During this time, one of my friends had become a Christian. She became very involved in youth group activities at one of the churches in town and was always ready to talk about all the fun things she was doing. She even invited me to attend church with her one Sunday. I went along mostly just to make her happy. I certainly didn't go for the service itself. I had no interest in what went on inside the church.
But, she kept getting me involved. The choir was putting on a musical drama and I was asked to help out because of my technical theater skills. I treated the production like any other theatrical production; I did my best to help make it go smoothly, but I paid no attention to the story being presented. We even took the show on the road and travelled to other churches. I went along, but somehow I felt like I just didn't fit in. Everyone was always very nice to me, but even that felt uncomfortable because it seemed like there was something going on in their lives that I just couldn't understand. What I didn't realize at the time was that, even though I was trying to ignore the story they were presenting, the message was still being presented to me over and over again.
After my friend graduated from high school, she got involved in the campus ministry at the local college. She also eventually dragged me to this group. I went to a couple of meetings and even a retreat with them. But I quickly dropped out because I just didn't want to participate in this "religion thing" that they were all involved with.
But I soon discovered that I couldn't stay away. For the first time in my life, I had come across a group of people who appreciated me just because I was another person. They didn't care about what I could do for them. They didn't care about how I dressed, or who I knew. I never had to do anything to impress them just to stay part of the group. They liked me just because I was me. Their parties didn't consist of sitting around smoking and getting drunk while listening to earsplitting rock music. They had fun! We'd go canoeing, hiking, bowling, swimming, play frisbee, and much more. And always there would be a phone call, "Are you coming? We really want you to join us." I didn't believe what they believed and I was sometimes quite vocal about it. But that never stopped them. They just wanted me to be part of the group.
continue...