I grew up in the church, it was just something we did every Sunday/Wednesday. I knew the stories and memorized Bible verses etc, but it wasn’t until age 10 that I decided to make the greatest decision of my entire life, accepting Christ as my Lord and Savior. It just so happens that same year my life was completely turned upside down.
I had lived in Wichita KS my for my whole life, but due to a family issue we moved across the country to Hawaii. I know most people would think of what amazing opportunity that would be, but it didn’t feel the greatest to leave everything I had ever known. I was always a go with the flow kinda person so I just went with it. I was still very young and I really didn’t understand what was going on anyway. We stayed there for around 3 years if I’m not mistaken. During that time we didn’t have much, but God always provided and looking back I realize how we were truly blessed we were.
Fast forward a few years and we ended up moving to Mexico. It didn’t really bother me, because even though we had lived in Hawaii for roughly 3 years, I hadn’t really gotten comfortable there. I have always been homeschooled so I didn’t necessarily make many friends there, nor did I have much family living there, so again I just kinda went with it. I wasn’t really scared to move Mexico, but I can’t describe the feeling of living in a country where you don’t understand a word of the language! I was able to pick up Spanish pretty quickly and I thank God for Him letting me learn it as fast as I did. Unlike Hawaii, I had plenty of family in Mexico, but they weren’t necessarily the best people.
Although I had accepted Christ I wasn’t very mature in my faith, I really started growing in Christ around the time I was 14. That year I wanted to get baptized, so that next time we were in the US (I’ll spare you the specifics but we had to go back and forth to the US every 6 months since we weren’t Mexican citizens) I took my faith to the next level so to speak and publicly proclaimed my faith by getting baptized.
After returning from the US and we were back in Mexico I was feeling pretty strong in my faith. Although I wasn’t spreading the Gospel with words, I was often asked if I was a Christian because of how I acted differently from other kids there. I’m not gonna lie it was hard to stay close to Christ while we were there because we didn’t go to church/I wasn’t around other believers. I’m not using that as an excuse, at the end of the day it was on me for not pursuing Christ as much as I should have, and I slipped into some very serious sins.
That next year (2015) we had finally moved back to the United States and things slowly started getting better. Although we had started going to our old church again (Riverlawn Christian Church) it was hard for me to find my place, because I was gone for roughly 5 years and everyone that I had considered my friends had all grown up together and moved on. So I just kinda floated around for about a year not really growing in my faith at all. I had church friend groups here and there but none of them were very serious about their faith.
It wasn’t till about a year ago (writing this in 2018) that I started strengthening my relationship with Christ. I had finally found a group of people that I really clicked with, and everything was going great.
By far the most impactful thing in my faith walk that has happened so far was a CIY (Christ in Youth) conference our youth group went to this past summer. We grew so much as brothers and sisters in Christ in those few days. I can’t really pinpoint one specific thing from that conference that was so impactful, I guess it was just God at work. He is still currently at work in us as we continue to grow in fellowship with each other and in Christ, I’m super excited to see what God does next!
Just to kinda wrap this whole thing up, if there is anything that I’ve learned it’s that we have to trust God no matter what. He truly loves us and His ways are so much greater than ours, even though we sometimes wonder why He does what He does just know that He works everything out for His glory! So be willing to let God use you as an instrument to further His kingdom! Thanks for reading, God bless! (P.S. I hope my profile picture made you smile.)