This past weekend I was able to close out my CRAZY unexpected four years in college by standing in front of HMCC, the place where I became a Christian and learned how to follow Jesus. For those that couldn't be there, let me take this chance to boast to everyone on the world wide web :)
As I reflect on my time in college, one lesson God has taught me is how every sacrifice I made was in fact no sacrifice at all.
Growing up in an agnostic family, the thought of a higher-being never even crossed my mind for most of my life. When I came to college and was prompted with the question “If you were to die tomorrow, would you know for sure you’d go to heaven?”, this Jesus figure became relevant in my life for the very first time. After months of weighing the pros and cons of handing over my life to someone else, I committed to follow Christ at the end of my freshman year (through Xanga) but could not shake the fact that I had to sacrifice my old lifestyle. Even when I became a Christian, I didn’t really know what it meant to follow Christ –all I remember from my freshman year is that if I wanted to follow Jesus, I had to deny myself, take up my cross, and follow Him (Matthew 16:24-25). The fact that if I tried to save my life, I would lose it—but if I lost my life for Christ, I would find it—didn’t make any sense to me. But seeing that my worldly success left me unsatisfied compelled me to give this paradoxical Truth a chance.
A friend of mine once described the Bible as a GPS that can help people navigate through life. Even though I received this GPS as a gift three years ago, I rarely actually used the GPS for what it was capable of, because I still trusted in my own experiences and abilities as reliable sources. I accepted Jesus as my Savior but refused to make Him my Lord, largely because my entire life of doing things out of my own power and efforts led me to good results (when I took every SAT practice exam I could scavenge, I got the score I wanted—when I revised my resume over and over, I got the internships I hoped for). When God challenged me last summer to give up the internship I felt like I had worked all my life for, I couldn’t help but ask, ‘WHY GOD?! WHY THIS SUMMER OF ALL SUMMERS?! Why can’t I just participate in missions NEXT summer, when I already have a job secured and have a whole summer to spare?!’ It all seemed like too much of a sacrifice at the time, but God miraculously changed my heart to obey. After almost an year of questioning the worth of that “sacrifice”, I can confidently stand here today to tell you that every bit of it was worth it—not just in the way that the summer challenged my understanding of what Jesus means to me, but even in the way God used specific instances to reveal new personal passions and redirect my career pursuits.
God, I praise You because You have finally taken the driving wheel and become Lord over my life. I thank You for every little sacrifice You’ve challenged me to make—my pre-Christian way of life, my one summer week to reach out to new students (OCR), my summer to be discipled through the CSMP, and even my future plans after graduation. As I made small steps of obedience and stopped making my own turns, You have shown me a new way of life—a life where I don’t need to feel the pressure or burden of getting lost, but one where I can fully trust in my handy dandy GPS that will lead me to the final destination without a doubt, every time. Praise the Lord for saving me my freshman year, flipping my life upside down, and using me to share the awesome news of our Lord JC!!
As I reflect on my time in college, one lesson God has taught me is how every sacrifice I made was in fact no sacrifice at all.
Growing up in an agnostic family, the thought of a higher-being never even crossed my mind for most of my life. When I came to college and was prompted with the question “If you were to die tomorrow, would you know for sure you’d go to heaven?”, this Jesus figure became relevant in my life for the very first time. After months of weighing the pros and cons of handing over my life to someone else, I committed to follow Christ at the end of my freshman year (through Xanga) but could not shake the fact that I had to sacrifice my old lifestyle. Even when I became a Christian, I didn’t really know what it meant to follow Christ –all I remember from my freshman year is that if I wanted to follow Jesus, I had to deny myself, take up my cross, and follow Him (Matthew 16:24-25). The fact that if I tried to save my life, I would lose it—but if I lost my life for Christ, I would find it—didn’t make any sense to me. But seeing that my worldly success left me unsatisfied compelled me to give this paradoxical Truth a chance.
A friend of mine once described the Bible as a GPS that can help people navigate through life. Even though I received this GPS as a gift three years ago, I rarely actually used the GPS for what it was capable of, because I still trusted in my own experiences and abilities as reliable sources. I accepted Jesus as my Savior but refused to make Him my Lord, largely because my entire life of doing things out of my own power and efforts led me to good results (when I took every SAT practice exam I could scavenge, I got the score I wanted—when I revised my resume over and over, I got the internships I hoped for). When God challenged me last summer to give up the internship I felt like I had worked all my life for, I couldn’t help but ask, ‘WHY GOD?! WHY THIS SUMMER OF ALL SUMMERS?! Why can’t I just participate in missions NEXT summer, when I already have a job secured and have a whole summer to spare?!’ It all seemed like too much of a sacrifice at the time, but God miraculously changed my heart to obey. After almost an year of questioning the worth of that “sacrifice”, I can confidently stand here today to tell you that every bit of it was worth it—not just in the way that the summer challenged my understanding of what Jesus means to me, but even in the way God used specific instances to reveal new personal passions and redirect my career pursuits.
God, I praise You because You have finally taken the driving wheel and become Lord over my life. I thank You for every little sacrifice You’ve challenged me to make—my pre-Christian way of life, my one summer week to reach out to new students (OCR), my summer to be discipled through the CSMP, and even my future plans after graduation. As I made small steps of obedience and stopped making my own turns, You have shown me a new way of life—a life where I don’t need to feel the pressure or burden of getting lost, but one where I can fully trust in my handy dandy GPS that will lead me to the final destination without a doubt, every time. Praise the Lord for saving me my freshman year, flipping my life upside down, and using me to share the awesome news of our Lord JC!!
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