My walk with God has been a very tumultuous one. I grew up knowing and believing in Him and understanding that Jesus Christ died for my sins, but there were many times when I just put Him off to the side. I prayed a lot growing up, but it was usually only if I needed something, and I would resent God if my prayers weren’t answered. I would later find out that God works on His own time, and He has a grand plan for my life that I will never really know- I just have to trust in Him.
My childhood was marked with a lot of fun memories, but also a lot of painful ones. All of my grandparents passed away by the time I was eleven, so I had to deal with death at a very young age. I knew that my grandparents went to Heaven, but I just didn’t understand why God took them one after the other and I was mad at Him for it. I should have been excited for them… finally meeting the Lord our Savior and spending eternity in paradise away from the pain and suffering in this world.
I have been blessed with a father, mother, twin sister, older brother, and a nephew. My parents love me very much and I couldn’t be happier with my life, but things haven’t always been so pleasant. Because of the way my dad used to treat my mom and us girls, I carried a lot of resentment and bitterness towards him. Our relationship was strained and I couldn’t even stand to be around my dad. There were times where I wanted to run away and never come back, and times when I felt so completely depressed and alone. I would pray to God at night, bawling and desperately searching for some peace and strength. He gave me strength, but I never acknowledged Him for it. I don’t remember once opening my Bible to look for answers. I gave God nothing and asked Him for everything. I never opened my heart to Him… part of me resented God and the other pleaded for His mercy… I was conflicted and so lost.
High school brought other struggles besides my relationship with my dad. I always felt like my friends didn’t care about me, and there was a lot of backstabbing and gossip. It was hard being a twin because I felt like I was constantly being compared to someone, and I felt like a failure compared to her. I ended up quitting sports and just working, and I had no real purpose in my life. Once my friends started to party, I felt left out and like I was missing out, so I started partying with them too. I never compromised my purity, but I compromised my integrity. We had some good times, but overall I just felt empty inside.
Jesus never gave up on me even when I turned my back on Him. It wasn’t until this year that I realized I needed to surrender my life to God and give Him everything. I re-dedicated my life to Christ at TC-X and nothing has been the same ever since. God has changed me, who I am now is not who I was. Christ is in my heart, mind and soul. Galatians 2:20 says, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” My resentment and bitterness towards my dad is gone, and my heart is filled with pure joy. I no longer listen to the lies of the world and I know that there’s nothing I can’t get through if I just ask God for help. He has shown me who I really am and where I am going, He has blessed me with wonderful new friends, He has mended my family’s relationship, and He is all I will ever need. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
As I went throughout my life before I knew Christ, I always tried to find acceptance in others. For example, I would need to find acceptance in my family. I am the oldest and knew that I had to lead by good examples for my brother and sister; so, I worked hard for my grades and was involved in many activities. I had to find acceptance in my friends. My freshman and sophomore years of high school were difficult as I did not have many friends to lean on nor did I have that big group of friends that hung out regularly. However, I did find this group of friends my junior and senior year and really enjoyed the rest of high school. I also found acceptance by dating someone my junior and senior year.
As you can see, the last two years of high school my life revolved around relationships. To feel accepted, my relationships with my friends and boyfriend had to be continued outside of school.
This was unfulfilling when my parents or something stopped me from hanging out with my friends or the boyfriend. I felt lonely if no one wanted to hang out with me. I wanted so badly to have deep, meaningful relationships with the people around me that I strived to make those relationships, even if they were unhealthy. I realized this when I came to college and I would hang out with someone just because I thought they would accept me as their friend.
My life changed when I got involved with a freshman bible study. My RA was also the bible study leader where she encouraged me to go to CRU’s fall retreat. There I received Christ as my Savior. Jesus Christ had always been in my life and I knew what He had done, but I did not have a personal relationship with him until then. I instead concentrated on relationships with other people and I continually struggled throughout high school to find those relationships.
I was very excited after I received Christ. My attitude became hopeful in knowing that I would not be left alone and I would make friends soon. By going to the fall retreat, I had met a ton of people from my floor, and who went to my bible study. Pretty soon we were all hanging out!
The work of the Holy Spirit in my life after I received Christ started out a little slow. I did not recognize the amount of change that could happen in my life until the second semester of my sophomore year. You see, I had this boyfriend whom I still looked for acceptance in; this relationship went on for another 1 1/2 after I received Christ. This ended, and I became a lot more active in my relationship with God and with the fellowship of CRU. I was in the Word daily and I became a member of Conference Team. I was able to see that I did not need acceptance in other people but that I was already accepted into God’s will.
My life has changed in that I know I am always accepted into Christ’s family. He will never leave me and I will always have someone to lean on. I noticed this change when I relied on God to carry me through the break-up of my relationship and my reliance on Him has grown ever since. Because of this, I am motivated in knowing that God has some amazing plans for me. He has allowed me to go through these struggles for the purpose of me learning about His grace and sovereignty.
Before I truly began following Christ I had a constant need to seek approval from other people. I wanted to be liked. This caused me to be very hard on myself when something was not perfect. Everything from the way I looked to the activities I took part in were a part of this approval seeking attitude I had.
My happiness and security came from being very involved in many different “good” things, and from seeming to have it all together.
This was unfulfilling because I knew that at different instances I had let people down, and that there was no way that I could keep everyone happy. I felt like I was racing towards a goal that I would never be able to reach.
I accepted Christ into my life at a young age. I was attending a Vacation Bible School when I remember hearing about the opportunity to accept Christ into my life, and I knew that I needed Him to be my Savior.
I grew up in a family that modeled the love of Christ and shared his message from the time I was born. I continued to learn more and more about what it meant to have a personal relationship with Him as I grew older.
Before receiving Christ, I struggled with feelings of inadequacy and guilt for even the smallest things.
On that day at VBS, I remember a feeling of excitement and nervousness coming over me, as I knew that this was a life changing decision. More importantly though, I remember a feeling of peace that reassured me of God’s love. The reality of who God and who Jesus were, was beginning to sink in.
Upon receiving Christ I began to see myself as a child of God who was loved no matter what I did or did not do. Life increasingly became an opportunity to live in the light of His love instead of a constant struggle to please everyone and do the right thing.
As I grew older, I continued to learn what it meant to walk with Jesus and I knew that He was always with me, through the good times and the bad. I especially remember this being true as I began to have friends who were dealing with difficult self-worth issues in middle and high school. I truly felt Jesus holding on to me during those times and allowing me to find my worth in Him. He was the firm foundation-the rock in my life, as written about by the Psalmist. This was also around the time that I started to read the Bible for myself, instead of just being taught it by someone else. It was a source of comfort and a guiding light in my life.
I am now motivated to live for the glory of God and not for myself. I know that this is possible not because I am good at trying really hard but because of the grace He has shown me. I am learning what it means to live a life filled with the Holy Spirit and I am excited to serve Him all the days of my life.
Still Struggling
My life has not been filled with dramatic encounters with God or radical changes in my behavior; rather it has been a long and drawn out process that is still going on today. I grew up as your average middle class, church attending, “do-all-the-right-things” boy. My earliest memory is probably sitting on a piano bench with my Grandma. She asked me if God was the Lord and Savior of my life. I didn’t really know what that meant at the time, but it sounded pretty cool so I decided to join the Christian club. I always liked going to church because we got to hear all these amazing stories about how God flooded the entire world and killed everybody except those who were on the Ark, how this guy named Jonah got eaten by a whale, and even how David and the Israelites killed the mighty Goliath. Actually, I can’t believe my parents actually let me hear these stories — they are pretty violent. Anyway, that’s all church really was to me: stories. Stories about how God got mad and a ton of people died. My view of God was that he was always angry at us humans and really wanted to punish us. My life was spent trying to please him. I would go to church every Sunday and Wednesday. I went to camp every summer. I even went to Chicago and Mexico on mission trips to prove to God that he didn’t have to be disappointed with me. But none of this seemed to work. I still felt like there was more I could do to help people. After failing to please God for 17 years, I decided that I was done.
I don’t remember what happened first. Did I give up on God first or did I start dating first? Regardless, at some point in time I switched from pleasing God to pleasing my girlfriend. She became the center or my universe and I was the center of hers. Dating her was great. I finally understood why everybody loved to date someone. When you date somebody for a long time you really get to know them. Their hopes, fears, dreams and whatever else you can think of. Only, this relationship I thought I was in control of all of a sudden found itself in areas that I wasn’t comfortable with. Things happened so fast. I looked back and didn’t know how I had fallen to where I was. I promptly exited that relationship but immediately entered another one. Once again, I found myself making my girlfriend the center of my universe and even though she was happy, I felt empty inside. One day she brought me to church. I hadn’t been in several months I think. That day, the pastor of the church gave a sermon on God’s love for us. At that exact moment I realized what had been missing from my view of God all those years. He loves us. No matter what we did or how we failed, God still loved us for who we are (or aren’t).
I would love to tell you that my life changed from that instant forward and that I walked off into the sunset to live a happy a fulfilling life. Even though it would make for a great story, that’s not how God works. Things have been really hard for me. Its been over three years since that day and I’m still fighting God. Even though I understand his love for me, I find it extremely hard to accept it free of charge. I don’t like handouts in life. There are days when this reluctance to accept love turns into doubting the very existence of God. Sometimes it all just seems so preposterous to me, that there is this almighty power that loves me even if I spit in his face and turn my back on him. But I can no longer deny the fact that I crave God with every fiber of my being. I crave him like a bird craves the early worm or like a young child craves attention. I want to be in a relationship with him that is perfect and in which there will be no disappointment—because he can’t fail. So even though I am having a hard time right now, brighter days are in store for me because I have the hope and the love of God, and who can beat that!?
How can you have a loving and personal relationship with someone who isn’t even here? This is something I questioned for a long time. I grew up going to church and bible camp, but I never really understood it all. I always knew there was probably a God out there somewhere, but I thought it didn’t really apply to my life right now. I was always very shy and self conscious, believing I wasn’t worth anything. I relied on other people, especially boys, to make me feel good about myself. My life revolved around boys. I couldn’t really be happy without one giving me attention and love. I needed boys to make me feel like I was whole and complete. But this was all so unfulfilling. I only really felt joyful for brief periods of time; happiness never stayed for long. When there wasn’t a boy around, negative thoughts about myself and the world around me slowly crept in.
Because of this need for love, I become involved in a long unhealthy relationship during high school. I allowed this boy to become my entire world and pushed everyone else in my life away. Our relationship was very physical and I gave him almost everything. It eventually ended with him cheating on me. I felt completely abandoned and unloved by everyone. If he didn’t want me anymore, why would anyone else want me? My reason for living was no longer there, so I became depressed.
But this is where the Lord came to me and worked a miracle in my life. He used one of my weakest moments to lead me to him. A friend started bringing me to youth group where the Lord began to work on my heart. I slowly started to understand that he was the only thing that was going to bring me out of this depression. I realized that I had given boys the place in my heart that only God is meant to have. It wasn’t satisfying me, because no boy on this earth can do what God can do. When I gave God back his place in my heart I slowly changed my outlook on life and began to feel better about myself.
I began a long journey of learning how to give everything to the Lord and of him changing me into the type of person he wants me to be. I was once motivated by my own desires, which always led me astray, but I began to be motivated by God. I wanted to honor him with my life so everything I did was now for him. The decisions I started making were difficult, but they eventually led me to happiness and what was best for me.
But I am not saying that my life is perfect now, by any means. I still have struggles and I even turned away from God during one of these hard times. My freshman year of college exposed me to many new things, including a whole new group of boys. Second semester I got involved with a boy on my floor. He slowly broke down all the walls that the Lord had helped me to build up over the years and I finally gave in. We became involved physically and I started reverting back to the way I was before I let God into my life. I was angry at God for doing this to me. Why had he allowed me to go through this? Why hadn’t he given me strength to stay away? Why had he left me alone to deal with this? At one point I even decided God didn’t exist anymore.
When I did finally get away from this boy, it took me awhile to allow the Lord in again. Luckily I had connected myself with CRU and with good friends to lead me back to him. I began to realize that I had asked the Lord for this. Earlier that year I decided to surrender my entire life to him, including my relationships with boys. He was giving me an opportunity to show him that I was really willing to do this, but I wasn’t ready for it. I thought he had abandoned me but I realized that he was actually holding me in his hands the whole time I just wasn’t able to see it. I could have given myself completely to this boy, which would have devastated me, but no matter how many times it almost happened, it never actually did. There is nothing to explain this except for the Lord’s work. Even when I was pushing him away he still loved me enough to not let me fall completely into darkness.
I’ve learned that no one is perfect, even Christians. Life is hard and everyone will go through difficult times, but it’s so much easier to make it through those times when you have God on your side. He will give you strength to keep going and you can trust that he has a purpose for your life personally. Your life has meaning because the Lord wants to use you to do amazing things! He loves you so much and he will always be there waiting for you. He will radically transform your life if you only let him in.
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