Without A Doubt - The Essentials Of Saving FaithSample

I am an example of someone who wasn’t saved out of atheism, but rather from false assurance. Being falsely assured of one’s salvation is grounded in ignorance, and this is precisely my story and linked primarily with my own church upbringing. I grew up going to church every Sunday unless I was sick or out of town. Each night, our family would say a memorized prayer before eating dinner: “God is great, God is good, let us thank Him for our food.” I owned a Bible, which was given to me after my confirmation at the neighborhood Methodist church, but I don’t remember reading it. I knew about Noah and the Ark, David and Goliath, and that Jesus helped a lot of people.

In middle school, a pretty girl invited me to a Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) “huddle meeting.” I played sports and believed in God, and did I mention she was pretty? So, I went. FCA was a great time, and I went every week to the huddle meeting with other classmates. We would hear something the kids called a “testimony” from athletes who played football for the Florida State Seminoles, and I thought it was the coolest.

As the school year went on, it was time for the FCA fall retreat. I had never heard of one of those before. It was a one-day event in a camp-type setting held about an hour from where I lived. The thought of getting on a bus and spending the day with my friends and playing in sports competitions sounded like my type of thing, so I signed up as quickly as my parents agreed to let me go. After dodgeball, kickball, and some relay races, we had our assembly time. The speaker was a large man who had played professional football, and I remember thinking his muscles were bigger than Hulk Hogans. He told really funny stories and then started talking about our need to trust in Jesus, that He died for our sins and rose from the grave. 

The speaker gave what I now know is called an “invitation” to respond to his presentation of the gospel. At the time, I had never been to an event where the speaker had asked anyone to “come forward” and trust in Jesus Christ. Dozens of students stood up and walked forward to meet with FCA staff members and give their lives to Jesus. I didn’t move, because as far as I was concerned, I was a Christian. Sin, Jesus’ blood, and my need for repentance were new things to my ears, but I was fairly certain I was okay.

Then something happened that opened my eyes, truly freaked me out, and changed my life. The speaker said, “There is one more thing I want to share for some of you still in your seats.” He then read the words of Jesus from the passage in Matthew you just read.

I don’t remember his commentary exactly, but he shouted that there were people in the room who went to church, came from good families, said a prayer before meals, but had never trusted in Jesus Christ. “You are no more a Christian than someone who doesn’t believe in God at all, and that will lead you straight to hell! God will not let sin go unpunished. You need forgiveness for your sins and only Jesus can give you that forgiveness, because He took on the punishment that you deserved, even though He had never sinned.”

I walked down to the front completely freaked out. I had thought hell was for really bad people who committed crimes like murder, not for someone like me. It is where evil dictators went, not middle-schoolers from nice families who went to church and had a picture in the Olan Mills church directory to prove it. This muscular, enthusiastic preacher was talking about a Jesus with which I was unfamiliar. “The gospel” in my mind was a kind of music where people wore choir robes and clapped. I had no idea it was about Jesus dying on the cross for me, or that His death even mattered. I walked forward, prayed to trust in Christ with a staff member named Walter, and I was angry. Don’t get me wrong, I experienced joy over this great news about my sins being forgiven, but I was upset. How was it that I had been to church my entire life and nobody had ever told me this news?

I needed someone to talk to me about assurance because I had had no idea mine was false. In my eyes, I was headed to heaven when I died because that’s where you go if you’re not a bad person. I didn’t lie awake at night thinking about my relationship with God, because I didn’t know I had any reason to worry about it. This is not because I was secure in Christ, but because I didn’t even know what that meant, or why it mattered. The security I now felt was based on truth, not on faulty assumptions that claimed to be Christian without any dependence on the saving work of Jesus Christ on my behalf.