Easter Testimony

I was baptized last week so my testimony is still very fresh in my mind. Unfortunately, I don't think my story is very entertaining. I don't have many huge moments where God showed me everything in an epic moment, but rather God has tended to enlighten me gradually through my daily walk. I am going to write this from scratch so it won't be too organized, but I'd rather it be this way than sound like an essay.

So it all started with my first girlfriend. Just a quick background: my entire teenage years were devoted to girls. I wanted to take French class just because I thought there would be more girls than Spanish classes. I switched from violin to double bass in orchestra because I realized there were many violin players...only one bassist. It'd be easier for a girl to notice me. And you laugh...but it actually worked! I "initiated" my first girlfriend in December of eighth grade and it lasted until my February of freshman year. I remember. I had the date in my AIM profile.

This girl was my world. I talked to her constantly. I thought about her constantly. I'd visit her constantly. I walked two miles one way to see her. I'd envision what we would do years and years from now. Every holiday was an excuse to celebrate her. Quite literally...the object of my worship. But then...someone gave her a gift for Christmas. I was very, very jealous for her. It wasn't just that she got a gift from someone, but that she had even told me that this guy had confessed his affections to her before. And she accepted his gift. I wasn't very happy. My jealousy eventually pushed her away and she broke up with me.

I was a wreck for a couple months. My friends would tell me that I was a zombie. I never talked to anyone in school. I just wanted everyone to see my pain, how badly this was affecting me. There was a huge hole where there used to be an overflow of attention for me and I wanted to repair it so badly. I would go home and run blunt knives across my arms. I wanted to kill myself but I was too scared to die. I asked everyone for help, my friends, my enemies, her new boyfriend, and even my parents. Nothing worked.

However, my friend, Sam, asked me to go to church with him one day. I had no idea about what church was like so I went. They sang songs and I liked singing. Enough by Christ Tomlin was a song we often sang and each time, I related it back to my ex-girlfriend. I was still stuck. But something kept me there. There was wisdom in what was being preached. And I liked singing songs. So I kept going and I kept going. Eventually, I attended the summer youth retreat where the guest speaker asked us..."If you want to be saved, ask Jesus to come into your life". And I did that. I knew I was broken and had to be fixed. God didn't need to me to be the best because he knew I was the worst. And I knew I was the worst. And God healed me of my anguish. But at the time, I really didn't know what I was getting into.

I think I lived with a kind of moralism for most of my high school years. I was big on forgiving people because I had been forgiven. No drugs, no alcohol. You weren't supposed to steal. When I got challenged to a fight, I made up my mind to just show and let the guy hit me until he was satisfied. I'd be like Jesus then, right? Suffering for an enemy. But I still had a lot of pride. I wore my arrogance around like a badge of honor. The confidence I exuded made a lot of people respect me. And I was after the respect and admiration...of girls. Still after girls.

I got good at manipulating people. I would purposely not respond to texts or IMs or give the cold shoulder. I played a lot of mind games. But to me, I was always the good guy. I still had my share of heart break and betrayal. And I did my share of my breaking hearts and betraying others' trust. I remember a point in time during my senior year when things were at their worst and I prayed to God to take it away from me. Whatever hold I had over girls...I didn't want it anymore.

I was still a sinner. Moralism was failing and I couldn't do it on my own. But by the grace of God, he was still working through scum like me. Some of my friends were coming to know God through our interactions. Granted, it was me arguing harshly with them, it was me pushing a truth that I didn't even understand onto them, but God was working nonetheless.

Looking back, I don't think I had very much guidance. No one reached out to me too much and in the same way, I didn't think of the church as my home. I would usually go for the message and leave shortly afterward. Sometimes it was because not many people talked to me, sometimes it was because I didn't want to talk to anyone. By the middle of my freshman year in college, I had left altogether. I drifted for a while, dissatisfied with how my life was going. God was humbling me. I wasn't doing very well in school, I wasn't finding any cute girls to like.

Some time in between all this, my friend, Henrik, invited me to a bible study for KCM. I was floored right away. These people actually seemed like they cared about me! And they were smart! I kept going to KCM and during the next semester, I started learning theology with many of them. One week, we were going over the characteristics of salvation. There were seven, none of which I specifically remember. But at the time, I realized I didn't have any of them. So I prayed. And I prayed over those seven things for a month. When I came out of it, I've experienced this lasting transformation that has lasted to this day. I've been far from perfect. I'm still a sinner but God can love sinners. He killed his Son for sinners. I was talking to a Muslim this week, and I explained...this is why we believe the Gospel! Where have you found love more compelling, more offensive, more invasive? Praise God for crushing the Son of Man for our sake. All glory belongs to him alone.