My Testimony

Today I'm taking part in the "Bloggy Tour of Testimonies" and sharing my testimony. I just love this tour!
Anyway, for my testimony. As I've said on here before, I was raised in a Christian home. My parents weren't perfect of course, but they always lived the life in front of me. And when they did do something wrong, I saw them ask forgiveness for it.
I learned very early on that Jesus died to forgive our sins. By the time I was five I could pretty much quote the entire Christmas story and tell you the whole reason Jesus came. (Seriously there are videos of Christmas plays when I was little.)
Then when I was five I started at a Christian school, so once again I had Christian influences all around (as far as teachers go anyway.)
It was around that time that I decided it was time for me to "pray the prayer." After all, I knew that Jesus had come to die for my sins. I knew that I was a sinner. So I prayed the prayer, and being the good Baptist girl that I was, I was baptized.
But I came to realize later in life that I had just been going through the motions. As a matter of fact, I went through the motions of that prayer countless times. Anytime I watched a movie about the end times or I heard a sermon or watched a play about hell I prayed the prayer. But I never truly meant the prayer until March of 1995 when I was 12 years old.
A preacher had come for revival, and it was Friday night of revival. I can't tell you one word that the preacher preached. Seriously because most of the revival I didn't pay ONE BIT of attention. On Friday night God convicted me. He showed me that I had played church and prayed a few prayers, but that I had never really changed. I had never become a true Christian.
That night I went down to the alter, and I prayed and asked Christ to come into my heart for real. Not because I thought it was what others wanted me to do. Not because I was scared of hell (though I was because after all, it's a scary place to think of, and I didn't want to go there.) But I prayed because I knew deep down inside that I was a sinner, and I needed a Savior.
I came alive that night. Old things truly passed away and all things became new. I'm not going to say I've been perfect since that time. I'd be a liar if I did.
But Jesus has been with me each step of the way, and He's taught me so much. His Word has become something that I want to learn rather than something I had to learn in my Christian school. Church has become somewhere that I love to go rather than somewhere I was forced to go. And singing has become something I do for Him rather than something I did for myself. There is much more I could say about my testimony, but I'll stop here for now.
I was a sinner on a church pew, but God saved me by His amazing grace!