I can’t pin down the exact date – or even the exact year really, but I believe it was sometime around New Year’s Day, 1994 that I became a Christian. I wasn’t told I was supposed to remember that – although it was a day of exceptional importance for me.
And so here I am, coming up on 29 years. And a lot has happened in that time that has only helped me grow stronger and more confident in my faith.
There was a time, and a time I remember well, when I was not a Christian. When I thought I believed in God, but eventually came to understand that I was just believing in my own goodness to get by. I really had no clue who God was. I thought he was some kind of overseer. Someone who watched over things, but didn’t mind if I did my own thing…as long as I threw him a bone by thinking he actually existed (and was rooting for me). But my way of believing was just that. My way. It put no demands on myself to live or act or believe in any particular way. It was all very convenient. I could do anything I wanted. And I probably did, constrained only by that which was accepted and rejected by the general society around me. As long as I had someone worse than me with which to compare myself, I was gold. And hey, in a world that gave us Hitler and John Wayne Gacy, I was better than gold.
But that was before that day in early 1994.
Here’s what happened: On Christmas Day of 1993, I was doing my thing. So when my wife, who was attending a Korean church in the area, asked me if I wanted to go to church, I said, “Yeah.” I mean, I was a good guy. Good guys can at least go to church on Christmas. Or maybe even, I’m better than the next guy who doesn’t even go to church on Christmas! Yeah. That sounds about right.
And it was there that I actually heard something different than the usual Christmas talk. I heard that God loved the world (tracking so far). He loved it so much he sent his son – the little baby, Jesus (Yup. That’s Christmas, alright). And that little baby Jesus came to die for me (Uh, this is Christmas, right?). Because I was a sinner (wait, what?), who was actually living in rebellion against God (huh?!?), and that I needed to actually repent and believe in him.
Hmmm. Well, that was interesting.
I went home, unchanged. As I said, it wasn’t until sometime around New Year’s Day – about a week later – that the full impact of what was said that day struck me. I broke down in tears, and my life has not been the same since. Thankfully. I was transformed. A new creation. And that all may sound either really good or very strange to some of you, but that’s not my point here.
What brought this all on was a reminder. A reminder given by my pastor in this morning’s church service: a single verse from Peter’s second letter – verse nine of chapter three – which says, “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
And it was here that I remembered that time – both before and after the day God saved me – and I got it. I realized that If he decided to wrap it all up the moment the ball dropped in Times Square that New Year’s Eve, I would’ve been a goner – lost for eternity.
I know that sounds strange to some of you. “Saved” is a strange word. From what would I need saving? And besides, “What kind of God would put such ridiculous demands on us?” That was certainly me before that day. Like I said, my faith was quite convenient for me. It checked all of my boxes and lived up perfectly to my standards. But I never stopped to think that maybe my standards weren’t the best out there, no matter how well-intentioned. That maybe, if there was really a God who actually created me – that gave me the very breath that I breathed, the food, the water…the works – then maybe he should have something to say about it without me sticking in my own biased way of thinking (which, of course, I had been doing all along).
And it all fits. The world really is a beautiful place. But we all know there’s something wrong. That things fall far below what it could be. That there’s a lot of pain and death and suffering. A lot of greed and reckless consumption and self-absorption. Many of us live our lives so well (even if it’s a veneer over some kind of hurt), but it doesn’t take much imagination to see that everything could be better. That everything could be right.
But God gives us reason for hope.
He gives us hope…unless we end up on the wrong side of that final day. He is not slow! But he’s waiting. He waited for me. He’s waiting for the countless others who have come to him in the time since that New Year’s season. He’s obviously waiting for more if you’re reading this. Is he waiting for you?
As usual, I’ll gladly talk to you about it if you drop me a line.