Before exercising faith in Jesus by submitting to him as Lord of my life, I believed God was real but hadn’t experienced him working in my life. Since August 2, 1971, God has repeatedly made himself real to me in my experience.
The Bible contains many verses in which God says he will act, with the result that people will know from their experience that he real and in charge. For me, the book of Ezekiel is the best example of this: In the 48 chapters of this book, God says 78 times (!) that he will soon act, with the result that “then they will know that I am the Lord.” For example: Ezekiel 37:6, 13-14: “I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord. 13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord.” Most of these 78 promises in the book of Ezekiel were made to the people of Israel who, because of unbelief and disobedience to God, had been exiled to Babylon. Some were concluding that their exile meant that Israel’s God was weaker than Babylon’s god Marduk. Through the prophet Ezekiel, God said repeatedly to the exiles that he would soon act in such a way that they would know from their experience that he is the Lord.
The prophet Elijah, during his confrontation with the 450 prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, prayed, “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”(1 Kings 18:36-37). God responded with a shocking display of his power, and the people then knew from firsthand experience who the true God is—not Baal but the Lord (Yahweh): “Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, ‘The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!’ (1 Kings 18:38-39)
When the capital city of Israel’s northern kingdom was under siege by thirty-three foreign kings and their armies, a prophet announced to Israel’s evil King Ahab, “This is what the Lord says: ‘Do you see this vast army? I will give it into your hand today and then you will know that I am the Lord.'” (1 Kings 20:13)
Jesus made a similar promise to his disciples that he would reveal himself to all those who believe in him and obey him: “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him.” Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, “But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?” Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.” (John 14:21-23)
Over the past 46 years, as I have learned about God, and sought to love and obey him, I have experienced his guidance and provision in ways that have proven to me that he is real, is good and loving, is in charge, is true to his promises, and is worthy of our commitment and trust! He has indeed brought great fulfillment to my life. Here are some experiences I have had with God since 1971—in mostly chronological order:
1971
My first experience of God happened on August 4, 1971–two days after I gave my life to Christ. During an evening prayer meeting of college students from Christ Church of Oak Brook, Illinois, I was sitting on the floor of the college pastor’s home in a circle of students who were praying. I had never been in a prayer meeting before. With my head bowed as I listened to others pray, a light bulb went off unexpectedly in my head in what I now call my first Eureka! moment: “Hey, I became a Christian!” I then understood the meaning of my commitment to God two nights earlier. I sensed that God had shown this to me. That night, for the first time, I experienced God as real in my life, and felt personal fulfillment as a result.
Before I became a Christian in 1971, at the age of 20, I wasn’t intererested in reading and studying as I went through school. I competed in 5 sports growing up: baseball, football, basketball, tennis and ice hockey. My motivation was to out-compete my peers, not only in sports but also in school regarding who got the highest grades. So I was not interested in what I was studying in school, just in out-competing my peers for the highest grades. Yet within weeks of deciding to follow Christ in 1971, I had memorized the first six chapters of the Book of Romans due to experiencing a new inner drive to understand and follow the Bible by memorizing it and studying it. This drive has never left me. After I married Sharon in 1973, in 1974 I was working full-time as a house painter after we moved to Denver, waiting to start seminary that fall. I was continuing to read and memorize the Bible in seeking to understand it when one day I experienced a sense that Gold told me I should get up at 4am every day to do my Bible study and memorization of it. So I did that, and it has continued to this day. For most of the the 46 years since then I have read through the Bible each year, following a one-year reading plan. God has often given me insight into his Word, or guidance, for my life during this daily time of seeking him through reading and memorizing the Bible. This discipline of daily Bible study has given me great personal fulfillment.
I’ve been swimming laps as my primary exercise since about 1980. Until 2006, to motivate myself in doing 32- lap miles, I would pretend I was a major league pitcher (like I was in Little League as a child, when I had set a record for my community by striking out 16 of 18 batters I faced in a six-inning game once), seeking to win the major league Cy Young award. As I swam lap 1 of 32, I would tell myself my record for the year was 0 wins and 32 losses. Each lap I completed became a win, such that when I finished lap 32, completing the mile, my record for the year was 32 wins and 0 losses. “I win the Cy Young award!” I would tell myself as I completed the mile. Another way I would motivate my mind in trying to swim a mile was to pretend that my favorite football team, the Denver Broncos, was losing a game 32-0 as I started my mile. After lap 32, they had actually won that game, 32-0, I would tell myself in celebrating the completion of that mile. In 2006, after 26 years of those mental athletic games I would play in helping me swim miles, as I swam a mile one day I sensed a directive from the Lord: “When you are swimming, you should go over Bible verses.” Since that I have done that instead of mental athletic games. To this day, I review memorized Bible verses while I swim or verses I am trying to memorize. To start it in 2006, I took verses I had already memorized (and all new verses subsequently memorized since then) and put them to a 2-2 musical rhythm, because the rhythm of swimming is left/right, left/right. The result is what I now call my hobby, which God told me to call “Hip Hop Heaven” —memorizing verses in syncopated 2/2 beats, and reviewing them as I swim laps. Until 2007 I measured each day’s swimming by how many laps I swam. Now I measure it by how many verses I reviewed. I review about 4 verses per lap. Swimming a mile used to take me 32 laps; now it takes me about 128 verses. I credit the Lord for enlivening the monotony of my exercise routine!