Hello, My Name Is ...

Hello, my name is Rod and I’m a hater of God. Now, before you move to another website, please continue reading. This isn’t a “normal” story of how a person found God and then everything is just wonderful with a perfect life with no hardships or difficulties. This is a real description of somebody who wants to be true and honest about what they are.

Long after I started this journey with God, He showed me that I needed help. He showed me that I would need His help everyday of my life … not just once or twice before I died. He shows me that He isn’t merely a crutch or a gurney, but He is like life support for a person – helping me breathe, keeping my heart pumping, making my brain function, my entire person to exist as a living entity in this universe. This goes way beyond just leaning on something … it became my very lifeline, my very source of living.

It started a few years ago when I was driving to work and just minding my own business. I was listening and singing to music and then all of a sudden a curtain appeared before me. Now, this might concern people if they thought that I wasn’t able to see the road. Not so, I could still see everything, but there was a very real curtain there. After a brief moment, a slit in the curtain allowed a blinding light to shine into my eyes. You might think this to be that “bright white light” that people have described between when they die and then come back to life. It wasn’t that kind of light, because I was still alive … or so I thought. It was black light – bright, shining, but black as ink and just as blinding.

What God showed me was only a little glimpse of who I really am – and it was blindingly black. I am someone who hates God and wants to do what I want to do without considering anybody else. I am selfish and proud. I am willing to kill anybody to get what I want. I use words to injure others. I think thoughts that are evil and cause me to want to do things my way. I don’t want to do the things I should, I want to do the things I shouldn’t do. You see, there are things I do that I’m not proud of … but, most of the time, they’re things that people don’t see. They happen in my mind, my thoughts. But, if I continue to think about them, I end up doing them.

If people knew what goes on in my mind, they would probably fear me. They absolutely wouldn’t want to be around me because I am evil and do evil. But, that doesn’t stop me from thinking and doing these things.

So, what am I to do? Who can help me? That’s what God shows me during the drive-by curtain call. He shows me that He sees me entirely differently than I see myself. You see, He was telling me the truth about me – that I’m a rotten, stinking, evil person. I don’t deserve to live, but actually deserve to die. I am a person without hope.

He then shows me how He can help me. He offers me a new life. He gives me hope and future and offers me a new way of thinking. He shows me that I can turn to Him and, at that very moment and instant in time, can tell him about the evil I’m thinking and doing. But, it doesn’t stop there. He doesn’t condemn me and turn away from me. Just the opposite, He opens His arms and when I step towards Him, He wraps His loving arms around me and holds me. I then say, “Daddy, forgive me for the evil I’m thinking and the evil I want to do.” He says, “I do forgive you and I love you … forever. You’re part of my family and I want to be with you forever.” God helps me and makes a way for me to spend all of time and eternity with Him.

Each day that I exist, I am cognizant of my evil, which then reminds me of my need for God. He then reminds me that He made the way for me … The Way is Jesus. Jesus is the Way, Truth and Life. Because of Jesus taking my place and dying for my sin – past, present, and future – I can be with my Heavenly Father, starting now and into forever.

So, now when I think or do evil, I don’t concern myself with what others think. I only am concerned with what He thinks – my Father – the One who made the Way for me to get back to Him. My life is in Him. My entire existence is in Him. I run to Him several times a day – because it’s several times a day that I think or do evil. He’s always there, waiting with arms open, ready to hold me again. I tell Him what’s wrong and because I’ve done that, He gives me a clean record, just as if I hadn’t done anything wrong. He forgives me … always.

You see, sometimes people around me aren’t as forgiving because they want to hold the bad things I think and do against me. But, that’s all right, because I know Somebody who loves me unconditionally. He always wants to forgive me – because He always wants to be with me and He paid the price to be with me. He is more concerned with where I am with Him than what I’ve done.

Like I said when I starting writing this, this isn’t a “normal” story of how a person found God and then everything is just wonderful with a perfect life with no hardships or difficulties. I don’t have a perfect life and I have hardships and difficulties everyday, but now I have someone to help me make it through each day. There are some people who love me and forgive me, but most aren’t capable of loving and forgiving me like my Father. That’s the hardest and most difficult part of living each day … knowing that some people around me don’t love me and forgive me. But, He does and that gets me through each day.

Even though there are people in your life that probably don’t know what you’re going through at any given moment in your life, or who may not be loving or forgiving towards you. God loves me and that makes it possible for me to love you. I accept you … because God accepts me. I forgive you … because God forgives me. I want you to know that I love you, accept you, and forgive you. If you ever need anything, I can only offer to help but your Heavenly Father can provide everything you need, never forget that. I, and others, may fail you, but He will never fail you.