[JennyHallu]

I don't think I ever could really say I was a Christian until about 18, and not a strong one until just the past year/few months. Events and circumstances conspired to hit me with a brick wall of responsibility and need-for-maturity, and that's a fairly good time to go looking for a little help. I'm afraid I shall be eternally skeptical of the person who says "I was baptized when I was five, and I'm such a strong Christian..." I'm twenty, and I know how much I have to learn, and I'm just beginning to see what a huge thing religious faith is, especially faith as "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen". It takes some real maturity of thought and action even to understand what you are saying and promising when you say that you are a Christian (or a Muslim, or a Wiccan, or laying claim to any faith or lack thereof as the cornerstone of your life.)

And in my experience, the strongest and most amazing faiths I have seen in the lives of my friends and family (I'm phrasing it that way because I'm including a Jewish friend of mine) are those that were raised in the faith, and had the courage to test their beliefs, and CHOSE to return to that faith. To the Christians and those with New Testaments reading this thread, read 1 Thess 5:21. Or maybe 2 Thess. There's only a 5:21 in one of them, so good luck.