2 Cor 4:3-4

Everything "we" do is wrong and we don't have anything to offer Christ. Yet, he still loves us. You are going through something that a whole lot of Christians go through. You see Satan tries to blind people to the Gospel. He does this by getting them to see their past failures, their current sins, an uncertain future. He shows us everything that is wrong about us, and when we focus our sight on us we cannot see the Gospel. So I will try to show you the Gospel.

God has forgiven you for everything that you did wrong. He did this before you even sinned. He did this not because you deserved it but because he loves you. He loves you so much that he gave up everything for you. You don't have to do anything but surrender to God's grace and let him love you. God has the perfect plan for you and he knows the best way to clean you up. Stop worrying about what you did, are doing, or will do wrong. Jesus took care of EVERYTHING.

I know many believers who have the same misery. My brother died a few years ago thinking just as you are, yet I could offer him no comfort and I felt that I somehow let him down. He told me the same things you are telling us....that he had asked for forgiveness, had admitted to God that he was a sinner and had invited Jesus into his heart perhaps hundreds of times but that it all seemed in vain to him. He looked at others who (like me) had a rather miraculous experience and wondered why. Try as I might I could not satisfy his feeling of being deserted by God...that he was left thinking the cross just wasn't intended for him. He went to his grave with the feeling he was lost. It breaks my heart to think about it because his life was so very difficult from the beginning. He suffer unspeakable abuse while still in diapers and that continued through to adulthood. As a result he made poor decisions and paid dearly for them.
I do not understand why.
When I got saved there was no doubt. He placed within me a deep hunger for His Word. When I first picked up a pocket NT someone had given me I was there in the throng of people pressing in to hear Him every time I read each of the Gospels. His words came to life and I gorged myself on them.
But as for my brother, the Bible remained just another book to him and I wonder why. I prayed with him and for him yet nothing changed.
As yet God has not revealed to me why. Was my brother insincere when he turned to God and asked Jesus into his heart? I don't believe he was. So then what explains the results? I honestly do not know. As for now I can only hope that God heard his pleas and saved him. And I tell myself that his early, sudden death was a merciful act of God. Is that just human understanding? I don't know.
As for your situation, all I can suggest is that, if you have truely repented and agreed with God that you are but a sinful person deserving of eternal darkness and invited Him into your heart, then perhaps that's all you have to hang onto. Just keep hanging onto the one thing you do know and wait on Him. In His perfect time He will give you the assurance you so desparatly desire. Spend every spare moment in His word and keep your request before Him every waking moment. Perhaps He is teaching you something that can only be taught by silence. Wait on Him. And when you can no longer stand the waiting, wait on Him some more.
I wish I had a better answer for you but that is the extent of my understanding.

In ALL of your spare time read and study the Bible. Front to back. Every word.
Faith comes by hearing; hearing by the Word of God.

looking4joy said:

I have lost my way. I'll keep waiting on Him, but I am in a very dark place.

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He is already there, but you can't see Him.
He's been with you, your entire life.
He's been waiting on you.

I used to think just like you. Oh, how many times I've said things similar to the Sinner's Prayer, how many times I've seen altar calls on TV, how many times I've heard the Gospel, and I always believed in it, and I always believed in Him. At times, my faith was shaken, at times I had thoughts of (I still do occasionally but I quickly push them out) "what if this is all wrong and I'll just cease to exist when I die?"

Three months ago, my mom had a good long talk with me about religion, and suggested two pastors (John MacArthur, along with a warning about his Calvinism and David Wilkerson) to listen to, and got me into reading the King James Version of the Bible (I tried reading a Bible dad bought for me when I was a teenager, it was an NIV and well... I was a teenager. I didn't really understand what I was reading at the time).

Well, anyways... it's been 3+ months that I've been following Him more closely, and actually paying attention to Him. Well, I had a dream the other night after a few days of me asking Him "when was I saved?" because I always thought back to all of those altar calls I've seen on TV, the few times I went to church, many times I was a kid when I prayed, begging for Jesus to save me, and expecting some kind of supernatural experience to happen...

Wanna know what the dream was?

I had this long, long dream of general life-living... going to work, sitting and watching TV, at one point I was even doing work around the house. Just general things in life.

Except.... Christ was standing right next to me the entire time during the dream. Nobody else could see Him, only I could and He and I would "talk" to each other, as if we were somehow mind-speaking and He gave me advice, and such things.

I believe this dream was sent to me by Him, and I believe this dream is a pretty telling answer to my questions -- He was right there the entire time!

looking4joy said:

In this passage, Paul says that if the gospel is veiled, it's veiled to those who are perishing. He says the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers from the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God.

I feel so blinded myself. I hope I'm not going to perish. My faith is like the skin of my teeth. It's not a significant amount of faith at all. But I want to believe and I don't want a blinded mind. I worry so much that God's wrath rests on me. And I don't know what to do about it. I have prayed earnestly to Jesus to save me, and it's seemed to be that I've had some fellowship now and then. But something is wrong. It doesn't seem like my relationship is right with God. I know I have trouble areas in my life - my past I'm ashamed of and my present confusing situation in life. I am struggling with sin in some areas. God knows that I struggle and I confess them to Him. But what I'm going through - I don't know how to explain exactly. I've never been able to just know that I know that I know I'm saved. I've either wrestled with sin so long or found I don't have anything to offer Christ and everything I do seems wrong, or felt like my heart is unable to see that light of the gospel. I'm hoping someone could shed some light on this post.

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Once you believe you are saved! PERIOD!

When you have doubts, it is your "Old Sin Nature" cluttering up your soul. Use 1 John 1:9 every time you sin, this is called "Being in Fellowship." Remember, the Lord is Faithful, always will be. It is us that fail, don't punish yourself. He has MANY tools for us to overcome our internal weaknesses, but we MUST LEARN all about His plan, learn the bible from the Original Languages, this way you know "exactly" what the Lord say's. YOU are His CHILD, HE will NEVER let you go! Got it?!


Rom 8:38-39
For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, (MAN with their false doctrines and Arrogance) shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
{Doctrine of Eternal Security - Once in the Relationship, No Out}
John 10:28~~"As well, I {Jesus} give {it is a gift he gives} them {My sheep} eternal life {salvation is PERMANENT--IRREVOCABLE}, and they will absolutely NO {ouk} . . . NOT EVER {me} . . . perish {apollumi}. Neither {Kai ouk} can anyone {man, angel, or God Himself - because He declared it} will ever 'seize by violence'/snatch them from My hand/grasp {cheir}.
{Note: Apollumi means to perish - to be absolutely obliterated. It refers to Revelation 20:15 where all who are not in the book of life/unbelievers will be tossed into the Lake of Fire. Once you follow the shepherd out the door (faith in Christ) into the pasture, you receive the GIFT of eternal life. You did not earn it, nor can you DO anything to lose it.}
{Note: Ouk and me are both negatives. Two negatives together in the Greek is a very strong negative (as opposed to English where it would be a positive). Now the verb apollumi is in the subjunctive mood. When you put a double negative followed by a subjunctive, it means it is totally impossible - no way! - for a believer to lose his salvation - VERY strong - over and out.}
{Note: Cheir is the Greek word for the human hand. When attributed to God the Father it is an anthropomorphism, which is attributing characteristics of man to God. Your hands move when your brain tells it to. It means when you are His sheep, no one will steal you away even if you wanted to be stolen!}

looking4joy said:

In this passage, Paul says that if the gospel is veiled, it's veiled to those who are perishing. He says the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers from the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God.

I feel so blinded myself. I hope I'm not going to perish. My faith is like the skin of my teeth. It's not a significant amount of faith at all. But I want to believe and I don't want a blinded mind. I worry so much that God's wrath rests on me. And I don't know what to do about it. I have prayed earnestly to Jesus to save me, and it's seemed to be that I've had some fellowship now and then. But something is wrong. It doesn't seem like my relationship is right with God. I know I have trouble areas in my life - my past I'm ashamed of and my present confusing situation in life. I am struggling with sin in some areas. God knows that I struggle and I confess them to Him. But what I'm going through - I don't know how to explain exactly. I've never been able to just know that I know that I know I'm saved. I've either wrestled with sin so long or found I don't have anything to offer Christ and everything I do seems wrong, or felt like my heart is unable to see that light of the gospel. I'm hoping someone could shed some light on this post.

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Sometimes we get our head stuck in a place where we never feel worthy or good enough. And if we feel that way about ourselves, we wonder why would anyone do anything for me? I'm not good enough. I don't deserve it.

The thing is that Jesus died for all His children. The word tells us that we will know how to love, because Jesus loved us first. We will know how to forgive because of how He has forgiven us.

Do you know that He loves you? Died for you?