Once upon a time, I had a pastor who would routinely comment that I cut my teeth on the church pews because I grew up going to church and was taught about God at an early age. What he meant by this was that my salvation was seemingly easier than most people who had lived in sin and was dramatically changed. While it was true that I did have an advantage growing up on the church pews, it was wrong to downplay my own personal salvation experience.
No, I wasn't lying drunk or drugged in a ditch somewhere when I received my salvation, but each person's experience is different and their own. We all have our own struggles and battles that is unique to us. Salvation isn't a competition to measure who was worse than another. Just because I grew up in church didn't give me an immunity to needing salvation.
The pastor made me feel like I should go out and commit a bunch of REAL sins so that my salvation experience would be worthy of his opinion.The Bible says, "For ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and ALL are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus."
We are all in the same boat when it comes to salvation.
To say it was "easy" for me is unfair because you don't know me or the road I have travelled.
Yes, I grew up in church and learning about Jesus as early as I can remember. You also should know that I grew up in a church that taught that if you messed up and did something wrong that you could lose your salvation so there was a lot of starting/stopping the salvation process - or so we thought. It was a very, very frustrating experience. There was absolutely NO room for error. Who could live up to that?
Although my dad was my pastor for my childhood years, it wasn't until I was a teenager when I can point to a time that I truly received salvation. We had a revival service with a man named Bruce Scotton who was a traveling evangelist that impacted my life at that time. What he preached reached my soul and the fact that he took an interest in me made a huge difference. Before, when we had an evangelist, I was usually ignored and pushed to the background. Bruce took an interest in me and talked to me and even played games with me. At the time I had my first electronic football game, and he took time to play it with me. He wasn't all about preaching but relating and that's how I discovered the real Jesus for me. So, to say it was "easy" because I cut my teeth on the church pews is completely ridiculous.
Of course, after that experience, I have had my ups and downs in my experience. I haven't always been perfect or sinless, but I have continued to hold onto my salvation.
The Bible also says: ".... work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose."
We all have to make our own way. We can't look at someone and assume we know their experience. We should encourage each other to do good and be a better version of ourselves, not compare how bad we have been. That's silly.
I have known others who "cut their teeth on the church pews" but when they grew up, they left the church and rebelled against it because of their experiences in the church. Growing up in church is not always an easy way for some. When you grow up in church you see the good, bad and ugly of church and church people. It wasn't always the perfect heavenly experience like you would think.
The salvation experience is a very important part of a person's life. It is not our job to grade the experience but to embrace it, celebrate it and focus on the fact that a person has a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
