Thanks, Maria, for your response. It is encouraging.
Yesterday, with nothing on my schedule but to go to church, I was able to sit back, understand myself to be saved, and decide that, starting today, I would proceed with my schedule and agenda without concerning myself with whether or not I was in God’s will. I was figuring that as God needed to change my plans, He would. My responsibility was going to be to carry forward with my plans and schedule, and let things happen as God sees fit.
That is the commitment that I started out today with. That mode of operation did not last long. I started out the day with some Bible reading, and the reading of the notes in my Dr. David Jeremiah Study Bible. I am in the third chapter of Luke. After I read the chapter the first time through, I read the study notes. It was some things in the study notes that got me thinking. I needed to realize Who Jesus is, and genuinely seek “Your will be done not mine.” As it came time for me to start on my scheduled tasks, I was remembering the verse that says. “whatever you do, do it heartily, as unto the Lord and not as unto men.” This is not natural for me. I tend to go by, “whatever I do, do it heartily, for MYSELF, first, for others, second.” ‘For God’ may or may not even make the list. Part of my thoughts this morning was to think about the time when the Samaritan woman that Jesus met at the well, went into the town and told people about Jesus. They came out to hear Him. Then they said to the woman something to the effect of, ‘Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we have heard Him ourselves and have come to realize that this is indeed the savior of the world.’ I tried concentrating on that and concentrating on Him. At least briefly or sporadically. But then my mind would switch into regular gear and I would probably switch back to living for myself, moment by moment.
I started telling Jesus that I needed to KNOW I was in His kingdom, safe in His arms forever, no mater what. I told Him that I know there are bad reasons for wanting assurance of salvation, such as to think one can go on living for themselves, moment by moment, instead of living for Jesus moment by moment, and still understand they are saved and eternally secure. But, I said, there are also VALID reasons for wanting eternal security. I was thinking that if I could just declare myself to be saved, I could proceed with my plans. But what went along with that thought is the thought, “But maybe I am not really saved.”
JD Greaar, who wrote the book, Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart: How to know for sure you are saved, said that by the time he was eighteen, he had probably asked Jesus into his heart 5000 times. He said that his first year in college was the worst year of his life. He was earning good grades in a good school, but doubting his salvation, and this doubt was driving him to despair. In his spare time, he did not go out and party with his friends, but stayed chained to his desk, studying the Bible and Bible commentaries. On one or more occasions, I decided to follow his pattern. I said, I will seek to earn good grades in a good school – that is, seek to carry out my natural-realm plans and agenda – but, in my spare time, seek salvation. Once, I tried saying that I will declare myself to be saved, so that I can function in the good school, but in my spare time, just in case I’m not really saved, will continue to seek salvation. The idea was to attempt to live in two “parallel universes,” one in which I was saved, and the other, in which I might not be saved.
Well, I have discovered that I cannot do that. I cannot even try to earn good grades in a good school while doubting my salvation.
So, today, as time to begin my schedule rolled around, and I just could not keep up a permanent perception of being saved, I decided to post this instead of carrying out my “duties.”
Since my mother died in 2011, I have been full time seeking salvation. I have been living on an inheritance, not able to function such as to work a job to earn a living. I am heading for a financial cliff, over which I run out of money and cannot afford to live. I figure I cannot, with my background, get a job that will pay me enough to really live on. I have had a two-pronged plan to avoid going over the financial cliff. One, I have a business idea and two, I have an invention idea. I do not know if the invention is truly workable, but I have strong reason, these days, to think it might be. I am really into the idea of this invention. I think it might work, and that, if so, it could provide me, and possibly others, with sustenance so that we could eat. But I figure that, even if workable, it would be at least a few to several years before it came to fruition. I expect to go over the financial cliff before then. So, I have the business idea and have been hoping that that will provide me with a decent income sooner, in the meantime.
I want to ‘earn good grades in a good school.’ That is, I would like for my agenda to be carried out. But experience is showing me that I cannot function while doubting my salvation. And I am always going to doubt my salvation while defaulting to living for myself, moment by moment, instead of living for Jesus, moment by moment.
I had a conversation one time with a guy whom I refer to as “Josh-in-the-Woods.” He said that, earlier in his life, he would give his life to Christ, then, at the next moment, say to himself, “I am OK with Jesus. Now I’m going to do what I want.” After this got repeated some number of times, he then found himself, eight hours a day, walking through the woods and crying out, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” Eventually, he went to a Christian psychiatrist. The psych said to him, “Do you believe God has bought you here?” He said, yes. He was then diagnosed with OCD and prescribed medication. He said that, eventually, he came out of the woods, got a job, got married and had kids. I have wanted to ask him how he got assurance of salvation, but have not had the chance to do so. One thing I know, is that no amount of medication nor psych counseling will give one assurance of salvation.
I’ve likened myself to Josh-in-the-Woods. I don’t do literally the same thing he did in the woods, but my spiritual and psyche state are like his. One Christian leader once told me, “Non-Christians do not walk through the woods all day, saying, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’” Another Christian once told me that what he sees in me is “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.”
Some people are convinced that I am a Christian. Just not me.
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