I'm Back!

Surprise! I am indeed alive! I'm back after a lengthly 4 month absence. My laptop imploding caused the absence in the first place, then after that got replaced I just wasn't in the swing of it to keep up blogging, what with all the work I'm trying to get done, as well as all the new games are getting played instead of the work that I'm trying to do. However, seeing as my brain is in overdrive tonight and I cant bring myself to start another level on SpaceChem(a new awesome game I've discovered, I might review it at a later date) I decided to complete a challenge that Hannah set me quite a while back now, which was to write and upload my testimony. Here goes nothing....

I started life as a baby, much like everyone else. Like a lot of English children, I was Christened at an early age at my parent's and grandparent's church. As soon as I was old enough, my grandparents started taking me to church and to Sunday school, where I learnt all the things you learn at Sunday school. This continued up to around the age of 15 for me, as the church had a more discussion oriented group for people 14-16 or so. As my GCSEs loomed on the horizon, I stopped going to church under the premise of working during the time, but really I think I had just decided that church was too young for me anymore. Instead of seeking out the next level of church, that is going to the main service and listening to the sermons, I continued to not attend. All through this time I still considered myself a Christian, although now looking back I would not say that I was. During that time my understanding of God, Jesus, and the natures of sin and salvation were only skin deep, they had no greater impact on my life than any other piece of knowledge. Time passed, until I met Theresa, a Christian, and we started 'dating' when I was 17. Seeing as I still thought I was a Christian, everything was okay, until one day Theresa confronted me and told me that she didn't think that I was a Christian. She took the time to explain to me the difference between just knowing the facts and actually having salvation from my sins. It was after this that I started searching for my own personal salvation. It took a very long time for my search to come to an end, almost 1 and a half years. In the summer of 2009, me and Theresa went on a study trip to Israel. During the week, I mentioned to the leader of the trip, Paul, that I wasn't yet saved, information that he passed on the the man doing the speaking that week, Micheal Ots. On the last night of the holiday, Theresa convinced me to go and talk to Micheal about everything. We sat on the edge of the Lake Galilee and really discussed all the 'issues' that I had with becoming a Christian, and he explained each one away to the point where I really had no choice but to pray for the forgiveness of my sins. After that he prayed with me and I felt really positive about the whole experience, as you might expect! Since then I have been trying to learn more about my God and have been trying to become more like Jesus. Its not always been plain sailing. Me and Theresa broke up a year after my conversion, which was a pretty tough time. I was helped through it by prayer and the support of my Christian friends. More recently, my aunt has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. I cant comprehend any kind of good coming out of that situation for anyone involved and it's really testing the limit of my faith to try and keep hold of the fact that God works all things for good. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that once you become a Christian everything becomes easy. If anything, life gets more complex and a lot lot harder. All we can do is rely on God to pull us through, and that's what I'm trying to do now.