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Faith Comes through HearingMany years ago, while I was still in high school, my sister came to tell me of the love of Jesus. At that time I received the Lord into my heart. Afterwards I became dissatisfied and confused. My sister had never again talked about or mentioned the Lord Jesus again. Is this all there is to my salvation? Now do I just wait for the Lord to return to make everything better? This was my concept. I grew up in a Baptist denomination and all I remember of their teaching was that we were being saved from hell fire and brimstone. I grew increasingly cold toward the Lord and religion, and after many years I had stopped going to church. My mother would plead with me to go to the Easter sunrise service every year. Eventually I had turned my back on this too. I was fully in the world and not separated from it. After I married, my wife and I had started to look at our lives and our beliefs. I worked for a time with a man who claimed to have “spiritual insight,” psychic abilities and out of body experiences. These things were interesting to us, but they did not fill the void in my life. I knew that the Lord had saved me, and by His mercy I was unable to enter the world of the occult. Always in my being I sensed that this was not for me. After many more years we decided to go back to church. It was through a denomination that we both felt the need to be baptized. After a few times meeting with this group, we were both baptized. Hallelujah! Again, I felt as though I had somehow grown closer to the Lord. As before, there was little or no care for my spiritual progress. Again I felt that I was left without any direction. My wife and I moved into a small home under some most remarkable circumstances. I believe today that this was the sovereign hand of God placing us there. One warm evening while my wife was working and the kids were in bed I was lying in bed with the bedroom window open. It was fairly early and I just lay down to rest. I heard some sort of speaking from my neighbor's home. They were calling loudly on the name of the Lord Jesus! After a time they started repeating and repeating aloud verses right out of the Bible. This was so strange to me that I tried to peer out my window to see for sure where this had come from. My neighbor's living room window sort of faced our direction but I could not see what was going on. I just lay back in bed and listened to them pray and call on the name of the Lord. At first I was offended because I felt as though I knew the Lord. After all I had accepted Him into my heart about 9 years before. Also I considered my baptism. I knew right then that my faith was not so strong as the people next door to us. How could anyone call on the name of the Lord so boldly? The more I listened the more I was convicted. I prayed a simple prayer to the Lord in great big tears. I prayed, “Lord, I desire to have a faith so strong as to call on Your name just like our neighbors.” Praise the Lord! In about a year my prayer was answered through my wife's inquisitiveness of our neighbors' beliefs. The questions flew and the answers at first were slow. By the Lord's mercy and my wife's persistence, and because of our children, we began meeting with the local church. My son at that time was quite small and he was the first to go to children's meeting with our neighbors. Then my wife went to the meeting all by herself and returned so full of life that I could not understand it. The next Sunday I had decided to go to see about this meeting. I must have fought the devil all night because I could not go to sleep. By about five in the morning I knew I could get to sleep if I would just say to myself “John, you do not have to go to that meeting.” Look, it was already five in the morning, why back out now? I was determined to go to that meeting even if it meant that I would not sleep for a week. If the devil was willing to fight so hard to keep me from this place then I knew I had to go. Although I do not remember what the meeting was about I wept throughout and wondered at the sense of oneness and care displayed there. I have never had such a high experience of the Lord in my life and I knew there was no turning back. The Lord is not just some objective truth for us to believe. He is a living person who can be subjectively experienced by us. This is something for us to experience, not only individually, but corporately. As an individual Christian I have found that I cannot make it. I need the supply of all the believers in Christ Jesus. In the local church I have experienced the practical oneness of the body of Christ. Being subject to the Head of the Body, Christ Jesus, I am part of His bride getting ready for His coming back. Then I will be one with Him and others for eternity as the New Jerusalem. I thank the Lord for His grace and mercy to have captured me with His beauty. John R. Sefcik | Back to List |
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