■ by JAMIE NOBLIN


MAMA’S PERSISTENT PRAYERS B


Y THE RIPE OLD AGE of 15, I was too smart for God. I didn’t need Sunday school, or the youth group, or Bible study, or the fellowship of the brothers and sisters at church. I had it all figured out. But Mama kept praying for me.


Mama tried so hard for so many years— using any excuse she could find to get me to attend church. “It’s Mother’s Day and I’d really like you to come to church with me,” or “Your niece will be in the Christ- mas play, don’t you want to come?” But I always refused. I was always too busy, going my own way, doing my own thing, and the last place I wanted to be was in church. I told Mama that if I had been raised in a “normal” denomination, I might still be in church. The Pentecostals were too loud and emotional, but if I’d been brought up as an Episcopalian, I might still be a member. She kept praying, and sometimes arguing, trying so hard to get me back into church.


After years away from church and after losing my dad, I started thinking more about religion. I remembered the Jewish friends I had over the years. Their religion seemed safe, traditional, normal. Maybe that was the way to go. They had the same Bible as the Christians—at least the first half—so maybe my family would accept it and leave me alone. But no, Mama kept praying.


I started attending Jewish conversion classes, but as the months passed, some- thing didn’t feel right and I dropped out. I chalked it up to being too busy to focus on religion right then, but I’d get back to it soon.


As the 2008 Christmas season arrived, I received a flyer in the mail about a Christ- mas Eve service at a local church. My first instinct was to throw it away, but instead I left it on an end table. Meanwhile, I thought it was time to send out some Hanukkah cards, but I didn’t. Instead I picked up a wreath and a little Christmas


THE KEYS TO ETERNAL LIFE


CHRIST PAID for our salvation with His death on the cross, but for us to accept this gift is as simple as using these keys to unlock the door:


Acknowledge you have sinned


“If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8).* “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).


Believe in Jesus


“Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31). “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that who- ever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).


Confess and renounce your sin


“If you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9). “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).


*Scriptures are from the New International Version.


tree to decorate my apartment. I didn’t feel like celebrating Hanukkah.


Three weeks after Christmas, in Janu- ary 2009, I still had the wreath hanging up, I still hadn’t thrown away the church flyer, and I still didn’t know what to make of myself. But then as I watched the Presidential Inauguration on televi- sion, I burst into tears as Joseph Lowery gave the benediction. There was some- thing about that old pastor’s cadence as he called on God that touched a nerve and brought back a lot of memories from my childhood—back when I believed. I knew it was Jesus I was missing! Mama was so happy. Her prayers had been answered!


I sent her a study Bible the next month after she told me she had wanted one for years. I started going to church, praying, and reading the Word.


Just two months after I got saved, Mama passed away. In planning her funeral, my sister and I looked through her old, well-worn Bible for a favorite verse she might have highlighted. As I flipped open the cover, I saw Mama’s prayer list, and my salvation was listed at the very top. I always knew Mama was praying, but I never knew until then how much. I can- not express how very sad yet how grateful I was for all the times she must have said that prayer for me.


Weeks later I finally started looking through some of Mama’s belongings and found the new study Bible I had given her. This time in the front cover I didn’t find a prayer list, but instead the inscription, “Jamie has come back to the Lord! Hal- lelujah!”


Today I am saved because of the redeeming power of the blood of Jesus Christ and the power of a persistent moth- er’s prayers.


Jamie Noblin attends the Clarksburg, Maryland, Church of God.


26 EVANGEL • JULY 2010


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