I’ve shared with you before that I’ve never known a day in my life apart from God’s love, and that putting my faith in His love for me never came difficult for me.

I truly cannot remember a time in my life when I didn’t believe in God‘s love for me, or that Christ had given His life to save me from my sin.

There was a day, though, when I was nine years old, following Vacation Bible School at my church, when I did meet with the pastor of our church (with my grandfather‘s help) and I officially declared my faith in Jesus for salvation.

I was baptized just a couple of Sundays later, and it was real! As much as a nine-year-old child can believe in and trust in God, I did! If there had been an accident – if I had died at any point – I know I would’ve gone to heaven because of God’s love and Jesus’ sacrifice and the faith that had been taught to me and demonstrated for me from a young age which I clung to.

It was not until I was a teenager, though, that I began to take steps to make my faith in God my own.

See, my faith in God as a child was real – it was genuine, and I truly was saved and destined for heaven, even as a child! I have no doubts or questions about any of that whatsoever.

But, my faith through those years, like just about everything else in our lives when we are children, it depended on others: in my case, it was my grandparents, and my Sunday school teachers, and my church – and that’s okay! There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.

I mean, when you were a child, weren’t you dependent on your parents for food? Didn’t you live in a house or an apartment that someone else paid for? Is that wrong? It was still your food. It was still your house, right? You just shared it with your parents or guardians – that’s the way we grow and develop as children – it’s right and proper.

But there comes a day when you start to work to provide your own food for yourself. You start to provide your own housing – your life becomes your own to manage and take care of and lead. And our faith in Jesus is just the same. It’s right, and it’s proper to grow up in the faith of others until we can take steps to make that faith our own.

I am the Christian that I am today in large part (and with humongous thanks!) to the example, and the teaching, and the patience, and the investment of dozens of faithful Christian adults all throughout my childhood and teenage years. But there came a point in my life, when I couldn’t just depend on the faith of others to get me through anymore. There comes a point where our faith in Jesus needs to become our own.

I was saved at age 9, and it was real. Then for me, that point of beginning to make my faith my own came around age 14. In the next post, I’ll share the importance of making your faith in Jesus your own!