Words verse 30 & 31 from New Living Translation (NLT)

Words verse 28 from Amplified Bible (AMP)

After years and years of looking in all the wrong places, I finally surrendered. It was like I had been walking in a dark forest for ages, and God said to me: "are you done? Are you willing to do it My way?"

And He was right. After years of doing things my way, I could only draw one conclusion: it's not working. Sure, I had seen success, and in some ways I was successful. But behind closed doors I was feeling increasingly miserable. The depression worsened each year. I felt small, insignificant. I seemed to pick up every kind of addiction along the way. The thought of ending my life was almost daily. It became my escape.

My crying out to God is the equivalent of this jailor in Acts 16, he cried out: "what must I do to be saved?" And in my case also, to be saved from myself..

Then Paul gives him a lengthy to-do-list..

Oh wait, no, it's only one sentence! 😱

This is what Paul says: "believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved!"(..along with everyone in your household!).

But surely, it couldn't be that simple? What about the sinner's prayer? All the terrible things in this guy's past?

Remember the murderer hanging next to Jesus on the cross? He believed Jesus was the Son of God and Jesus told him, you will be with me in paradise.

It's not our repentance that makes us right with God. It's our faith (Rom 10:4) You've done nothing to deserve it. It's His gift to you.

Believe is just another word for trust. You basically say: I trust You Jesus. I need you, I can't do this alone.

And you know what happens?

Well, I can tell you what happened to me. I was filled with gratitude, with love for this Father who I had willfully ignored all these years. There He was. Not a bad word about me or my past life. In the light of this Love I could see the mess I had made. The things I had done that'd hurt God, hurt me.

And I was committed to loving this God with all I had and have for the rest of my life. In the time after that I repented of many things. But it was a process. It took me a while to see and understand the things I had done. But when I did, I could wholeheartedly say: I'm so sorry for the things I've done. Thank You for Your forgiveness! 🙏❤️

I wanna give you something to think about. I see a lot of Christians post posts on their social media that shout: Repent!

That's not the good news. I can almost guarantee you that when you shout 'repent' like that in someone's face, it will harden them.

Don't do it. Say 'believe', and you will be saved. He's waiting for you, arms wide open. 🙌

PS Oh and do what the jailor did: get yourself baptised. You wanna drown that 'old man' (Rom 6:6) make sure he's really dead! 😉