How I fell in Love With God

After struggling in life to being an acceptable person, an acceptable Christian, mostly through my teenage years, I got angry at the church and my family judging me. I got tired of hearing every Sunday that I was a sinner and needed to change not only my ways but my very thinking.

I recited the sinners prayer every Sunday in church because the pulpit told me I was unacceptable to God and headed for hell. My dad made me feel guilty about even breathing air, not because of what he said, but because of his silence. He never knew he was my hero and when he would ignore me when I spoke, I interpreted it as guilt. My Dad was my model citizen, he could do no wrong. I used to listen to his every word when he told stories to others. I tried so hard to be perfect like he was.

When I got my first job, I moved to another county and abandoned the guilt trip church brought me and when I would visit my family, I tried my best to ignore the guilt trip till I could leave town and return to my guilt free life.

I refused to accept religion telling me over and over I was a worthless sinner. There had to be a better way.
Salvation must be simple, living in Christ Jesus must be simple enough a weak minded emotional wreck could be saved and enjoy peace with God.

Then one day God opened up my heart, my eyes to the gospel of grace, right there in the New Testament, the new covenant with man. Love the Lord your God and others.

Following this post are the details Joel Rosenburg was teaching, but this is exactly how it worked for me.

First I believed that salvation was incredibly simple and an undeserved gift we do not earn. Just accept the gift of salvation through the work of the cross, believe.

After you accept the gift, pray God give you another gift. Desire and He will!
The desire brought me hunger and thirst for His word and truth.
The hunger and thirst made me meditate on God's love
By meditating on Him I got to know Him better.
The more I got to know Him, my Heavenly Father, my Lord and Savior Jesus, The Holy Spirit,
the more I fell in love with Him.
The more I love Him, the more I obey Him.
The more I obey Him the more I abide in Him.
The more I abide in Him, the more good fruit I bear.
The more fruit I bear the more I glorify Him.
The secret of life is to glorify God.

All I had to do was believe that He would answer my prayer of desire and accept His free gift of salvation.

I had to break, before God could shape and mold me.
My dad had nothing to do with it, I have a new hero that does not make me feel guilty and fills my heart with love for my dad. After all, he is my dad and I love him so.