Hi, my name is Justin, and I am a college student from Louisiana. I want to share with you a little about how I became a Christian.
When I was younger my family attended church every Sunday and my mother instilled good morals and values within me. The church that we attended never really emphasized salvation. It pretty much taught that a person could get to heaven by doing good works and not killing or hurting others.
One summer, my cousin and I attended a Christian camp. I heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ for the first time there, and I realized that I had been missing out on something. I saw the sin that was present in my life, and I confessed it to God. I asked Him to be my Lord and Savior and to free me from my sinful nature. When I returned home from camp, I was excited to tell my mother of my new found joy. She did'nt really understand.
Needless to say, my excitement dwindled in the weeks that followed. As months went by, I began doing things that typical adolescents do. I seemed to have forgotten what Christ had done for me. I would go from one interest to another, one hobby to another, trying to find the joy that I had once experienced.
By the time I got to high school, I was doing whatever I could to gain popularity. This eventually turned me onto sports, and drugs that enhance the athlete.
I graduated and went on to attend college, but college life quickly catapulted me onto the party scene. I could not maintain my grades and soon dropped out. My illicit use of alcohol and drugs overwhelmed me, and before I knew it my life was a complete wreck.
I lived in fear that God would strike me down at any moment. That was not the same God of mercy that I had experienced as a child. During a three-month stay at a rehab facility, God began to speak to me. I began reading the Bible for the first time. Answers to life's questions began to jump out at me.
When I returned home from rehab, I began spending time with other Christians. I re-committed my life to Christ, and have been seeking His will ever since.
In the last three years God has given me a growing relationship with Him and assurance of my salvation. He has blessed me with godly friends to keep me accountable and a wonderful Christian fiancee.
We can do nothing to earn God's favor, because our sin separates us from Him. We are all guilty of sin, but by the sacrifice of God's own Son Jesus Christ, we are reconciled to Him. Our salvation is by God's grace alone, not by our works (Ephesians 2:8-9).
To attain God's salvation through Jesus Christ we must realize that we are sinners and that we need God's mercy. Apart from God we will never experience true victory, and in the end we will perish. ""The consequence of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.""(Romans 6:23)
