OK this is my story on how I came to know God. My first discovery of a higher power came when I was seven years old and my parents took me out to the movies to see Back to the Future (That's kind of why it's my favorite movie) Before that I had heard in sunday school that we were all part of a bigger plan but the movie is what first made me understand that everything in the past was engineered from the beginning with a bigger picture in mind. Kind of a thinker of a kid wasn't I? So, right there I decided that I wanted to be part of the bigger plan and that was all well and good until I was about thirteen years old and started to notice girls. Now, I thought that this was the most amazing discovery of the twentieth century and I wanted more than anything to be able to spend some time with them but they weren't real nuts about that idea and still aren't. That first rejection hurt, as did the second, and third, and fourth..... Then came number twelve, the one that would eventually cause my downfall. She was perfect (or so I thought) smart, funny, gorgeous and best of all she seemed to be thinking the same thoughts that I was at the same time, a thinking along the same wavelenghth kind of thing. But, she was a cheerleader and kind of stuck up. OK, she hated me. After that one I took some time to think about what was going on in my life and at that time I came to the conclusion that either A:God enjoyed having me as his cosmic joke and taunting me with the things I want or B:God didn't exist and I was a fool to think otherwise. I thought it over and over and decided that answer A was the truth and I didn't want to be a joke anymore. I just turned my back on God and everything that I'd believed before and I was miserable. The following year was my junior year in high school and everything was terrible, my grades were horrendous, I had no friends and I was looking ahead to the following summer when I was turning 18, a legal adult and I was thinking if this is a taste of what my adult life is going to be, than I don't want it. Fortunately a girl I knew from homeroom noticed that I was kind of down in the dumps (probably from my banging my head against my locker every morning) and invited me over to her house on monday nights to be part of something called Young Life campaigners. Now, my first thought was, "#@!$%^#@$ NO!!" but she kept asking every week, again and again and again, and I found out that one of the guys in my Journalism class went to it as well and he was pretty cool so I gave it a shot, but as the end of the school year approached campaigners seemed to be too little too late and I decided at the end of the year that if some miracle didn't occur and make my whole life worth living again between then and my birthday (8/3) I was just going take the train down to the city and jump off the Ben Franklin bridge. Then after I made this decision I found out that the campaigners group was going up to camp that summer so I thought, I'll give this one last shot. We left on Aug. second, coincidence, I think not. And for the first day or two the leader of the group Zach, was trying to convince me to lighten up and have a good time... and the rest of the week he was trying to get me to stop having a good time. There was so much freedom up there at Young Life camp and the surroundings were so beutiful I'd've had to have been comatose not to have had a good time and in the end the talks that our group had helped me to get over (not forget about mind you 'cause I still pray for her) the annonymous cheerleader who had been so important to me. And toward the middle of the week the camp staff did a little skit that I recognized as being taken from my favorite movie which was yet another strange coincidence that helped me to be sure that I was doing the right thing. It was that night that I finalized the agreement that I'd made with God in a movie theater when I was seven, on August 6, 1996 I accepted that God loved me and didn't think of me as a cosmic joke and that if I was supposed to be with someone forever it would happen in his time and not mine and (coincidentally) the female leader that I went up to camp with told me out of the blue that I was "A really fun guy"  which was the one thing that I had been trying to become.  Right there I was hooked and I knew that I was in with God for the long haul. <>< 

      February 7, 2001- I'm still in it for the long haul but I guess a few things have changed since I posted this many moons ago. I'm not as wild and crazy as I used to be but I still do have fun. I haven't really seen or talked to Greg, my partner in crime, in almost four years (I wonder how he's doing) I've grown up and grown wiser I've been told. I got turned down two more times by ladies I was interested in but it's certainly become easier to take. I'm sure now that if God has somebody for me, I'll meet her in his time, not mine. I'm hoping to take a short term missions trip this summer (which four years ago when I was just a new Christian I never would've thought I'd be even considering that). It's amazing how God works, changing you into what he always had in mind for you to be but you never would've thought you'd be in a million years. I'll try and keep this updated more from now on but since nobody ever really reads this but me, I guess it doesn't really matter. :) <><