My Story

I don't remember when I gave my life to Jesus. I was too little to know the moment, I just believed.

After late Saturday night parties, Mom and Dad wanted to sleep in on Sunday morning. My dad claimed to be an atheist, but my mom had been raised religious, so it was important to her that my brother and I had religion. She would wake us up, go back to bed, and my little brother, Ben, and I walked to the neighborhood church a few blocks away for Sunday School. That must be the place I first heard the Bible stories.

I remember how my little girl discussions went with Dad about God. They always ended something like this, "Becky, some people need God. I'm really glad you have him, but Daddy doesn't need God."

One day I walked down the stairs to our basement and saw Dad sitting on the couch reading "The Way" Bible, taking notes, and highlighting portions of it. I was so excited, but I didn't know he was reading the Bible to disprove it, not because he wanted to accept it.

Somewhere around second grade, my family life took a drastic turn. Three doctors in our small town became friends with Dad and invited him to weekly breakfasts with them. They were Christians, but my dad respected them as intellectuals. Eventually Dad said, "They put skin on Christ for me. They could never have argued me into believing, they couldn't have done that. Instead they loved me into the Kingdom. I saw Jesus in them so clearly, I couldn't deny the truth any longer."

My mom became friends with the doctor's wives and other Christian women in town, and she realized that the religion she had grown up with was meaningless without a relationship with God. Her life was empty and her marriage was falling apart. One night as they were about to fall asleep, Mom said, "Roy, I need to become a Christian."

His response was, "Me, too." They prayed together that night and we were all never the same.

I witnessed such a change in Mom and Dad and their marriage, it strengthened my faith in ways I'll never be able to describe.

At that time, we became your typical American Christian family. We went to church together, Mom and Dad got involved with Bible studies, and made great friendships with other Christian families. They were hungry for the Bible.

Ben and I went to Sunday School, summer camps, and as we got older, youth groups.

When people would ask me to share my testimony, I'd always clam up because I didn't think I had a story to tell. It was really my parents' story, I thought. My testimony is their testimony. I didn't have some dramatic life of being addicted to drugs and then healed. I didn't have a huge period of teenage rebellion that led to my life falling apart. There are amazing stories of God's healing in people's lives and how He transformed those lives. The church I go to now is full of stories of God's amazing rescues, but I always just saw myself as the goody goody girl who always believed in God, went to church and youth group, and really had nothing exciting to share. I often joked about making up a more exciting story.

One thing I can do is encourage parents. If you want to be a good parent, you need Jesus. I can personally attest to what a gift it is to children when their parents give their lives to Jesus and raise them to know Him. All of my life I have had the joy of knowing Jesus. I didn't have to ever go through a time without Him. It's a gift to grow up in a Christian home even if you don't end up with a very exciting testimony. : )

When people ask my parents what they did to raise Ben and I so successfully, they laugh and say, "Jesus did it."

My mom would often pray, "Lord, I don't know what I'm doing here. You raise them!"

So, yes, my childhood testimony is my parents' story, but as time has gone on, I've seen how God has been faithful to give me my own story, a story that isn't my mom and dad's story, but Becky's story, but because this post is already so long, I'll have to tell Part 2 tomorrow. : )

Seek the Lord Sunday is a weekly blog carnival hosted my good friend Daiquiri. Stop by and see what other bloggers are talking about this morning and join in. The more the merrier!

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