Birmingham Staff

As a child, my family was everything to me. I was raised in a morally upright home, and my parents taught me to live a life of service and self-sacrifice. They modeled this in their own lives by constantly giving to others. My earliest memories consist of me seeking to live up to this ideal; but my real motivation was to feel like I mattered and  had made an impact. I never heard the message of the Gospel, rather I constantly sought to be a good person. When I got to college, I looked back on these memories, and it seemed as though it was all in vain. I was like a hamster on a wheel chasing something that I would never really be able to catch.

Then, after a semester in my fraternity, a fraternity brother shared his testimony with me. It was the very first time I heard the story of Jesus. The idea that Jesus died for me and loved me despite my imperfections was unreal, so I started to investigate. I began by trying to earn my salvation through not sinning.  However, the more I read in the Bible, heard the true Gospel, and failed at being perfect,  I understood that there was nothing I could do to earn my salvation. I stood in a courtroom guilty of sin, and the judge, because of what Jesus had done, declared “Not guilty!” and gave me eternal life. This truth set me free from my slavery to sin and striving for perfection, and my life has never been the same.