Salvation, the best gift a parent can share with their child.

I was reflecting on the special event of last month, January 9th, 2012, Wyatt accepted Christ as his Savior. It has been my privilege to be there when each of my children has accepted Christ. It is a wonder to see the spark that ignites as the realization of Scriptural truths catches their hearts, and they are driven to seek reconciliation with their Creator.

I always wonder that such a simple conversation, often at their bedside, can have a life-altering affect. But though I may wonder, it never lasts long. In each case the child has come to me in the following days with perplexing spiritual questions and observations, which can only be answered with Scripture. I see that a hunger has been awakened! My job as their mother has shifted from bringing them to understand the Law of God, and letting it be their "schoolmaster" to show their need for Christ's redemption... but to their gardener, helping to sow and water the seed of Truth in their hearts, and nurture their spiritual growth. To help them weed out the old nature of sin, and run the race before them.

Write these commandments that I've given you today on your hearts. Get them inside of you and then get them inside your children. Talk about them wherever you are, sitting at home or walking in the street; talk about them from the time you get up in the morning to when you fall into bed at night. Tie them on your hands and foreheads as a reminder; inscribe them on the doorposts of your homes and on your city gates.
Deut. 6:6-9

Now I can say that I know that ALL of my children can be certain of their eternal home - Who said you can't take your treasure with you? Pour in the scripture! It is God's Word that makes the soil of their hearts ready, and it is His promise that it will not come back void. It is a blessing to have been with each of them in that moment when the "spark" dawns. Each time, the conversation goes a little like this one with Mayda:

(excerpt from my old Blog )


Feb 22, 2010
These are the moments...
... when being a mom is the best job in the world.

Mayda asked Jesus to be her Lord and Saviour tonight. :)

Today on our way home from a vet appointment, Emma announced from the back seat of the car that she had helped Mayda pray to ask Jesus into her heart. I thanked Emma for her evangelism and explained to her that there is more involved than saying a special prayer, and that truly it must come from the heart. This perplexed her but I think she's getting it. She had read her CEF (Child Evengelism Fellowship) storybook to Mayda and in the back was a simple prayer and she had gotten Mayda to repeat it back to her.  Not exactly a heart response...

So tonight I asked Mayda to join me in the rocking chair and talk about Jesus. She brought the book and showed me the prayer she had prayed. I asked her if she knew she was a sinner.

"What's sin?"

I explained sin is breaking God's laws, such as lying, etc. And we recited James 2:10 that tells us breaking one of God's laws is like breaking them all. I asked her if she had ever sinned.

"No, I've never sinned" :)

So reminded her of a lie she had told only about an hour before, and the light came on and her eyes narrowed.

"Oh"

Did you know God wants us to be perfect, or we can't be in heaven with Him? Are you perfect?

"Yes"

Really?

"um no"

me neither. Well if we can't get to heaven, where DO we go? Then we delved into a super simple explanation of what hell is, and that it is real. Her eyes were big as saucers.

"I don't want to go there!" Tears welling up.

Me neither, and God doesn't want you to either. He loved you so much that He made a plan. His Son, Jesus, was perfect, so perfect that He had no sin, no sin to pay for. If I died and went to hell I'd be paying for my own sin, but Jesus had none. So he offers to take your sin and pay for it. I had her hold out her hands and we transferred the imaginary burden of her sin from on hand to the other, onto Jesus, and then I explained that he took the punishment for her sin. What does the Bible say that is? "For the wages of sin is death" Romans 3:23 So then we talked about Jesus' death and how He did it for us, and that after He died, He went down into hell to conquer sin and death. By now she's sobbing for her Dear Jesus.

Do you know what happens next?

*sniff* "No! What?"

He rose up from the dead, and came back to life. He walked and talked and then went up to heaven to be with God. He was able to take the sin of the world, because He was God, and then come back to life. When he went to heaven He gave us His Holy Spirit to live in those who invite Him in, so He can be in our hearts.

She was so exhuberant it was as if Easter had happened all over again right there in our living room.

Do you want Him to take your sin, so you can be perfect, and send His Holy Spirit into your heart?

"Yes! I do want to!"

So we prayed a simple prayer, and cried together. When she was done she said, "Oh, I feel better!" with a big letting-it-all-go kind of sigh.

Then she told Emma: "I sinned and... theres this bad part, a place called hell, it's dark! But then I asked Jesus in my heart, and He washed it all clean! and I can be with God!"

----

Bear with me as I write it all out, but I want her to remember... especially the tears, and the joy. You see, I was only four when I met Jesus, on such simple terms as these. Sitting on my bed with my mom... I can remember the light coming in my bedroom window. I don't remember a lot else about it. When I was 12 I rededicated my life to Him, and I remember a big change that day. It's the first I knew really what the peace of the Holy Spirit was all about. Even at 12 I knew the burden of my own sin, especially the hidden ones that plagued my heart... But then the Light broke through and... "Oh, I feel better!"

“Come now, and let us reason together,”

Says the Lord,

“Though your sins are like scarlet,

They shall be as white as snow;

Though they are red like crimson,

They shall be as wool.

Isaiah 1:18