It Takes Only a Moment

Before

I was raised Christian, but for a long time I had no idea what that truly meant.

As a teenager, I professed faith. I was baptized. I was taught Scripture, and eventually I taught it to others.

Then hardship came.

My faith was tested, and I was found lacking.

I fell away into unbelief and remained there for many years.

A great deal of life happened during that time. I married my childhood sweetheart. We welcomed our first child. There was love in my life, and there were good things—things I remain profoundly grateful for.

But there was darkness, too.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, I slipped into a place I am still too ashamed to describe in any detail.

What I can tell you is that eventually I stopped feeling much of anything.

I was numb.

Not merely sad. Not merely tired.

Numb.

It felt as though something inside me had gone quiet. I moved through life, worked, spoke, laughed when I was supposed to laugh, and did the things a person is expected to do—but internally, I might as well have been dead.

There were moments when the people I loved were the only tether keeping me here.

And for years, that was simply my life.

The Moment

Then, less than two months ago, something happened.

I was doomscrolling TikTok one evening, probably around eight or nine at night, when an image appeared on my screen.

From what I remember, the background was completely black, with white text—nothing elaborate, almost forgettable in any other context. The words were something along the lines of:

Once Saved, Always Saved.

That was it.

And then something changed.

It is difficult to describe this without sounding strange, because the experience itself was strange.

I felt a distinct heat emanate from my neck and chest until it seemed to envelop my entire body, and suddenly it felt as though I were breathing after having forgotten how.

My thoughts began moving in a direction they had not moved in years.

I remembered the cross.

I remembered the promise.

I remembered Jesus.

And for the first time in nearly twenty years, I felt something I had almost forgotten was possible: Joy.

Not excitement or nostalgia.

Joy. Real joy.

And suddenly, things I had spent years around but never truly understood began to make sense to me.

I had grown up in church. I had read the Bible. I had listened to sermons. I had been baptized. I had even taught others. And yet, standing there nearly twenty years later, I realized how little I had understood about what it actually means to know Jesus—what it means to come to the foot of the cross with nothing to offer, what it means to stop trying to justify yourself, what it means to follow Him.

It was as though things I had known about for years suddenly became real.

Now, I want to be careful here.

That image could have been completely ordinary. The account posting it could have been completely ordinary. The timing could have been coincidence. People have since offered me plenty of perfectly reasonable explanations for what happened that night, and I am not interested in pretending I can prove otherwise.

I can only tell you what I experienced.

And there is one detail I still cannot explain.

I distinctly remember liking that video on TikTok. I remember saving it. I remember downloading it to my phone. Later, I went looking for it.

Can you guess what was nowhere to be found? Make of that what you will.

I know only what happened afterward: I began seeking Jesus again.

Now

At first, I kept everything private—questions, thoughts, prayers, passages of Scripture I suddenly saw differently, things that frightened me, things that comforted me, things I could not stop turning over in my mind. I put them all into a journal because, in many ways, I feel like an infant in the faith.

There is an enormous amount I do not know, and an even greater amount I once thought I knew but am now discovering I barely understood.

And I would be remiss to lose even a single thought the Lord gives me. So I wrote them down.

Then today, a phrase came to mind:

The Why.

And I could not shake it. I mulled it over in my head. What is it about that phrase?

Could it be:

Why do I believe this?

Or was it:

Why did this passage frighten me while another brought me peace?

Maybe even:

Why did I walk away?

Or further:

Why did I come back?

But really, what it came down to:

Why Christ?

Those questions are the reason this exists.

I am not writing as someone standing at the end of the road, turning back to explain the journey to everyone behind me. I am writing while I walk it myself. Maybe I'm even behind you. I've already tripped over obstacles. I've already failed. But while I cling desperately to Jesus, perhaps something I learn along the way can help you, too.

This is where I will document my thoughts, my questions, my challenges, my prayers, and what I am learning in Scripture along the way.

Sometimes I may be wrong. In fact, I would be shocked if I weren't. Sometimes I may return to something I wrote months earlier and realize I understood it poorly. If that happens, I hope I will have the humility to say so.

Because the purpose of this is not to prove how much I know.

It is to know Him better.

And to keep a record of the questions that lead me there.

I do not know how often I will post. I do not know where this will lead—but I know why I am doing it.

I pray that somewhere in these pages, something I wrestled with might help you wrestle with it too; that something which comforted me might comfort you; that something which sent me searching through Scripture might send you searching too.

And above all, I pray that whatever usefulness these words may have will point beyond me toward our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

That is The Why.