This is an excerpt from one of my classes today. My professor, Larry Kirk, gave a very thought provoking analogy. It convicted me for how easy it is to imitate someone who is really hearing the music. Oh Lord, help me to hear the music and to help me to help others hear the music too!
On Monday, after much begging from my biggest girl, I caved and gave her her first haircut. While it was completely thrilling for her, it was a little sad and sentimental for me. Granted, I probably only cut about 14 hairs, since she didn’t have that much in the back anyway, and I was just trying to even it out. Still, this is another milestone in my baby growing bigger…
For one of my classes, I (Eric) was assigned to write out my testimony. Instead of sharing a “defining moment” when I became a Christian, the professor challenged us to write on our whole life as the story of needing Christ’s redeeming love. I still focused more on growing up, than the present, but it’s getting there (I am looking forward to learning more in this class).
If your interested, here it is.
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I am an experience person. What I mean is that to know, understand, and believe in something I need to experience it first. When a child is told that a stove is hot and not to touch it, but does it anyway and burns their hand, they learn from the experience. That’s my life. My parents and others told me not to do things throughout my childhood, so I had to try them. Part of it was rebelliousness, I don’t like to be told what to do. Another part was that I wanted to experience it, try it, and find out for myself. I learned some hard lessons, as you can imagine, and I got burned many times.
For some reason, I could never just listen and observe, I had to experience it, except when it came to Christianity. I went to church with my family and knew Christians, and they told me that knowing Christ was great and joyous, but to be honest it looked pretty plain and dorky. What kind of person reads the Bible, prays, and goes to church on Sunday? Boring people (or so I thought).
Eventually the more I tried things that burned me, the more interested I was in knowing the God that others around me worshipped. Sure I saw tears and hard moments in Christians lives, but I also saw hope and joy, and I wondered why?
At some point in high school I decided to stop observing and to experience God. I wanted to know if the joy was true. I wanted to know if there was a purpose to my life. What does that mean? Well it means that I started to pay attention in church a little more, but I would still fall asleep at times. It means I read the Bible more and talked to others more. Eventually I realized that God does give joy, and it’s real joy because it’s the joy that is there even when bad things happen. It’s there when I really screw up big time and the whole world (as it sometimes seems) is out to get me. It’s unconditional forgiveness all the time. It’s also an ongoing discovery of how great a God our Creator is. It’s a journey of learning how foolish I really am, and how much I need a Savior.
I am still an experience person. I experience the joy of knowing Christ each day. Being a Christian isn’t arriving in the promised land, at least not yet. I have many struggles each day. Family, finances, work, transmissions not working the way they should, selfish and impatient children, and the reality that I am even more selfish and impatient than my two year old are all things that I struggle with often. But I have hope and a fresh start every moment, not because I deserve it, but because Christ did deserve it and He gave it to me and took the death I deserved. Thank you, Jesus.
