What must I do to be saved?

Blog # -My Understanding of Salvation

The Invitation –“Lets do Life Together”

                “Salvation is simple.” Something I hear people say all the time. But it was not that simple for me. I grew up in church that made salvation felt unreachable. Where obtaining it was contingent upon your righteous living, and where the pastor had to deem you to be saved. I did not understand most sermons. From a little boy to a young man I spent that part of church with toys, talking with friends, my phone (when that era began), or trying not to fall asleep. “That part of church was for the adults” were my thoughts. I did what I could to stay in tune which led to a few sermons I can remember and use today but most were a blur. My Church highlights for me were Praise and Worship because I got to play the drums or when my Uncle preached because he stayed on fire for Jesus and that meant shouting music. I never understood why my parents or any of the other adults served the Lord. Most of my spiritual encounters were very emotionally centered or force due to wanting to please the pastor or the people.

                So naturally I lived a life of sinned behind closed doors. The eyes and ears I wanted to keep my sins from were the ones of my parents and the church body[KG1] .  My God encounter didn’t happen yet. God wasn’t that real to me yet. Being saved to me was someone who didn’t sin. Someone who was almost perfect. When I got saved, I was anticipating on having this internal feeling that triggering an uncontrollable external expression once I got saved. AND THEN I’m told, once saved I have to find this thing called the Holy Ghost too?

Ok…I’m lost and sinning feels too good to figure it out so I will come back when I’m done with this sin life.

Life went on that way until it was time to transition to another church. At the alter call at the new church I was asked if I was saved and at about 21 or 22 years old my response was, “I don’t know.” Then salvation was explained: I was told it was as simple as believing Jesus died for my sins through the sacrifice on the cross and believing this gives me my seat in heaven. Nothing magic will happen after this moment, but your change will come gradually. Man…I was painfully unsatisfied. We as human thrive off sensations and I felt not…a…thing when that I received the news on the simplicity of salvation. There had to be more....

It wasn’t all clear after that day, but I felt cheated and bitter for a very long time due the way I was brought up believing salvation was this huge thing that induced so much fear, stress, and yearning to go after something beyond my reach. 

As years past my relationship with God truly did increase. My love for Christ, His Word, and His Ways grew stronger. I still have scars from my past that cause me to battle with judging others over holding people accountable according to the Word along with many other sinful thorns I picked up along the way but God is full of grace and mercy.

All of that brings me here with you.

God and living for Him has become so important to me that it landed me in front of some information that has allowed me to completely understand the salvation process. It gives me great pleasure to share my findings with you in hopes of you joining us as we do life together- striving to be our best as we live and serve the one True and Living God.

I would have to say at this time in my life the Holy Spirit has given me some go-to pastors and Tony Evans has been quite instrumental in my desire to grow deeper in God. I enjoy his ability to eloquently create sentences, his knowledge of the word, ability to bring life stories into his message, and his humility. I have a sermon on phone from him entitled Ruling Through the Word where after a couple listens, abiding with God and The Word I came up an more thorough understanding.

Here is how it came it me:

1. With no choice of my own, I was born with Sin embedded into my soul.

2. My soul is me. It’s not my body, it is all the many things that makes me Tim Young

3. All that is Tim Young; the good, bad, ugly, beautiful, happy, sad, strengths, weaknesses, gains, and pains are naturally contaminated causing my perception to be distorted. This is all due to this birth defect called sin.

4. No matter the nationality, culture, or creed every human being has red blood running through their veins and all were born with this same but individually unique Sin birth defect.

5. Each person has their own sin encounters at different moments, stages, and times throughout their lives. This is what makes it feel so unique.

6. Sin in its simplest form is all things acted, thought upon, or spoken, that are not of God. 

7. Sin is self-centered in nature. Naïve to the dangerous down-spiraling effects of those ungodly thoughts, words and actions. From an instant point of view, sin only wants temporal satisfaction.

8. There is one thing that can eliminate sin and that is the Blood of Jesus Christ.

9. Through believing that Jesus died on the Cross for my sins (because nothing else could wash my sins away) as the ultimate sacrifice,  I instantly possess a free ticket into Heaven when the time comes for my soul to leave this earth through the physical death. As soon as I take my last breath, Heaven will be my reward due to my choice to believe.

10. But that is only the first part of salvation – The second grants me a New Life on earth; a New Birth in Christ. Compared to the people before the Crucifixion, I get the living God inside of me where they had encounters. Now sin gets a roommate that it will soon wish never moved in; the 3rd of the Trinity, The Holy Spirit(Holy Ghost)

11. The Holy Spirit starts out as a seed that enters our souls upon accepting Christ as our savior. This seed can only grow through consistent application of God’s instructions and the continual denying of one’s life-dominating birth defect sin. These serve as spiritual nutrients, sun, and water causing an expansion of the Holy Spirit seed in one’s life that will grow to be a strong plant firmly rooted in God. The larger it grows the smaller the dependent of sin becomes. The larger it grows the less room sin will have to dominate the soul.

12. This what we call The Sanctification of the Soul. The reality is that your soul is destined for Heaven as a believer of Christ. A soul in heaven is purified of all sin. A soul on earth is not. The Holy Spirit produces a away out- means to fight back against the many attacks and temptations to sin. In Heaven there is no such a thing as time or history as life after the only natural death will lead to eternity in Heaven or Hell. Children of God while in History/ Time (life on earth) get the opportunity to prepare their souls for Heaven through this Sanctification Process because it is still saturated in sin.

Well there you have it. There is more great things to come after this breakdown. If you are interested in knowing contact me and we can talk further. There is also a resource link below.  I pray and hope this opens up a deeper understanding of salvation like it has done for me. I pray that this excites you about your journey, gets you excited to share the gospel, and thrilled for what heaven will be like without pain fear, disease, hatred, and all things sin related.

PEACE & BLESSINGS,

TIM YOUNG

Tune In…Be Challenged…Be Blessed.

Embrace Your Channel!

Focus on your purpose and tune into your own channel!

Never have I ever wanted to be seen or accepted by so many people in my life but only experienced rejection. It’s almost as if I had the letters written on my forehead, I HAVE AN INFECTIOUS DISEASE! Here’s an example of how my mind works when I am seeking this kind of acceptance; at work, my desk is positioned in the last cubicle of my row so when I am greeted by certain people I tend to get the leftover energy from all the other greetings prior to me. I think to myself; what’s that all about! In so many areas of my life I have found myself in situations where I am miserable, trying to fit into a mold that doesn’t fit me. This often backfires leading to frustration making me seem unstable and unapproachable. I often find myself asking, ‘What did I do? What am I not doing? What do I have to do to be accepted?” Something like that happened to me recently and I heard The Holy Spirit say, “You have your own channel that I gave you for the appointed people to tune into to get what they need from ME through YOU. Embrace the TV Programs that are on your TV Station, market those pilots,

record and film those series, set them to air, and I will do the rest.”

• Embrace the result of isolation caused by rejection • Let God filter/screen your thoughts • Pray for the people in your current circle • Pray for the people that need to be in circle for your next move • Fight back with the Power of the Holy Spirit against your emotions because that is what will be trying to dominate your peace and joy. • Pray for strength as you head into this liberating process. For me, the biggest challenge in moments like these is looking past the people-pleaser handicap that I possess. I understand now that when trying to be a people-pleaser you compromise your originality, people grow frustrated with your inconsistencies wanting less to do with you because your attempts are centered on adjusting to them than just being yourself, or you will be tossed away when you have been used up.

Mindset Shift: ABC can’t be MTV. NBC can’t be BET. When you tune into ABC, you’re not looking for TV Shows on BET, NBC, or MTV right? When people discover your channel, they are not looking for reruns of The Wayne’s Brothers on Thursday night at prime time. Especially when they know it’s coming on MTV-2 after Martin most nights. Shows like Martin, The Jamie Foxx Show, The Wayne’s Brothers, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and My Wife and Kids did what they were supposed to do; they were themselves and did that so well that people were perfectly fine with watching them over and over again multiple years after the series ended.

Self-Reflection Are the shows you’re airing conducive to the wellbeing of the viewers or is it just for fame and fortune? What TV shows need to be cancelled? What is in demand right now? THE GOD PERSPECTIVE It’s befitting to merge this mental approach with this sermon I found, The Mindset of a Servant from Dr. Tony Evans. In this sermon he discussed in a very prominent way how followers of Christ are educated to think like the greatest servant who ever did it, Jesus Christ Himself. In Philippians 2:1-11 Tony reveals 4 core principles. I would like to focus on the last two that supports the self-reflection portion. Are the shows you’re airing conducive to the wellbeing of the viewers or is it just for fame and fortune? What TV shows need to be cancelled? What is in demand right now?

• The 3rd principle states Servants think in terms of their new position in Christ. Jesus was all God and all man. Everything He did on this earth from birth to the cross was driven by God’s purpose for his life. Jesus could have easily leaned on the God-side to change every single situation He encountered on the Man-side. Jesus could have also healed every single person that requested healing, answered every single question that was asked unto Him, and destroyed every demon that the devil sent. But Jesus stayed connected to God through the ways of Abiding (that we possess as well) and willingly chose to serve God through only doing as He was told over what could have done. If you had the power that Jesus had, would you take advantage of the God- side and just dominate every Man-side-issue you faced? Would you have conformed to the Devil when he tempted Jesus before the cross to just derail everything because you had all the power to do so? Or would consult the Creator that granted you your power, conform to his words and ways, and use that power for the good of Him, His people, and yourself? You as an individual possess are your own TV station. As a TV station when people are viewing your TV shows the power you possess is proven in the alternate name used for TV shows- Television Programming. You’re not just viewing; you are being programmed based upon the content provided to you. So I ask again, when people are captivated by your Television Programming (your words, presence, and actions) ...what are you downloading into their system?

• The 4th principle states Servants think in terms of true greatness. Jesus’ television programming was not swayed by popularity. The TV Shows that became in-demand only became that way because of His obedience and commitment to pleasing God. Since Jesus was only in it to please God, He obtain the ultimate reward not just on earth but in heaven (see link for supportive scriptures). Yes, Jesus did service the best, but God gave us grace, mercy and the Sanctification through Holy Spirit due to salvation. With this triple threat we are granted the opportunity to sift and filter through all the TV Programming that needs to be cancelled because it is not benefitting our viewers.

Know you power. Use it wisely.

TIM YOUNG

Tune in... Be Challenged...Be Blessed.