I was listening to a woman talk about how she used to be a Christian, but has deconverted to become an atheist. There are a couple of things I just want to point out that I feel may be helpful.
In her story she commented on how she had been brought up in a Christian home and how she had been heavily involved in church activities, and missions trips etc., but she never mentioned anything about her own conversion to Christ. This is troublesome to say the least. One of the clearest teachings of Scripture is that no one is born a Christian - we are all born at a distance from God, and are by nature the children of wrath (Ephesians 2 v 1-3). Every single individual needs to personally repent and receive the Lord Jesus Christ as their own Saviour. Those who do that recognise it as the pivotal moment of their life - the most significant experience they could ever have - the moment they were saved! She said nothing about this conversion, so why would anyone think there was one?
The second thing I want to mention is that she said she had a real problem with the Scripture's teaching on hell. She said she just could never see the point of it. Now, this too is very problematic, because repentance involves seeing our sin and seeing ourselves as God sees our sin and ourselves. Repentance involves a change of mind to agree with God. Here is someone who never could see the point of hell - well then she was, by definition, unrepentant! One cannot be saved until they recognise the seriousness of the problem of his sins. This lady is saying she never could see the point of hell, and so she is saying she never saw the seriousness of sin, and thus she could not have been forgiven.
Another thing I want to point out is this - she takes it as a slur on her integrity when people say she wasn't a real Christian. She says people are accusing her of living a deliberate lie for over twenty years. I'm accusing her of no such thing. This article is not an attack on her integrity, it is an attack on a popular Gospel that let's people think they are Christians because they are involved in church, love Jesus, and try to help people. This article is an attack of modern "evangelism" that tells people they are Christians when these people have no sense of the seriousness of sin and no appreciation of the righteousness of God in the eternal judgment of the sinner, no realisation of the amazing grace of God in providing salvation, and no recognition of the blood of Christ as the only hope for the guilty, the cross of Christ as the only boast of the saved.
She came to realise that what she had been brought up with was empty and powerless. It was! Sadly there are multitudes who go on thinking this perversion of "Christianity" is adequate. Such people need the true Gospel - the Gospel of Christ which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes (Romans 1 v 16) - the Gospel which will benefit every sinner who owns himself to be helpless and hell-deserving and in need of Christ.
