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Stop the world, I want to get off! I believe we have all felt that way at
one time or another. I felt that way for years. I chased the American Dream for decades, only to find emptiness. My next success was
expected to bring me happiness, joy, peace and contentment. I achieved many things, but happiness and peace eluded me.
I remember studying Abraham Maslow at Boston University in 1974. He had a theory called Man’s Hierarchy of Needs. At the base was
the need for food, shelter and clothing, but at the top of that hierarchy, was the need for self-actualization. I bought this theory
hook, line and sinker and I pursued the life of a modern day Renaissance Man.
I pursued education, art, sports, career, romance, culinary skills, political influence and of course personal wealth. In doing so,
I believed I would find that personal gratification that comes from achievement, success and prestige. In all these pursuits, I rejected
the God of my youth. You see, He got in my way, so I just denied His existence and I pressed on with my own agenda.
After 30 years of chasing the lie, I found the American Dream was a Nightmare. My writing and photography were dark and foreboding.
Themes of despair and decay were prominent in all my thoughts. Regardless of my success, there was no joy in my life. Happiness
was always somewhere over the horizon, it was never in the present.
The great King Solomon experienced similar emptiness as stated in Ecclesiastes 2:11 "…when I surveyed all that my hands had done
and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun".
I knew I had to get God back into my life, so I decided to add religion
to my "To Do list". After 6 months of trying to get something out of religion, I was invited to a Bible-based church and my eyes were
opened up to Jesus Christ. I found it isn’t about checking churchgoing off my "To Do list". It’s about accepting God’s grace
through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ on a cross for me!
I had attended this Bible teaching church twice when the guys invited me to a monthly men’s breakfast. I went and listened as some
hockey coach shared a Jesus story and another guy shared his testimony. Then some guys suggested we go to Living Stone. I
asked, "what’s Living Stone"? Bob answered, "Come and see".
When I arrived at Living Stone, there was a full size cross stretched
across two sawhorses. The plan was to erect it that day. The cross had been built the week before, for Easter. I thought I was
surrounded by a bunch of fools. They were taking this Jesus stuff too far.
Before the cross was planted in the ground every man there had the opportunity to carry that cross partway to its destination. When the
full weight of the cross was placed on my shoulders I almost collapsed to the ground under its weight. I am 6'1" and 200 lbs. I
wondered what it must have been like to carry that cross having been beaten, flogged and wearing a crown of thorns. A week later, I
fell to my knees at an altar call and asked Jesus into my heart. One year later, on Good Friday, I knelt at the base of that cross and wept
like a baby, knowing I helped nail my savior to that tree.
"Father forgive Chuck, for he knows not what he does."
I have been an apprentice stone cutter at Living Stone on the weekend for three years now. I have witnessed God’s changes in my
life and blessings too numerous to mention. Through God’s grace, I now lead the men’s ministry in that church. It is always a joy to see
how visitors are touched by God’s Word in stone. Perhaps my most memorable day was last summer when I led a men’s event at Living
Stone. After one of the brothers shared his testimony, a young drug addict fell to his knees and gave his life to Christ. He is now in Teen
Challenge and he is destined for the ministry. Praise God!
After all my years of searching I have found happiness, joy and peace in knowing a man from Nazareth named Jesus. But I no longer
seek contentment because there are too many who are still lost, those who reject Jesus and try to create their own god in their own
image. I pray for them because I was there and I know the futility of their quest.
-- Chuck Miller, 2001
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Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me...
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