We are all The Body of Christ. You may make all the boorish demands you wish but your institutional bias remains irrelevant.
People won't accept a deception simply by your demands that they do.
Church Membership, does not Save you.
Sitting in a Pew every week, does not Save you.
Being an Acolyte, does not Save you.
Head knowledge about Jesus and as the stories about HIM were TRUE, did not SAVE ME.
Christian Water Baptism, does not Save you.
Being a Community Service Volunter, does not Save you.
Being a Sunday School Teacher, does not Save your.
I was all of those things, and I didn't even know that
I WAS NOT SAVED.
I was about to turn 29, when I got saved, after my THIRD ATTEMPT at Suicide, in1977. On my first two attempts I had a pistol against my Temple, with the TRIGGER half pulled, when
a TERROR OVER WHELMED ME. A TERROR, that not even the worst Mass Murderer with a knife to my throat, couldn't even come close to PUTTING IN ME. That TERROR I was in reality, standing in the gates of Hades/Hell, about to WALK IN. I did not care if I hurt my parants, or my Brother or Sister. I just wanted to CEASE TO EXIST.
After my third attempt, which I was an attempt to arrange a FATAL MOTORCYCLE ACCIDENT, while three times as Drunk as I have ever been. I was on a FRESHLY poured, extra thick Gravel road, for a whole mile with NO HELMET, Leaning out over that handle bars so that I would HIT HEAD FIRST at over 65 mph. At the start of that mile, I even TAUNTED GOD, by YELLING;
"IF YOU WANT TO TAKE ME ON THIS MILE, YOU CAN DO IT ANY WHERE YOU WANT TO, AS I DO NOT WANT TO SEE ANOTHER DAY!"
Dispite all of that, THE BIKE DID NOT EVEN WABBLE A BIT. IT WAS AS IF I WAS RIDING ON PAVEMENT. I sat up another 3 or 4 hours, and as I stepped into my bedroom a thought crossed my mind. "I cannot even ride like that, when I was sober." It was like GOD was saying to me, "NO YOU DON'T, BECAUSE I HAVE A PLAN FOR YOUR LIFE." As wave, after, wave of GUILT for my whole lifestyle washed over me. AND I PLEADED WITH HIM TO FORGIVE ME FOR MY WHOLE LIFESTYLE. I MUST HAVE CRIED, WEEPING IN ENDLESS SOBS FOR AT LEAST 1.5 HOURS MORE. AT SOME POINT IN THE GREAVING PROCESS, THE HOLY SPIRIT GAVE ME A PRAYER THAT I HAD NEVER HEARD BEFORE.
I prayed:
Forgive Me LORD, Forgive ME! If you have a purpose for my life, then LORD, you are going to have to come into it, and run my Life. Because I am making a total MESS of it.
No one ever taught me that Prayer, it was the a TOTAL SURRENDER TO JESUS CHRIST. In my youth until I was almost 29, HE was only in my HEAD. AND NOW HE and the Holy Spirit, WAS IN MY HEART. NOTHING IN ME, I KNEW WOULD EVER WANT TO TAKE IT BACK. The difference was NIGHT AND DAY IN ME. I LOVED HIM ENOUGH that I REALLY WANT HIM to control my life forever, and yes, I knew I had a SIN NATURE would want to interfere. But now I had JESUS CHRIST and the HOLY SPIRIT in my HEART, and they would never LEAVE ME!
NO Statement as the top, NONE OF THAT WAS THERE in the beginning, even WATER BAPTISM DID NOT SAVE, because is it is Spiritual BAPTISM, where the Holy Spirit emmerses us into the Spiritual Body of CHRIST,
THAT SAVES.
1 Corinthians 12:13 (HCSB)
13
For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—
whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
Romans 10:8-10 (NASB)
8 But what does it say? "THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, IN YOUR MOUTH AND IN YOUR HEART"—that is, the word of faith which we are preaching,
9
that if you confess {NOT just profess} with your mouth JESUS as LORD , and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;
10
for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses,
resulting in salvation.
