Did you ever feel you're missing something, always searching but never finding, have a hole in you and try to do stuff to distract yourself from that need .. ? :)  I did, too .. but I found out what it's for!  Can I tell ya about it? :)

 

At a young age I remember kneeling with my parents and asking Jesus to clean out all the junk I'd been doing with my life and make me a new person.  I noticed a change.  Then near the end of High School I thought God had no power to help me with the problems I encountered.  I applied to big name schools, and got into my last choice, Taylor University, a small Christian school north of Indianapolis.  By the end of my first year of college at Taylor, I lived alone, had a girlfriend I'd never met living in Canada, had long hair of several colors, a really low math grade, and a lot of confusion, anguish, and almost even a loss of control over my own life.  I got kicked out of school a few weeks before the end of the school year, with possible readmission after one year.

 

When I got home I was told I'd go to counseling for sexual and computer addictions, and I resisted and just wanted to lay in bed alone for the longest time.  When I finally attended 2 sessions, the question I was asked, "What would you say if I were to tell you that Jesus (God) is the only one that can help you out with this problem?" still sticks in my mind.  :)  At the time, I said, "Naw, you're wrong, I've tried, he can't .." and I didn't want to give it another chance.  I had phone conversations with Tammy to Cananda, and got a few letters from my high school friends, but I basically wanted to go down to the county park 2mi down the road and hang myself in a picnic shelter with the business card of the admin guy who got me kicked out of Taylor on the ground underneath me.  The letters and encouragements of my friends who did know Jesus, even my gf who I was hurting immensely in that area, kept me from doing this .. and prayer.  So, one day dad had my brothers bring me out to the van and put me in the back.  He took me to the South Bend airport from Goshen where we lived.  He left me in the parking lot and drove away.  He didn't want to see me again until I decided to change, and then he left for Russia for a couple of weeks.

 

I walked 25 miles that day.  In one part of South Bend, an African-american homeless man said to me, "Man, you look like you jus' los' yer bes' frien'!"  I felt hopeless.  I stayed in the county park 2mi from home.  I was planning to wait the 3 days it would take for me to die w/o food and water.  I chose near the end of day 2 to drink some water and eat the wild raspberries growing along the road through the park.  I'd read, "as long as there's life, there's hope"  I still felt empty even though I was alive.  That weekend I got food from the house and hitched a ride back to the park.  One night I didn't want to wait for the rangers to go to sleep before leaving the woods to sleep at a table or something, and the elementary school next door had people at it.  I slept on a dark road near the elementary school.  A passing car called the cops.  Four to six cars converging from different directions made me wonder what was going on, when I decided to get up and walk somewhere else, since there had been cars coming and going on the road.  My parents followed me after my conversation with the cops.  That was another long walk that night, away from them.  Finally I did go back to the house.  Dad was gone.  I got back into all my old stuff.  I worked for a year in a little cubicle on some new technology.  I started swing dancing for fun near the end of the summer.

 

Finally, we went on vacation as a family to fill the time between the end of my work and the beginning of Purdue.  I brought with me my old King James Scofield Bible.  I read the Proverbs corresponding to the days of the month, chapter 28 for the 28th, etc.  I guess I did it because I thought I needed it and had done it before in High School.  From there, I began to attend church again with my family.

 

One Wednesday night I chose to go hang out with the college age group as the sun was setting on the warm Indiana August day.  Out in the field behind the church we sat on some wood RR ties or boards and sang, then the leader, Sarah, said she hadn't prepared anything to say, but instead was going to have us just read the Word, because the word of God is powerful.  So, I opened the Bible and we went around the circle reading through the book of James.

 

After all the cynicism, lies, weak jokes, and lame personal attacks I'd been through in the past 2 years, I had found something true.  It hit something inside me that said, this is true, this's right .. ! :)  I'd found something nurturing! I didn't want to stop looking at and understanding the kind words, the love, the real things written there!  I was being nourished by the word of God. :)

 

The next Sunday the sermon was bout taking steps of faith that demand prayer, setting up a prayer chair in your basement, and praying kingdom prayers for all the saints in the church and that people would be brought to know God.  During worship and singing to God and pouring out my heart to him with love songs stronger than anyone would ever use for a fallible person, I cried, tears ran down my face and I felt full of joy.  From here I began talking to God and trying to get to know him on a personal basis more regularly, especially looking beyond me and my needs to praying for other people around me, the ones I see on the bus, in the labs and classes, professors, and leaders of the church or other people I know about that need prayer. :)

 

On the way to Purdue for the beginning of fall semester, dad gave me a book called How to Stay Christian in College, by Navigators.  It was a help to my life and the situations I encountered at college.  It helps combat sincerism, and just helped me to see truth and lie, reality and falseness as they really are.  I still look back and read it some after intense reading that happened in the first couple of months.  I became involved in Campus Crusade for Christ and InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.  I started to read the Bible to know about God and look for Jesus and his love, instead of out of obligation or legalism.  It's like going back to read the old letters your girlfriend sent you.  Our God loves us a lot.  His letter, letters to us, about himself and how we can love him back are right here .. Oh, how I'd love to introduce you to the loving God who saved me from so many things! :)