Cap's Corner: Are YOU ready for a change in 2019?

Here we are, the beginning of another year – one that can be the year of real change in your life.

I know that most of you have felt a desire to be … well, better! You feel that there is something missing in your life, as if you were created for something much more than what you are right now. You might feel that life is just slipping by, and there is a large part of you that feels so disengaged with life.

Maybe your life is hectic; you are so busy that you are in desperate need of peace. You hunger for a time to just be still – to have some moments when you can just stop the running, the working, the cleaning, the paying of bills, and the taking care of family members. You are not wanting to completely stop all of these things, but you feel as if you are spread far too thin.

You have tried many different things to fix the longing that is deep inside of you; some things help for a while, but in time, they will all fail. And when they fail, you find yourself still feeling “less.” You feel incomplete.

If this sounds familiar, welcome to my world – what was my world, that is. After I graduated from high school and moved out of my parents' home, I did my own thing, and I liked it. I ate what I wanted to eat. I went to bed when I wanted to. I watched what I wanted to watch on TV. And nobody was there telling me to clean my room (which I always thought was the stupidest thing in the world to do. No one was going to see it, and I was just going to make it messy again).

I got married to whom I wanted, and I lived where I wanted to live. I did what I wanted to do, and I did it when I wanted to do it. But there was always something missing – something deep inside of me that was missing. I tried to find out what it was. I tried to fill that “hole” in my life with drugs, alcohol, and women. When all that failed, I became a workaholic. I thought, “If I could just make enough money, have that fancy title, have a new custom-built home, drive the newest cars, and wear the best clothing, I would be happy.”

But everything I tried only made the hole bigger. I wanted those things to fulfill me, but instead, they destroyed me. I lost just about everything that I thought was so important. I lost my wife, my daughter (for a season), and even my carrier. I was a broke, single father caring for my son. The hole that I had tried to fill had become so big that it was all-consuming. These were the darkest days of my life. I had lost all hope in everything.

The only thing that kept me going was my love for my son. Yet with all that love, I still needed help taking care of him. I wanted someone out there who would take him off my hands for a few hours a week, and I thought getting him involved in a church youth group would do the job.

I walked him into a church one Sunday morning to get him into a youth group – and it was the first time I had been in a church in 20 years. I thought I was there only to get him into a youth group, but someone else had different plans for me.

When everything else had failed me – when everyone else had failed me, and when I had failed myself and felt there was nothing out there for me – I finally discovered God. I didn't discover this “all-powerful” being that created everything in the universe, and I did not find Him to be the god of rules. Instead, I found God to be the God of love, passion, grace, and mercy – even for me!

That was years ago. To this day, I can still feel the sense of wonder and amazement I felt when I discovered that God saw value in me. What did He think I was worth? EVERYTHING! He was the thing that had been missing in my life. God filled the all-consuming hole that was in my soul, and He did not fill it with guilt or shame. He filled that hole with love, a divine love that is still showing me how He sees me. He sees me as worth it … all of it!

I walked into a church in Kingwood, TX thinking I was doing so for my son. But I found out that I did so for God’s son: me.

Do you feel that there just isn’t enough of you? That you have been missing out on something? Do you feel that you have no hope? I have felt these things, too. But those feelings are no longer in my life: I found the thing that was missing, and it was God.

Are you ready for a real change in your life? God is waiting for you!