If you are reading this, then you know by now that I am a missionary traveling around Latin America. But perhaps many of you don’t know how I got here. So I want to take this chance to share a small piece of my story with you.
I’m from a small town in North Carolina where it’s a part of the culture to go to church every Sunday morning. I grew up going to church every Sunday and Wednesday because my parents took my brother and me. I learned the Old Testament stories of Noah and Daniel and Jonah. To this day I can still sing the song I learned to memorize the books of the Bible. We also sang songs like Father Abraham and Zacchaeus Was a Wee Little Man. I remember learning about Hell and being afraid to go there. I learned about how Jesus died on a cross for me and the rest of the world to save us from our sins.
I said a salvation prayer when I was 7 years old. I got baptized and all my family came to watch. For a while I went around asking all my friends if they were “saved”.
After this, I went on living life just like anyone else. I began to find my worth in my performance in school or sports, or in what my friends thought of me.
I always had a sense that there had to be something more to life.
When I was in high school, I got involved in an organization called Young Life. Every Monday night, we would get together at someone’s house, sing crazy songs, and play crazy games. And someone always talked about Jesus and who he was. I usually tuned this part out because I thought I already knew all about that.
During the summer of 2010, just after I graduated from high school, I went to a Young Life camp for a week. It was a week full of Monday nights—we played more crazy games and sang more crazy songs. And every night someone got up in front of this group of high schoolers and told us about Jesus.
Something about the message he was sharing was different than what I had heard my whole life growing up.
He was telling me about a Jesus who wanted a relationship with me. A Jesus who wanted to be my friend. A Jesus who wasn’t about rules, but was about getting to know me. A Jesus who wants me to know him too. A Jesus who came to bring full and abundant life, not just in Heaven, but here on earth as well. I grew up in church, hearing about Jesus, but I had never heard it quite like this.
I realized that if what they were saying was true, then my life had to be different. I was a good kid in the sense that I didn’t get into trouble. I didn’t struggle with alcohol, drugs, or sex, and I am thankful for that. But simply being a good person and living in constant communion with Jesus are two very different things.
So during that week in July 2010, exactly 4 years ago, I made a decision that I was going to follow Christ. That I was going to say “Yes” to the invitation to be his friend.
I know that deciding to follow Jesus was the best decision I have ever made in my life. The life I lived before Christ was just okay, but Jesus didn’t die so that we might live mediocre lives. He says in John 10:10 that he came to give us “life to the full”.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to settle for a second-rate life when I can live the best life with Jesus.
