Board index ‹ Salvation

[Bok Choy Boy]

What does it mean to "Accept Jesus as my personal savior?" And I'm also not sure on the other statements about having a "Personal relationship with Jesus Christ" and other similar statements.

[jimwalton]

The cliche way to say it is that religion is our attempt to find God, and to do things that earn our way into his favor. But what Christianity is is God finding us, and his desire to have a relationship with us. By relationship, I mean that God loves us because he made us, and he wants us to love him in return, much as a husband and wife would. He's not looking for you to make a checklist of "been to church, read my Bible today, said my prayers, lit a candle, yep, check check check," I've done my religious duty. What he wants is for us to love him and to experience his love in return. What he wants is that we will commit our lives to him, again, much as a husband and wife would. He wants to adopt us as family, where we are related to him because he wanted to have us, and he bought us, and brought us to himself. You see, it's not religion where I do my religious thing and earn his favor, or I do my religious thing and I'm done for the day, or that anything in this life particularly has SACRAMENTAL value, meaning that by doing those things I obligate God in some way to act on my behalf. No, it's more like father and son, mother and daughter, brothers, sisters—a personal relationship. We relate to each other on a relational basis, not a sacramental one.

When I accept Jesus as my personal savior, I am asking Him to forgive my sins, to save me from them, and to welcome me into His family. I recognize His love and sacrifice for me, and His desire to have a relationship with me. In return I promise to turn away from my sins (repudiate them), and to live to please Him with my life. So I have "accepted" him into my life as the focus and direction of my life, my #1 love relationship, it is "personal", not just a religious exercise, and He is my savior, because I acknowledge that only He can save me from my sins, I can't save myself by being good or practicing religious things.