I recently was asked to recount my story and how faith in Jesus became such a central part of my life:
I’ve been searching my whole life. It began as a very young child: An intense longing to matter complicated by the fact that I am the only adopted son of three children. As seems to be the testimony of most with a similar lot in life, an identity crisis existed that was nearly inconsolable by either of my parents. A taste of this here, a touch of that there. That is how it began. I can say with confidence now that God protected me in my search to a large degree.
Nevertheless, I arrived at college a terribly wounded man who, having nothing of worth from within, continued seeking to fill what I now know only God could. I made fast friends in a fraternity. Again, as seems to be the testimony of many, my friend’s habits quickly became my own.
Looking back now, I envision a madman who, catching a glimpse of the sky in a puddle, feverishly dug downward in hopes of finding that which he first saw. What I was searching for seems best captured by Blaise Pascal:
“There once was in man a true happiness of which now remain to him only the mark of empty trace, which he in vain tries to fill from all his surroundings, seeking from things absent the help he does not obtain in things present. But these are all inadequate, because the infinite abyss can only be filled by an infinite and immutable object, that is to say, only by God Himself”
I failed desperately. In pursuit of something quite real, I chose to chase a mythical dragon. Alcohol became routine, as did endless stints of partying to the extent that on most weeks, I was more than likely drinking five to six nights a week. I found myself in many troubled romantic relationships, many of them overlapping or coinciding.
But praise God, a soldier of Christ was placed in my path. Michael was on staff with Campus Crusade and had a heart to bring light to my darkened fraternity. Something about Michael was magnetic. Shortly after losing a very close friend and fraternity brother to a drunk-driver, I began to question my journey more. I saw a man who, at best, was an average man made to be a hero by family and friends as they attempted to make meaning of the tragedy. I did not want people creating a myth in eulogizing me.
I began to converse with Michael about life and my deep desire for meaning. I wanted to have purpose and identity. Michael helped explain something to me that was quite far from any teaching I ever heard in church. He helped illuminate to me that the only way to truly matter was in surrendered relationship with Christ. He shared that God in fact designed me, with intent and identity. I confess, or even profess, that my decision for Christ was made by a desperate man who knew nothing of who he was and even less of who he was meant to be.
At this point in their testimony, many begin to describe the things that changed as result of the saving work of Christ in their life. I too, have a long list of behaviors and desires that have changed—or been redeemed rather. But I am not merely a man defined by behaviors. I am a man more defined by what I do than what I do not. Most importantly, I am best described in how I do what I do.
The most prominent landmark of my story is rather something of constancy: namely that I am an even more desperate man now than I ever was when Christ intersected me. Rather than rid me of it, Christ has seen fit to riddle me with it. I continue to find myself to be a man of desperate desire. And it is only now, that my desire has met its consummate partner in Christ. That deep longing that has been with me throughout, and with all of man since the fall, has been made to bear fruit. And that is undoubtedly the picture: a man, beginning his return to the Garden. One might more simply say it’s a tale of Eden, undone.