I was never on his radar because nothing in my life ever got better. I believed I had done something very wrong as a little girl and I was being punished for it. I could not remember what I had done. I kept thinking and thinking trying to make my mind remember but I never could. I decided it must have been awfully bad because no matter how hard I tried, my mind was blank.
I learned about God in Sunday School when I was in Grade School. The adults said he loved me and nothing I did could ever stop that love. That sounded nice but I knew something they didn't. I wasn't lovable. I was used for a punching bag and stuff like that so they were talking about the other kids around the table. You see, God never visited my home. My home was a scary place to live. There was yelling and screaming and hitting and hiding. There was crying, too. God visited the nice houses. Mine was not a nice house. I knew that and I accepted it.
When I was a teenager I ran away from home. The adult I ran away to I trusted even though she scared me. She had a friend come over to talk to me about Jesus. Jesus was related to God - He was God's Son. Jesus was someone I could have a personal relationship with if I accepted Him into my heart. I smirked and said, "He doesn't want to live in my heart." I knew my heart was bad.
A couple of years later (when I was fourteen) I got into recovery and I started seeing a counselor. My recovery group had a Higher Power I could believe in and it could be God if I wanted it to be. After awhile I decided to try it. When I was seventeen, I borrowed some other peoples ways of relating to God. Slowly, I started to feel that maybe a relationship was forming. A few years rolled by and I was in the next phase of my recovery. I was twenty years old when the God of twelve step groups started to be too small for me, I asked my mom about it. She suggested I go to her church. She said, "Amy, you can wear your jeans and no one will talk to you." She knew exactly what to say.
I went to my first service in September 1987. In December 1987 I heard the lyrics to the song Silent Night for the very first time. I wept. In March of 1988 I was rocked to my knees when I heard the message, "The Fear of Death." The pastor said when I die it will be like a blink of an eye and I'll be standing before a Holy God. I'll have no time to make a decision about where I'll spend my eternity. If I were to die right now, where would I be? I knew the answer and it wasn't heaven.
I went home, called my sponsor (who was a Christian) and told her about it. When I asked her what to do she replied, "Amy, you know what to do." "Yeah, I know." I went into my bedroom, knelt beside my bed that had a blue comforter, closed my eyes, clasped my hands and asked Jesus to please forgive my sins and live in my heart. I was crying. I'll always remember that moment.
Three months later our church was having their baptism services. They did this one weekend every June during our regular church services. I did mine at the 11:15 Sunday service. The baptism service is where you publicly affirm your decision to have Jesus pay for your sin on the cross and to have all your sins forgiven by His death on the cross.
There were a couple of teaching pastors and elders on the stage so you didn't know who was going to baptize you. I was gratefully baptized by Rev. William James Hybels. I walked and stood in front of him. I looked him in the eyes as he asked me questions to make sure I understood the commitment I'd made then he baptized me. As he did so, tears rolled down my cheeks and I closed my eyes. I wanted to take in this moment - the most important moment of my life. When he was done, he shook my hand and said, "Walk with the Lord, Amy." I've never forgotten those words and in fact, had them inscribed on my bible.
Many years later I was baptized in our church's lake. I had a great fear of being immersed under water so I took a class at the YMCA called T.O.W. (Terrified of Water) so that I could be water baptized. Then I asked one of the elders I knew if he could be the one who dunked me. In June 1995 (Seven years later), I bounced up out of the water feeling clean and freed, restored and whole from an area of sin I was confused about.
Since both baptism days, I have never been the same. I learned I never did anything bad that caused the abuse. I was the victim of someone else's disease of alcoholism. I learned God was with me through all of the ugliness of my childhood - I was never alone. I learned I have sinful behaviors that need to stop, that only God can help me remove. Best of all, I learned I have a forever friend in Jesus - who will always be with me and guide me wherever I go.
Why Jesus? He paid a debt he did not owe.
Instead, he paid a debt I owed that I could not pay.
Thank you, Jesus.
I'm forever in YOUR debt.
