So I've grown up in a Christian home my whole life and our family went to church every Sunday but I didn't thing about having a relationship with God until I was 14 years old. I noticed myself being in a depression at age 14 and I wanted to have a relationship with God but didn't really understand how to have one. My friends would tell me to read my Bible and have devotions everyday but whenever I would try to read my Bible I had a hard time understanding it so I wouldn't read it. I would pray and cry myself many nights to sleep because I wanted to be able to read the Bible and understand it and I didn't want to just read it because "it was the Christian thing to do" or to please my friends because I had read my Bible. Whenever I would try to read my Bible it felt as if something was in the way. As time went on my depression grew worse and I had a hard time trusting people so I didn't talk to people about my depression and I was afraid of people judging me. When I was 16 years old I went to a conference and heard a pastor speak and he given an illustration about turning away from sin using a big black bean bag and he had talked about how we can grow comfortable with sin and eventually it eats us up. Also, he had said "we can't feel our way closer to God". Anyway so when I came home I started listening to his sermons online and because of that I started to go to church because I actually wanted to and not because it felt like a chore that I had to do every Sunday and because my parents made me. I went because I wanted to go. So, a year later, spring of 2011, age 17, my depression had grown really bad and I started to have suicidal thoughts but the thing that held me back was my fear of death. "Would I go to hell if I killed myself?". My parents found out I was in a depression and my youth pastor found out that I was having suicidal thoughts and contacted my parents and he told me "it would be the most selfish thing I could do". So I started to pick up my Bible more throughout the year and I actually prayed that God would show me how suicide was selfish. Then that summer (2011) I started sponsering a child from India through Gospel For Asia and started to learn a lot about India but never thought I would actually go. So that Fall, in November 16'th, I was randomly looking for a mission trip to India and I come across an organization that has a trip to India and once I was done reading it God says to me " I want you to go to India. this is why suicide is selfish, because I have a plan for your life". God also took away my depression that day and it didn't come back. I remember looking at the price of the trip and thinking "there is no way I can do this" but God said "trust me I'll provide" and he did! He also gave me a love for the Bible like I had never before. He also showed me that there is light at the end of the tunnel and that when we go through hard times, even though we can't see what God is doing right then and there he is there with us. And I also learned from that, that God allows us to go through trials to either bring us to God or closer to him. From my life verse is Jeremiah 29:11.
I can't say exactly when I got saved but I know I am saved. Throughout my years when I was in my depression I would pray many times to God and so I can't pinpiont an exact day to when I got saved. I did end up going to India that next summer (2012). Since that time God has continued to show me things I need to grow in and no way has my life been perfect. Yes, there are days when I get down but I haven't been in a depression like the one I was in from age 14-17. I hope that what you will take away from this is that if you (the reader) are going through hard time that you won't lose hope. God does hear our prayers even if it seems like he's not there....he is there. And God wants to have a relationship with you. He loves you very much and sees all that you are going through.
I can't say exactly when I got saved but I know I am saved. Throughout my years when I was in my depression I would pray many times to God and so I can't pinpiont an exact day to when I got saved. I did end up going to India that next summer (2012). Since that time God has continued to show me things I need to grow in and no way has my life been perfect. Yes, there are days when I get down but I haven't been in a depression like the one I was in from age 14-17. I hope that what you will take away from this is that if you (the reader) are going through hard time that you won't lose hope. God does hear our prayers even if it seems like he's not there....he is there. And God wants to have a relationship with you. He loves you very much and sees all that you are going through.
