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Don, Here is my story. I assume it will have to be short and to the point so here we go. I was raised in a non-religious Protestant family that never went to church. My mother was raised in the North of Ireland and she'd learned that going to church meant learning to hate other people and greed for your personal financial gain. My father professed belief, but I learned how to swear and take the Father and Son's names in vain from him. To me, some guy being born of a virgin, who lived a sinless life and died on a cross, was resurrected and lives now in Heaven; was as believable as some fat guy travelling around the world giving presents to rotten little brats who I figured didn't deserve them and a bunny rabbit that lays chocolate eggs to give to those same brats. I was highly intelligent and thought I could figure out my own path in life. When I became an adult I was living in my self-induced pit of drinking & smoking dope. I had gone to university for computer science but ended up spending most of my time in the school pub. I quit and then went out into the world getting into an apprenticeship to learn a trade. Though I held down a full-time job and completed an apprenticeship as an electrician, I was going nowhere in life. Through the time of my apprenticeship and early in my career there were many "religious" people who kept inviting me to come to church or talking about the bible and what it said. These people came from all walks of life and denominational backgrounds: from a Catholic bar owner for whom I worked as a barboy/bartender/bouncer who told me how the birth of the State of Israel in 1948 was prophesied in the bible; to a Pentecostal/Charismatic church secretary who invited me to church so I could meet a "nice church-going girl" (though her version of nice and mine were different at the time); to a Catholic priest in a Northern Canadian town where I'd worked in construction; to Salvation Army bell ringers at the kettles at Christmas time; to a Baptist neighbour across the street. I wanted none of it, my chosen friends and associations being those that I could party with, get drunk and stoned with, and forget about the world and the bleak future. Then during the Gulf War, a friend who was right into bible prophecy (I had thought her a little bit of a space cadet) introduced me to the possibility that maybe this bible stuff was true. I had tried to read a King James Version New Testament the Gideon's had given to the students in my school when I was in Grade 6; but couldn't understand all the thee's, thou's, goeth's etc... She loaned me her bible and I thought I wouldn't be able to read it as it was King James; but here I was, 27 years old, reading and fully understanding what I was reading. There is a verse repeated a number of times in the New Testament, said by Jesus and usually following a parable or other form of His infinite wisdom. "If any man have ears to hear, let him hear." Mark 4:23 & Mark 7:16 It also says in Matthew 13:15, "For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them." Finally I was seeing and hearing what God was saying to me after all these years. Jesus has healed me, I am no longer dependent on drugs or alcohol to see me through a day or week, I can look to Him and know I will get through it somehow. Ironically, the people inviting me to church were from different churches, makes you wonder sometimes how some can look at other denominations and say "God doesn't speak to them". But I digress from my point. As a Christian for a decade now, I look back on all the testimonies I've heard and a surprising number of them involve someone praying for the person who has ended up giving their life to Christ and now sharing their testimony. As far as I can tell, there is absolutely no one who prayed for me. It wasn't my Mom, I'm praying for her now so she will accept Him and get into heaven. It wasn't my Dad, though he did say after I stopped smoking dope and drinking he was glad to see me going to church. It wasn't my brother as I started to go to church long before he did. It certainly wasn't any of my dope smoking friends, they tried to pull me away from those crazy-religious-mindcontrolling-churchgoing-cultist-folk. It was God who got me saved. John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. That's right. God sent His Son to die for me. Someone who didn't deserve it, someone who was destroying the body He had created that contained the Spirit He wanted to fellowship with. He wants to fellowship with you and me, He wants to see us in Heaven after this mortal flesh goes back to the dust. The only way that will happen is if we accept His Son and the sacrifice He made. John 3:17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. I am writing this on the eve of Good Friday, 2000. Thankful that God loved me. Thankful for what Jesus Christ did for me. Putting aside the fact He has now put me in my own successful business as an electrical contractor, but for which I am also very thankful. If you too want to get to Heaven, make sure you accept Jesus as your Lord and Personal Saviour and what He did for you approximately 2000 Easters ago. And go to church, there you can meet a "nice church-going girl"... Geoff Click HERE to return to the edited story Click HERE to create a banner that links to this story! Your e-mail address will be kept private!
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