"Christ does not want us to live to hover next to Him in a religious system, but to be born again and live through Him and in Him."
My name is Jaime Mardones Ovalle. I am 46 years old and I live in the South of Chile. Out of obedience to the Holy Spirit, I write these lines to you dear brothers, and through you to many Catholic people, especially priests. I write them with love and gratitude to many Catholics. I remember since I was a child the closeness of Jesus in my family, because of my parents sowing the truths of the Bible in my spirit. After the age of 18, to learn more about Jesus, I went to the Saint Fidel Catholic Seminary . But, there my contact with the Lord was hovering by His side, doing many activities, studying hard for three years of philosophy and half a year of theology. I was then one of the most advanced students, a philosophy professor at a night school, with an offer to study abroad.
The best thing I did in the Seminary was to participate in a Bible study group, in which we tried to put the word of God into practice. Of that small group, most of us withdrew from the said Seminary.
In the aforementioned Seminary I received a solid Catholic formation. And my curiosity led me to read Protestant authors for the spiritual life. In addition, I read the most evangelical of Catholics: Francis of Assisi, who struck me with his desire to live the gospel without glory, without the addition of human traditions.
When I decided to withdraw from the Seminary, some priests wanted to direct me to various retreats, so that I would reconsider. And a priest friend, Marcos Uribe, gave me the best advice of my life: "that I begin to pray for my future wife." And I began the prayer in this sense: Until six months later Angelica appeared in my life and I in hers.
On the occasions when I went to mass with Angelica, some people would look at us with frowns. However, we always maintained certain religious practices and cooperation with the Catholic Church. So also in the university ministry of Valparaíso, while I was studying law. Until my graduate thesis at the Valparaíso Law School (Catholic University), I did it on the laity, in the area of canon law. So we were good Catholics. And because of that and my law studies, I was offered a job in the Kolping work (international association of Catholic laity) in Villarrica. In the Kolping Society (1988 to 1992) I became friends with many craftsmen in the country and with Kolping leaders in Latin America and other countries around the world. The work was enough. A great crisis in July 1992 affected me with a severe illness. And thank God for the blessed test, which put Jesus from head to heart, to all life, to the new birth (Jn. 3: 3); that a few months before we were converted, I read in the catechism of the Catholic Church, as one of the requirements to receive communion in the first centuries of Christianity, the new birth (1355 of said Catechism). Too bad, and to the detriment of millions of people, in the Catholic Church so far it is only a historical requirement, this experience with Jesus, the new birth.
In the spring of 1995, we visited Angélica's work, the Villarrica Baptist Church, presided over by Pastor Eduardo Pisero (through him I got to know the magazine En La Calle Recta). This pastor, in a very intelligent way, commented for those who met in the Church, but directed more to the visits that we were, the passage from 2 Corinthians 5:17: Old are gone; behold, they are all made new. I later shared this message in my catechesis group in the Catholic chapel: Sagrada Familia. And I pondered it for months, while it distilled like fresh water of new life in my heart. Until Angélica was invited by Elizabeth Garrido (a friend), to an evangelical campaign in the Christian and Missionary Alliance Church, preached by pastor Nolberto Marín, and that day Saturday April 27, 1996 he preached on Deuteronomy 10:17, that "God is no respecter of persons." The message was somewhat providential. My heart was touched by the message of God's love and affection for all people, especially me. However, it was Angelica who raised her hand first in the temple. With my load of religiosity I prayed the acceptance prayer of Jesus and I did not dare to raise my hand at the request of the pastor. I looked to my side and Angelica did raise her hand. So, I too dared and gave my whole life to Christ.
Jesus Christ has healed and transformed me and has made me walk in the Spirit with my whole family. Not long ago the Holy Spirit gave me a dream in which "I was visiting several priests in a prison and I was able to talk to some about the Lord and the new birth, but others were sleeping and I could not talk to them."
For this reason, I am writing these lines to make known to many Catholics that they are imprisoned in the prison of religiosity. Therefore, they must return with deep humility to the biblical sources, which remain forever, free from traditions and doctrines of men, ephemeral, transitory, mere opinions of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. They must announce Christ and not, as up to now, a preaching of the world order. Indeed, countless Catholics are unaware of Jesus and the work of the Holy Spirit; countless Catholics have not been born again and are ignorant of the Holy Scriptures.
It's easy to get confused. It's easy to think that the Church has a lot of different goals: education, building buildings, and holding services. The Church exists for the sole purpose of "making disciples" (Mt. 28:19), of leading men to Christ so that they may be born again, be children of God and other little Christs.
Jesus Christ Himself invites us to make the most important decision in life: accept Him and receive Him. For which He tells us: "I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will enter him, and I will dine with him, and he with Me " (Ap. 3.20); because He does not want us to live hovering next to Him in a religious system, but to have a new birth and live on the basis of His same Person.
Nicodemus was very religious, a teacher of Israel, but he was not saved; he knew nothing of the new birth (Jn.3: 4); he had religion, but he was not satisfied, he understood that religion without Christ was dead. But, he lacked understanding that it was not only necessary to look to Christ, but to live in Him (Eph. 1: 1).
To be born again means to be born from above, to be born of God. This is impossible for religion because Nicodemus raised objections; but according to Jesus Christ it is necessary in order to "enter the Kingdom of God" (Jn. 3: 5). Since "what is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit" (Jn.3: 6).
So the new birth is the work of the Holy Spirit and occurs when the same Holy Spirit takes the Word of God and applies it to the heart of the sinner, convicting him of sin because he does not fully believe in Christ, of righteousness because Christ is alive together with God the Father, and of judgment because satan has been judged; and showing him that only through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ can he be saved (John 1: 11-13; 16: 4-15).
So we have to be born again to be children of God, we have to fight against the current and decide for Christ, and we have to live in Christ to be true Christians and not in name only.
The Sacred Scriptures question us all in a forceful way, when it says: "So, repent and convert, so that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshment may come from the presence of the Lord, and He sends Jesus Christ, who was foretold " (Acts 3: 19-20). Amen.
Jaime Mardones Ovalle
Taken from: On the Straight Street
[Source: https://www.conocereislaverdad.org/testi_jmardonesovalle.htm]
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