Have you lost your faith?
To have an intimate walk with the Lord requires much more than repenting and this is often overlooked. Don’t misunderstand me, it is imperative that everyone receives the gift of grace that God has given us as He wishes no one to perish but have everlasting life.
But some of us tend to be legalistic when bringing souls to Christ and we forget to follow up with the newborns to see how they’re doing and if they’re further pursuing their calling.
It can be difficult to share the Gospel with a lost soul and not everyone believes the truth the moment they hear it. In my opinion, the harder part is dedicating one’s life to Christ, once chained to sin and now free, but not really feeling it.
Take it from my experience, when I first came to Christ I couldn’t fully grasp the transformation that Christ had done in me. It wasn’t like I could see heaven’s doors open and angels blowing trumpets. I knew because I had accepted being a sinner and therefore needed salvation. It came from the One true God whose Son died on the cross for my sins, resurrected on the third day, and ascended to the right hand of the Father. I no longer had to pay for my own debt and one day I was going to meet my Creator. That was all I knew and that was truly all I needed to know at the moment of repentance.
But there is so much more. I needed to be discipled to understand it all. To this day, I still am learning and I have to keep pursuing what God has called me to do.
Anyone can repent and accept Christ as their Savior with all of their heart, mind, and soul, and could return to their old life as if nothing ever happened. Whether they’re truly saved or not is between them and the holy Judge, as we will never be able to know until we get to heaven. But the least we can do is to stay close to them to help them stay on the right path.
Proverbs 3:5-8
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your body and refreshment to your bones.
Every believer needs to seek God’s wisdom, guidance, and provisions. No man or woman can rely on their own understanding of life and they must fear the Lord – in other words, we must give up our attitudes, will, feelings, deeds, and goals and exchange them for God’s. You will find it is a wise bargain in the end.
This sounds a lot more than just praying a prayer of repentance and it’s not shared enough with those who have just come to Christ. Without our full submission, we will continue to walk blindly through the darkness of this world.
Thankfully, God is so gracious and kind that He has given us the Word of God. Scripture allows us to not only understand Who He is, but get intimately close to Him.
Think about Enoch. We learned from Genesis 5 that Enoch was a man who walked with God for 300 years yet there were no Scriptures at the time. How did he do it?
Hebrews 11:5
By faith Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death; and he was not found because God took him up; for before he was taken up, he was attested to have been pleasing to God.
How can you please the Lord without knowing what you’re expected to do? It’s obvious that Enoch had to constantly pursue Him to learn how to live to be pleasing in His eyes. In Jude 14-15, we learn that Enoch had been warning his people about a judgment that was to come – the Flood.
During his time, society was wicked and wanted nothing to do with God. Enoch was bold enough to prophesize to them and he did not fear man, for he knew His Creator.
It’s hard enough to walk one day without trying to sin, I can’t imagine what it was like to walk 300 days with the Lord and still manage to be pleasing to Him. Yet Enoch was human and he was able to do it, and not only that but he also tried to get the people around him to turn away from their ungodliness. Surely, he sinned every day just like us but he constantly sought the Lord and had faith in Him. Ultimately, it was his faith that truly saved him – just like Abel, Noah, Abraham, and Moses.
Hebrews 11:1
Now faith is the certainty of things hoped for, a proof of things not seen.
Have faith in the Lord, even when you can’t see the things you want or the things He has promised to you. Know that He is with you and He will never leave you. Reach out to estranged friends, try to find that person who was patient enough to listen to you share the Gospel, and pray. Never cease to pray. You never know the things the Lord has been working on while you were away from those people. We have a Helper, given to us by the Father in Jesus’ name, and He is here to teach us and reminds us of everything the Lord has already taught us.
CHUKA KEN MINISTRY 