We celebrate a lot of things in this life. We celebrate birthdays, anniversaries and “gotcha” days. We celebrate Christmas, Easter, and other holidays. On New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, we, along with the rest of the world, celebrate the change of a date on a calendar. But, today, I want to encourage us all to celebrate something a little different this year. I want us to celebrate the time that our hearts and lives were changed by the Lord.
My friend, Amanda and her husband, Greg, recently lost a grandmother. The dear, godly woman had played a crucial role in Greg’s life. According to Greg, she had lived out the essence of a Proverbs 31 woman, but surprisingly, he had never actually heard her story of conversion. It’s not really that unusual.
Without formal opportunities to present our testimonies in church, many believers fail to share their testimonies even to family. In fact, many may not even understand what that term means.
A testimony in a court of law is a formal written or spoken statement. A person presenting a testimony in a trial has to swear to tell the truth about whatever he or she saw or did. A Christian testimony is not that different. It is a truthful statement of when and how you turned your life over to Christ. While it is vitally important that we live our testimonies, it is equally important that we speak them.
Thankfully, Greg and Amanda’s family recovered letters that their grandmother had written. In those letters, she shared stories of her life, including the time when she decided to be a Christ-follower. Not every family is so blessed.
This experience prompted Amanda to make a suggestion. She suggested that the family write down their testimonies so that they could all be collected, shared and stored in a family book of faith. She shared that suggestion with me and the other ladies in our small group. It is such an awesome idea that I wanted to share it with you all too.
This year, I want you, I want all of us, to share our testimonies. I encourage you to make it a goal, a New Year’s Resolution. Let’s share our testimonies with at least one person this year, but let’s also write them down. Let’s give our families and friends a lasting legacy, a way of celebrating the time when God changed our hearts, minds, and lives. Let’s create a permanent record so that the people who love us can remember not only us, but more importantly what God has done for us, when we are gone.
Just the thought may make some of you anxious. But you don’t have to be intimidated. You don’t have to be scared. In fact, writing your testimony can help prepare you, to help you be more ready to speak it when the opportunity arises. It doesn’t have to be long. It doesn’t have to be elaborate. And it definitely doesn’t need to be full of theological terms or Bible verses. Your testimony is as individual as you, and it needs to sound like you—you telling the story of how Christ came into your life.
Perhaps you don’t remember the exact date, or maybe your conversion experience wasn’t something that happened in one specific moment. Maybe, for you, coming to Christ was a process that occurred over a period of time. Maybe you lived many years before you came to know God and had many experiences, or maybe you came to Him in the faith and innocence of childhood. Don’t expect your testimony to be like everyone else’s because no two will be exactly alike.
The most important thing in our lives as believers is knowing that there was a time when we came to Christ. If you had a time when you realized that you were sinner, that you admitted your sinfulness to God and asked for His forgiveness, that you gave your heart and life to Him, acknowledged that He and He alone is God, then you have a testimony. You have a reason to celebrate.
If you have not had that experience, then I pray that you don’t wait. What better way could there be to start the new year than starting it with Jesus?
Stay tuned for Thursday’s blog with tips and ideas to help you record your testimony and create your family’s own book of faith!