Religion to Relationship Part 1

This will be part one of this new series. I hope you are all blessed by my testimony and that you too will see the importance of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
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I grew up in a nice Christian family. We went to church every week, prayer meetings and we went to nursing homes to sing to the elderly. We read the Bible and we learned all the neat stories in the Bible. As a young adult, I thought I had it altogether when it came to religion.

In 1988 my husband and I got married. We had our first son in 1990. Then in Jan of 1991, because my husband was having a very hard time finding a job that would support us (so that I could be a stay at home mom,) he joined the military. Six weeks of boot camp - and I was not able to hardly talk to him at all. Then on to the training school for the next several month. Then he got his first orders. He had asked for a base in Texas - that way we could be close to family. But he got Germany. He left for Germany in June of 1991. My son and I were not able to go till October of 1991. It was a lot time of not getting to see my husband. It was hard being a "single parent." But I understood that my husband was trying to do the best thing for our family.
The only housing that my husband was able to get for us we out on the economy- meaning not military housing. This made us very isolated. I had been told by a few people that the people in Germany have English classes in their schools so they know how to speak at least some English. Well we did not find this to be the case. We had one TV station that had about 6 hours of English speaking shows during the day. And we had one radio station - one that played a lot of music I did not want to listen to. The days were long. During this time I decided I was going to read my Bible through. So during my son's nap times I would read my Bible and pray. As I type this I can remember sitting in a chair by the big windows with the sunlight shining through. And feeling the warmth. It was like God's love melting my heart and helping me to understand that what he wanted was a relationship with me, and for me not to be stuck in just a religion with do's and don'ts. He wanted not only to be my Creator, my Saviour but, also my Friend. Even though this time in Germany was very hard for me, the blessing that I received from it was so very worth it- a relationship with God. I am still on a journey to getting to know Him more and more.

Today the sun is shining and it is a beautiful day. And I am reminded of that day many years ago when I really gave my heart to God. I just thought that I would share my testimony today. May you also grow in your relationship with God.