ROZE: Confession of an apostate
Is it possible to be saved a second time in your lifetime? Is it possible to meet Jesus twice? A thought I pondered the majority of the time, thinking about the past I once lived and the past I once was. There was a moment in my life where I thought that I was saved. It is written in the Book of Romans that if you declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.1
I declared with my mouth that Jesus is my lord and savior, and everything that happened after that appears to be magical and mystical. Have you ever felt secure, felt that you are saved eternally, and felt being forgiven; the joy of knowing you have someone like Jesus to return to; that was the feeling I had at the time. But behind those feelings of happiness, there is this shadow of emptiness, anger, and despair that sticks to you and follows you wherever you go. After thinking about it thoroughly, I didn't believe Jesus with all my heart. Besides, why will I believe Jesus? I don't even know him, and I don't have a reason to believe him. All I knew back then was the things said in church services about him after that I have no idea. I declared what I declared because I have an ulterior motive in doing so, it's to impress the girl i have a relationship with and was with me in that moment (my wife now) and the people around me. The magical and mystical feeling I had back then, I think, was just a normal reaction to a thought that you are saved because of what you declared. An exciting feeling of knowing a new person in your life but this time it's Jesus. I am a young dad. I had a child at the age of 17, and I thought I could be a good dad even though I don't have any standard of what fatherhood is and just went through it. I was a nominal Christian; I went to church, started One2one with a small group leader, and, as I previously stated, I declared what was written, but nothing happened after that. For me, church became a place to hide, a place where I could be good and just enjoy the company of worshiping believers. Who would not feel good in the presence of it? I couldn't remember at what point it changed. All I remember was the feeling of being tired of everything, the explosion of the shadows that linger behind those feelings of happiness, and because of that, I rebelled against the Lord and began to question him and deny him. That was the start of being an apostate. "Why?" was the most common question that I had. "Why do I have to go through this?" "Why do I need to be a father this young?" "Why is this happening to me if you truly love me?" "Why am I suffering while others escape?" "You are not the real God, because if you were, you would not let this happen," and many other questions. I assure you that I was questioning and denying God at all times during that period. And I was not content with just questions; I rebelled against him in actions. I partied hard. I was a player even though I am in a relationship and do the opposite if I am called to do right. But despite all of that, I still have a conviction that I said to myself I would never do, to still honor the relationship I had with the girl (my wife now), a line I was not supposed to cross and still did it.
I remember being in a train station waiting for my ride and asking the Lord, "Why are you still here?" Then a thought came through my mind, and it hit me. Why am I denying God if he doesn't exist? Can you deny something that doesn't exist? Can you say that you didn't commit a crime without a crime taking place somewhere? Or can you deny that a square is not a circle without an idea what a circle is? It is somehow similar to what CS Lewis said that "A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line,"2 but in the sense of my situation, why am I talking to God if I deny him? I am rebelling against someone I once denied existed. Isn't that contradictory? Looking back on all of what I've done, I realized that I was talking to God all this time. And then I asked myself, is this who God really is? Someone who pursues even an apostate like me, who has denied him all of this time? After that, I committed myself to a week of prayer and fasting. While praying and meditating about all the things I've done, I realized that I didn't believe in my heart who Jesus is, and that's the missing part in my faith. I always say that I met Jesus twice; the first one is him introducing himself to me through those church services I have attended, and the second one is him allowing me to discover him through the events that happened. Some of you may have asked, if Jesus introduced himself to you the first time isn't that enough for you to discover him? The answer is no. Think about it, if I introduce myself to you, is my introduction enough for you to discover who I really am? Just as you need time to spend with me to really know me and trust me, I needed that time too to know who Jesus really is. I don't have a "road to Damascus moment" just like Apostle Paul, I don't have a life turning event that will make me realize I have God, I don't have a reason to believe before those events happened in my life. And God allowed me to go through those events for me to know Jesus, spend time with him to know and have that reason to believe in him. Why did I think that? Because like I said all of those times, I spent denying him just justified that he is with me.
So, to answer the very first question, is it possible to be saved a second time in your lifetime? The answer is just my point of view that is based on the experience given. The answer can be no on the basis of this question. Why do you need to be saved a second time if you were really saved the first time? And it is really quite articulated in the Second Chapter of the Book of First John, where John talks about sin. Then also in my life, I didn't get saved just by my declaration, I got saved by Christ when he made me realize that I did not accept him with all my heart. I am still on the journey as we all are knowing him more each and every day. I still have that shadow of emptiness, anger, and despair behind me, it's like the thorn I have, the cross I have to bear but I know that God's grace is sufficient for me, for his power is made perfect in my weakness (2 Corinthians 12). And I hope that this testimony I have written can give you hope about how loving God is and give a glimpse of what I've been through in the start of my journey to being a Christian.
Footnotes:
1 The Holy Bible, New International Version, Biblica Inc, 2011 2 Lewis, C.S. "The Rival Conceptions of God". Mere Christianity 1952 Book II Chapter 1
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