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My Hope In Christ

I believe in Christ. But before I came to believe in Christ, there were people who constantly ministered and witnessed to me that indeed Jesus Christ is real. During that time I had many questions. I had doubts. And it was a struggle in me of whether I will believe these people.

Although I attended the Bible studies, my heart was not really in it and I was telling myself, anyway this is for God, and if these people are in error then let God have mercy upon me and rescue me from their hands, because I was staying in my brother’s Flat and I had no choice but to constantly attend the Bible study at his place and go with them to Church every Friday. Worship services here in the Middle East are held on Fridays as do the Muslims. And so that went on. But as for me, I continued with my personal reading of the Bible as I used to in the past.

As time went on, things started to change. The songs they played in Church started to move me to tears. The lady Pastor went around during the Praise and Worship and she was praying over the people and laying hands on them. And she did pray over me also. I just bowed my head as she prayed and received everything for whatever good they would bring me.

And soon enough I realized it inside me that this thing is real. And I was confronted on the inside of me that if I choose to continue on with this “church thing,” I will have to say goodbye to all my vices and all the other “bad things” that I enjoy doing. And then I will have to say NO to my friends if they ask me out during the night when I go on vacation. I will have to give up drinking and merry making at bars and resto-bars and like places. These things were going on in my head.

And then finally one day I said, OK Lord I’m in. They asked me to play guitars in the Worship team, I said I’m in. When they went to the beach to have Water Baptism, I said I’m in. When the Pastor asked who wanted to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, I said I’m in. And so I did.

And here I am now preaching what I gather from the word of God into this blog. But you know, it is a constant struggle and there is always something that tries to pull me back. One time during a Worship service, an “outsider’s eye” occurred to me and I saw the Church from an outsider’s perspective. I was standing at the back and as I look at the people in front, we were like… just a bunch of crazy people gather together. You know, we were dancing and singing and we looked like crazy people gathered together in this small room totally disconnected from the outside world - and for what? And what about the money that the people give to the Church? Some of these people don’t even have enough to meet their own necessities and they have families to support but here they are giving as much money they can to the Church. It all looked crazy.

But I pulled back myself and said, No, I am not going back there. I am not going outside, I’m staying here. And I was comforted when I remembered Peter’s words saying, Where else shall we go Lord? You have the words of eternal life. And this is the very same hope that I have in Christ. And I am fully persuaded that there is nothing better that this world can offer. Nothing. It is in Christ that we have hope.
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