God's Never Failing Love

Praise the Lord, we truly serve an amazing God. I never have penned out my testimony like this before, however there is a first time for everything. I wish I had an amazing testimony of how God found me on the streets, but I don't, I was born into this church; or I wish I had a testimony of how God used me in a foreign land to see lives changed, but I have rarely traveled outside the confines of this great country. What I do have though, is a testimony of God's never failing love, His undeserved mercy, and His restoring grace that takes you back time and time again.

As I stated, I was born into this body of believers with the most amazing parents, who would make sure that four boys were dressed, with Bibles and offering in hand each Sunday. Some of my earliest childhood memories are of the church, I was filled with the gift of the Holy Ghost at the ripe old age of nine and baptized in the precious name of Jesus Christ a few weeks later. Knowing what I know and having been brought up in the church, it makes it all that much more embarrassing to tell this story as I let my own ways get in the way of God's perfect will being done.

High school is one of the most trying times for young people, very few can relate or even imagine what a young person goes through on a day to day basis in and out of school. The prevalence of sin and immorality in schools today is almost more than one can comprehend, yet alone deal with at young and moldable age. My senior year of high school was supposed to be the year everything came together, all my hard work, dedication and commitment were finally going to pay off, success was within my reach—or so I thought as things that were supposed to be coming together fell apart. On October 30th, 2005 a car carrying three young men, drove headlong into a telephone pole at around 60 miles an hour, instantly killing one passenger, mentally and physically disabling the second, the driver would succumb to his injuries and die the next day in the ICU of the hospital—the driver of that car was my best friend, Brice.

Brice and I had started kindergarten together and had grown up and grown closer since then. We made plans for what we were going to do after high school, how we could be roommates in college, and together, we would be able to make our feeble dreams and plans come to pass. In one moment, everything would change for me. I remember the police officer coming into the classroom I was in and telling me the news, as I broke down into a weeping mess on the ground realizing that Brice was gone and in my lack of understanding placing the blame on God, asking in anger "Why? Why God? Why Brice? Why my best friend? Couldn't it have been someone else?"

The Bible tells us in Hebrews 9:27 that, "It is appointed unto men once to die, and after that the judgment." But even this does not always bring comfort and solace to us as we attempt to deal with hurt, heartache, and loss we feel of someone dying. I let the loss of Brice get the better of me as I let anger and hurt takeover my life and take control of my path. Growing increasingly angry I made one poor choice after another, letting my life fall farther and farther into the clutches of sin. I let my anger grow to the point that my friends who were trying to be there to support and encourage me were not willing to come around any more, and putting myself in situations that a Christian young man should never find himself in. I cut myself off from the world and continued to slip deeper and farther from God. I let my anger effect my walk with God to the point that I had turned my back on him all together, no longer attending church on any regular basis and when I did it was only out of obligation to my parents and the routine that I had been raised in. I was detached from the world, and had become isolated because of my anger.

It was about 12 months after this when my family made the trip to come to see my eldest brother, as at that time he lived about 5 hours north of me. I can remember so vividly that Sunday of the trip we took. The preacher, preached a message of forgiveness and mercy, of understanding and acceptance; whether he knew it or not, he was preaching to me. I tried to cut out the words he spoke, and close myself off as I had become excellent at doing by this time. God's word came through the highest barrier that I tried to put up. With tears in her eyes my mother looked at me and said, "Come on let's go pray", I remember weeping at the altar begging God for forgiveness and mercy, to fill me again with His spirit, and without hesitation He did.

Like I said my testimony may not be like some, but mine is that of Micah 7:8 "Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy: when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me." No matter how far we stray, no matter where we find ourselves, no matter how many times we fall, God's love is still enough, His mercy endures and His grace is always there to restore. For a year I let my walk with God suffer, I pushed Him away, and blamed Him, even still He stood there with arms outstretched and love in His voice saying "My son has come home". What kind of love would do that for me, what kind of God would love so freely no matter what I had done?

I firmly believe that without a test, there can be no testimony; and while being ashamed of the actions I have taken in the past, I am humbled by the mere thought of God's love. He loved so much that, even when He was suspended between heaven and earth on a cross, with a beaten and broken body, His arms outstretched to say, "My child I love you this much". The greatest testimony of all times is that of Jesus Christ's love for each and every one of us. With this I pray that God would bless and keep each and everyone of you.