My Story in Believing Christ

In this reflective post, I would like to focus on my journey of believing christ throughout life. I always had some doubts about Christianity when I was young. However, as I have gotten older I found that this journey is just as important! I am truly grateful for all the challenges and painful events that I have experienced early on in life. Despite being somewhat an over-thinker in many situations. I realized a lot of past events were somehow placed at the right time for no real reason. I did not deliberately think of why if you get what I mean. But it is almost as if God had placed specific challenges carefully to become the person I strive to be, even when my faith was sketchy bad in the past.

1. Questioning God Perhaps what is most interesting for me is my mom is Christian, but my dad isn't. So this has created a unique situation, meaning I can have gotten both perspectives as I grew up. It is one of the things that I realized I had to figure out myself. The questioning God phase was really from childhood years to high school years. As a child, my mom brought me to church and soon, I was in youth groups and youth bible study groups. I remember that one of my biggest complaints was the bible itself. Being diagnosed with dyslexia was not helping with the situation at the time. I was skipping sentences when reading, and after, I would always wish someone would simplify it for me. It also felt very complicated in terms of language, I recall saying it sounds like a school textbook at that point. The second issue focused on remembering bible verses and memorizing them. Knowing that teachers and educational psychologists saying that I have problems were understanding words and reciting verses was a big hit to myself esteem. I definitely felt outcasted in youth groups. Later on, I joined adult service instead, as it felt more interesting and more learnable, despite not fully understanding each session. It was because I was able to be left alone and take in as much as I could. However, as I grew older, especially in the last two years of high school, I have grown to be a lot more philosophical. This has turned from initial complaints into doubt about Christianity. 2. The Doubts Doubting God pretty much lasted till the end of 2019. If someone were to ask me if I was Christian, when I was a child, ill reply with no, but wouldn't reject Christianity as I could not seem to see or feel what people are saying. However, if you were to ask me during my last two years of high school, my answer would be in the middle of 5/10. The reason behind this is because I believe that Christianity is the most realistic and evident religion out there. But the issue I had was more on the bases of scientific thinking, replicability and concern over one single source. This doubt continues on for a majority of my university years.

There were really two significant points during my doubt phase that God has reached out without me noticing until I looked back. One was during a week-long Nelson Norman UX conference when I naturally became friends with another attendee. One day mid-conference, he asked me if I believed in Jesus Christ, and I said my, 5/10 answer. He offered to read his favourite parts of the bible to me and that he understands my concerns. The next day one hour before the conference, he read me the bible and started explaining and having me reflect on its teachings. One hour passed so fast that we were late for our session by thirty minutes conference. Nonetheless, it was closer to 10/10, even if I was unable to say for sure. Not realizing we kept in contact to this day and that hour made so much of a difference to me. The second occasion was back in Vancouver with a now close friend of mine. We have been connecting here and there before but haven't really connected as in-depth until now. She invited me to Alpha in the end, which completed my 100% answer that I have not come in to accept yet back in the conference, but at Alpha, it reminded me that it was about historical accuracy (99% accurate) rather than scientific accuracy.

3. God Giving Me A Lesson At The Right Time So how does this all fall into me believing in Jesus Christ? I was so engraved and focused on comparing myself and thinking of what to do next. That I forgot to step back and look at the bigger picture and appreciate the small things that happened. A large part of it required me to reflect a lot over the years and breaking it down with the psychologist. But looking back, here are a few things that I am grateful that God has put in place for me. Even if it did not felt like it at the time. It was because of those negative experiences that I was able to grow to become someone I am proud of today. 1. The bullying from middle school TAUGHT me to be okay with myself and that it is not the appearance that matters, but it is one's heart and genuine personality that ultimately means the most. 2. Being diagnosed with dyslexia and being pushed down by grades despite trying very hard TAUGHT me that no system is perfect in this world. Often there is no one right answer in life. Instead, it is a more complex system happening. Additionally, there are always different ways of achieving a goal or learning something. And that grades are not an indicator of smartness in real life, especially! 3. My complicated relationship with parents and finding my dad cheating TAUGHT me that parents are not perfect. It further strengthened commonly overlooked issues like communication, honesty, understanding in relationships. It taught me in the future as a father is about showing rather than saying. It is showing that we are not perfect, and that how to resolve complex issues. It is about being there and believing in them. It is allowing autonomy and not overly controlling. It also taught me what true forgiveness is and how it feels to forgive someone. 4. Being continuously rejected made me feeling continuously hopeless with relationships TAUGHT me that feeling of not being good enough was normal, but wasn't the reason. It taught me that my past attempts in valuing honest and truthful communication were not 'too much,' but necessary for the foundation of building long-lasting meaningful relationships. It has allowed me to help others and learn from other's relationship mistakes over the years. It taught me real genuine caring and love are very different from superficial love and that others and you will both identify and feel appreciated. It taught me keeping things ends up being a problem. Instead, we should communicate with your partner and respect each other. It is having vulnerability together and trusting each other, but also strengthen each other in the process. It is not lust; rather, it something much deeper and that it takes commitment and effort always!

4. What did I learn in The End?

In summary, I should not be over my mind and worried as God had a plan all along, even when it felt super painful and chaotic at the time. Recently I started to read the bible more and learning more about God's teachings. And FYI, read the bible with the attitude of learning more, instead of reading it as a textbook with a mindset of what I will get from it. Now that I am reading the bible and understanding it more, I realized that a lot of what he teaches us speaking to me through the various experiences that I had before. Such as my understanding of what I believed love is today would not have surfaced if it were not from rejections after rejections that I faced. I found that despite being hopeless and depressed, all those challenges that God has chosen these challenges for me at different stages of my life to make me a person I am today. Although painful, I am glad I experienced so much being a 22-year-old and I hope to live with faith that he will do what's best for us no matter what the times are.

Take Care,

Timothy