“My Walk with God”
As a child I was forced to attend church functions four or five days out of the week. I was a member of countless organizations and groups. Playing the part was always easy for me because that’s what I was accustomed to. I sang, and played piano for numerous choirs, I even lead a bible study group for three years. With all of these opportunities to feel this infamous spirit that I heard about for as long as I can remember, it just did not happen. At least this is what I foolishly believed at that point in my life.
I’ve learned that as a child my mind needed something tangible to hold on to and believe in. Just hearing great testimonies from people made me feel that it was a hoax or brainwashing. There was no-way possible in my young mind, that a being that can’t be seen or heard is the grand architect of everything. In high school I explored the idea that there may not even be a God. I read almost everything that had the word God in it, and I kept coming up the same conclusion, there isn’t a God. I now realize that God is always in your heart. He gave us free will so it is now our decision whether or not we want eternal life. I was too “smart” for my own good, instead of opening my heart to receive the blessing that he had already bestowed upon. I was trying to understand with my mind everything that is God, when it says in the bible that God is not to be understood but revered and loved. I must have missed that during my intellectual exploits.
I remember an instance when I was about fourteen years old, my grandmother had just gone on to being with God. We were having a family gathering when one of the elders from my family stopped me to say, “Boy I know you don’t believe me, but you will be a minister one day”. This is a thought that has rattled around in my brain for about fifteen years now. I have been through a lot of transitions in my life, I dropped out of high school and completely fell away from God. From there my life went downhill, from working dead end jobs to even living off of my parents. I even resorted to donating plasma to make ends meet. All the while, I still persisted to believe that even if there was a God, he didn’t care was going on with me. One of my very good friends became very spiritual and this obviously affected our conversations from this point.
We began to discuss things from the bible such as, the creation, the immaculate conception, the resurrection, and many others. This fueled a fire that I didn’t even know existed, this fire was my thirst to learn more about faith.