My Walk....

So....lately I have been thinking about my Walk with Christ....I don't know why I have been thinking about it and dwelling on my past because I know God wants me to live in the present and not to worry about my past endeavors, but I can't help but look back at my Walk.
My Walk begins at the age of 5....now I only have scattered memories from this time, but here is what my Mom has filled me in with now so that I can understand a little better. My younger brother, who was 2 at this time, was diagnosed with leukemia. What is leukemia? Well it is basically where cancer cells in your blood are then attacked by the body's immune system making it weaker against minor sicknesses and ailments. OK...enough background on that. So, at the age of 5 my life was completely upside down. I felt like my parents abandoned me and my youngest brother, just a baby at the time, and were always gone to Minneapolis for doctor appointments and spinal taps etc....etc. But, during this time I stayed at my grandma's house. This is where my faith really began. She always talked about God's will and every night that we stayed there, me and her would pray right before bed to thank God for what we have and then asked him to heal my brother of that retched disease. The praying and all the support paid off, as he was healed of the disease!

Jeremiah 29:11 (one of my favorite verses) states: "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." This verse speaks about trusting the LORD for his plans are only good for you, even though we don't believe this statement at times and ask Why do these bad things happen to good people? Well, there is not a clear cut answer I can give you guys about why these things happen.....but I can tell you that in my personal experience God pulls you from the darkness that you are in and brings you back into the light because these things that happen to you are only made to help you succeed in life, not to bring you down.

In my life, the darkness that fell over me was tremendous after my brother was fully recovered. I was now in 4th grade and I my appetite began to increase. I grew in weight from average healthy weight, to an unhealthy weight. As a result of my weight gain, I became the "pick on kid," or the kid that everyone loved to make fun of. I mean I was called names all through those years, I even got the nickname "Rhino" because I would get SO angry with the name calling and would charge at the person out of pure frustration. These anger issues at school then became the same with my parents, and my mom especially.

This time was the time in my life that I hate to remember, when ever I think about the things I did, I cringe and sometimes sob in regret. This is even hard to tell you guys about as it still plucks at my heartstrings, but I ,as a 4th going into 5th grader, beat my mother. She would tell me to do something and boooom explosion and I would hit her.......I hit my own mother. The one person I could confide in and I hit her.....this continues to linger in my mind thinking that I could do such a thing. I did indeed work this stuff out with some deep and even drastic counseling, but during all of this my family and I grew farther and farther and farther away from God. We were not committing ourselves fully to the LORD like it tells us to do in Proverbs 16:3, "Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and he will establish your plans." My family and I didn't go to church, we didn't go to Sunday school. I only went to release time on Wednesdays because I liked the shortened classes and the cool little reward field trips we used to do. Even after the miracle of my brother, we didn't even legitly talk about God in our household.

Fast forward, 7th grade confirmation starts God starts working through my youth director and starts reeling me back into him. At first I resisted, then as I started to understand God and the story of Jesus, I began to feel myself starting to change from a depressed and saddened kid to a flower blossom ready to emerge.

Fast forward again, 2 years later, 9th grade......I start feeling the presence of God in me.....I feel his arms helping me support my burdens and my stressers. This whole movement of feelings toward God really came to a head when I went through TEC. Now I this is not a promotion to those reading this, but my faith was brought into a whole new dimension!

Anyway fast forward again, to present day. My faith is in full bloom! The flower that was just a bud at the beginning of my 7th grade year is now at the point to where I feel that my relationship with God is as strong as ever. Let me end this post with this, Jesus died on the cross so that I and all of us can be forgiven for our sins and our transgressions. Now, I tell you that I now am a full follower of Christ, do I make hypocritical mistakes? Yes. Do I know that I am totally forgiven for these mistakes I have made in my past? Most definitely. Now think to your Walks....are their some things you regret? don't like? resent?.....I'm sure you do, but now think of the same Walk Jesus took so that our sins could be forgiven. Pretty amazing to think that one man would knowingly sacrifice himself to have our transgressions and sins washed clean wouldn't you say?

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." - 1 John 1:9