I’m Leanne, and, for as long as I can remember, I’ve been going to church. I’d go, and I’d listen, and participate in all the different lessons we were taught during worship sessions. All these amazing miracles…I tried to spread the Gospel to people in my family that didn’t know God. I knew what happened and it was not that I didn’t believe, not that I didn’t understand, just that I'd never felt Jesus actively working in my own life. I felt like I was a mistake sometimes.
In November of 2020, I began working on a presentation to spread the Gospel to my cousin. I presented it to one of the church leaders, she asked me “Do you want to accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior this time?” I answered with a sure, “Yeah! Of course!” Then she led me to a prayer to confess my sins and accept Jesus in my heart as my Savior and Lord. Yet I didn’t fully understand what that prayer meant until I started to attend the online New Christian classes. Even after that, I barely prayed, I missed devotionals often, I rarely tried to spread the Gospel anymore. I sort of just gave up Church life for a “normal” life, one where I just did all my schoolwork and then did whatever I wanted to do. I was so distant with God.
During the school year, I started coming back to Friday Fellowship. I started to have more Christian friends, and one of them, they go to the same school I do, and started to come to Church every weekend again because of them. That same summer, we went to Tuscarora for a retreat. I didn’t think it would be as spiritually opening as it was. But it was. The songs set a fire in my soul with a passion for God. I learned to walk by faith with a fire and passion for God. I wasn’t afraid to shout to the Lord, I actually felt the Spirit for the first time here. When I came back, I think all of us could still feel it, the powerful presence of God at Church. I walked into seventh grade thinking I was ready. I was not prepared, however, for one of the most difficult trials in my life.
For me, eczema ruined me. I couldn’t go on a trip with my friends. I couldn’t go to school for a full week. I had to see so many doctors. I had so many sleepless nights. I had absolutely zero faith. I got frustrated with God. I lost all hope that I would be better, so I just kept making it worse. When I first heard about Tundra 2023, I was so excited until I realized that it was going to be nearly impossible that I would be good enough to go in time. I prayed about it. I didn’t know what to pray for, so I just spoke to God and asked Him to help me. I knew that it was unlikely I would be able to go. It was right after coming home from a long trip to a doctor in Queens that God revealed Himself to me. I was about to scratch at myself because I had lost all faith. I heard a voice telling me to go for it: “Why not?” I told myself. And then I heard the other voice. It told me that it would always be there for me, it would protect and fight for me, and it, God, asked if He’d ever let me down.
I answered with a firm, “No.”
This was the first time that I remember that God personally spoke to me-- A direct message! I was filled with a giddy excitement, and today, I can say that it’s because I knew God never gave up on me. I knew that this was my second chance. I believed in God, and He ensured me that I had been saved. Jesus sacrificed himself for me, for us, He is my Lord and Savior. This is God’s gift. He rescued me from my own sin, and I turned back to Him. I felt God there, and He spoke to me directly. His words just turned my life around, I was able to resist the devil’s temptations, and over the weeks from Tundra to today, I’ve embraced God more and more.
After this moment, I can’t say I was a better person. I, of course, like all, was still a sinner who had bad habits, who missed devotions, who only sometimes read Scripture. I put a lot of pressure on myself to get close to perfect grades. I’ve cried so many times because of my own failure to achieve perfection in everything, feeling like I wasn’t enough. But that’s the devil’s lies. Everyone is a sinner, I was, I still am. I lied and I still made excuses. But that’s why, that is why we need Jesus in our lives. When I recognized myself as a sinner, it was like I had a new consciousness in my mind. God took me in, and I was reborn. I know now that the change could not have been possible if Jesus wasn’t there, and He didn’t talk to me. I now felt guilty and prayed after I made a mistake or sinned again. I picked up online devos with two great counselors. I joined the praise team. I felt at peace when I stood at Church: A sanctuary and place of God’s Spirit. I know that God is with me always, like how He was with the disciples throughout their teachings. Someone once told me that I was here for a reason, that God has His will for me. I’m not here by mistake. I know I’m not perfect, and I’ll never be. I can’t do anything by myself, but with God, anything is possible. I am new in God, in the Spirit. God walks with us.
“I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:20 states.
I know that God promises me that.