From Kingdom Hall to the Kingdom of God

by Kelly Karam

My spiritual journey started in a Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I was born and raised as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I was taught about a God named Jehovah, my Father. He was the God my family served, prayed to, studied about, and ultimately feared.

We spent a lot of time in personal Bible study and in church, we had meetings 3 times a week plus put in service hours, like going door to door (what they were and still are famous for). Those service hours were all recorded and handed in to the elders at the end of every month. Despite all the study and service, I never felt as close to God as I wanted. He seemed distant or somehow disconnected from me.

Growing up I spent alot of time feeling like I didn’t belong in the church. I always had a sense I never measured up. I didn’t have a perfect attendance record, others had more service hours than me, my dad wasn’t an elder, my best friends’ dads were, I didn’t have it all together. The list goes on and on.

I never felt secure in my salvation. It seemed I could never do enough. From a young age until I was 20, I remember having reoccurring nightmares of finding out at Christ’s return I simply didn’t cut it.

At the age of 20, I met my match – literally.

I started dating a Baptist boy. Things got serious. We knew we had to sort out our religious differences if we wanted to move forward. My soon to be in-laws also recognized the importance of being evenly yoked, so they put us in touch with a gentleman named Ray from the Navigators. He set up a bible study with the two of us.

I viewed this as the perfect opportunity to convert the both of them. Our studies were uneventful in my humble opinion. Ray seemed wishy washy to me, he had no concrete, definite answers, which is what I had always been used to. Jehovah’s Witnesses have an answer that makes sense for any question one could ask. In Ray’s quiet way, he would let me preach my interpretation of the scriptures and then respectfully say, that’s one way to look at it, here’s what I take from it…. I remember him pointing out the importance of reading scripture prayerfully. I was used to being told what the scripture meant – No Questions Asked.

In the weeks that followed, Chris and I would go to the downtown library to look up the Greek and Hebrew origins of words. I started to discover there was more than one definition. As Jehovah’s Witnesses, we were only ever allowed to read spiritual material that was published by our Watchtower Society. So these library dictionaries and concordances were creating small cracks in my belief system.

Still focused on converting Chris and Ray, I agreed to attend a Ralph Bell Crusade night in lieu of Chris attending a service at my Kingdom Hall.

I distinctly remember being very unimpressed by the sermon and looking forward to going home. Then came the alter call. I recall Chris bowing his head in prayer, me thinking you can pray all you want, I’m not going up. I wrapped my hands around my chair to hold myself down in my seat.

I remember being in awe of the power of God as I was being physically moved to the front.

As I walked, I felt all my burdens being lifted from me completely. Those burdens were the burdens of works.

What I know now, that I didn’t know then:

• I know I didn’t know Him as I do today.
• I know He 1st loved me and sent his son to die for me and because of that I don’t have to try and earn my salvation.
• I know I belong to Him because he says – I am His child

My study of Ephesians this summer reminded me of my identity in Christ. I encourage you to read it if you haven’t lately. Here are my Coles notes:

• Eph. 1:7 – our sins are taken away and we are forgiven
• Eph. 2:5 – says, it’s by Grace you have been saved.
• Eph. 2:8 – for its by grace you have been saved through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.
• Eph. 3:12 – we can come with freedom and confidence into God’s presence. No more nightmares since he brought me up that aisle!!

Charles Stanley once said, “Salvation is not a reward that God has given to us for works or for good behavior.  Salvation is the result of grace and goodness and the love of God. It is a Free gift from God to those who trust him as personal savior”

I want to encourage you to make that decision to trust Him and make Him your personal Savior if haven’t already.

To learn more about making this decision that Kelly speaks of – read about the Good News on this website.