My testimony starts a bit cliché like a lot of Christians I know, I was brought up in a Christian family, de-blah-de-blah-de-blah. But I have to say, the fact that my parents were Christians didn't really help me all that much in my journey with Jesus. I was made to come to church every Sunday, and when I was little, I found it really was very boring, and really unfair that I had to go! I went to Sunday school, and from there, I got the impression that being a Christian was all about believing in God, and knowing all the stories from the bible. Little did I know just how wrong I was.

When I was 11 I went on this Christian pathfinder camp called Barnstaple, it completely changed by perspective on Christianity, as I discovered about the Holy Spirit and gifts of the spirit, and all these exciting things that God provides. I realised for the first time that being a Christian was about having a 2-way relationship with God, you talk to him, and he talks to you, and I really wanted to start to get to know him properly.

So I came back from Barnstaple on a spiritual high, and really went for it for the first few months, and started to fade away. The same thing happened each time I went to Barnstaple, and I knew there was something preventing me from keeping it up at home. The church I go to, has a youth club called The Pulse, I used to go there every Friday night and just hang out with mates, I knew that it was run by the Christians at my church, but I thought nothing of it. When I was 13 I became a leader at the youth club, and discovered that there was an event on Sunday nights after church called Pulse8. It's basically a church service in itself, and it's like having Barnstaple all year round I suppose! It's really awesome, and it really helped me to keep that passion for God all year round!

While all this was going on, a lot of things were going on in my life. I'd started a new school, because I was bullied quite badly in my old one, and as time passed more and more things went wrong in my life. I really struggled with the idea that God knew what we were going through, because although Jesus did suffer, he was a guy (to put it bluntly), and he didn't go through all the things I was going through, he didn't have a clue how much pain I was in! I became very depressed and extremely angry at everything. I always told myself that I would never be the person that blames God for things going wrong in their life; but I was just so angry, I was blaming the people that had caused me to go through all this pain, I blamed myself for letting these things go wrong, and eventually, I began blaming God for not doing anything about it, like he promised. I eventually got to a point where I was fed up dedicating my whole life to God, serving him, and not getting anything in return, and I was giving up on God, I didn't want to be a Christian anymore, I'm gonna do things my way!

Ironically, just after having made this decision, I went on the CU's weekend away. I was very pessimistic, sure that God wouldn't talk to me, and I wouldn't go for God's sake at all. The problem was, in such a happy clappy Christian environment, I found it impossible to stay mad at God; and I just joined in with all the singing and religious talk, no-one needed to know that I wasn't actually a Christian. I stayed in a cabin with everyone from the CU who had gone; the first night some of the girls started to open up about things going on in their lives, and I felt almost drawn to tell them about the problems I'd been having as well. I felt as though the cabin was completely safe, like there were angels around the building, and I had complete trust in the girls in the cabin. So eventually I plucked up the courage to share, and although I found it really hard to talk about what I'd gone through so openly, I felt so much better afterwards, like the burden had been lifted from me. I woke up the next morning, and went to the meeting. Pete, who was talking, talked about being prejudice. It really opened my eyes. I've always had very strong views about how God loves everyone equally, unconditionally, regardless of their sins, and as God's follower I must show that love. I didn't realise that I was being really hypocritical of that view, because I was actually showing a lot of hate to these people that had hurt me. I was so angry at what they did, I didn't realise that was judgmental, because God loves them, and so should I. I felt myself wanting to forgive them. I spoke to my friend about it later, and I realised I shouldn't be angry at myself either, because I should be looking to the future, rather than dwelling on the past. This meant there was only 1 person left to be angry at, and that was God.

We prayed about it, and a word that God had given me earlier in the week suddenly came to light, and I realised God's love, and I felt God's love in it's entirety, and I realised that I couldn't be separated from this overwhelming, never-ending love. This love I felt was so pure, so strong, how could I ever want to be away from a love that tells me that nothing else in the world matters, could you bear to be away from that love, if you felt it unconditionally in your heart?

One of the girls at the CU later had a bible verse for me, which said I would be filled with an inexpressible joy, and I was, I can't even describe how I felt, I went from being really depressed and really angry, to feeling so much joy and so much love, and peace! All in the space of a weekend! If God can do that for me, he can do it for you too! He already died the most horrific ever death, with his hands and feet nailed to a plank of wood, just so that you could live, now he still wants to do more for you, I think that's absolutely awesome!


-Michelle Rawlins