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Nice post Carla. I was also saved while going to an old time Southern Baptist church that was very very serious about Salvation, and you don't see that as much today. While I'm not such a fire and brimstone preacher here's a neat story which apparently came from Britain I believe to the US at one time as a powerful life changing message...I can't repeat much of anything very well but in short....
Have you heard this?...About the 2 guys flying on a plane somewhere and they both "put on" the Lord Jesus Christ? One of the guys started feeling some discomfort "wearing" the Lord, who is compared to wearing a parachute. for example when food came, the parachute restricted his free movement some and other various things kept causing him some discomfort so that he began thinking or saying that...
"Hey, I've been lied to! I was told that by wearing the Lord I'd have a peaceful and enjoyable "flight," and all I'm getting out of this is discomforts! He kept getting more irritated by the discomforts while the other guy never complained once but actually remained very happy and content even though the parachute caused him the same experience of flight.
Eventually the one guy took off the parachute, because it didn't prove to him to increase the comfort or pleasure of the flight. So ofcourse, something goes wrong with the plane and it starts nose diving. Now the guy is in a panic trying to get the parachute back on but is unsuccessful in the little time he had.
The moral ofcourse...The guy who kept the parachute on really did not notice any discomfort, because the peace of mind and the security he knew by keeping his on out-weighed any discomfort to the point that he didn't really even notice any.
So in this day when so many are preaching more about the comforts and great flight you will have if you wear the Lord Jesus Christ vs. the "real ultimate reason" that people put it on, which is not for a great flight but to avoid ultimate death, is it any wonder that so many put on Christ for the more superficial reasons of a great flight, and then take him off at the first signs of discomfort (the trials and testings of life as a Christian)?
The guy was never told the parachute would save his life; he was only told about how it would offer a "great flight." So here's to the old time Baptist Church which was very serious about the wages of sin which are death and about the free gift of Salvation, which is not by works but by Grace.
I've had many amazing experiences since the old Baptist church and a much deeper walk with God, but yet I thank God that I was so blessed to hear the kind of truth that roots and grounds your soul in the very simple but yet very serious and powerful truth of which God says...."How shall we escape if we neglect so great a Salvation?"
We today are a culture that is all about comfort, pleasure, and worldly prosperity, so that we have adjusted the Gospel to meet the desires of the natural man, and as a result...a loss of Power in the Church!
I never forget this message I heard which came across with far more depth of reality and power than I have told it. It holds a great meaning for what is occuring today with the Gospel message and the results of this new Gospel are a weakened Church and weak and ungrounded followers of Christ.
It was also mentioned, and I believe this so much...that to the Prideful you preach the Law, which shows man his sin, because this is really what the prideful need in order to snap them to the reality of their spiritual need, but to the poor and hurting, you don't pound them with the Law but you preach Grace, because they are willing and prepared to receive it, and recognize their need.
Have you ever noticed that the proud do not respond well to such a great gift because they in their pride do not feel or recognize a need beyond what they have provided themselves? Yet their need is the greatest. Amen.
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