Teen
GOING TO
CHURCH MEAN I’M A
CHRISTIAN?
Our Daily Bread
DOES
DOES GOING TO
CHURCH
MEAN I’M A
CHRISTIAN?
I was taken along to church when I was really young. I made crafts in Sunday school and sang lots of ‘action’ songs before I joined the large, action-packed youth group as a teenager. The leader was a guy called Steve. Steve’s idea of a youth group was big, loud and fun. The more friends we brought, the more prizes we won. I never seriously doubted that the Bible was true. I wasn’t ‘brainwashed’ into it; I genuinely thought, and still do, that a biblical worldview is the only one that makes sense of the big questions about life. Even as I went through different fashions and phases in my teenage life, I was still the most regular attender of the Wednesday night youth group. I even talked to my friends about Jesus. They had a lot of questions and I proudly answered with all of my Bible knowledge. My problem was that I had a dark side. I loved my look. I was obsessed with my image and my own happiness. Every boy I saw was either a potential boyfriend or a nobody. I daydreamed about sex constantly.
Being young and in church is hard. There’s a lot of confusing expectation about what we should and shouldn’t do; and an exciting world out there we want to explore. If you’re struggling with how you feel in church and even in trying to work out what a Christian actually is, then I hope my story encourages you and helps you think about what your next step might be.
THE
DOUBLE
LIFE
When you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. —1 John 2:15-16 Every person has to meet God for themselves. We cannot ride on our parents’ faith. I finally found that out when I was 17. I was dating a cool guy. I didn’t actually fancy him, but he liked me and that was enough. He was a year older and drove a motorcycle. He was edgy and world-wise; and being with him gave me street cred. He fit right into my fantasy. I remember going to a friend’s house one day during this time. She was the pastor’s daughter. She showed me her prayer diary, neatly placed next to her Bible on her bedside table with a special pen and bookmark. I saw her list of answered prayer and wondered how anyone who was 17 could care about stupid prayer diaries when there was a whole world out there to discover. Other Christians talked about “the world” like it was a bad thing, but they just didn’t fit into it like I did. I had a connection to the world that I thought they couldn’t possibly understand. Standing there holding my friend’s prayer diary, however, made me feel ashamed. It was a defining moment in my life. I realised that day that I loved the world more than I loved Jesus.
THE
TURNAROUND
My brother and I kept a stash of very cheap beer in our basement. Every time my parents left the house friends would come over and we would drink and swear and do all the sorts of things that Christian teenagers are not supposed to do. I even used to sneak out at night when everyone was asleep. I would meet my friends and do every possible thing that I was told not to. No amount of belief in Jesus, no sinner’s prayer, no knowledge of the Bible could mask the fact that I loved doing my own thing and living for me.
I believed that Jesus was real with all of my heart, but I just didn’t want to follow him. One morning, after a night with my boyfriend, I woke up and felt the whole world screech to a halt. It was as if time had stopped and there was nothing but me and God. I had the most terrifying thought I’ve ever had in my life: I was going to hell, and I deserved it. That was the morning I turned back to God. No matter how much I knew about Jesus, His teaching and His death and resurrection, I hadn’t actually chosen to give Him my life and follow Him for myself. I stopped trying to justify my lifestyle and finally agreed with God that it was sin (it cut Him out and was selfish and harmful); and it deserved His judgement. Everything I already knew about Jesus should have made it obvious that I wasn’t really His. I was just part of ‘church life’ where God’s love and forgiveness was guaranteed so long as you were part of it and prayed a sinners’ prayer.
THE
CHANGE
The change I noticed immediately was in my imagination. I stopped having lustful day dreams. If my mind strayed where it shouldn’t, it was almost like an electric shock jarring me back to safety. I felt clean. My mind wanted to focus on God and I saw the world in a totally new way. Trusting Jesus doesn’t mean we’ll never struggle with sin again, but He will help us change our attitude towards it and the pain our selfishness can lead to. I once heard a preacher say that a sinner runs to sin and loves it, but God’s people fall into sin and hate it. We all have things that we struggle with, but, as a teenager, I came to understand that:
“When you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you”. Ultimately, we do have to choose if we’re going to live just for ourselves or for God. This doesn’t mean we won’t ever fail, make a mistake or get tripped up by bad decisions. But those who belong to God actually want God to keep transforming them by His Holy Spirit so they can become more like Jesus.
THE
DANGER OF CHURCH LIFE
There are many dangers in the kind of ‘church life’ I grew up in. To me the scariest one is to think you are saved when you aren’t. I don’t write that to panic you, but because I want to offer you some advice. The Bible is clear that, “If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9). But that decision will change our lives. It results in a relationship with God Himself, who chooses to live in us by His Holy Spirit! And this is why the Bible tells us to examine ourselves, as Paul commanded in 2 Corinthians 13:5: “Test yourselves. Surely you know that Jesus Christ is among you; if not, you have failed the test of genuine faith” And again, John said: “We can be sure that we know him if we obey his commandments” (1 John 2:3). If we have no active, living relationship with God, we need to test ourselves to see what or who we are really living for. If I had never taken a good, hard look at myself with God, I probably would have gone through life thinking I was a Christian simply because I knew the Bible in my head. I would have stayed active in the ‘church life’, but in reality I would have been living for myself. As someone who now trusts Jesus, it is still challenging to live for God: my selfishness is constantly demanding my attention. I have to keep examining myself before God and relying on Him to keep transforming me into the person He wants me to be by His Holy Spirit. But I know I belong to Jesus and that His death pays for all my sin. I know He will bring me safely into His home after I die.
TESTING
OURSELVES
The question this leaves us with is: how do we examine ourselves? What exactly are we looking for? Here are a few things we can take a look at: Firstly, we need to look at our relationship with God. Are we interested in getting to know Him, or is it a bore? My attitude towards my friend’s prayer diary revealed where I really was. I thought prayer was an unnecessary job rather than the way to know God better.
The truth is that praying and reading the Bible goes against our instincts. They always have; they always will. That means that older Christians will still struggle to keep doing them; a bit like someone who wants to be healthy struggling with the routine of eating well and exercising. If we have no interest in getting closer to God and living for Him, that should be a warning sign.
TESTING
OURSELVES Secondly, we need to look at our relationship with the world. The important question is, “Am I trying to get away with it or trying to get free from it?” Are we trying to make room for our selfishness? I was once chatting to a friend who told me that swearing was fine because it’s just words, and if we don’t mean anything bad by them it can’t be wrong (despite the command against it in Ephesians 4:29). “God looks at my heart,” he said. How could I argue with that? My friend had managed to justify swearing, something non-Christians can be upset by.
Now, my question to my friend would be, “Why do you want to get away with it? Why not just give it up?” Swearing is a small example. The point is: are we trying to make room for things in our lives that don’t please God? We all do this from time to time, but anyone who really wants to follow Jesus won’t be in peace while loving the world more than God. Thirdly, we should examine our relationships with other people. When I was in school, I had an enemy. Her name was Lori and she bullied me. I hated her. After I trusted Jesus, my attitude changed towards Lori. It wasn’t that I didn’t hate her anymore . . . I just didn’t want to hate her anymore. I found myself praying something I never prayed before; I asked God to help me love her. One night, I had a dream that Lori was my best friend. The next day when I saw her in school, I simply couldn’t hate her. God had answered the prayer which he led me to pray and gave me love for my enemy. We are told: “If anyone claims, ‘I am living in the light,’ but hates a fellow believer, that person is still living in darkness” (1 John 2:9). Giving our lives to Jesus doesn’t mean we will never have a nasty thought again, but if we feel fine about holding grudges towards other people, that is another warning sign.
WHO’S IN
CHARGE?
Finally, let’s ask ourselves this question, “Who is driving my life?” How do we make our decisions, for example? If we are simply following our own feelings, instincts or logic, then Jesus is not in control of our lives. As a young artist, I had always wanted to go to The Art Institute of Chicago. One day, my art teacher came to me and said that he wanted to submit my name for a place at that school. As I prayed about the decision (having only given my life to Jesus shortly before) I decided to say no to my teacher. I knew that the temptations at that college would be too much for me. As well as that, I was feeling a pull to serve God in some other way. My attitude had totally changed and I ended up going to Bible College to prepare for a life in overseas missions. The direction of my life was set by God, not my ambition. Funnily enough, it was in Bible College that I got my start as a freelance artist! I’m sure others would add other things to that list, but those are the things that helped guide me as a teenage Christian.
WHO’S IN
CHARGE? Ultimately, the most important question is the one Jesus asked His followers: “Who do you say I am?” (Mark 8:29). He didn’t ask “Who does the church say I am?”, “Who do your parents say I am?” or “Who do your friends say I am?” He asked His followers for their own personal response to Him. He asks the same question of us. So who do you say He is? Have you read His story in the Bible to make up your mind? And if you say He is God, have you given Him your life? Growing up as part of ‘church life’ can be great. But it also comes with its own dangers. My challenge to you is this: make it your goal to find Jesus for yourself. Don’t get years down the line before you examine whether you’ve ever really met Him.
Our Daily Bread Ministries would love to help you explore who Jesus is and what He has done for you! We have many short booklets answering big questions such as Who is Jesus? and Can we really trust the Bible? available for you to read online at ourdailybread.org/lookingatlife
Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996, 2004. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved. Š 2018 by Our Daily Bread Ministries. All rights reserved.
“WHEN YOU LOVE THE WORLD, YOU DO NOT HAVE THE LOVE OF THE FATHER IN YOU” (1 JOHN 2:15).
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