My Journey's Beginning

Recently, I have been meeting with a group of guys one morning a week to just study God's word and talk about the role we play as men in our families, marriages, relationships, churches, careers, etc. One of our take-aways this week was to write down our story. So I have decided to write mine down for everyone to read. This is where my journey with Christ began.

First off, I was raised Roman Catholic. I went to the private school at our church from kindergarten through 8th grade. I was an alter boy from the 3rd grade and I was a member of our high school youth group. I did everything I was supposed to do. I didn't drink, I didn't smoke, I tried to do everything I was supposed to in order to be known as a "good person." But there was always something missing.

I went off to college and embarked on sewing my wild oats. Thank God none of them took root anywhere. I found the woman of my dreams about 6 months before graduation in June of 2000. By August, I was on my way to Arizona to start my career in the US Air Force. In January of 2002, I married that same woman of my dreams and 7 months later, our lives were changed. With family 1800 miles away, I left my wife in Tucson while I went on deployment to Kuwait and Afghanistan. At the time I left, I was happy to leave. We were having trouble as a newlywed couple and the time away was going to be good. I never knew how good for us it would be.

I started my deployment in Kuwait in September of 2002, but in October, I was forward deployed to an air base in Afghanistan. After about 4 weeks of deployment, I began to miss home. I began to realize what I had left behind. I began to long for something more in my life than my work. I had taken a small library of books along with me when I left. Among those books was a devotional by Oswald Chambers titled "My Utmost for His Highest." A friend of mine had given it to me before I graduated 2 years earlier. I had never picked it up until that time.

I started reading it every night before I drifted off to sleep in my single bed next to the hand made wooden bookcase that served as my home away from home. I went to sleep with the roar of jet engines, the occasional attack alarm sound, explosions in the background, and my thoughts of life without my wife and Christ. During this time, my beautiful wife also sent me Gary Chapman's "The Five Love Languages." I began reading that as well and I realized what I had left behind. I realized what was missing in my life besides my wife. One night, I found my way to Christ.

After so many years of playing the part and thinking that I was a "good person," I finally found the greatest gift available: God's amazing grace. And thus began my journey with Christ. My life has never been the same since.

From the beginning,
Jesus Freak Out!