I recall the moment many years ago, when I first accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior... It was around May of 1982 in Tucson, Arizona as I was attending college. A friend of mine (who was also in the choir with me) had invited me around the beginning of the year, to come and sing with him at his church. It seemed their young adult choir at his church were just beginning to put together a special Easter program and they needed some more baritones & basses! So naturally, I jumped right in and helped out. I enjoyed the singing of course, but I really enjoyed the fellowship (I was also going through some personal disappointment at the time) and so after we had finished the Easter program, I continued to attend and found myself curiously drawn to Christ.
One Sunday in May as the pastor was giving his usual "altar-call" something came over me, call it what you will - a voice in my head, the summoning of the spirit or perhaps it was the message that Sunday which laid heavily on my heart - whichever it was - I stood up and walked slowly forward, then gently knelt down on the front steps of the sanctuary. The one single thing I remember the most, was that as I stood up and was walking up to the front of the sanctuary - it was if everything became profoundly silent for what seemed an eternity. It's funny the things that race through your mind at a moment like that. It wasn't scary or anything like that - no, not at all - I felt completely at peace actually... but strangely also felt separated from everything for a while... Even after I was baptised a week or two later - that strange "giddy" feeling lasted for several weeks, maybe even months afterwards. I couldn't explain it. Just a feeling of "joy" and "peace" which I desperately needed at the time and would need in the months that followed as well. (My grandfather would pass away a few months later from prostate cancer just weeks before his 80th birthday... we were close and we lived just a few houses apart)
Time would continue to pass by, and eventually that "feeling" of peace and joy that I so strongly had in the first few months after my acceptance - gently waned over time. I earnestly continued in my efforts to read my bible and attend church as often as I could over the next several years, but one thing led to another and school, music, friends and work eventually won over Jesus being first in my life affairs.
Eventually, as time passed - I graduated from college, landed my first teaching job, got married and then moved to another city and my church attendance and bible reading began to slowly fade away with all the changes in my life...
Several years later I would learn that God was never far away from me, even though my heart had drifted farther and farther away from Him.
That moment when I first accepted Jesus as my savior changed my life in ways I never thought of at the time. The Bible clearly says right there in 2 Corinthians 5:17
"...if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!"
Now I know, years later that that moment when I stepped forward during the music and invitation, was my first worship "epiphany." What I did not know at the time, was that it would not be my last - even though it would take nearly eleven years (and more deeply disappointing personal setbacks) before the next one would occur - The amazing thing to me was that Christ was there with me all the time.
Blessings to you,
Dave
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