My mother is Puerto Rican and Catholic. My father was an agnostic who believed in a "happy hunting ground". My mother took me often to church to do all the Catholic ritual stuff. Then, in Catechism class, we all rose to our feet when the Father walked in. Something deep inside of me thought this was wrong. Like Mordecai not bowing to Haman, I went to my mother and told her I no longer wanted to go. She did not force me.
I was without religion for the next 10 years, and I felt very empty going through Junior High School. I wanted God, but could not find Him. Then, my friend Steve asked me if I had ever been "saved". What was that? He told me that it was asking Jesus into your heart as Lord and Savior. I could have Jesus come in to my heart?!? I was never told this at the Catholic church. I was just given a lot of rituals and things to do and requirements to keep--all of which led me away from God! So on Thanksgiving night of 1970, I asked Jesus into my heart as Lord and Savior. A few months later, I asked the Holy Spirit to fill me and from that point on, I knew that God was real, God was personal and that the Bible was indeed His very eternal Word.
I became one of those "born-again" Jesus Freaks of the 1970s. This was the Calvary Chapel movement that started (mostly) at Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa, California USA, and has been spreading the Good News all over the world and over the Internet.
I was by myself when I asked Christ into my heart, because I figured if He is God, He can meet me where I am at and not at a church. And He did, in a big and personal way. Been walking and talking with Him for 37 years now.
I have always wanted a personal relationship with my Creator, but never knew how to gain it. Christianity showed me how, and proved it beyond what I could imagine. The Bible showed me that this salvation was free, with no requirements other than to believe and trust in the Savior as Lord.
Christianity is founded on freedom. Freedom to receive, freedom to reject, freedom to opt-out, freedom to change your mind and opt-back-in again (read the parable of the Prodigal Son--he started as one of the family).
Free will is everything to God. He will never force anything upon you without your will to do so.
