Previous Challenge Entry (Level 2 – Intermediate)
Topic: Lifeguard (11/09/06)
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TITLE: A DESTINY TO FULFILL | Previous Challenge Entry
By Everest Alexander
11/12/06 -
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“That’s a loaded question my young friend, are you sure you have the time for an accurate response,” he said, smiling.
“I’m all ears,” She replied.
“Well, two significant things happened that steered me into my destiny, the first at age eleven and the second at twenty-one.”
Sarah leaned forward as Khashif began his narration.
“The day was sunny and the river looked inviting, so, being the swimmer I was, I immediately dove in and started frolicking.”
“The water was deep, just the way I liked it. I grew up next to a river, so depth was not a problem but a welcomed feature for me.”
“I was totally enjoying my swim when without warning I was suddenly two feet under water sucked down by the strongest current I had ever felt!”
“Drinking copious amounts of water I desperately struggled for the surface and the chance at a lung full of fresh air. How I appreciated the awesome privilege of breathing at that point. Some how I fought my way to the surface and thankfully thought, ‘Thank Go...’ Back under water again, this time fear flowed like acid through my soul eroding my last facade of calm. I clawed my way frantically through the water as the current desperately pulled me back!”
“When I got to the surface the second time I contemplated calling for help but something refrained me, later I found out it was my stupid pride. However, I was instantly cured of this when I was sucked under for the third time!
I came up screaming “HELLLPPPP! HELLLPPPP!”
Thank God somebody heard and responded to my cries. Later I discovered it was a sixteen-year-old youth named Terry who became my lifeguard that day.
“At that age the spiritual significance of that incident was lost on me, but it was exactly ten years later when another experience brought it home.”
“My father had died five years before and my mother was living 6,000 miles away in another country ‘trying to make a better life for us,’ she told me, when I questioned why she was leaving me at age eight. Now, thirteen years later I was living (barely) on my own, eking out a meager existence and suffering much mental and emotional torment. I had no idea that the Enemy had targeted me for psychological assassination just like he had targeted me for physical death ten years earlier in the river.”
“Just like that day too, I had reached the point where I felt like I was going under for the last time, drowning in psychological despair. I was a morbid, brooding mess. No mother, no father, I felt totally forsaken! Alone! Abandoned! I truly believed that suicide was my only reprieve.”
“I was about to end it all, when one day my cousin asked me a questioned that stopped me cold… and saved my life.”
“Things were particularly depressing that day when I visited my aunt. (Visited) That’s a laugh; I just conveniently hung around her house hoping someone would offer me something to eat. I was unemployed for months, hadn’t eaten a hot meal in days and about to be kicked out on the street from my run-down apartment.”
“My cousin asked me, ‘How are you getting by these days, Khashif?’ To which I glibly responded, ‘By the grace of God’ and was turning away when she pressed me again. ‘No, seriously, how are you REALLY making it?’ This second time, her words struck a chord within me and I had to stop and cogitate for a couple seconds. ‘BY THE GRACE OF GOD’ I replied, this time when I said those words a light turned on in my heart and I received a revelation.
Just like when He used that young man to save me from the river years before, I saw the Lord stretching out His hand to save me once again and give me hope I never had.”
I realized, in that moment, that I was alive ONLY BY HIS GRACE and that I was alive for a purpose.
It took me several more years of truly amazing encounters to completely surrender to Him and the Path He chose for me but these two experiences were instrumental in recognizing that my life had meaning, value and that I had a divine destiny to fulfill.
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