When I first started my Christian walk, I had a few challenges that left me wondering if the Christian walk was even for me. I knew I loved God, but I did A LOT of ungodly things. When it came to my Christianity, I can admit I had one foot in and one foot out. I wanted to serve Christ, but on my own terms.
My weaknesses were my mouth and sex. I had a potty mouth. I would curse you out in a heartbeat. When it came to sex, I was never promiscuous, but I engaged in premarital sex. I knew it was wrong, but like I said, this was my weakness. Whether your weakness is an addiction, a toxic relationship, or a bad habit, the good news is you can overcome it. I’ll be honest, the Christian walk is still a struggle for me, but I am determined to keep walking.
Here are three things I have to remind myself everyday in order to stay on track:
1. God is a forgiving God, but that’s not an excuse to keep doing wrong.
God is always there to lift us up when we stumble in our Christian walk. He accepts us for who we are flaws and all no doubt, but if we repent and are truly sorry, our next course of action should be trying to avoid making the same mistakes over and over and over again.
As I mentioned, sex was one of my biggest weaknesses. During the beginning stages of my Christian walk, I was in a relationship with a guy that I was head over heals in love with. And yes, we were engaging in premarital sex on a regular basis.
It wasn’t a perfect relationship. In fact it was a toxic relationship… but I loved him. We would break up almost every month. He would disappoint me, I would dump him, he would tell me how sorry he was, I would take him back, and then the cycle would repeat again. I would repent every time we had sex. I would beg God for forgiveness.
Sometimes I would ask for forgiveness before I had even committed the sin, because I felt so guilty. Until a light bulb went off in my head. Instantly I realized that I was doing the same thing to God, that my boyfriend was doing to me.
I wondered if I was breaking God’s heart the way my mate was breaking mine. I didn’t know for sure, but the thought of it made me cringe. That was the turning point in my Christianity.
2. Being a Christian also means being an example
As Christians we have a duty to share the Gospel of Christ. One way of doing that is by living a Christ like life. No, we will never be perfect like Christ, but we can let our light shine so that through us, non-believers will see Christ and desire a relationship with Him. Our job is not to be critical of those who are not living a Godly life, but to be an example of Christ.
I remember when I was trying to tame my mouth and stop cursing…. I noticed that when I was around people who shared the same bad habit, cursing came natural. It was harder to control. But when I was around people who didn’t curse, I didn’t curse. Not that I didn’t want to at times, but I eventually got to a point where I was able to express myself without using curse words.
Here are words of wisdom my pastor shared with me when I was stumbling in my Christian walk: “If you have to change the way you act when people are looking, maybe that’s an indication that you have some work to do within yourself.” If you must distance yourself from bad influences, by all means do it!
3. It doesn’t matter if everyone else is doing it, wrong is still wrong.
Don’t make the mistake of following other Christians who have one foot in and one foot out. In the end, when it’s all said and done, God will judge you for your sins just as He will judge them for theirs.
This was one of my biggest mistakes. Looking at what other people in the church and what other Christians were doing. Instead of studying my bible to understand exactly what God says I should do. I wasn’t consistent in standing up for what I knew was right.
I was reading an article the other day on modern day Christians. After reading the article I started reading some of the comments. One comment stood out. It read “I hate old fashioned Christians”. I laughed, but felt sad at the same time.
There’s no such thing as an “old fashioned Christian” God’s word never changes. People do. We have let society brainwash us into thinking that if it feels good, do it! Never mind the consequences. Live in the moment. YOLO!
