Robin Vogsland
Two weeks into my fifth year of college, I was getting to the point of realizing that living life the way I was doing it was nothing but crap. At the time I thought this strange for I really had everything going for me; I anticipated no problems finishing up my engineering degree, followed by a satisfying, well paid career, and a wide open future. And most importantly I had a good education in the nature of things--general knowledge, science, philosophy, and analytical reasoning (I thought I knew a lot). I had control over myself and my destiny; I was my own god--I had to be, because I had decided to believe and to live as if the real one was not there. I made my own morals; I invented my own goals; I tried to believe that there were things worth striving and sacrificing for.
At that time, when I should have been most satisfied with myself and eager to get on with my life work, I was just plain tired of it all. I was tired from the effort of constantly creating my own world (in my own mind)--the effort of being my own god. When I reflected on my life and thought of what it would be like to keep on that way for 30, 40, 50+ years, I could not see how the burden could be borne. Privately, I started to call my life a "living death"-walking around, but all burned out and worn out inside.
For 8 years I had rejected God but I often thought about the things I had learned as a child; I remember saying to myself frequently, "If there is a God, he is Christ" but I did not want to bow down to anyone or anything.
One night I lay in bed, thinking of the next two years of hard work in graduate school, thinking of the prospect of working hard and feeling dead-for the rest of my life. I was frantic: I've never had any serious inclination to suicide so I did not see any escape--what a trap I was in. That night as I lay there I finally broke, the selfish will that would not bow to a master, cried out to be saved from a lifetime of death. I had to, there was no way out. All I could pray was, "If you are there show me." I've never felt the same since, and I have never been the same since. Those signs that I wanted showed up, first as peace of mind and then as subtle, but (to me) unmistakable "accidents-with-a-purpose", leading me to increasing faith and discipleship.
I've always remembered how I felt those months before I broke, I still know how empty and dead and hopeless I felt; it was a preview of hell, and by God's grace I will never go back to that--ever; no matter what I have to give up or put up with; nothing is worth living without God. I won't live with that emptiness ever again. The scars of those years remain, memories of evil and unkind deeds, bad habits hard to break, etc., but in compensation the Lord has though my experience given me a very clear understanding of what I have been saved from.
Since then God has blessed me incredibly; life is so sweet, so wonderful-even the troubles are wonderful. I love God; I love my family; I love other Christians, and even strangers, so much and so easily; when before I hardly felt anything very strong for anyone or anything. I thought I loved my future wife before the change but it was nothing compared to how I came to love her after God showed me how to love Him. What a change it was! To give up the twisted and frantic life and to live life the way it was meant to be--from now on I will be the creation and He can be the God. AMEN