Before Jesus Changed My Life
I thought "freedom" meant the ability to do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. This led me into situations that gratified me. That felt good in the moment, but I was blinded by how harmful these things truly were. This led me into a situation where someone I thought I could trust sexually assaulted me. I felt broken and an overwhelming sense of shame. I looked into things of this world to put me back together. I placed my value in my image, how others saw me, athletic and academic success, which later turned into career success, and my ability to provide for myself. I expected these identifiers to fill the hopelessness and brokenness that I was running from, and for a while it would work, until, inevitably, when the world or people let me down, I became even more broken and hopeless.
How Jesus Changed My Life
It wasn't until the things I put my identity in slowly slipped away: graduating, ending my athletic career after 13 years, my friends moved back home, I lost my job, and ended up “stuck” in Iowa. I looked at my life and it was nothing to be proud of. All my hopes and dreams for my life seemed so far out of reach. One night all I could do was weep. How did all this happen? To the world where I found my value, I was a failure but in that moment, the only way I can explain it is that I felt the love of Jesus wrap around me and say, "I don't love you because of the titles you hold in this world. I love you because you are mine." In a world where my life was deemed a failure, the Great Shepherd pursued me, chased after me, loved me. It made me realize my eyes were in the wrong place. Our Father is the only thing I should chase after.
One of the most known bible passages, but for a good reason is John 3:16, John 3:16 ESV “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” This perfectly sums up the gospel. God wants to be with us and is where all good things flow. Due to our human-ness, our sin, and worldly desires, this separates us from God. Atonement and sacrifice had to be given in the Old Testament so God could dwell with His people. Until Jesus came down, God in human form to live a perfect life free of sin so he could be the ultimate sacrifice. Jesus bore the weight of our guilt and shame and died on the cross as the perfect sacrifice for God to unleash His wrath and anger onto all human kind. Jesus bore that weight so my sins and yours could be forgiven. Today, we can repent and be brought closer to the Father because of the love and selflessness of Jesus because we are made new in Christ. We no longer have to stay dead in our sin, the love of our Lord has set us free so that we may live eternally with Him. We love because He first loved us to give up his one and only son so that we have hope and life. When you accept this as truth in your heart and realize the depth the Lord has done to call us home the only thing you can do is see God as the true prize. Not because He demands it, that wouldn't be true love and adoration, but because He deserves it through the love and mercy He shares.
My Life After Jesus Saved Me
There is so much gratitude when you realize our God will meet us where we are and how unworthy we are for the grace and mercy that is extended to us. A wretched sinner who had nothing to offer was surrounded by unconditional love that people and things on this earth cannot give. To truly understand, that gift needs to be shared. My motives shifted from "What does this say about me?" to "How would these decisions glorify Him?" There is no greater peace or comfort knowing that this life wasn't meant for us, and one day we will be called home, and all I hope to hear is "Well done, good and faithful servant," because this gift was never meant for us to keep to ourselves.