Christ chooses you or you're dead.

I shared this quotation from Rosaria Champagne Butterfield's book The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert in last Sunday's afternoon message.  It comes as she describes the trepidation she felt the first time she was asked to give a public "testimony" of her conversion:

All of the testimonies that I had heard up to this point were egocentric and filled with pride.  Aren’t I the smarty pants for choosing Christ!  I made a decision for Christ, aren’t I great?  I committed my life to Christ, aren’t I better than those heathen who haven’t?  This whole line of thinking is both pervasive among evangelical Christians and absurd.  My whole body recoiled against this line of thinking.  I’m proof of the pudding.  I didn’t choose Christ.  Nobody chooses Christ.  Christ chooses you or you’re dead.  After Christ chooses you, you respond because you must.  Period.  It’s not a pretty story (p. 81).