Changed by Jesus #34

By Benjamin, Ballard campus

During the fall quarter of my freshman at the University of Washington, Jesus Christ pulled me up from the darkest pit I had ever dug for myself, and set me upon the rock that is himself. It is a blessedly disorienting thing to be pulled out of darkness.

At the beginning of my university experience, I was one of the many who took full sinful advantage of my new found freedom. I lived a fast life with lots of mistakes, alcohol, sexual sin, lies, gossip, and selfishness. God was just a moral weight that I would place on the other end of the scale in attempt to bring balance to my destructive actions.

Things started to change after my roommate started taking me to Mars Hill. I began to hear powerful teaching about who God really is, and how my view of him had been horribly mangled into a moralistic, kind-of-religious, kind-of-New-Age heresy.

I had been to church before, but until that particular quarter I had not heard and felt God’s word. The sermons cut me so deep. I do not remember if it was a day or a week when I first received a new heart from and for Jesus, but I do know that God used the solid teaching and community of Mars Hill Church to scorch through the cobwebs that coated the coffin I once called a heart. God replaced that stone with a heart of flesh, a heart that loves Jesus Christ.

Shortly after I became a Christian, I began to participate in the Mars Hill College Mission. As I slowly integrated into the family of the church, I felt God fortifying my heart and the faith he had given me. I continued to learn honest and truthful teaching about who God really is; eventually I got baptized and began leading a community group.

Jesus has forever changed my life. I am so thankful for him, and for Mars Hill Church, which God uses to bring lost sheep like me back into his fold.