Embracing a New Life, Saying Good Riddance to the Old

As a 19 year old serving in the US Air Force, I was sent to Europe for a two year tour in the Netherlands. People told me there that you “Work Hard, Play Hard.” I fell right into the lifestyle and did just that. Imagine a nineteen year old in a permissive culture and away from home for the first time, and you get a sense of what that life looked like. However, when the alcohol wore off and I was left with the same problems and a hangover to go with them, I began to believe deeply that there had to be more to life than that. Alcohol and partying could not fill the inner need to be loved and accepted for who I was.

I finished my tour in the Netherlands and was reassigned to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to finish my enlistment. The culture there was slightly less decadent, but I found myself falling into the same pitfalls. About a month before my enlistment was to end, I got a call in my dormitory from my dad. He told me he had been arrested for Driving While Intoxicated, had started attending AA meetings, and “was turning his life over to God as he understood Him.” I was quite skeptical at first. My dad was an active alcoholic for over thirty years at that point, and was in his fifties. Could someone that set in his ways really change? Though I hoped it was possible, I wasn’t quite ready yet to believe it.

I came home and the change in my dad was absolutely breathtaking. The hardened, angry and bitter man I had known had been replaced by a kind, compassionate man. I decided I wanted that for myself. I only attended open AA meetings with dad, as I had a drinking problem but was not an alcoholic. I started watching Christian programming on TV. One day, I prayed with a man on TV to receive Jesus as both my Lord and my Savior.

That was nearly 20 years ago now. My deeply held convictions in the Christian faith have cost me a few friends and subjected me at times to scorn. I have never looked back at my old life. God has carried me through all the storms of life, showered me with His love and given me great hope for the future. I have not been perfect but His grace has covered me and spurred me on. A moment in His presence has been greater than all of the 19 years I spent living for myself.


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