Have you ever come to a fork in the road where everything (your future, your family, your faith) seemed to hang in the balance?
“You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe.
You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.”Morpheus, The Matrix
All of us have a story, but not all of us have a Reformation story. Here’s mine.
From Lutheran Roots to Gospel Awakening
I was baptized as an infant and raised in a Lutheran church, originally part of the American Lutheran Church (ALC), which later merged into the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). I went through First Communion and Confirmation, but I don’t recall ever being taught the gospel.
Yes, I learned the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds, but I never heard about the imputed righteousness of Christ or justification by faith alone. Ironically, in a church bearing Martin Luther’s name, the very truths that launched the Reformation were never explained.
During Confirmation, I once asked a pastor if “good people” from other religions would go to heaven. The answer was:
“There are many ways to God, but Christianity is the most direct path.”
That moment was cataclysmic. If all paths lead to God, why not just make my own? And that’s exactly what I did for the next decade.
Looking back, I now see that even my time in the Lutheran Church was part of God’s providence. Though I didn’t yet understand the gospel, the seed was planted. Through the rhythms of liturgy, the exposure to Scripture, and the creeds I memorized without grasping their meaning, God was quietly at work. He was preparing me, through those early experiences and the later challenges of life, for the moment when the gospel would break through.
As Jesus taught, the seed sown in rocky soil may not bear fruit immediately, but when God tills the heart, new life springs up in due time.
Post Tenebras Lux: After Darkness, Light
God was merciful. He placed faithful Christian co-workers in my life who challenged my claim to be a Christian. Even my then-fiancée told me, “If I could change one thing about you, it would be that you become a Christian.” At the time, I was offended by this. How could they question my faith when I had been confirmed and believed in Jesus? I didn’t yet realize that what I had was not saving faith, but mere intellectual assent.
At the time, I believed I already was a Christian. I intellectually believed in Jesus. But then someone pointed out James 2:19:
“You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!” James 2:19
That verse shook me.
One night after work, I bought a Bible at the local Cornerstone Christian Bookstore. I wanted to prove to myself, and to others, that I really was a Christian. But as I read the Gospel of John and the Book of Romans, the Holy Spirit illuminated my heart and mind. It was as if a light bulb went on. For the first time, I was able to understand, and care, what the Bible was saying. I saw my sin, my guilt before a holy God, and my desperate need for a Savior.
I later learned that true saving faith consists of three essential components:
- Knowledge: a right understanding of who Christ is and what He has done
- Assent: agreement that the gospel is true
- Trust: a wholehearted resting in Christ alone for salvation
That final element, personal trust, was what I had lacked for so long. I came to believe that Jesus truly could save me, not simply because He was a religious figure, but because He is the eternal Son of God, who fulfilled the covenant of works by living a perfect life in my place, and who died as a propitiation for sin, satisfying the wrath of God on behalf of all who believe. And He did this for me.
These truths were beautifully echoed in the Reformed confessions I was just beginning to discover. As the Belgic Confession declares in Article 20:
“We believe that God…gave His Son to die…and raised Him for our justification, in order that by Him we might have immortality and eternal life.”
And as the Heidelberg Catechism teaches:
Q. What is true faith?
A. It is not only a sure knowledge by which I hold as true all that God has revealed to us in Scripture; it is also a wholehearted trust, which the Holy Spirit creates in me by the gospel…that not only others, but I too, have had my sins forgiven, have been made forever right with God, and have been granted salvation.
This wasn’t just theological language anymore. It was my lived experience. God granted me repentance and true faith in Christ, and I trusted Him not only as the Savior of sinners, but as my Savior.
Road to Geneva
When the gospel took root, I returned to church, this time with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS). I was encouraged to find they upheld the inerrancy of Scripture, and was blessed to have our firstborn son baptized there.
So metaphorically speaking, it was from Wittenberg that our family took the road to Geneva.
Paul’s letter to the Romans revealed that God foreknew, predestined, called, and justified His elect by sovereign grace. It clashed with everything I thought I knew about free will, yet the text was unmistakable:
“So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy.”
Wanting to know if this was a theological anomaly, I turned to Ephesians:
“Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.”
This was no anomaly. These “doctrines of grace” were consistent biblical truth, which I had never been shown before.
The Five Points of Calvinism
At a child’s birthday party at Chuck-E-Cheese, a friend handed me a book: The Five Points of Calvinism by Edwin Palmer. I had never heard the term “Calvinist” before, but I identified with much of what I read, except for one point: Limited Atonement.
Didn’t Jesus die for the sins of the whole world?
But as I studied the Scripture proofs, I found the case for Limited Atonement (Definite Atonement) to be both biblical and compelling. R.C. Sproul once said:
“It is the easiest of the five points to prove, because Christ’s death actually saves.”
I realized that it’s the Arminian view (Christ died for everyone) that limits the atonement. Christ’s death, in that system, makes salvation possible for all, but doesn’t secure it for anyone. A person must still generate faith with their own will.
But the problem with this is that spiritually dead people can’t generate true faith.
“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all.”
I devoured The Sovereignty of God by A.W. Pink, Chosen by God by R.C. Sproul, and The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination by Loraine Boettner. In fact, it was when I was reading Chosen by God outside a cigar shop when the owner spotted the title and said in a Middle Eastern accent, “If you want something really hardcore, read The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination!” So I did, and I couldn’t put it down.
Leaving Lutheranism
I was still in the Lutheran church, but frustration was growing. I asked my pastor if he believed in the sovereignty of God. He answered:
“Sovereignty isn’t in the Bible! It’s a Reformed word!”
When I asked whether I could lose my salvation, he laughed:
“Yes—stop believing!”
That didn’t sit right with me, especially since I had recently read John 10:28-29 and Luther’s Bondage of the Will. What I read in Luther didn’t match what I was hearing from the pulpit.
Then I was asked to teach a Sunday school class at our Lutheran church. I was told I could pick any passage. Still in my “cage stage,” I chose Romans 9.
It did not go over well.
On the doctrines of grace, it became clear that my Lutheran context leaned more Arminian than Calvinist. I told my wife, “I can’t do this anymore. I need to go to a church like R.C. Sproul’s.”
Finding a Reformed Church
Finding a confessionally Reformed church in Southern California wasn’t easy. But in God’s providence, we heard a short radio ad (voiced by R.C. Sproul) promoting a local Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). When I heard the pastor say, “We teach the Bible the way R.C. Sproul did,” I knew we had found our Geneva.
We faced trials and transitions over the years. I studied at The Master’s University, and we moved between several churches (Baptist, PCA) and eventually joined a United Reformed Church (URC), where we are today.
Watch the Conversation
I joined Aaron Running on his podcast to talk about my Lutheran upbringing and how I came to embrace the Reformed faith. You can watch our conversation below.
Watch the conversation on YouTube
A Word of Encouragement
If you’re on this Reformation road, know this:
- You will face resistance, from friends, family, and even pastors.
- Stay rooted in Scripture.
- Read sound theology, such as the ones mentioned above as well as:
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- What is Reformed Theology, R.C. Sproul
- Sacred Bond, Michael G. Brown
- Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin
- Systematic Theology, Louis Berkhof
- Reformed Dogmatics, Herman Bavinck
But above all, read the Reformed Confessions.
The Heidelberg Catechism will warm your heart and instruct your soul.
The Belgic Confession and the Westminster Confession of Faith are monumental in their clarity, precision, and depth.
These are not relics of a bygone age; they are enduring summaries of Scripture, forged in times of struggle and written to anchor the church in truth.
Hold this passage close to your heart; it’s the foundation of covenant theology and the heartbeat of God’s promise to His people:
“And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.”
