My whole life I confused God with religion.  It was easy for me to see hypocrisy in those who professed to believe in God in church on Sunday but lived just like I lived the rest of the week.  Although I was taken to church each Sunday as a child, all my ears heard was that I could never please God and that I was going to hell.  (Now, that’s not necessarily what was being said, but that’s what my ears heard.)   By my teen years, I knew I had done several things that I had heard qualified me for hell.  So, I decided that if I was going to hell, I was going to have a good time on the way there.  I eventually came to reject the idea that there was a place such as hell.  I also became so hostile toward anything spiritual that I passed right on by being agnostic and went straight to atheism.

My life was a life of self will run riot.  I was driven to the depths of depression and the brink of insanity.  During these years I had an experience where I thought I was going to die.  Somewhere in my gut I cried out, “God if there is a God, please help.”  (Funny prayer for an atheist, huh?) In the blink of an eye I knew there was something bigger than me.  I didn’t know who or what, but I knew there was something out there.  It scared me, because if there was a God, it changed everything.

I launched out on an intellectual pursuit lasting eight years to disprove what had happened to me so I could continue living how I wanted—me in charge.  I started by studying world religions, reading New Age books and anything “spiritual” I could get my hands on.  Several years into the journey, and having had many seeds planted by Christians, I found myself in a church much like Dogwood.  My husband, Patrick, and I had our first child by then and decided we should do what “proper” people do and take her to church.  The first time I walked into that church I thought it was a cult.  I had attended a conservative denomination growing up, so the rock band on stage kind of threw me.  My husband, (being the spiritual head of the home that he was) looked at me and said, “Alison, the Chinese buffet does not open for another forty-five minutes.  Let’s just stay.”  (God can really use anything, can’t He?)

Listening to the pastor that day, I could see how Biblical principles applied to life today—my life.  I still wasn’t convinced that it was for me, though.  The pastor there encouraged me to take a Beth Moore Bible study “When Godly People Do Ungodly Things.”  I was so excited to go there and find out why people were such hypocrites.  Little did I know that I would find out about myself there!  The women in that study were so patient with me and all of my unbelief.  They just kept loving me and praying for me.  I came to know Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior in that class.  For the first time in my life I truly came to understand grace.

I can honestly say that only God can change a heart that was as hardened as mine.  I love the words of the Audio Adrenaline song “Pierced” that was popular around the time I came to know Christ.  They describe my relationship with Him perfectly:

Though I am wounded and unworthy
Though I am selfish and untrue
You are holy, You’re the healer
You forgave me and made me new

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