I got saved through a failed relationship with a guy I was very much in love with. He was more interested in someone else.
I was devastated and considered and dismissed the options of psychiatric help, and the fleeting thought of ending it all.
I too, was raised Catholic, but one did not just talk to God casually, and besides, I had not been to church in years.
One day, in despair, I prayed and told God “If You can straighten out this mess of a life of mine, You can have it. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll even become a missionary and go to Africa, because I’d rather be happy doing what you want than keep on going the way I am.”
I remember it like it was yesterday, and that was back in 1977, 44 years ago.
Through a series of circumstances that I now look back and see how God worked in my life, I ended up working with a Christian who witnessed profusely, and when he explained about asking Jesus into your heart as an act of your will, I thought “That’s it! That’s what I want! Jesus, I don’t know what it means to ask You in as an act of my will, but I will You in!”
After that, without anyone instructing me of all things I was supposed to do as a Christian, I thought *I need to start going to church. And I need to start reading the Bible, and giving. Where on earth do I buy a Bible?*
The Holy Spirit led me in all that I needed to do.
Thank you so, so much for sharing your story here! I can remember being on my mail route and listening to Chuck Swindoll on Christian radio talk about asking Jesus into your heart. I asked over and over again! I also later asked to be given a heart like good soil, according to the parable Jesus told in Matthew 13:1-23.
I volunteered at that time at the Christian radio station. A strong Christian woman there took me under her wing as a new disciple. She described inviting Jesus into every chamber of her heart with his gentle light, so that no room was left dark or barred from her Savior's searching purview.