My testimony

I was running with a good friend on our normal 6 a.m. Monday morning run.  I love these runs.  They just start my week off right.  We talk the entire time and then all of a sudden 3 miles is up and we are off to our homes for a hot shower.  We talked about reaching women in our community and encouraging women in our church with the hope of Christ.  I told her about this great event we did at our former church that was called "Homes of Light".  A wonderful evening around the holidays in which women got together, brought their friends, and reflected on what Jesus had done in their lives.  Someone usually gave a devotional and another women would give her testimony.  My friend said "let's do it!"  and so we did.  

Our Homes of Light was last night. I was set to give my testimony.  I was nervous..  Then my husband prayed over me and he prayed this from Ephesians (3:8) in which Paul writes:

⁸ Though I am the least deserving of all God’s people, he graciously gave me the privilege of telling the Gentiles about the endless treasures available to them in Christ.

The PRIVILEGE.  That is what I have.  I have the privilege of telling others about the endless treasures available to them in Christ.  It is not meant to be a burden, as I often view it.  A privilege.  An "I love you so much I want you to KNOW what Christ has done in my life because I want you to know that it is also available to you."  

And so, here is my story:

Before Christ:

     Growing up, I knew about the Lord.  I knew about Jesus.  I wanted to “be good”.  I was a pretty good kid.  I knew and really didn’t doubt the story I heard about Jesus coming to this earth as a baby, living and preaching, dying on the cross and being raised from the dead 3 days later.  We church hopped as a family and went to lots of different churches as I grew up but every Sunday we would look at these truths.   I listened to the truths, thought about them, did not doubt them and then “put them on the shelf” the rest of the week.  I thought this was what following Jesus was about.
       
       Then came life.  The hard times and the good times.  Hard times in high school as my brother has bipolar and it was a messy time for our family.  He was in and out of mental institutions, hospitals, and jail.  I began to party on the weekends at the end of my high school career.  I maintained honor roll status and was most valuable on the swim team those past two years with swimming so I had a “good kid” front.  I started to get really good at telling people what I thought they wanted to hear.  This is still a huge struggle for me:  to be open and transparent and REAL.  But I would go to youth group and be a “good kid”, hang out with the swim team and be a “jock”,  go out drinking with my friends and be a “party girl”,   Frankly, all the different roles were confusing and exhausting.  I often worried that people would figure me out.  College was a continuation of high school in that regard.  I looked really nice on the outside….and seemed to have a lot going for me but more partying meant more bad decisions and while I looked shiny on the outside, on the inside I felt myself going a little hollow and empty trying to keep up the “good kid” appearance but knowing I had failed.  Faith in Jesus was not something I thought of these days very much.  I would go to church for the holiday events.  God had become my “lucky rabbits foot”.  I would take Him off the shelf and dust Him off and pray to Him when I needed Him but then I would put Him back on the shelf and go and live my life without thinking about Him. 

Turning point:

       After college I became a high school science teacher, my dream job.  I married a man who I was completely in love with most of college, Craig.  We moved to a cute Iowa town and bought our first home together.  We enjoyed hiking and biking and camping and were talking about starting a family.  I should have been on top of the world.  But I was still empty.  Something was still missing.  I remember sitting in our home one day going down the list and thinking:  Why am I not content in this?  Why do I still feel like something is missing?  Is this all life is?

        After that day a few events started to turn my heart to the Lord.  Craig’s brother and then my Dad (1 month later) went into rehab for alcoholism.  December 3^rd, 2005 I was going to visit my dad at the rehab center half way through his 30 days there.  This was a very hard day.  My dad was (and is)  really important to me.   We have an amazing relationship.  I talk to him all the time, even now.   He was (and is) an amazing father and to get ready to visit him in a much needed treatment center was admitting that something was wrong.  We are a very loving family but we like to brush some things under the rug….the hard things mainly.  Visiting one of us in a treatment center for alcohol makes us have to pick up the rug and clean out all the junk we had been hiding under it for years.  I think we were all struggling with the honesty that the situation called for.  That morning Craig and I went to a church service with my mom.  The pastor was talking about salvation and I will NEVER forget the message he gave that day.   He was talking about a time when he was 8 years old and he knew enough about the bible and believed it was true but that he had never trusted Jesus as his savior, never asked Jesus to be the Lord of his life.  At 8 years old, he understood enough about the bible and Jesus and sin to know that if he died that day that he would go to hell.   As he spoke those words, I felt I had been punched in the gut.  He was talking about me.  I knew the bible.  I knew about Jesus.  I had prayed to him when I needed help.  But I also knew that I had never taken a good look at my life, realized that I am a sinner and asked Jesus to be my Savior.  I had never believed that I needed Jesus to cover the sins I had committed.    Asked Him to work in my heart, to change me, to direct my steps.

        I went home from that church service.  Went straight downstairs….Craig says I was white as a ghost and prayed the most important prayer of my life.   I started to think about the day I would have to stand before a holy God.   I recognized I am not good on my own.  I do things that are wrong and then feel guilty and then go back and do them again.  I cannot change on my own.  I think I finally realized that I do need a Savior.  That on my own I am not “Good” so I asked Jesus to take over my heart and my life.  I asked Him to give me a desire to live for Him.   I thanked Him for being “good” and taking the penalty for my sin when He died on the cross. 

 And I came out of that bedroom changed.

The after:

         I did feel different almost immediately.  I felt a peace come over my life.  I was going to visit my father in rehab in one hour and I had complete peace.  Giving my sin and my life over to Jesus…..I thought it would be hard to surrender control but those first moments showed me that it is beautiful to surrender our lives over to the one who knows the way we should go.  I felt what I now know is written in scripture 2 Corinthians 5:17  “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come.  The old has gone, the new is here.

        Now I wanted to dig into the bible…..how?  Joined a bible study that started with Genesis.  None of the women knew I was a days old believer and I just learned and learned and learned.  We joined a small group.  We found out we don’t have to be perfect which is good because we aren’t.  We also found out what conviction of sin felt like as we tried to do things we were used to in our old way of living.  God definitely guided us gently that first year.

            Now:  9 years and 1 day as I sit and write this.  I have started to realize that my relationship with Christ is like a lot of relationships I am in.  There are times of sweet fellowship, mountaintop times, times He is so near as I pray and read my bible or talk of Him.  There are also times in which I feel far from Him.  I can have a week when I am not spending quality time in prayer or reading my bible and not feeling like I want to invest any more of “my time” into the relationship.  Those are weeks in which I usually end up losing my patience with my husband or kids or a situation and I am back on my knees.   If it didn’t work to not seek the Lord for 26 years, how do I think I can be on my own even for an hour?

              In between those times are the day to day times with the Lord.  I am reading the Bible, I am praying, I am learning.  I am not having a “mountaintop” feeling and changes in me are not “transformations” as they are in those big moments.  They are small, minute transformations.  Ones I cannot even see until I talk to or see someone I haven’t seen in years and they say “you are different”.  I feel this is where God has grown me the most.  The small, minute, daily, almost indiscernable changes that over time have changed my heart.  I read about the areas he is working on me in Galations 5:22 when he is talking about the Fruit of the Spirit and the Holy Spirit at work in our lives. “ But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”

             Years ago I would not have described myself as a “joy filled person” but today I have glimpses of it.  I have no days in which I think “is this all there is” any more.  I am not an overly kind person but God has continually nudged me to “think of others”.   I don't know if "gentleness" will ever be the first words used to describe me but I can definitely feel God growing me to be more gentle in my responses.   Yes.  It is in the daily fellowship in which God has changed me.  I cannot imagine my life without Him in it any more.  The emptiness that I couldn’t put my finger on.  That was my ache for God in my life.