Kathy's Bible StudyCourtesy Of Firequill Publications email: FireQuill@cox.net

Webmasters note: A few years back we had the privilege of hosting a student from Taiwan for about ten days. This was a charming young lady and after she returned home Kathy mailed her the following letter giving her testimony of how she became a follower of Jesus Christ. I hope you enjoy it and if by some chance you haven’t given your life to the Master, do so now; why put it off? God loves you and sent Jesus to pay for your salvation. The price is paid, the gift is yours but you must claim it to make it your own.

#####

Let’s see.  Today I am going to tell you how I became a follower of Jesus Christ. I used to say “how I became a Christian”, but that term has so been misrepresented by the world that I have changed it.  My faith is my life.

When I was seventeen, I graduated from high school.  I did not come from a religious family.  My mother was Roman Catholic and my father Protestant.  But by the time my brother and I were born, they didn’t attend church.  My grandfather was a Christian and he took Gary and me to church with him.  That was really my only education as far as the things of God.  But when we moved to California, his influence ceased, so I didn’t go to church much at all.

When I was in high school, I had a friend who’s father was the Methodist minister in our town.  I loved my friend and her family.  They were loving and kind just as my own family was, but they were different.  Their love seemed to come from a common source, whereas in my family we all loved from our own innermost beings.  That’s probably badly written, but it’s the best I can do.  Anyway, my friend’s family spoke of God as though he were a dear friend.  I always thought of God as someone who lived way off in heaven.  I certainly never thought he was the least bit interested in my life.

While I enjoyed being in their home, I didn’t enjoy talking about God. Although to both the minister and his wife it seemed as natural as breathing.  I sensed, even as a non-Christian, that to involve God in my life would demand much more than I was willing to give.  I was right.

When I graduated another friend of mine and I went to Pasadena California to go to college.  We became roommates.  Here I was, 17 with an apartment of my own, a checking account and a 4 year scholarship.  I thought I was really grown up and that the world was going to be lucky to have me show it what life was all about!  In other words, my head was a lot bigger than my brains.

Unknown to me, my Christian friend was in college 3,000 miles away praying for me.  God heard those prayers, and proceeded to answer them.  The first morning of school I awakened with the most unhappy, miserable feeling I had ever had.  What had happened to the joy of yesterday?  I was so unhappy I didn’t want to live!  I know now that this was God working in my life to turn me to Him.

As the days dragged on, my misery became more intense.  My roommate was worried about me, but when she tried to find out what was wrong, I couldn’t tell her.  I didn’t know myself.  I only knew that if my emotional anguish was going to continue, I didn’t want to go on living.  I couldn’t eat and lost weight and I couldn’t sleep.

I began reading books on religion in the college library.  They were no help.  Finally one day I checked out a Bible and began reading in Romans.  The first chapter told me what my problem was: I was a sinner and God hates sin.  I assumed that meant He hated me too.  I am so happy I was wrong about that.

Now that I knew I was a sinner, I was faced with what I thought were two solutions.  I could end my life, but reading the Bible had convinced me there was a hell — a place of eternal separation from God.  I certainly had no desire to go there.  The other solution would be to live a life of good works pleasing to God.  Perhaps then he would overlook my sins.  So, I set about being good.  But I couldn’t.  If I wasn’t doing something wrong, I was always thinking something wrong.  It was like trying to catch the wind in my hands.  All this venture did was convince me more deeply than ever that I was indeed a sinner.  What to do?

I wrote to my Christian friend and told her of my misery.  I also told her that I was going to visit her dad next time I was home for a weekend.  And that’s exactly what I did.

Keep in mind that during this time I was reading the Bible many hours a day and praying too.  I felt like my prayers were bouncing off the ceiling and falling back to earth, and every verse I read just affirmed that God hated sin and would someday judge it.  You can imagine what my studies were like.  I couldn’t concentrate on my books or classes.  I was failing some of them.  My parents were very upset about that.  When I graduated from high school, I was an honor student, I won a scholarship.  What happened, they wanted to know.  I couldn’t make them understand what I was going through.

On my next trip home I went to see my friend’s father.  I felt awkward and didn’t know how to tell them what I was going through.  But they were wise people, and they knew that God was working in my life.  I told them how wonderful school was and how happy I was — which was of course not true.  I remember sitting there feeling like I was going to shatter into a million pieces.  Finally, he began telling me how happy my friend was because she was learning about God and how much He loved her.

That was too much!  I broke down and cried.  The minister and his wife just sat there patiently and let me cry.  Then I looked up at him and said, “Do you think God would do for me what He’s doing in Pat’s life?”

“Of course He would.  He loves you and that’s why you’re here”, they replied.  God loved me?  Me, Kathy, with all my shortcomings and the weight of my sins.  Oh, if it were only true!  How I wanted to believe.

He took out his Bible and showed me all the verses where Christ said that he had come to die for a lost world.  In all the times I had read the Bible, I had never read that.  I know now that God had blinded me to these passages until I was convinced that I was a sinner.  How wise he is to lead us one step at a time.

Then he asked me if I would like to pray and ask Christ to forgive my sins, come into my heart and make me a new creation.  Would I!  And that’s what I did.  When I left that house to go back to college, I was a new Kathy with a new life stretching before me.  Where there had been unhappiness and misery and a fear of God, there was now joy and a new relationship with God.  He was no longer my judge, He was my father.  He had loved me all along and had brought me through this terrible time so he could show me that great love.  There is a verse in Jeremiah that says, “Behold, I loved thee with an everlasting love and drawn thee to myself.”

Daphane, how strange yet wonderful that telling you this after all these years (34) is just as exciting and vibrant as though it happened ten minutes ago.  And how wonderful to share it with you. I have failed many times in my walk with Christ, but he has always been there with his love and forgiveness.  I have learned that the only strength to live a life pleasing to him comes from him.  I have also learned to love his word.  I have studied and taught the Bible for many years.  There’s so much more to learn.