also good at pleasing others (and enjoyed being a people pleaser). So it always felt as if i was being pretty darn close to perfect. 

 "I wasn't a sinner like most." I stayed far away from the line of good and bad, the right and wrong choices. I didn't come close to going over "the" line.

It wasn't until a few years ago that I realized I wasn't not perfect or anywhere near being perfect. I really was starting to understand grace. It is okay if  I get close to the line and i have discovered that the line isn't as thin as I once believed. God allows the space for messing up and making the wrong choices. God's grace and mercy is what I have really been learning the last several years. I have discovered that even though I am not perfect no matter how hard I try, I know that God's grace and mercy will never end. It is everlasting. 

I have truly recognized my need for Him and the dependence that is a MUST! 

Because God has been merciful to us, we have a reason to be merciful in our actions toward those who are in need. 

We must 

"be merciful, just as our Father also is merciful"

Luke 6:36

Mercy is one of God's communicable attributes, meaning that he shares it with us and expects it from us. 

When I came across that verse I truly felt like the doors came crashing open and the flood gates were being rushed over me. Here I was thinking I was better than a certain person due to whatever reason and I clearly am not. I should show them grace and mercy that God has showed me thorough out my life so far.

If we belong to him, if we are being delivered from sin because of God's mercy, we have a reason to to always and forever grateful to our heavenly Father. We should be singing right along wit the psalmist,

 "I will sing of the mercies of the LORD forever"

Psalm 89:1

Or with Horatio Spafford when he writes in his hymn, It Is Well with My Soul:

...Let this blest assurance control,

That Christ hath regarded my helpless estate,

And hath shed His own blood for my should.

...Praise the Lord, Praise the Lord, O my soul!

My testimony many not be quite as moving to a person who truly was in the depths of the darkness. But, surly to someone who has stood tried and true through the time of their walk. We all have ups and downs in our relationship with Christ. However it's the constant up hills that we continue to do that means a lot. 

Hope you enjoyed!

Many Blessings To YOU!!