My Story…

When I awoke from my brain tumor surgery several years ago I felt the presence of something that I can not really describe in words other than to say that I no longer doubted the fact that there was something supernatural in this world that connects us all.  You may attribute this to many things and I could have as well considering the pressure that was released from my head that day.  But now I don’t have any doubts.

I have been searching for the meaning of life since I was in high school or before and there has been a hole inside of me that has never been able to be filled.  I studied philosophy, world religion, had many relationships and went around the world searching for answers…  Many people are not afflicted as deeply as I was with this yearning to know and they go through life content with what they do know.  Maybe life’s difficulties are what cause people to seek these truths, but for whatever the reason I want you to know what has happened to me in the last year.

“What if it is true?” I asked myself.  What if there is a God?  And what if he inspired people to write what he wanted us to know about this world in a book?  And what if the world is the way it is because of what happened in this story?  It has been building in me for quite some time, but I have not been able to understand it… I was hooked on the news – a steady stream of murders, theft, violence, rape and evil. Messed up lives for generation after generation that result in unbelievable pain and anguish for so many. I kept asking myself why, why does this seem to continue and get worse rather than better?  And where is my place in it?  For too long I had been sitting on the sidelines watching life go by…

So I began to listen.  I began to not simply turn off as soon as I heard the subject of God come up.  What if there is something in that book that I could learn?  This I did know:  Three of the world’s major religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, were all born out of the same place.  The Jews were the first, then Christ came and many, though not all, followed him and finally Muhammed came and some broke off and followed him.  The clash of these three religions is at the heart of much of the conflict that we see in the world today.  I lived with Muslims for two years and their faith is incredibly intense.  I concluded that I needed to know a lot more before I dismissed it as not being relevant.

So what did I know about Christianity?  What did I learn as a kid?  Frankly, I learned enough to have a pretty good set of values, but not much more.  Mostly what I remember was ritual rather than teaching.  Stand, sit, kneel, stand, sing, receive communion – not being really sure about what any of it really meant.  In high school and college I studied religion, but in a completely detached way as if it really didn’t have any relationship to me or my life.  It wasn’t until I was ready to really listen, that I picked up Rick Warren’s book – A Purpose Driven Life – this past Spring at the airport. At any other time in my life up to that point, I would have opened the front cover, read a little and shut the door, but not that day.  Something is happening now and for whatever reason people are making the Bible relevant again and explaining scripture in ways that make sense today.  As I turned the pages, things started to make sense not just logically, but in my heart as well.  So I read and I thought and I felt.

Then I went to church and I listened to people who explained what was written in ways that anybody could understand.  And I listened to the bible on CD and heard God speaking to me through this story.  It is truly amazing how something that was written over hundreds of years can have a consistency and truths that weave all the way through it.  Even what seems so hard to believe when heard out of context takes on a whole new light when it is heard as part of this story.  When the planes crashed into the World Trade Center it seemed like something almost unreal, yet it was very very real.  Just because it seems like it could not have happened, doesn’t mean that it didn’t and so it is for me with what seems so unbelievable in the Bible.

One of the teachings that comes from the Bible is that men are meant to be part of a community, and more importantly, that we are suppose to go through life with a group of men that really know us at a deep level.  This spoke to me and as a result Steve Tyranski asked me to join my men’s group.  For the past several months we have gathered together on Thursday nights to share dinner, prayer, and our lives and support one another to become better men, fathers, husbands, friends.  Through this experience I could feel God working in me and revealing things to me that I didn’t truly understand week after week.

One of the most powerful experiences I had with the small group was during what is called a “story weekend” this summer.  This weekend men’s retreat is designed around sharing your life’s story with the group and group leaders, one of whom was a Director of a Christian counseling center.  As part of the preparation for the weekend, you are asked to think about your entire life and pick out the people, events and emotions surrounding them that have shaped your life.  Then during the weekend each person shares their story, people ask questions and by listening to others stories you begin to understand yours as well.  This weekend made me realize just how much pain is in this world and brought me to a greater realization of the message of the Gospel to the world.

Then I watched God moving in peoples’ lives and I saw lives transformed – in the men’s group, from reading, at church and on TV.  It is a message of hope in a world with so much of the opposite.

The reason that I am writing this and the most significant part of this story is that I have accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior with all that that means and I am incredibly thankful.  I am on the right path no matter what happens in my life.  And I know that there are those of you reading this that will dismiss it as being something that is only happening because of the circumstances in my life – the only thing that I can say is that if this is true, and what I believe is true, it will be reflected in my life and you will be the judge.