For many of my readers that know me personally or follow me on social media, they know that my husband and I have recently found ourselves falling in love with Christ. I know that that can be a touchy topic for a lot of people and for so many years I've often been a person that has kept faith under wraps for fear of what people would say. I never wanted to make waves or have people think poorly of me for my beliefs. I imagine that this stems from the fact that I never really knew anything about religion or what it meant to be a Christian. Growing up, religion wasn't a part of my upbringing. Not to say that my parents are at fault or that they did something wrong. It just wasn't something we did, nor did I feel like it was something I was missing as a kid. It wasn't until high school that faith even started to matter to me, and honestly at the time I had no idea what that even meant for me. Several of my friends went to church and talked about God. I decided to give it a try - what did I have to lose? I visited church with some friends and found that I really enjoyed being there. I attended off and on and then ended up going to church camp. It was by far one of the highlights of growing up. I will forever remember that trip with fondness and love. It was moving to feel such passion and love in a massive room surrounded by thousands of other people. What I didn't realize then was that I was feeling the Holy Spirit surrounding each and every one of us in that room. It was incredible and to say that I was overwhelmed would be a major understatement. After that trip, I never went back to church. Not until college. I don't have an answer for why, but it just didn't happen. I don't believe that it was conscious decision to not go, I just didn't.
When I started college, I had no intentions of seeking Christ. A few of my hall mates were religious and I remember feeling drawn to them. They would talk to me about God and religion, but it wasn't necessarily something that I was super into. I listened to sermons with a few of them, talked about Christ and prayed. It was great and I really enjoyed it. As I continued college, I attended church a couple of times with some of my friends. Here and there I would seek verses out of the bible that I needed to read at specific times, but I still had my apprehensions. My parents weren't religious, my close friends joked about religion, and honestly, how could any of this stuff even be real?
Fast forward to April 2017. My husband and I were having a lazy Saturday morning. We were watching TV, hanging out with our son and deciding what we were going to do for the day. We saw something on the news about politics or something of that nature and talked about how maybe we needed to find some faith in our lives. It was a brief statement that neither of us put any weight in. We then decided we were going to go visit a friend of mine and started getting ready for the day. Jesse left something in the car and ran out to grab it. He comes back in and says, "You need to come outside right now." I was a bit annoyed because I was trying to get ready to go, but I obliged and stepped outside with he and our son. Standing in front of me was a pastor and his son. Immediately stunned, I looked at Jesse and then introduced myself to this man standing in front of me. He explained that he and his son were meeting people in the neighborhood and that he wanted to know if he could ask us a few questions, read a few scriptures to us, and pray with us. We both agreed. He went on to ask us if we believed that we would go to Heaven when we died. We both said that we hoped we would, but that really we had no idea. He explained that there were specific scriptures in the bible that confirmed that we would in fact go to Heaven if we just asked God. He read those to us, explained what each one meant and then prayed with us. It was 10 minutes of a conversation with a man that we had never meant that ended up paving the path toward where we are now. We discussed what had happened after the pastor had left and both came to the conclusion that we felt different. We felt something happen that day (that Holy Spirit has been trying to fill me up since high school, I tell you what!) and we both decided that we would look further into faith. Over the next week I researched faith. I googled, YouTubed and reached out to trusted family and friends. I found myself continually coming back to a little church 5 minutes from our apartment and we decided that we would try it out that coming Sunday - Easter Sunday. This wasn't the church of the pastor that had come to our door, but a church that seemed to be calling to me continually throughout the week. Easter Sunday came and we put our nicest outfits on, packed up the diaper bag and headed over to what has become our home away from home every Sunday. It took one sermon and I was hooked. I have never felt more welcomed into a church in my life.
Since then, Jesse and I have not missed a service, we have read many books of the bible, engaged in bible study together and separately, prayed countless times and were baptized in July. We found this place of security that neither of us had ever known. I can't speak entirely for Jesse as I know his journey is a bit different than mine, but I can say that my journey with Christ this time around has been so different than the past. I not only feel Christ in and around me, I feel a fire ablaze in my heart. I am overwhelmed by God's grace every single day. I am in awe of God's glory and cannot imagine how I navigated life without knowing Him.
I know that there are so many people who don't agree with Christianity and faith. I know that there are people who believe in different Gods, have different values and morals, and that a lot of people don't agree with my faith. And that is okay. I still love and cherish each and every one of you. At the end of the day, I've spent so much time hiding my beliefs and my faith for fear of judgement, but the only judgement that I stand to face is the judgement of my Lord and Savior. I appreciate the differences in the world and I appreciate that everyone has something different that they cling to because I truly believe that that is how God created it to be. I am honored to have been called to Christ in such a powerful way and I am going to continue to navigate this journey as I am called to be.
"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." Phillipians 4:13
Xx,
Mama Yearley
Note: Reposted from my previous blog.
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