You’re welcome for getting that little ditty in your head. It is pretty catchy. But it’s completely and totally inaccurate, because as God’s people, we are royals.

But have you ever stopped to think about what life would be like without God? What life was like before God was in our lives? Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus and reminded them of life (if you could call it that) before God:

Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh—who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands— that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world (2:11-12).

Sometimes, as people who’ve “grown up in the church” we don’t really feel like that. We don’t feel like we’ve ever been without Christ. We don’t feel like we’ve ever been strangers to the promise of heaven. We’ve probably never felt hopeless or without God. At least, that was me. That was me prior to November 14th.

Something changed that day; something I’ve been hesitant to post for all the world to see. You see, as someone who grew up attending worship services, there wasn’t ever a time when I felt like a dirty, rotten sinner. One day, at 9, I distinctly remember whispering to my mom that I wanted to be baptized. I’d never talked about it before. I hadn’t even listened to the sermon. I just knew that’s what you do and I did it. And then, I lived the rest of my life (to this point) doing my best to be right with God. And there were plenty of days in there that I felt like a dirty rotten sinner.

More and more, the days that I felt something was wrong became increasingly frequent. I heard sermon after sermon about what it meant to truly become a disciple of Christ–and it wasn’t just waking up from a nap during worship and being dipped in water. It was counting a cost (Luke 14:26-33). It was about becoming a brand new person (Romans 6). It was about letting Jesus be the light that shines forth from your life (Gal. 2:20). And, it wasn’t me. It hadn’t been me.

So I looked at my husband one Thursday at lunch and tearfully told him all of this. I told him that I knew what Jesus said about counting the cost, and that I didn’t believe I had any inkling of an idea of what that meant at 9. I told him that I hadn’t changed even a little bit from the time I went into the water until I came out. But that I was scared of what that meant. Did it mean I didn’t trust in God’s forgiveness? Did it mean I’d been living a lie for half of my life? We didn’t know the answers, but we knew the answer. We knew that I could know. So he took me immediately to East Hill and he baptized me into Christ without hesitation and for the remission of my sins (Acts 2:38). It was the best day of my life. Every doubt, every fear, every guilty thought…gone.

I say all of that to say this: I felt it. I felt without hope and without God. I felt my prayers hindered. I felt my extreme guilt for sin and knew what my punishment could be. I cried and cried and cried standing in those waters before I was baptized, because I knew. I knew all of my sins were and had been weighing on me. I knew that I was this close to freedom, and it was amazing. Since that day, I have been a proud and thankful member of God’s royal family. Once an enemy, but now a daughter of the Almighty.

That’s what today’s Royal Family podcast is about. It’s about being enemies and finding forgiveness. I hope you’ll join in the conversation by listening to the latest Royal Family Podcast here.