Jesus, My Savior

Jesus isn’t just the Savior, He’s my Savior.

Christ died for my sins. He was buried for my sins. He was raised on the third day so I could spend eternity with him.

This week’s name is Savior, and I can’t let it pass without telling you who Jesus is to me.

I grew up in a church-going household, and I don’t think I’ve ever had a moment of not wanting to believe. I’ve had doubts, though. Who hasn’t?

What I didn’t know was how to know God. I knew what I was taught and what I absorbed–the first being lots of rules and the second being that the people around me didn’t really know Him, either. They did what the Church told them to do and hoped for the best. You wouldn’t really know till you died if you were good enough to pass muster, but if you did your best and did your penance for what you’d done wrong, then hopefully . . .

And then there was Annie. These pictures aren’t flattering to any of us, but they’re all I can find. I didn’t keep much to remind me of my childhood. Besides, these pictures are reality.

Annie came to work for our family when my brother was twelve days old. Nowadays, you’d call her a nanny. But she was just Annie. A fixture. My world. She came to work for us when my brother was 12 days old. Officially, she was there to watch my brother when my mother was at work in the family business. Unofficially, she was an adult in the house when my mother was passed out drunk. She came six days a week with a half day off on Thursdays to get her hair done. In a chaotic home, she was the one constant. By the time I was 10, I was spending Sunday afternoons at Annie’s house.

Annie loved Jesus. She puttered around the house singing hymns off-key and listening to radio preachers like Peter Popoff and Rex Humbard. She read Little Golden Books to me and taught me about Noah and Daniel and Jesus. She was a simple woman with a simple faith. And she modeled unconditional love when when I couldn’t figure out how to get my parents to love me.

My life was complicated. I was surrounded by addiction and abuse and various personality disorders which made for a home filled with strife. Children need consistency. Annie was my pole star in a choppy sea.

When I was fourteen, I was sick of trying to be good enough. Sick of trying to fix my family. Sick of trying to cover up the craziness at home. And sick to death of the hypocrisy I saw among those who called themselves Christians. I cried out to God, telling Him that if He was real, He needed to show up in a big way, or I was done.

And show up He did.

The heavens didn’t open. He didn’t speak to me audibly. But my brother came to faith and shared the gospel with me. It sounded good, but it seemed too easy. I started watching Christian TV after my parents went to bed. (They wouldn’t have approved.) My brother and I sneaked off to Wednesday night Bible study. (How lame is that. I did most everything in secret.) Every time someone said to pray the Sinner’s Prayer, I did. But salvation couldn’t be that easy, could it? Just pray a prayer, and poof, you’re good?

That didn’t make sense.

I bought a Bible and started devouring the New Testament, especially Acts. It read like an adventure novel. And I still did everything the Church said to do, because salvation couldn’t be as simple as just saying a prayer.

This went on till my senior year in high school.

Turns out, I was right.

Because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. – Romans 10:9-10 (ESV)

This confession business is more than lip service. Jesus isn’t your Savior unless He’s your Lord. We talked about that here.

So, the first Sunday in January, 1983, I came to know Jesus as Lord. And realized I didn’t know the first thing about how to be a Christian. I felt like an eighteen-year-old baby. I spent several years studying and observing, learning to be a Christian human being. To this day, I wonder if my BSU director Joyce ever realized how intensely I was molding myself after her. Then, I realized I didn’t know anything about being a Christian woman. All my learned behaviors were a recipe for disaster. But God.

For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work among you will complete it by the day of Christ Jesus. –Philippians 1:6

Jesus was faithful. He put women in my path that made me think, “I want to be them when I grow up.” Sherry and Sue, wives and mothers in my church back in Oklahoma, mentored me in what it is to be a godly wife and mother.

But the most important element in my growth as a disciple has been spending time in the Word.

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. Eph 5:25-27

I don’t know how this washing business works; I just know that it does. I’m not who I used to be.

Jesus put Annie and Joyce and Sherry and Sue and countless others in my path to lead me to Him. With the Holy Spirit to guide me into all truth and the Word to wash me, little by little, I’m being transformed.

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. – Galatians 2:20