At church this morning, one of the people from the congregation gave
the message. He has been coming to our church for about two years. He
was baptized this past June, as I write about here. In his message, he was giving us his testimony about how he became a Christian.
He told us that he long had feelings of aimlessness, depression, and
anxiety, and those were hurting his relationship with his girlfriend.
One day, when he was at the mall, he received a phone call from someone
he did not know and with whom he had no connection. The phone call was
from a Christian lady telling him that she felt that he needed the Lord,
and she proceeded to pray the sinner’s prayer with him. For about a
year, he did not think much about that, but his girlfriend left him and
started seeing someone else, and he felt that he had hit rock bottom.
The Christian lady on the phone sent him a book, which offered a
Christian perspective about various emotions, such as anger. He would
read that every night before going to bed, and that made him feel
better. He decided to find his happiness in the Lord, whether or not he
and his girlfriend got back together. Over time, they did, and now
they are engaged. He says that he has seen his prayers get answered
before his eyes, and that he has had dreams at night that have come true
in reality. He also said that God has a plan for him and for
everyone. He still has to conquer fear, he told us, but he asked us why
we should be afraid, when God is watching over us.
He also said that many of us when we pray rush to the “Amen” at the
end of the prayer, but he said that we should not be in such a hurry
because God wants to help us.
One of the ladies at church is losing her hearing, and she found the
young man’s insight about prayer to be helpful to her. She said that,
for her, prayer is often a routine, and she felt convicted that she
should put more effort into it. “Then, maybe I will get my hearing
back!”, she said. In my mind, I was somewhat questioning what seemed to
be her picture of God—-as someone who needs to be appeased. That
seemed to differ, in my mind, from what the young man was saying: that
God is there to help us, but we need to make ourselves available to
him. But who exactly am I to question where the lady was coming from.
It may not resonate with me, entirely, but obviously she hopes for a
miracle from God, and there is nothing wrong with that. Moreover, my
impression is that she is the type of person who will continue to love
and serve the Lord, even if she loses her hearing.
In terms of the young man’s sermon, I liked the fact that the
Christian lady on the phone not only walked him through the sinner’s
prayer, but also provided him with tools of discipleship: how to live a
better life, how to see the world in a better way, etc. There is much
more to being a Christian than the sinner’s prayer! There is walking
with God.
I, too, have anxiety and get depressed. I do not know if it is
clinical, but it is still difficult. Having Asperger’s Syndrome is
difficult. I also can have a hard time trusting in God, since I wonder
why I should believe that things will turn out well for me, when they
don’t seem to turn out well for a lot of people on earth. Where is God
in their lives? I don’t go so far as to say that God is not in their lives, though. Anyway, faith is not always easy for me, but I still pray.