I was raised in a non-Christian home. My parents did not believe in influencing us toward or against God. My mother used to tell me, “Marjie, I have no right to influence your religious beliefs.” She and my dad did take us to church for a couple of years so that we could decide what we wanted to believe. I was about nine or ten years old. We didn’t go to Sunday school. My parents marched us in right before the service started and lined us up on the pew – all six of us. The youngest was in the nursery. Then I sat through a boring sermon. I could hardly wait for church to be over. The only thing I decided was that I hated church.
When I was about fourteen years old, I asked my mother, “Mom, is there really a God?” My mom responded, “Oh, yes, Marjie. Think about creation, how everything works together in unison; the way our bodies function, the birth of a baby, how perfectly they’re formed. Yes, there really is a God.”
If a parent were in the market to influence their child spiritually, that question opened the door, and my mother did influence me in a positive way. Had she given me a list of reasons why she believed that God did not exist, I might have developed a more atheistic approach toward Him, and I may not have gotten saved when I did. Still, I didn’t accept Jesus as my Savior for another three years. I was nearly an adult.
I’ve been saved now for 39 years and I’ve been walking with the Lord for 36 of them. Just a couple of days ago, as I was working on the Lord’s Page entry, I started pondering on Jesus being the Light of the world (John 8:12), and how darkness is the absence of light. Those who go to hell will be forever removed from the presence of God. Then I remembered Matthew 25:30, where Jesus said, “And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
Outer darkness – the absence of all light! If you’ve ever been deep inside a cave when the lights went out, you know how dark it can get without the smallest ray of light. You can’t see a thing, not even if it were held right in front of your eyes.
That’s what hell’s going to be like because Jesus won’t be there. He is the light of the world. But then I thought, What about the lake of fire? Fire gives off a glow of light. So how could someone be in complete darkness if they’re surrounded by fire? My pastor said that he’s known people that have lived through fires and those people who found themselves caught in the middle of a fire, totally surrounded by flames, said that it was pitch black. They couldn’t see anything. Hell is a place of torment and everlasting punishment, but I think the greatest horror of hell will likely be its unbearable darkness.
That’s a horrible place to go, especially when it’s unnecessary because God’s Son already paid the price for our sin. All you must do to escape that eternal darkness and torment is to believe that Jesus died for you. Acts 16:31 says, “…Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved…” Yet, my mother felt it was her God-given duty to not in any way influence her children in religious matters. She is not alone in her beliefs. A lot of lost people believe that Christians “brainwash” their children, and that we have no business influencing them spiritually. There are influences everywhere you look. To not influence our children for Christ is to allow the world to influence them against Christ.
I have three brothers. One of them is a Mormon. The youngest turned to Catholicism, and the oldest will have nothing to do with anyone but Mom, so I don’t know where he is spiritually, but I suspect he’s still lost. I have three sisters. The oldest accepted Christ on her death bed. One is an agnostic, and the youngest has professed atheism.
As a missionary once told me, “Marj, someone is going to brainwash your children. It had better be you.”