Salvation Stories: Sojourn’s Laura Beiter

We will celebrate another Baptism Sunday on January 15. If you would like to take this important step in identifying with Christ and His bride, email baptism@sojournchurch.com by Monday, January 9.

I grew up going to church but I did not know Jesus. As a small child I had a babysitter that told me, “You only go to heaven if you believe in Jesus.” That is where my journey began.

I spent the next 25 years in a pattern of searching while sinning. I was involved in boyfriends, drinking, and rebelling. In college my world expanded. I loved the party culture, but my heart was still searching. My search for peace and satisfaction led me to dabbling in Buddhism and other Eastern religions. The whole time, in the back of my mind, I still remembered that little girl who heard the words, “Jesus is the only way.”

At around the age of thirty, a good friend, Jay, started to introduce me to Jesus as my savior. He told me that I was a sinner, that we all worship and chase something. That only Jesus can satisfy.

I had spent most of my life believing that if you are good, you go to heaven. Once, during a conversation with Jay, he told me that we canʼt earn our salvation. He told me that we are sinners and that only by placing our trust in Christ and His work on the cross can we be saved. This was the turning point in my journey. I had never heard the gospel until that moment. The Holy Spirit started to work in me!

I spent the next ten years with my wonderful husband, Denis, trying to balance work with our ever growing family. We attended a church regularly, but began to feel the weight of culture and the world beginning to press in on us. During that time Denis and I still enjoyed studying the Bible, talking about Jesus, and listening to sermon podcasts, but our lives were not changing.

Over the span of three or four years something began to happen, looking back it seems a battle was in place. The pressures of the world were almost insurmountable. We had four children now, none older than eight, and Denis was working more and later. I felt myself losing traction, slipping out of hope and trying to find satisfaction in the world.

However, I still read scripture and listened to my podcasted sermons daily, and I maintained a foothold by Godʼs grace. Through the combination of reading and hearing Godʼs word, having a strong believer like Jay speaking into our lives, and the emptiness of the world realized, Denis and I began to feel a tug in our hearts. The Spirit was setting us up for a need, a reliance, to trust in Jesus Christ to be Lord of our life. All other masters had been cruel and disappointing.

Ultimately, we were lead to Sojourn, and much of my growth in trust of the gospel has occurred here, after beginning attendance at Sojourn. Seeing the body of Christ gather for worship, meeting with fellow believers during the week to work out struggles, and share in victories and joy found in the gospel all had tremendous effect on me.

I felt the idea of the Spirit in my life being transformed into “the Spirit is present!” And Christ in His infinite love and mercy put in my heart that I am His. That He loves me now, for who I am, a sinner no longer under condemnation! It is only by His grace and mercy that I die to my former self with Christ on the cross, and am reborn in Him. He has saved me for Himself on that last day!