Story 1: Quiet Time

My journey to Christ was quiet. I wasn’t one who had a radical change from a non-believer to a believer.

I can remember going to church as a small child and praying to God in my room throughout my entire life. I never questioned if God was there, because time and time again He showed himself.

God has always been my closest friend, and often we spent time together in the quiet and dark moments before I fell asleep in my room.

Often I would feel lonely, not because I had no one in my life, but because no one truly seemed to know how I felt, or understood the deep longing that I had to feel seen, loved, and appreciated.

My parents did the best they could with raising my sister and I, as all parents do. But they weren’t in a happy marriage, and often tension and unhappiness filled the spaces between the moments in our home. As a result, there were many nights when I cried myself to sleep.

I would fold my hands and sit up in the dark, wondering if God was truly as close as I had been told.

Even in the moments when God felt far away, or my prayers seemed to float into empty space, I never stopped praying. And even after a night of tears, when the room around me felt empty, a peace I couldn’t explain would settle down over me.

On one of those nights, I experienced God in a way that would forever convince me that I was not alone.

I had been praying to God in those quiet nighttime moments, and I was crying. I remember asking God to answer me. I was pouring out my heart to Him and feeling utterly alone. I ended my prayer, and laid down on the bed.

Turning, I went to face the wall. I remember that my eyes were open, and I stared at the fuzzy blackness of the wall. And out of the silence, I heard a voice. And I physically felt my soul shudder inside my body at the sound.

“Jasmine.” Was all it said, but I knew who spoke the word.

I heard God speak to me and I knew it was Him. I heard the voice with my ears, and even though I had never heard Him speak before, I just knew it was Him.

“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” -John 10:27

You may want to know what the voice sounded like, and it’s hard to describe.

The voice was loud and quiet at the same time. It was the still small voice, but there was power in it. If He had asked me to do anything in that moment, I know I would have without question. His voice was that of a commander, and also a friend.

I was too shaken to speak after God said my name, and part of me wishes that I had said something back to Him. The next morning, the devil came for the word God had spoken to me.

“When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside.” -Matthew 13:19

He whispered lies to me, that it was a dream. I had imagined the whole thing. Surely God hadn’t spoken to me. And I would have believed the lie, if not for the unshakeable truth. I had felt my soul shudder in my body at the word. I had never experienced that before, and I could not justify that I had made it up.

I was changed after that night.

Even though I have not heard the audible voice of God since that night, I am forever reminded that He knows my name. And that is enough reason to keep pursuing God. I will never abandon my Lord, because He is real. He knows my name.

And He knows your name too.