Being raised in a Christian Family doesn’t make one a child of God. It doesn’t make a person a genuine Christian. Genuine Christians do not inherit Christianity from their parents.
Genuine Christian faith is an intimate, personal matter between you and God. Following are stories of people who came to realize this fact.
Whitney Meade grew up in a Christian household with strong, believing parents. She asked Jesus to come live in her heart as a young girl at her uncle’s church. She knew something had changed in her, even at the age of 7. She was very involved in church activities growing up, but she also craved acceptance from other people. She craved acceptance and popularity with her friends more than she desired relationship with God. She got into partying, but she maintained a “perfect” exterior. She was hurt a lot by her friends in high school, and she looked to college to fulfill her dreams. College was a rude awakening. She had always achieved everything she wanted, but that changed in college. She came to a place where she was utterly empty. Nothing filled that emptiness, and she finally turned back to God. This is her story.
Julie grew up in a Christian family and “gave her life to Christ” around 10 years old. She didn’t really know what it meant. It was just something she was expected to do.
As she got older, she found church boring, and she “drifted away”, not that she was ever really anchored in the faith. When she began to outgrow her parents as a teenager, she was exposed to the world of outside the church.
One thing left to another: porn, masturbation, same-sex attraction, panic disorder and PTSD. Depression increased. She became suicidal. She started drinking.
She always believed in God, but she had no relationship with Him. Her story is not much different than many kids who grow up in Christian families who go to church. All of that changed for Julie, though. This is her story.
Navigating by Faith 