New Creation ( How I met Jesus)

I first met Jesus when I was twenty-five.

I had been living in the United States for about two and a half years. I was already married and had two beautiful children, my 5-year-old boy and my baby who was only months old. At that time, I was suffering from a deep postpartum depression that prevented me from seeing the happiness of my days. Not even I myself understood the reason for so much sadness and anguish that surrounded me. It was exactly at this critical emotional time that the news arrived: My grandmother had died in Brazil. The shock of the news amalgamated with my delicate state and threw me into one of the deepest valleys I have crossed in my life. the reason for that is that I was terrified about death. Since I was a child, I was scared of even thinking about death and anything associated with it.  This fear arose when at the age of three I lost my best friend. From then on, the dread of death implanted itself in my heart and threw me in an ocean of fears.  As the years passed, the greater this fear became. Knowing that my grandmother had left to this unknown world of the dead, generated in me a grief that went beyond mourning and penetrated into the universe of doubt, questioning and deep sadness at having to confront the ephemeral reality of our earthly existence.

My nights were long. I burned with questions I couldn't find answers for: where is my grandmother now? Is that what life is all about? Could it be that after so much struggle to raise 13 children, sacrificing herself, suffering from so many physical ailments, her existence simply ceased?  Does everything really end up just under the ground without any hope left? What is the main reason for one having been here?  Why then live? And it was in this moment of deep pain that I, who knew Jesus only intellectually, began to seek him spiritually. In tears, I cried out to the Lord. I asked him to reveal to me the true purpose of life. I cried out to his compassion and began to confess my weakness and lack of faith before him. And even though I didn't know how to pray, I asked him to lead me to the truth.

The answer did not come immediately. A few months later, it was in a service visiting a neighboring church that the Lord revealed Himself to me through the words of a guest pastor. The sermon was simple. He preached about the moment that the guards threw lots to see who would get Jesus' garments at the foot of the cross (John 19:23-24). What remained in my memory and in the Spirit were his words: they were casting lots to get insignificant things: the clothes and sandals of a wanderer and they failed to realize that on that cross was the One who could give them all the more through the promise of eternal life for which he was dying there. At that moment, my eyes were opened; the scales fell from them: Jesus died so that we might have eternal life! Hallelujah! Death is not our end, and whoever believes in him will live even if they dye (John 11:15)! He was the missing link for spiritual understanding in my life. And this was how Jesus turned my grief into joy. (John 16:20)

 I understood then that it was not really death that I feared.  The fact is that I was dead and buried by the weight of my sins, by my bitterness. I was lost in the darkness of a Godless path. But the Lord on that holy day chose to breathe life into my spirit and made me be born again. Now I was a new creature and the weight of death no longer shook my bones. My fear was gone as the Lord began to do wonders in me as He still is doing today.

I know that I am a work in progress. However, the fact that I was reborn in Christ and baptized by his Holy Spirit has over the years humbled me into understanding that even in the deepest of valleys he is with me, leading me to green pastures. And his transforming word continues to be the light that illuminates my path.

When I am weak, he makes me strong, when I am thirsty, he satisfies me, when tears come, he collects them and keeps them in a precious vessel.

Despite the circumstances, I walk everyday with my Savior. The one who heard my prayer in a moment of deepest pain, the one who visited a young mother in the day of her distress and rescued that lost sheep to the joy of the angels in heaven. It is to him that I will raise up praise forever and ever. Praise be to his transforming power!

If you don't already know Jesus Christ, this wonderful Savior, I encourage you to know Him. He is right now knocking on the door of your heart and if you open it, he will come in and dine with you and your life will never be the same. This I know, for I have experienced it.  I invite you to “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” (Psalm 34:8)