I think anyone who knows me well would say that I’ve always been a pretty deep and intense guy. I don’t know why exactly but there has always been some part of me that I can’t shut off that has to know what’s behind the scenes. I’ve never been content with surface conversations and surface answers to deep questions. I would never say that I’m the sharpest knife in the drawer but I rarely stop asking questions and I rarely quit anything.

In high school I was a pretty confused individual. There were several aspects of my life that I wanted to change really badly and they consumed the lion’s share of my thought life. Once I got to college those pressing difficulties kind of dissipated. I had always wanted to grow a few inches and by the time I got to college I had. I had always wanted to be in the “in” crowd and by the time I got to college I was. I had always wanted to have an easier time hooking up with girls and once I got to college that was pretty easy too. I had never gotten good grades in high school but once I got to college I started rocking it out in school.

All of a sudden the major boulders that I wanted to move had moved. The only surprise was that I thought I would be happy as soon as they moved but….I wasn’t. My college was paid for. I had cool friends and attractive girls that were interested in me. I was making good grades in sunny South Carolina but my soul still had a hole inside of it.

Up until this point I had kind of prayed before. I would pray sometimes that I would sink a putt on the golf course or that my team would win a baseball game. I thought of God as the big guy upstairs who I would occasionally think about while my friends and I were getting high but I never really prayed.

I have often wrote about on this blog how I really gave my life to Christ on December 12 of 2000 but that was not the first time I lifted up a legit prayer.

I remember it was probably around October of that same year. I was in my apartment room and the weight of everything was getting too heavy. I had been trying for so long to fix myself and I was out of answers. I had thought about it to death. I had fixed the things in my life that I thought would make me happy and yet I knew I had not found the meaning of life. I had no deeper sense of purpose and I didn’t know how to get one. My soul still felt empty and I didn’t know how to fill it. I had a good family and people around me that cared but that just wasn’t enough.

I had not really read the Bible that much up until this point and didn’t start reading it that day either. Somehow though there was a short prayer from the book of Psalms that was in my head. To this day I don’t know how these words were inside me but I remember praying them. I remember standing there in my apartment room. I needed help. If there was a God up there that really cared about me, I could certainly use some assistance. I knew in that moment that I had no idea if anyone would really hear me but inaudibly I said these words (at the time I did not know they came from Psalm 130)

“Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord”

That was it. No bells or whistles. Those words came out of my heart. It was weird. I actually felt like the prayer was heard. I felt like I was on a deserted island and I had shot up a flair. It was like dropping a stone down a chasm and you’re not sure if there is anything down there but then you hear the stone hit the bottom. I didn’t think anything of it as the entire moment lasted maybe 10 seconds but when those words were uttered from my heart I got the distinct impression that I was heard.

For the first time in my life I had momentarily put aside the stupid pride that I projected to everyone else that said I had it together. For the first time I basically said…..I don’t have a clue. I’m lost. I feel alone. I don’t know how to make this world make sense. I would really love it if you were real right now.

In that moment I didn’t need the concept of a God. I didn’t need beliefs or ideology because they couldn’t have helped me. If there was an actual God…a real living God on the throne of the universe….then I was interested. So, I took a stab and shot up a flair.

That was the first prayer I ever prayed.