Stories of Redemption

“…everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judges 21:25 LSB).

Have you ever come across someone and wondered if perhaps they were too far gone for God to save? When you look at certain individuals, perhaps you sometimes can’t help but wonder if there really is any hope for them. Well, I used to be one of those people who seemed beyond hope. 

Like so many lost people in our country and across the world, I was doing what was right in my own eyes. Actions, thoughts, and intentions that disgust me today were common back then; not only were they common, but I thought they were right, or at least okay. I believed that God was dead, as Nietzsche declared in his 1882 book titled The Gay Science.

Looking back today, I sometimes find it unfathomable that I’m actually a professing Christian; I was an advocate of everything that is wrong with our world today—held captive in substance abuse, and angry at a God, who, at the very least, was an evil God, if He existed at all.

“…unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3).

So, what changed? God changed me. And the only way it makes sense is to understand it in light of Jesus’ claim that unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. You probably hear the claim all the time that God changes those who choose to be changed, but in my case, I was changed solely by the grace of God, the blood of Christ, and the work of the Holy Spirit.

It happened on May 2, 2015, sometime in the afternoon. My sister-in-law had died in childbirth just days before, and the baby with her. When I saw them in the casket together, something broke in me that caused me to stumble to my car, blinded by tears. 

I was in such a devastated state of mind that I cannot even remember the drive back to my hotel. But I can so clearly remember the hotel, where I knelt before God for the first time, needing Him to be real and wanting Him to be near. And He was.

“Know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes by one’s own interpretation” (2 Peter 1:20).

How does a person go from such an enslaved state of mind to suddenly believe in the God of the Bible, and immediately begin to live a different kind of life? I couldn’t make sense of it at first. Moreover, even though my life changed dramatically, I really didn’t know what it was like to live as a Christian. I had been taught Christian values in my childhood, but that was a long time ago and under many different circumstances.

I’ll never forget the day I was walking out of the sanctuary at church and was accosted by one of the pastors, who invited me to sign up for Pastor Shawn’s two-year discipleship training program. The growth I experienced in those two years under Pastor Shawn was nothing short of remarkable. Within a few years, I went from a shy boy who almost couldn’t make eye contact with church people to a young man who stood before a congregation of hundreds and preached the Word of God. 

Today, I am a Christian who is still growing to maturity under the godly leadership of my church. I have not yet reached perfection, but by God’s grace, I will one day be completed by the very hand that has molded me this far. As a current elder at Bethel Mennonite Church, I look forward to the coming years with excitement because God is doing wonderful things, and He is still in the business of saving people and transforming them into the image of His Son. Gloria in excelsis Deo.