As I look back at my salvation experience, from a worldly view, it could seem rather mundane or even insignificant. I didn’t have a lightning bolt from Heaven experience as a young adult or a super exciting conversion experience. I did have some life – altering experiences as an adult that have formed me into the man I am today, but I’m getting ahead of myself...

I gave my life to Jesus around the age of seven or eight. I believe that is what kept me from having to have a lightning bolt from Heaven experience as mentioned above. I knew that something was missing in my life, and I decided to trust in Jesus to save my soul and to fill that void. My parents brought me to church every time the doors were open, and I was raised in a loving, God – centered home. I am the second of three boys, yes middle child..., and my parents have been married for over 50 years.

My story can best be compared to the prodigal son. I wandered from God as an adult for years. I knew my soul was secure, but I wasn’t living a life that was pleasing to God. I got married at twenty – two, and four years later, my first wife, Charlie (Charlotte), and I had our first child, Hannah. During this time, I was elected as a Deacon in my church, and shortly thereafter I became the choir director. My home life had begun to shift after the birth of Hannah, and I wrongly began to elevate her to a position of greater affection than my wife. That negative trend extended and expanded with the birth of our son, Ty, four years later. I loved my wife, but I loved my kids more than anything else, including my relationship with my Heavenly Father. I didn’t realize that at the time, but it would eventually be made crystal clear that I had placed my children as an idol in my life.

Fast forward several years and I found myself in an almost loveless marriage with two children and a wife that was more like a roommate than a spouse. Charlie and I decided that we no longer wanted to be married and, after failed counseling, we decided to move forward with the dissolution of our marriage. That was when things got very dark for me. As often happens in divorce situations, each person is getting information and input from people that are firmly in their camp, whether they want it or not, and whether it is good input or not. Long story short, Charlie attempted to take my children away from me and went so far as to get DSS involved, and I couldn’t see my children for almost two months, while we were waiting on a Family Court Hearing. I didn’t realize it at the time because I was so completely devastated, but that was the lightning bolt from Heaven moment in my life where God Almighty reminded me that He was to be first in my life – not my precious children. It was shown to me the frailty of human dependency, even with my children, and how they could be taken away from me at

any moment – either through death or circumstances. I got custody of Hannah within six months or so of my divorce, and I got custody of Ty, about three years later. Actually, Charlie and I shared joint custody, but I was the primary custodian, meaning, they lived with me.

Through my divorce and my marriage to Casey, God has shown me more grace and love that I could have ever imagined possible. God has given me a second chance to be a much better husband and father. Through all the ups and downs, and trials of my life, I still felt there was something missing – something incomplete. A few years ago, I’m not sure the exact time, our pastors preached a series on the Holy Spirit here at Awaken. God used that sermon series to bring everything fully into focus for me. Although I had the Holy Spirit within me for all those years, I had never fully allowed him to operate how He wanted. I was running my life. I surrendered my will at that time to the Holy Spirit and I now surrender to Him each and every morning and ask him to fill me completely – to empty me and be filled by the Holy Spirit so much that it pours out onto those around me. God has blessed my relationship with my children, both grown now, and my marriage to Casey is sweeter than I ever thought possible. The closer Casey and I each grew and continue to grow to God individually, the closer we are as a couple.

A few years after my divorce, Charlie and I reconciled to the point where we were able to forgive each other and ourselves for our failed marriage. Charlie has since remarried, to a great man named Keith, and he just recently became a pastor of a small church in North Carolina. I know that God prefers marriage over divorce. I also know and have seen that God will use anything, including divorce, to glorify Himself. God sometimes uses devastating circumstances, often time of our own making, to bring us to the point where we are forced to trust in him to sustain us. That is the truth I have experienced in my own life. I have not “arrived”, so to speak, in the Christian walk. I won’t fully arrive until I am at home in Heaven with my Savior and Lord. I do surrender daily to my Lord and ask him to guide my path and I trust him to do just that. The opportunity to serve my God as an Elder, is to me the ultimate redemptive story, to show others that we serve a God that is full of Grace and Mercy, and that with Him, all things are possible.

In His Name,

Craig Collier