My testimony, first draft

Here's the text of my testimony I am working on...would welcome all constructive critisms...don't be shy, I need some editing help now...



Although I grew up in a Christian home and understood the Bible, looking back I can see that I was a participant more than a believer. As I moved into high school and college, my parents’ faith never really felt like it was mine. I began to search for a fun life – and more and more began to lean on friends, activities, men, and alcohol to have fun. But the more I searched for fun, the lower I got. After college, I ended up living with and engaged to a non-Christian for five years. After chasing my own brand of happiness and what I thought I wanted for my life, I had dropped to an extreme low. I had closed down most of the good relationships in my life (including my family) and clung to my fiancée because for some reason, I thought he was providing for me – but in actuality, all of the finances (and therefore, debt) were my burden. My life consisted of going to work, coming home, and watching TV every night and most weekends. I had gone from a very active and motivated person to one who barely left the house and didn’t see where her life was headed – and didn’t really care.

A few weeks after finally breaking up with my fiancée, I woke up with an overwhelming desire to go to church. I knew I had to make a change, and God provided a loving place for me to make my recovery. I remember attending that first service and just feeling His love wrap around me like a big hug. I quickly realized He had been waiting for me this whole time – while I was off living my life on my terms, He was waiting and willing to forgive me for all my sins. I learned and finally really understood the real gospel – that we are separated from a perfect God because of our sin – but that He made a way to bridge that gap by coming as a man to die for our sins.

I slowly began to break out of the rubble that I had piled on my life. God surfaced my personality – I found Joy again in the literal and figurative sense. Where once money was my worry and obsession, He brought me through a series of very specific circumstances to free my heart from financial anxiety, and show me how He would provide for me – I needed to trust in Him, not myself or any other man.

Today, I want to tell my story in case someone else is in the situation I was in. As much as you try, you can’t do it on your own – get out of a relationship, out of depression, out of debt – but you can with God. My life is still tough at times and I’m still paying off the last of my debt four years later – but I now have hope and a purpose, and above all, I have a relationship with One who will never fail me. Now all I can do is thank Him for His grace, His provision, His mercy, and for not letting me marry that guy.

What's the coolest thing you've done in your life?

Sometimes I wonder, "What's the coolest thing you've done in your life, Joy?"  "What can you say, when you look back at your life, is the neatest thing you've worked on?"  Sometimes I just ask myself so I remember I do enjoy my life even through all the crazy hectic-ness.  Sometimes I ask myself because I'm just a nostalgic nerotic mess.  And sometimes I ask myself so I can re-evaluate my past in order to align my steps for the future.

Lately I have to put the film company on the top of the list.  Making Life In Transit with the rest of the VerticalBlu team was an amazing adventure, and one I wonder will happen again.  It's one of those rare moments in your life where you have all the elements combine in just the right way, at just the right time, to produce magic.  Something special happened to where the team of Daniel, Cori, Stronz, TC and I all just fit the puzzle pieces, amassed all this amazing talent, and whipped all those ingredients into a recipie that was bigger than its parts.  Not to say we didn't have our issues - nope, far from it, it was tough going and we weren't immune to breakdowns in communication and just wanting to snap from the pressure of this huge production.  But when I look back at the experience, it's all in a rosy glow.  And I guess that's what you really want to take away from experiences like that...

Other 'life highlights' since I'm thinking of them...

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  Years of marching band...bonding with the group over band camp...travelling to competitions on what seems like every early Saturday after a Friday night football game...the flags and uniforms and instruments and lights and backdrops and drums and music and love and everyone working toward a common goal...
  
  
  
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  Working at Info Services in college - all the crazy times during Student Assistant training each year...pizza parties every month or semester or however often our meetings were...learning so much my brain sometimes hurt and I wanted to cry because I could just barely keep up (ok this was a specific linux meeting Shende hosted so maybe it doesn't count here)...playing Quake in the training room...chair races down the hall in Trexler...the Telephone Doctor
  
  
  
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  Recent Soma trip to Havasu - just had an awesome time relaxing, playing in the water and the sand, being active, but mostly connecting with like-minded believers and friends
  
  
  
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  Disneyland trip in 2007 with Scott, Derek, Tiffani, and Shelley...such a great ride over, fun at our hotel "camping" LOL, the excitement of Disney for the first time, putting together songs to sing, Rick Warren's church that Sunday, the island in the afternoon, and the beautiful wedding in the evening, topped off by singing at the reception...such fun times with friends
  
  
  
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  Vegas with my high-school BFF's last year - Cirque du Soleil's Beatles' LOVE show - not many words for this, just fun, fun, fun, with some of my oldest friends (see above: Marching Band)
  
  
  

I'll add more...but I'm still tired, even though I haven't stopped posting blogs...funny how that is, isn't it?!  LOL