I don’t think I can remember a point in my life that I didn’t believe in God.  I grew up in the church and remember the stories from Sunday school always striking my fancy or at least my curiosity.  I think most of my life I realized the difference between good and bad.  Also when I encountered death or pain for the first time and throughout my childhood, God seemed like the only One to turn to.  In fact I would pray often and I think you could say that I prayed almost every night of my life.

All throughout my childhood however God was rather impersonal to me.  Not that He didn’t satisfy me with some sense of His goodness.  My understanding of God was limited to these moments of prayer, to church, to Sunday school, and questions of right and wrong…  God was sort of this great other.  I now understand that I didn’t truly become a Christian until later in life.

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“This is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent”  John 17: 3

I first began to really grapple with who God is in high school.  It was during this time that I first seriously read the bible and began to consider its claims.

I arrived at Woodberry Forest, an all boys boarding school in central Virginia full of ambition and ideals.  I had little concern for anything else than reaching my goals and success.  My first year there I used most all of my time and energy in my books and in the gym or on the field.  I had little regard for anyone or anything else outside myself, and pulled myself up to the second in my class and showed promise as an athlete.  Success and grades were my god.

My second year did not go so well as I hoped.  I can only describe to you the sinking feeling in my stomach as I moved in my dorm that year.  I told myself time after time that I wanted to be there, that I wanted to take on the world.  The fact remains that my heart was failing me.  I couldn’t do it, I just couldn’t do it.  I tried to convince myself that these things were good enough to strive for, but something was wrong.

One night after dinner a friend invited me to a bible study.  I had shrugged off the opportunity to go before, but for some reason I went that night and kept going.  The bible offered comfort.  I remember the way many verses would warm my affections and heart.  One that I still remember is Psalm 73: 26

“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”

I began to believe that there was something more important in my life other than my own success.  Looking back I now know that we only do experience this God, because He choose to humble Himself and come into the world in the flesh.  Not only that, but He died on the cross for the atonement of our sin to reconcile us with the God who we can come to know as father.  Romans 5:10-11 says:

“For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.  Much more than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”

I did not yet know God yet, I could not have told you the meaning of the verse above in high school.  I was not born again (John 3: 3), but I was beginning to understand more of who He is.  These moments of comfort and joy were perhaps signposts drawing me in and preparing me to meet God.

During my time in school at Woodberry, I had become friends with the janitor, Linda, in the library.  She was a Christian, and I was able to share my experiences in the bible study with her.  For my last year of school I decided to study abroad in Italy.  In saying goodbye to Linda, she said something that shocked me a little but remained with me ever since.  She said that I would be okay because the Lord is with me.

Going to Italy was a big risk for me, because I was shy and kept mostly to myself.  There I would be moving in with a stranger whose language I didn’t speak, at first, and whose culture is very different from my own.  I kept thinking of what my friend told me, that the Lord would be with me.

He indeed acted in bringing Femi into my life.  Femi was a friend of my host father from Nigeria fluent in English and Italian.  My host father brought him over for a few days to ease the initial communication barrier.  It turned out that Femi was an evangelical pastor starting a church there.  I was able to talk to him about God and I was blessed in being a member of his church.

Although Italy was perhaps one of the best years of my life, I experienced bouts of depression and had to face my fear daily of interacting a lot with people.  During my times alone I turned to the bible.  I found that times in need and in the times of great joy, the bible spoke to me directly the way no other book has spoken to me.  It was sometimes eerily as if I were meant to hear the specific words I was reading at that time.  These words gave me the comfort and strength I sought after.

“Nevertheless, I am continually with you;
 you hold my right hand.”     Psalm 73: 23

Besides being a comfort at times, church in Italy challenged me greatly.  Other than the different style of worship I encountered on Sundays, including praying out loud and music with drums, I came to consider the claims of Femi’s teaching.  I struggled over passages and lessons from the bible, sometimes to such an extent that I avoided my friend Femi and church all together.  I began to have a sense that there was something more in this faith.  I began to feel as if my own goals in life and ideas for success were too small and that I was missing the larger picture.  I wrestled so hard with the biblical proclamations I took a time away from church.

Femi lived and preached in a way that radically adhered to the bible.  There was an instance where he was preaching and told a story from his own life.  Someone had crashed into his car and owed him a couple thousand dollars.  The man didn’t want to pay him anything, so Femi forgave the man the debt and told him it was because Christ forgave his own debts that he could forgive him.  That was just one of the sermons where on my walk home I struggled.  I began to think that poor Femi just didn’t understand the world, in other wards he looked like a loser to me.  Looking back I understand that I worshiped still my own standing in the world and comfort.

There was another Sunday I remember when Femi announced that we were going to go out on the streets to share the gospel with the town Viterbo.  I made up an excuse that I couldn’t make it.  “What if one of my friends saw me with these people?”  I thought to myself.  I berated the church and Femi for doing such a thing.  Such a thing seemed to me prehistoric, futile, and naive.

Though I tried to forget these sermons and experiences, they remained deep down with in me.  I called myself a Christian, but I still choose the things of the world over the claims of Jesus Christ.  This seemingly hypocritical inconsistency in my life bothered me to no end.  Either I was a sinner or the bible was perhaps the most terrible book ever written.
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I returned to America in May and graduated after that year abroad.  Back at home everything seemed the same as when I left it.  I was happy to be back and at the same time missed Italy deeply.  However I had a lot to look forward to as I would start college at William and Mary that fall.

During the summer the Lord acted again in my life in a great way.  I spent a few weeks working for a family friend, doing projects for him around his house.  I worked most days with Eric.  Eric lived in their apartment above their garage.  He was here in America as a missionary from South Africa.  We spent many good days together.

One day while working on a table in the garage, he asked me about what I believed in.  I told him about the church in Italy, the bible studies, and my upbringing in a church.  I honestly don’t remember a lot of the specifics of our conversation, but the important thing that happened was that Jesus came into my life.  I don’t know of any softer way of putting it.  From talking to Eric I knew how deeply I had fallen short of God’s plans for me and I needed a Lord and Savior.

Eric asked me if I’d ever confessed Jesus as my Lord and Savior.  I told him that that there were many times where I had, but now there was something different.  He then asked if I would like to confess this.  I struggling in my mind and heart said “Yes, I do, I really do, but it doesn’t even seem like it could be real.”  Eric gave me assurance and some instruction, and I agreed to just do it.  So we stopped and prayed together.  I confessed my sin and unworthiness to approach God by my own efforts and I declared Christ as my Lord and Savior.  I truly felt that God was acting in my life.  Eric comforted me and we agreed to begin to meet regularly to study the bible.  When I was ready we began to finish our job on the table.

That day I felt like a dramatic change had taken place.  My life no longer centered around the things of this world, the false gods and superficial remedies I had made.  My life centered on Jesus Christ, who died on the cross to set me free from sin and guilt.  Although I continue to sin to this day, I know I have a savior lord, and what could be more important, more beautiful and satisfying than that.  Jesus says in John 3: 3 “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”  This was the day I believe that I was born again.  I went home and told my parents about by decision and what had happened.  I felt like a new person.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.”  2 Corinthians 5:17-18

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I spent three years at William and Mary and the Lord moved my heart deeply during this time again and again being faithful and pouring out his grace and forgiveness.

After my first year of college, I spent a month on Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts on FOCUS’ (Fellowship Of Christians in Universities and Schools) study center in a college leadership program and as a counselor to high school students.
During my time on Martha’s Vineyard I openly struggled over whether Jesus were the only way.  I was also reading buddhist books at the time.  I talked to older Christians at the study center over my concern for people who’ve never heard the gospel and also whether adhering supremely to the bible was narrow minded.

I don’t think I can adequately address this in this short testimony but two books I recommend are Leslie Newbigin’s The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, and The Universe Next Door by James W. Sire.  In short I became convinced that the bible was the word of God and Jesus was more than a great moral teacher and indeed the Son of God.  That there is no other way than for God himself to die in my place to be reconciled to Him.  The very things I had confessed before, but this time in light of the fear that I was overlooking something in all the religions and philosophies in the world.  I believe as it is written in the the gospel of John:

“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’”   John 14: 6

When I returned to college, I studied the bible in small groups and with older students and spent time in service in the community.  Through the molding of God’s Word, I could sense that I was being formed into a new person.
Although I felt this new transformation in my life, my health deteriorated.  Unfortunately my time at William and Mary ended with my struggle with deepening depression.  However, before my last semester there I spent a week at the Urbana Student Mission Conference and was deeply affected and encouraged to live a missional life.

“Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love….”  Ephesians 4: 1-2

I went out on a limb because of the encouragement I received at Urbana, and joined A Christian Ministry in the National Parks in Yellowstone the following summer.

That summer also affected me deeply.  I don’t think I have adequate words to describe how thankful I am for this experience.  Its memory remains with me constantly.  I took a risk for God and He returned it with blessing.  Our ministry team was blessed with not only sharing the gospel with one another but our lives as well.  (1 Thessalonians 2: 8)  Yellowstone is also a wonderful place to reflect on God’s beauty and strength in this majestic earth He has made.  Christ is sufficient, indeed more than enough to satisfy our needs.  It was one of the most joyful times of my life.
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Since Yellowstone I lived at home for about a year then moved across country to Eugene, Oregon for seven months, then back to Yellowstone for a few months, and then moved back in with my parents in Virginia preparing to finish my college education at Messiah College near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania starting this January.  I feel called to study as a music major.  I attended Urbana again this past December (see January 5th, 2010 post), and recently attended a church plant in Culpeper, Christ Covenant Church where I pitched in with guitar and box drum every once and a while.  Pastor Joe, of Christ Covenant served as a mentor to me during my recent time in Culpeper.  I’m deeply grateful for his help in writing this testimony and his teaching and support.  I am reminded in writing my testimony that it is not by my own cleverness or effort that I have followed Christ and continue to walk with Him, but by the grace of God.

For Jews demanded signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.  1 Corinthians 1: 22-24

God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”  1 Corinthians 1:28-31

Thank you for reading my testimony and welcome again to my blog.  I would encourage you to consider seriously the claims of Jesus Christ, to be a part of a church that preaches this message, and if you want to know more or would like me to pray for you please email me g.kirk1 at gmail.com.  Thanks again!