Then slowly the details of the day I accepted Christ started coming back to me. I remember listening to the sermon and the beginning of the invitation. They played �Just As I Am� and I remember standing there singing, with this enormous weight pressing down on my chest. I remember trembling and thinking �Go now, move.� I remember leaving my pew to start that long walk down to the front of the church, because I knew that if I didn�t leave that spot, I would regret it for the rest of my life. I remember the Pastor bending down, taking my hand and asking what he could do for me. I remember crying and saying �I know I�m a sinner. I know that Jesus died for me. I want to invite Jesus into my heart.� He prayed with me then, and I prayed along with him. I remember being baptized but I don�t remember feeling any different after I came up out of the water except I was wet, and knowing that now I was baptized with Jesus. I guess you could say that almost eleven was too young to know what I was doing. My mother and my grandmother both talked to me and were both convinced that I really believed in the fact that Jesus saved me that day. In a way I�m sorry that I was so young, because a lot of folks still think it�s better to wait until the child is at least thirteen or older. I remember twice while attending church, after having not been in a while, going back and rededicating my life to Jesus; backslidden and repenting for the time that I had been away.
I know that right now, some days God doesn�t get my best all the time. I get distracted by one thing, or worry, or situation, or person, and I don�t let Him order my days.
I was able to reach out to a lady at work, and let her in where I was; let her know that I understood the troubles she was facing at that time. She had a big problem that seemed to overwhelm her. She couldn�t sleep, couldn�t eat, and couldn�t concentrate at work, because of a worry that wouldn�t go away. I related to her in a way that I never would have considered possible just a few months before. I suggested that she pray about the whole thing and turn it over to God, and let Him handle it. I am glad to say that her problem was solved, and she is happier now than she was then.
Christmas was awkward. Everyone gave me presents that a Christian should receive, and I guess it was their way of reassuring me that I was one. My sister and her husband gave me a beautiful cross necklace. I felt really weird about wearing it when I still had doubts, because I thought that if people couldn�t tell without my wearing a symbol around my neck, then I wasn�t a very good witness. Slowly over the next few weeks, what I was reading in the Bible began to make sense again.
In January 1998, I was eating and felt a part of my tooth crack. I went to my dentist and found out that I had a cavity eat almost clean through to my nerve bundle in a back tooth. He told me that he was really surprised that I was not in any pain since I should have been having severe pain in that tooth, and possibly jaw pain or headaches. He asked if I had noticed any difference in the way my food had tasted, because I had swallowed all of the yuck that was in the cavity. He was amazed that I hadn�t come in before then to ask him to pull it. I had a root canal, and a crown put on that tooth......