“That almighty God would meet with a doubtful child by his spirit blows my socks off…”
When I was about 9 I started getting very scared of dying, I remember being afraid to go to sleep at night fearing I wouldn’t wake up again. I wondered what happened after you die, was it oblivion? Darkness? I asked my parents who are Christians about this and they said you go to be with God in heaven when you die. I started thinking that going to heaven was a nice thought but that someone has made all this God stuff up just to settle these fears. This lead to doubts about God’s existence. I remember I said a prayer in my room before I went to bed one night, it was an incredibly entitled prayer but it made perfect sense to 9 year old me at the time and it came from the heart. I said ‘God, if you are real, send me an angel right now and I’ll believe.’ So I waited and waited and nothing happened, I went to bed that night annoyed and doubtful. Anyway 6 months later when I had just turned 10 I went to a church kids camp for a week, it was summer time. Roughly halfway through the week during the worship I remember I felt an overwhelming sense of joy that Jesus had paid for all my wrongdoings on the cross, love for God and love for others washed over my innermost being, I felt like my soul had been struck by lightning and set on fire. All the doubts and all the fear of the past 6 months was replaced by peace and I knew that I needed to give Jesus my all and to follow him. I am so grateful now looking back for God’s patience and mercy with me, that almighty God would meet with a doubtful child by his spirit blows my socks off.