My Story

This story is really important to me. It reminds me of Gods grace and mercy and especially what HE did on the cross.

The beginning of this story starts when I was a child. My mother brought us up in the religion of Catholicism. I was baptized as a baby and attended mass on Sundays. At the age a child attends catechism my brother and I were there. When we read the new testament I realized that the religion was contradicting the bible. I started asking the church for answers, but none were given. The next year my mother enrolled me into a catholic school for seventh grade. This was the first and last year I attended a private school due my failing history, but I did attain some knowledge and get answers to some of my questions. Due to the imbalance of information and direction I continued on in confusion and frustration. Most of the time rejecting my conscience and justifying my behavior. I was taught by the church that I could go to a priest and get my sins taken away by saying hail Marys and our fathers. I learned I could just sin and go get them taken away when I wanted. Now I know how wrong they were. The Lord is the one who takes away sins and is the only mediator between God and man. But in the ignorance of my youth I led a sinful, go with what makes you feel good, life. I still prayed and sometimes I would realize all the bad stuff I was doing and go through spells depression. I turned to self medicating with alcohol and marijuana. At the age twenty two I owned a brand new four bedroom house, a nice car, the perfect dog, and I was making tons of money. To anyone on the outside I had it made. I partied hard and slept hard. I couldn't ask for anything more, so I thought. I started to feel terribly wrong in the inside. Every thing seemed like dust in the wind and every day became like nails on the chalk board. I found myself praying more intensely one night. I was led to the decision to get my life right with God. I starting attending this church around the corner from my house. It was a different religion from the one I was raise in so I thought it would be a start. I started to learn about God all over again. Now with a fresh perspective of urgency. I was desperate for God. I prayed and through the reading and learning of Gods words My questions were getting answered. I also found out its not about a religion or the church you attend its about your personal relationship with God. Better yet The Father, Son and Holy Spirit. From that point on my life was transformed. I repented and asked for forgiveness. This time I tried to stop sinning. The Holy Spirit would guide me through what I read in scripture and I would catch myself when I went against it. I would pray for God to help me not do it again. I had a spiritual warfare in my house. Sometimes I would be washing dishes and just fall to my knees with sorrow because I wanted to sin, but I didn't really want to sin. I knew inside God didn't want me to live the way I was. I felt like I was going crazy. I was abused from the age five till I was fourteen. I lived so long with lustful sin and drugs. My whole lifestyle and being able to function differently had to all come from God. It's natural for a person who was so use to living wrong to be changed to living right to fight against it. I did find out that submitting and humbling myself to what He wanted made it so much easier.
The most important thing for my life was He was changing my heart. I was always able to forgive, but I was still hurt. He took my pain, He changed the way I thought, He gave me new desires and in His timing He fulfilled them. I'm still growing and changing. He's still doing these things for me. Its something that is going to continue till I die. He asks us to evaluate ourselves daily. I don't think he want us to be stagnate. He wouldn't be-able to use us or make us better. That's why I think it will happen until he takes me, He wants us to continue after Him and be strong in our faith no matter what. Just like Jesus. Now, He had a relationship with His Father. I would love to have one similar.

So, I'm compelled by God to keep in faith and continue to strive for the better of His Kingdom, not the devils.

That's about it. I pray to follow the bible, I pray, we go to our church for fellowship ( a prayerfully sought out church ), we involve ourselves with others we are equally yoked with so we can encourage each other in the Lord, and we don't involve ourselves with activities that aren't pleasing to God.

We aren't legalistic about what we do we are led from with in to do these things. As we continue to be regenerated by the reading of His word, it becomes natural.

I truly pray for this to be a blessing in your life. It has been nice writing it and remembering what I'm saved from. Thank you for your friendship. Bridgette

Forbidden Fruit and Lost Innocence

Try to picture what may very well have been the single worst moment in the history of the human race: Adam and his wife Eve standing outside the gorgeous Garden of Eden. Banished. An angel with a flaming sword guaranteed they would never again experience the intimate walks and talked with God, the thorn-less ground, or the delicious fruit from the Garden of Eden. In their place Adam and Eve felt only nagging, haunting emotions of guilt, fear, and shame. Paradise Lost By a single act of rebellion against God, Adam and Eve had declared their independence. They had done more than merely eat a piece of forbidden fruit. At a deeper level, they had defined the clear-cut command of their maker. They had listened to the seductive voice of the tempter and succumbed to their own pride. They had overtly challenged the right of the Almighty God to guide and direct their lives, exercising authority and power over their own lives. The consequences of that deplorable decision were catastrophic: the curse of their Creator, death, sorrow, and life of pain and regret-not only for them but for all their descendants. At some point, Adam and Eve must have taken one last look at Eden, then turned away. Were they quiet? Who spoke first? Did they blame each other? Or did they fall into each other's arms? The Gift of Hope As they began to reflect on the terrible, final moments in the Garden, they must have thought of the sorrow in God's voice when He called out "Where are you?" And the puzzling curse on the serpent kept running through their minds (Gen.3:14, 15). According to God, the serpent would inflict yet more pain and suffering on the human race, but in the end he would be crushed by the Seed of Eve. It was a small ray of hope, a glimmer of a promise that paradise would not remain lost forever, a promise of a Deliverer and Savior (fulfilled in Jesus Christ, see Gal. 3:16, 19-26). Perhaps they also recalled the gentle way the Lord had graciously provided them with clothes just before their departure-a hint of God's love, His mercy. Soon it must have become clear to them that the loss in Eden was as much God's as theirs. The more they reflected, the more they must have become convinced that God wanted to restore them to Himself. The long wait for God's promised salvation had begun. Today, unlike Adam and Eve, we don't have to wait. The day of salvation is already here (2 Cor. 6:2). Jesus has already come to save us from our sins. If you believe in Him, you can be reconciled to your creator today and can look forward to living with Him in Paradise (see John 3:16 and Rev. 2:7 for the clear promises of God concerning eternal life). Taken from the Prophecy Study Bible by John C. Hagee

"Born-again"-ism

TRUTH TURNED TO ERROR

Doesn't the Bible teach that men must be born again? Was this not an
absolutely fundamental teaching of our Lord, His apostles, and the Church
down through the ages? Yes, of course it was, and without this there is no
true Christianity. But error cloaked in Biblical terms is still error. In
the case of the current born-again movement, Scriptural terminology is being
used to teach just the opposite of its original meaning. The great doctrine
of man's need for regeneration (i.e. miraculous new-birth) is being
presented in a way that denies the very point it is supposed to teach.
Stated simply the error is this —that men are born again as a result of
something they do. This something may be "going forward" at the close of an
evangelistic message, making a "decision" for Christ, or "repenting" and
"believing" the gospel. Whatever the requirement that is put before the
sinner, the impression is given that sinful man himself is the one who
brings about regeneration.
The sad results of such a teaching can be seen all around us. Evangelists
who believe that men dead in sin can and will turn to God if the right kind
of emotional and psychological inducement is presented, push and pressure
lost people into making "decisions." Whatever is necessary to get people to
come forward, or raise their hand, or sign a card, is tried by today's
"soul-winners." Highly emotional meetings, prolonged appeals, repeated
musical choruses, and even the deceitful tactic of having counselors
strategically placed in the audience to come forward at the time of the
"appeal" —all smack of the techniques of crowd psychology.

Those who do come forward (or raise their hand, or sign a card) are then
coached into believing that God has come into their lives, and that they are
now "saved." Deep down, though, they know that nothing has really happened.
The evangelist has done something, the lost person has done something, but
God has done nothing. There has been no miracle. The person may give mental
assent to the doctrine of the new birth and try to rejoice in it, but there
has been no supernatural passing from death to life (Ephesians 2:4-5). This
is why most of the "converts" of this kind of "born-againism" show no real
zeal for God, and many fall away completely after a month or two.

That some people are brought into the kingdom in these situations is no
doubt true. But it is in spite of these methods, not because of them. If we
turn to the section of Scripture most often quoted regarding the new birth
we find the Lord teaching just the opposite of the modern "soul-winner."

YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN

In the third chapter of John's Gospel, Jesus tells Nicodemus, "You must be
born again." What did the Lord mean by this statement? First of all, it
should be noted that Jesus said nothing of any action or decision that
Nicodemus must make, nor did He even tell him to repent and believe the
gospel. As a matter of fact, Jesus was not telling Nicodemus to do anything!
"You must be born again" was not a command Nicodemus was to obey, it was
simply a statement of fact. Nicodemus, in his blindness, misunderstood this
statement and asked how anyone could do such a thing as that —a man "cannot
enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?" To this
Jesus said in effect, "I'm not talking to you about you doing anything, I'm
talking about God doing something." "I'm talking about the Spirit of God
coming and miraculously generating life in you. You being flesh can only
produce flesh. Only the Spirit of God can produce the spiritual birth you
must have in order to enter the Kingdom of God, and God's Spirit blows where
He wishes" (John 3:1-8).
The modern evangelist's techniques and teaching are conspicuously absent in
this account. The Lord gave Nicodemus no "Four Spiritual Laws," nor any
instructions on "How to be Born Again," and He certainly used no
manipulative tricks. He was concerned to emphasize just one thing.
Regeneration is a miraculous work of God's Spirit.

We can, and must, tell men to turn from their sins and believe the Gospel,
but in doing this we should realize that when a man does repent and believe,
it is the result of God's prior regenerative working within him. If this
were not the case, if man must actually initiate his own salvation, then it
would be impossible to escape the conclusion that men do not need
regeneration at all, but possess in themselves an innate goodness which
causes them to seek after God. Though it be ever so slight, this goodness is
then the ultimate reason why one man is saved and another is lost. But the
apostle Paul clearly teaches the contrary when he writes:

There is none righteous, not even one;
There is none who understands,
There is none who seeks for God...
There is none who does good,
There is not even one (Romans 3:10-12)

Here Paul states plainly that there is no "spark of goodness" in man that
causes him to respond to the gospel. In fact, man, blinded by sin and Satan,
does not even understand the gospel. He is in total rebellion against God
and His truth. If regeneration were contingent upon man first desiring God,
no one would ever be born again, for "there is none who seeks for God."
Moreover, if man must ultimately be given credit for coming to God,
Christianity is turned into just one more of the world's man-centered
religions or cults which teach salvation by works. All such man-centered
systems offer a false hope, for it is simply impossible for sinful man to
make himself different than he is —he needs a new heart, he needs to be
"born again!"

Again, it should be stressed that we are certainly to tell men to seek God.
We must tell them to believe and receive Christ. But these commands will
fall on spiritually deaf ears unless God first generates life through the
inward workings of His Holy Spirit.

You may protest that this makes God the ultimate determiner of who is saved.
To this the apostles and prophets with one voice cry, "Amen!" "Salvation is
from the Lord." Christians, as John puts it in the opening chapter of his
gospel, are people, "who were born not...of the will of the flesh, nor of
the will of man, but of God" (John 1:13). That's why we give thanks to God
when someone is converted. We know that God has graciously wrought a miracle
—the sovereign, supernatural miracle of the new birth.

This truth should give us confidence to present the pure gospel, knowing
that it is not up to us to somehow maneuver and manipulate men into
Christianity. It should also bring us to our knees before the God Who is
sovereign in salvation. Only He can remove the heart of stone and give a new
heart. Only He can give life to the dead. Only He deserves the blessing,
glory, and honor.

Did God create Evil?

Did God create everything that exists? Does evil exist? Did God create evil?

A University professor at a well known institution of higher learning challenged his students with this question. "Did God create everything that exists?" A student bravely replied, "Yes he did!"

"God created everything?" The professor asked.

"Yes sir, he certainly did," the student replied.

Have a great day!!

The professor answered, "If God created everything; then God created evil.

And, since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are, then we can assume God is evil."

The student became quiet and did not answer the professor's hypothetical definition. The professor, quite pleased with himself, boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth.

Another student raised his hand and said, "May I ask you a question, professor?"

"Of course", replied the professor.

The student stood up and asked, "Professor, does cold exist?"

"What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?" The other students snickered at the young man's question.

The young man replied, "In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 F) is the total absence of heat; and all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat."

The student continued, "Professor, does darkness exist?"

The professor responded, "Of course it does."

The student replied, "Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact, we can use Newton 's prism to break white light into many colors and study the various wavelengths of each color. You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present."

Finally the young man asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?"

Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course, as I have already said. We see it everyday. It is in the daily examples of man's inhumanity to man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil.

To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist, sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart. It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat, or the darkness that comes when there is no light."

The professor sat down.

The young man's name -- Albert Einstein