Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
your thoughts...
By no means am I a perfect person. I’ve lied, stolen, cheated, manipulated, and even caused harm to others. I’ve always wanted to find happiness in temporary friends and objects instead of something that would give me joy in the long term. I’ve ignored my parents when they knew what’s been the best for me and have poked fun at my elders instead of listening to the wisdom that they have. I have lived for myself and not cared about other people and their opinions or even their advice at times. I have hated and been spiteful to those who love me. Like I said, I’m not a perfect person, not by a long shot. But why should you care? I’m just another kid from the Midwest that’s lived a life similar to most people. What’s different though is that I’ve gone through couple events that have changed my life forever.
Let me tell you a little bit more about myself, my name is Andrew Schneider and I am going into my fourth year as a Landscape Architecture student at Ball State University in Muncie, IN. I currently reside in southern Indiana while I’m not at school, but I haven’t always lived in Indiana. I grew up in a suburb of Detroit in a Christian home (a lot like most of the kids in the Midwest). I’ve always wanted to please people. This means that I would try to go along with the crowd and make people happy. At the church I grew up in, I was the same. My friends and I would just mess around and get into trouble. We would get yelled at almost every single Sunday and Wednesday. And I’m not going to lie to you. I had a blast not taking anything seriously. I enjoyed my elementary and middle school years. Sure there was a certain awkwardness that everyone experiences while growing up, but as a whole it was a fun time.
When I was in sixth grade, I had my first real glimpse at Christianity. It was at a fall retreat with a friend that I had first accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. When I had gotten back from that retreat nothing had really changed though. I was still the same old me. I continued with my people pleasing and regular shenanigans. The biggest change in my life came two years later when I found out I was moving to Indiana. This ended up going a lot smoother than I thought it was going to. The thing is though, I was stripped of everything I had wanted and strived for when I lived in Michigan. My friends were gone, and the “satisfaction” I had received from all of that work turned out to be empty.
Since I was starting over, I felt a little apathetic about finding a new church since it was difficult enough finding new friends. The friends eventually came and it was through these friends that I found a church. They invited me to come with them and I did. I ended up enjoying it and even went on a summer trip with them where another big event impacted my life. It was on this trip that I recommitted my life to being a Christ follower. After that I really began to put my reliance on Him and really tried living my life for Him. I’m not going to say that I didn’t screw up a bunch because that would be a blatant lie. I screwed up a bunch. I had begun to truly take to heart understand what Jesus did and why he had to do it. This was a huge deal because I no longer had to care what people thought about me. I just knew that I was loved (and still am) for who I was and was becoming.
Like I said before, “by no means am I a perfect person,” nor will I ever be. Through the saving grace and mercy of God I am seen as perfect. As His son, because His true son died a gruesome death so I could spend eternity with them. I’m going to continue to screw up and sin in many ways even though I don’t want to, but I have been redeemed and I can’t imagine living my life any other way. I know I am not the only that believes this but I want to know, do you agree with me? Do you think that Jesus came to die for us, or is that just garbage? Is there a higher power that loves us or do we just live our day-to-day lives how we want to? What do you think?