Letter to the Editor

A life-changing experience

To the editor:I appreciate David Limbaugh's discussion of Lee Strobel's reassuring work, "The Case for the Real Jesus." But a scholarly search is not always necessary.

In 1977 a fellow teacher told me Jesus Christ was who he claimed and my self-serving lifestyle was an affront to him, the God who had created me. I inexplicably responded like the Jerusalem crowd at the first Christian sermon about A.D. 37. I also was "pierced to the heart" and said, "What shall I do?"

The friend told me the same thing Peter had said: Repent (consider your life to be on the wrong foundation and turn away from it), be baptized (which I later was) and I would receive the Holy Spirit (which occurred in a most discernible manner).

What then occurred rendered the good work of men like Strobel unnecessary for me. As I left that room the startling presence of Jesus himself hurried to keep up at my right hand. I experienced a dramatic sense of forgiveness for the way I had been living and a deep desire to set right what I could. I had an ongoing passion to read my new Bible and get by myself to pray. A heretofore foreign voice gave me advice. I could give and receive unmitigated love for the first time.

Through the years I have been confronted by learned cynics and disconcerting events conspiring against faith. But my experiences to the contrary were deep. My life is buoyed to this day.

MIKE WOELK, Cape Girardeau