This Is Real Life: Something More
My life for the past four years has been a great deal of selfishness. Of running away from my problems, creating them for others and trying to avoid depression. This is how the life of a drug addict feels. I smoked pot everyday or nearly every day and drank whenever I could. I got arrested a few times for my abuse but never thought twice about doing it again. A lot of people can smoke pot and not get addicted, or think its fine. A lot of people can drink whenever, and not be an alcoholic. I wasn’t one of those people. I knew someplace inside of me that it was wrong and bad for me, but it gave me instant gratification. I never thought I could be forgiven or loved because how I felt about myself and my actions. My world was a constant struggle of trying to pass by as the normal student, while always thinking about how I could get high next. This dragged on in my life for 4 and half years. I filled my life up with women who gave me compliments on my talents, on hanging out with people who liked me just because I smoked and partied. I felt like the only people that truly accepted me were my folks, and I cursed them out and blamed them. I hated my parents for loving me and I didn’t even know why.
It came to the end of a semester and I failed 2 classes and withdrew from two more. My life was a torrent of drugs, alcohol and sex, weather pornography or woman. I knew I had to fight this and live a better life, somehow. Not even that, just to be able to live with myself, with a little forgiveness and love. I checked into rehab center near Milwaukee. I admitted to myself and others, including my folks that I was, and still am, powerless over my own addiction. That I can't do anything about it on my own willpower but I have to give it up to a higher power. I thought that higher power was my sponsor and other people.
I believed in God when I was younger but never understood what a relationship with a higher power meant. I always felt guilty and ashamed when I did bad things and "sinned". During my alcohol and drug abusing years I didn't believe in God and if I ever did admit to there being a God I said he would never forgive me and never want a relationship with something as disgusting as my heart. I looked fine on the outside now that I was sober for a while, but my insides still stung with guilt and remorse. I went to a youth group to find happiness. I found people there like Thom and Greg. Greg was blind since birth, but was the happiest person I think I had ever met. I never understood why. Thom had a background similar if not worse than mine with abuse and partying. He told me he never went to rehab, he said he found a bible in his dad's house and started reading it. He told me that the person that made him ashamed before forgave him for what he had done in the past. He said that God wanted to know him personally and help him with his struggles. This was the first time I ever felt hope so encouraging as this. I asked him how to have a relationship with God, and he threw a bible at me and told me to read. I went home that night and read. A lot of it didn't make a lot of sense, but I read it anyway. It told about Jesus and how he was God, but he came down to earth to get to know man. He did this by dying, by having us, people like me who have done wrong things, kill him. It said that God had to do this in order that we would get to know him. I hadn't heard this story in such a way. It seemed ridiculous that the creator of the world and universe would come and die for the bad things that I have done, just so I can be helped and loved by him. That's inexplicable to me. That's unfathomable love. That is something that made me fall to my knees and wish I had it. I didn’t know how I could have it. I couldn’t because of how I felt about myself. After time and time returning to talk with blind Greg and preacher Thom I knew it was true, somehow I believed that I could actually be forgiven also. I went back week after week while continuing on my rehab program and kept talking with pastors and friends about Jesus. After not too long I put my faith in the facts of Jesus, as Thom had said, by believing that Jesus came down to die for me thus relieving me of my faults, my sin. I then became a Christian.
Now this became a problem to me because all the Christians I knew didn't act like Jesus I read about at all. They didn't love and forgive and go on mission trips and help people. They were selfish just like I was. I had to figure out what I wanted to do. I decided since doing the things Christ talked about fulfilled and satisfied me so much, I would try and become as much like Christ as I could. Not letting my guilt get in the way, because Jesus took care of that for me. I wanted to become that love I had experienced to other people so they could know how to get away from a world that caused so much pain and strife and worry. Whoever I told though wouldn't believe me; they just said that Jesus doesn't exist. They said he came down to save who he wanted, only those righteous. I didn't understand because the Jesus I know came down to save me, someone who didn't enjoy living, who didn't feel purpose only pain. He came down not to condemn me of the bad things I had done, but to tell me it was ok and that I could still know God. The Jesus I know is humility and refuge, courage and strength. Most importantly he is love. The Jesus I know is love. This is my experience with something more to my life.
It came to the end of a semester and I failed 2 classes and withdrew from two more. My life was a torrent of drugs, alcohol and sex, weather pornography or woman. I knew I had to fight this and live a better life, somehow. Not even that, just to be able to live with myself, with a little forgiveness and love. I checked into rehab center near Milwaukee. I admitted to myself and others, including my folks that I was, and still am, powerless over my own addiction. That I can't do anything about it on my own willpower but I have to give it up to a higher power. I thought that higher power was my sponsor and other people.
I believed in God when I was younger but never understood what a relationship with a higher power meant. I always felt guilty and ashamed when I did bad things and "sinned". During my alcohol and drug abusing years I didn't believe in God and if I ever did admit to there being a God I said he would never forgive me and never want a relationship with something as disgusting as my heart. I looked fine on the outside now that I was sober for a while, but my insides still stung with guilt and remorse. I went to a youth group to find happiness. I found people there like Thom and Greg. Greg was blind since birth, but was the happiest person I think I had ever met. I never understood why. Thom had a background similar if not worse than mine with abuse and partying. He told me he never went to rehab, he said he found a bible in his dad's house and started reading it. He told me that the person that made him ashamed before forgave him for what he had done in the past. He said that God wanted to know him personally and help him with his struggles. This was the first time I ever felt hope so encouraging as this. I asked him how to have a relationship with God, and he threw a bible at me and told me to read. I went home that night and read. A lot of it didn't make a lot of sense, but I read it anyway. It told about Jesus and how he was God, but he came down to earth to get to know man. He did this by dying, by having us, people like me who have done wrong things, kill him. It said that God had to do this in order that we would get to know him. I hadn't heard this story in such a way. It seemed ridiculous that the creator of the world and universe would come and die for the bad things that I have done, just so I can be helped and loved by him. That's inexplicable to me. That's unfathomable love. That is something that made me fall to my knees and wish I had it. I didn’t know how I could have it. I couldn’t because of how I felt about myself. After time and time returning to talk with blind Greg and preacher Thom I knew it was true, somehow I believed that I could actually be forgiven also. I went back week after week while continuing on my rehab program and kept talking with pastors and friends about Jesus. After not too long I put my faith in the facts of Jesus, as Thom had said, by believing that Jesus came down to die for me thus relieving me of my faults, my sin. I then became a Christian.
Now this became a problem to me because all the Christians I knew didn't act like Jesus I read about at all. They didn't love and forgive and go on mission trips and help people. They were selfish just like I was. I had to figure out what I wanted to do. I decided since doing the things Christ talked about fulfilled and satisfied me so much, I would try and become as much like Christ as I could. Not letting my guilt get in the way, because Jesus took care of that for me. I wanted to become that love I had experienced to other people so they could know how to get away from a world that caused so much pain and strife and worry. Whoever I told though wouldn't believe me; they just said that Jesus doesn't exist. They said he came down to save who he wanted, only those righteous. I didn't understand because the Jesus I know came down to save me, someone who didn't enjoy living, who didn't feel purpose only pain. He came down not to condemn me of the bad things I had done, but to tell me it was ok and that I could still know God. The Jesus I know is humility and refuge, courage and strength. Most importantly he is love. The Jesus I know is love. This is my experience with something more to my life.