How I was before I came to Christ
To sum it up in one word, I was proud. In middle school, I was at the top of my class, so my fellow classmates and teachers praised me as one of their brightest, which felt good at the time, but it built my ego, until I began to shun those had lower academic success than I did, and this irrational pride brought about my downfall when I was in high school, because I really wanted to take this class, AP Biology, in sophomore year, even though the administrators and the teacher herself told me I should wait until junior year. But I took their admonishments as more like a challenge, because I said I was super smart, so I could do well in this class and prove them all wrong. But, in the end, I didn’t do as well as I’d hoped, and I got a B+. Most people laugh when they hear that I was sad about a B+, but they don’t understand that I based my self-worth off what I got as a grade, and to know that I went below my own standards made me feel as if I had failed.
How I came to Christ
So, I came to Christ after my dad was baptized. After he was baptized, I felt completely alone, because when I was little, I used to tell my dad about everything that happened at school, and I had come to rely on him for advice. So after he was baptized, whenever I came to ask him for help, he would always tell me to lift my worries up to God—which to me, felt more like an excuse not to help me. But I had seen how his worldview had changed for the better, after he was baptized. He was more optimistic about life. So, I believed that something that could make him so joyful couldn’t be bad. So, one night, I opened up the possibility of accepting Christ, myself. And immediately, I was filled with immense joy. So, I was like, “Ok, I’ll accept you God, as my Lord and Savior.”
To sum it up in one word, I was proud. In middle school, I was at the top of my class, so my fellow classmates and teachers praised me as one of their brightest, which felt good at the time, but it built my ego, until I began to shun those had lower academic success than I did, and this irrational pride brought about my downfall when I was in high school, because I really wanted to take this class, AP Biology, in sophomore year, even though the administrators and the teacher herself told me I should wait until junior year. But I took their admonishments as more like a challenge, because I said I was super smart, so I could do well in this class and prove them all wrong. But, in the end, I didn’t do as well as I’d hoped, and I got a B+. Most people laugh when they hear that I was sad about a B+, but they don’t understand that I based my self-worth off what I got as a grade, and to know that I went below my own standards made me feel as if I had failed.
How I came to Christ
So, I came to Christ after my dad was baptized. After he was baptized, I felt completely alone, because when I was little, I used to tell my dad about everything that happened at school, and I had come to rely on him for advice. So after he was baptized, whenever I came to ask him for help, he would always tell me to lift my worries up to God—which to me, felt more like an excuse not to help me. But I had seen how his worldview had changed for the better, after he was baptized. He was more optimistic about life. So, I believed that something that could make him so joyful couldn’t be bad. So, one night, I opened up the possibility of accepting Christ, myself. And immediately, I was filled with immense joy. So, I was like, “Ok, I’ll accept you God, as my Lord and Savior.”
How my life has changed after I accepted Jesus Christ
God took me on some tough training. I began applying for colleges, and I believed in the idea that if I had the will, then I had the way to achieve greatness and attend those Ivy League schools. But, each rejection letter was like another knife wound to my pride, and it drastically lowered my self-confidence.
Another thing that happened was, after I told my best friend that I had accepted Christ, she sent me a letter telling me all of the issues she has with Christianity. And, it became apparent that she hates pretty much every aspect of my faith, and that hurt me. One of the reasons why it hurt me was because we were best friends. I saw her like a sister to me for many years, and to imagine that she saw me as more like an enemy was painful. Another reason why her letter shook me was I couldn’t believe that my faith was so weak. I couldn’t believe that one letter could make me doubt so much. You have to understand, I idolized my best friend, because she was smart, and she got into every university she’d applied to, including multiple Ivy Leagues and Stanford. After I got her letter, I believed that my life was full of lies, regarding my self-worth and my identity as a believer, and I began to beat myself up, until I was paralyzed with pain. So, I began spending more time with Scripture, and that eventually led me to make three commitments to God last Sunday, on September 1, when I was holding the little cup of juice symbolizing Jesus’s blood shed for us. The first commitment was that I would forgive everyone who had ever sinned against me, including my best friend. The second commitment was that I would ask—I did ask for forgiveness from God for every sin that I’d committed, especially the ones I’d committed because of my pride. And the last commitment was the hardest one for me to make, which was that I would forgive myself.
A few nights ago, I confronted my lingering resentment against my best friend, and I decided that I wouldn’t love pieces of the world anymore, like the prestige of colleges. For example, Stanford is a great school, but I shouldn’t feel bad about Stanford being ranked higher than UC Davis, because if God wants me to improve lives and make them more joyful, I can do that no matter which college I go to, because God wants me to. I’d also read from the Scripture that God doesn’t have favorites. Some of us were born wealthy; some were born poor. Some of us have to deal with diseases that we don’t deserve. But, God puts us all in different circumstances and we just have to aim to be righteous and right with Him no matter which path we find ourselves walking.
Pastor Jordan told me to pick one or two verses, so I picked two. My first one is: “Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:15-16).
I learned from this verse not succumb to immobilizing depression, because when you are depressed or feeling bad about yourself, more often than not, you’re not paying attention to all those great opportunities God is placing in each day.
My second verse is: “Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13-14).
This verse teaches me to not look back, because what God offers all of us is far better than anything possible on this Earth, so we shouldn’t cling to the past or what’s here on Earth, because heaven is far better.
God took me on some tough training. I began applying for colleges, and I believed in the idea that if I had the will, then I had the way to achieve greatness and attend those Ivy League schools. But, each rejection letter was like another knife wound to my pride, and it drastically lowered my self-confidence.
Another thing that happened was, after I told my best friend that I had accepted Christ, she sent me a letter telling me all of the issues she has with Christianity. And, it became apparent that she hates pretty much every aspect of my faith, and that hurt me. One of the reasons why it hurt me was because we were best friends. I saw her like a sister to me for many years, and to imagine that she saw me as more like an enemy was painful. Another reason why her letter shook me was I couldn’t believe that my faith was so weak. I couldn’t believe that one letter could make me doubt so much. You have to understand, I idolized my best friend, because she was smart, and she got into every university she’d applied to, including multiple Ivy Leagues and Stanford. After I got her letter, I believed that my life was full of lies, regarding my self-worth and my identity as a believer, and I began to beat myself up, until I was paralyzed with pain. So, I began spending more time with Scripture, and that eventually led me to make three commitments to God last Sunday, on September 1, when I was holding the little cup of juice symbolizing Jesus’s blood shed for us. The first commitment was that I would forgive everyone who had ever sinned against me, including my best friend. The second commitment was that I would ask—I did ask for forgiveness from God for every sin that I’d committed, especially the ones I’d committed because of my pride. And the last commitment was the hardest one for me to make, which was that I would forgive myself.
A few nights ago, I confronted my lingering resentment against my best friend, and I decided that I wouldn’t love pieces of the world anymore, like the prestige of colleges. For example, Stanford is a great school, but I shouldn’t feel bad about Stanford being ranked higher than UC Davis, because if God wants me to improve lives and make them more joyful, I can do that no matter which college I go to, because God wants me to. I’d also read from the Scripture that God doesn’t have favorites. Some of us were born wealthy; some were born poor. Some of us have to deal with diseases that we don’t deserve. But, God puts us all in different circumstances and we just have to aim to be righteous and right with Him no matter which path we find ourselves walking.
Pastor Jordan told me to pick one or two verses, so I picked two. My first one is: “Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:15-16).
I learned from this verse not succumb to immobilizing depression, because when you are depressed or feeling bad about yourself, more often than not, you’re not paying attention to all those great opportunities God is placing in each day.
My second verse is: “Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13-14).
This verse teaches me to not look back, because what God offers all of us is far better than anything possible on this Earth, so we shouldn’t cling to the past or what’s here on Earth, because heaven is far better.
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