Everyone Has A Story

                Have you ever sat down and really thought about your testimony?  Do you know what you would tell someone if you had the chance to share your story with them?  Everyone that calls themselves a Christian has a story to tell and it should be able to tell it without thinking about it.  Your story, no matter how grand or routine, can and will help someone that needs to hear it at the time God gives you to tell it.

                When we read through the Bible, we find some very extraordinary testimonies from people like Abraham, Moses, Mary and Joseph, Jonah, and Paul.  We also get to imagine the testimonies of all the people that were healed by the touch of Jesus.  In every one of these people, we see a glimpse into the life of each and every one of them.  And just like all of them, we all have a story that allows people to see how the hand of God has changed each one of us. 

                My own personal story started pretty much like most kids that grew up in a church.  My grandfather was a minister and my grandmother was the children’s director, so they drug us to church just about every time the doors were open.  And we were usually the ones opening the doors.  With my grandfather being a preacher, we were held to a higher standard by almost everyone in the church.  These standards were hard to live up to and made it difficult to want to continue going.  So I eventually drifted away from the church. 

                As I got older and realized something was missing from my life, I made my way back to the church and back to the loving arms of God.  I was in my early twenties and was on top of the world or so I thought.  I spent time reading and praying every day, was teaching a children’s Sunday school class and was part of several Bible studies.  My life was engulfed with the love of God.  But that was also when Satan put more pressure on my personal life than I thought I could take.  I was trying to finish up my bachelor’s degree and keep everything else up as well, but the pressure finally pushed me to my breaking point.  Depression soon set in and I was ready to give up on life.  The more I tried to fake my way through life, the more depressed I would become.  Soon the church I was attending turned their back on me.  The church friends I thought I had would not talk to me.  I felt completely alone for the first time in my life. 

                I spent three years trying to fill a void in my soul with a party.  Monday night was poker night, Tuesday night was stay home with a bottle of moonshine or tequila, and Wednesday through Sunday was all filled with going to the clubs.  There were very few nights in that three year span that I didn’t drink alcohol to help mask the hurt.  Even on the nights that I said I was not drinking, I would still drink a six pack of beer.  There were more nights than I want to think about that to this day I don’t know how I wasn’t killed or worse yet I didn’t kill someone else.  During those nights, I didn’t care if I made it home or not.  There was something missing in my life and I was determined to fill the hole with alcohol and a party.

                Don’t get me wrong, during those years there were some very good things that happened as well.  And looking back on it now, God had a hand in keeping me alive and steering me back in the right direction.  Even though I was still living my life in the clubs and drinking, God had a plan for me.  He brought a woman into my life that eventually became my wife.  We soon had a family and things seemed to be finally starting feel right; but there was still something missing in my life. 

                It took a simple question from my young daughter to get me back on the right path.  We had gone to a family reunion at a local park and ran into an old friend of mine.  Her husband was the preacher that married my wife and me but we didn’t stay in contact with them much after the wedding.  They had a family and a church to run and we had a busy life with two young children, but that day she invited us to come visit their church.  I did what I always did when people invited me to church; I was polite and said we would try to check it out.  I had no intention of stepping foot inside their church or any other church at that time.  I would not allow myself to return to another hypocritical group of people.  But that all changed when we heard from the back seat of the car on our way home that afternoon a very simple question.  My very young daughter asked the simple question of, “can we go to church?”  That simple question not only got me back into a church but also started filling that hole in my soul.

                This is only the first half of my testimony.  I am living the second half out every day and there are mountains and valleys in my life that I have to deal with all the time.  My walk with Jesus is still a hard road to walk and Satan still knows how to bring me down and will do it every chance he gets.  My testimony is an ever evolving story that hopefully will one day help someone else make it through a rough season in their life.  Even with God right beside me every day, I still go through seasons of loneliness.  It is in those times that I have to remember that Jesus is right beside me and I have to lean on Him more in order to make it through the hard times.

                We all have a testimony that needs to be heard.  Your story could be similar to someone else’s story but they will never be the same.  It’s in the little differences that make your story relevant to the person that needs to hear it.  I ask everyone that reads this to leave their testimony in the comments.  I would love to hear how God is working in your life.   Maybe it is something you say in your comment that will save someone else.  So please share some or all of you story with us.

                “Lord, thank you for the testimony that you have given me.  I pray that someone reading my testimony will turn their life over to you or it will at least help them to know there is a way out of their situation.  Lord, I also pray for the people reading this and are willing to put their story out there for others to read.  If through all of this it reaches just one person and they turn to you, then You have made it worth it.  Thank you Lord for all the hard times and all the good times that have happened to me over the years, those are the things that allow me to have a testimony for others to hear.  In Your precious name I pray, Amen.”