Jimmy Kinyanjui

When my Sister- in-law, requested me to take her to Church one Sunday morning three years ago, I would never have imagined that this was where my search for God would end. Sarah had accompanied my wife and I to a close friend’s fundraiser, which happened to be all night. Since it was hard to drag me away from my favorite idol, alcohol. After much convincing, I was persuaded to attend the service.

Though we were late, I was warmly welcomed and she quickly got me a seat. The sermon was powerful and I was deeply impacted. A sermon I will never forget! One of my favorite topics of discussion, was politics. It was a time when Kenyans were clamoring for constitutional change and it was the talking point of town. So when the sermon was powerfully opened with the statement " Today we are going to talk about change…" the preacher caught my undivided attention. When he went on to talk about how people need to change their hearts much more than the constitution, I had no doubt that this was the best sermon I had heard and I had gathered a lot of ammunition to fuel my conversations and bar talk.

A few weeks later, while talking to a friend, I shared some of the content of the sermon (without indicating that it was from a sermon or quoting any scriptures). To my surprise, my friend asked me if I had ever considered sharing my ideas at a forum or if I would be interested in sharing them over the Internet. What I was saying definitely made a lot of sense to him.

I started attending Church and studied once. Even though my life was very unfulfilling, empty and meaningless, I was quickly choked by the same worries, depressions, fantasies and pleasures of the world that had engulfed me for the past 20 years, and quickly dropped off.

I had started smoking and drinking at the age of 15, after a three-year religious stint in my high school years. When I look back and ask myself what went wrong the first time I had sought for God as a 13 year old teen, I realize I had no proper spiritual guidance and my convictions were built around my religious cronies and not on the Bible. When my friends pulled out and others left school, I didn't last two months and went from one extreme to the other.

My wife Monica never had any serious religious convictions and didn't even consider attending Church. The disciples would later tell us that after I stopped attending Church, they continued to pray that I would return, and this time with my wife. About a year later, one Sunday morning as my wife and I lay in bed with hangover as usual, my wife suddenly said "lets go to Church". When she asked which Church we should go to, I immediately suggested the Church her sister attended. Though we weren't very sure where to go, we went where I had first attended a full service. By God's plan, one of the house churches happened to be meeting that Sunday in the vicinity. We enjoyed the service! My wife and I started studying the Bible, slowly but consistently.

It intrigues me to see how much Satan had tried to pull me away from the Kingdom, in my one-year postponement. But I look back and see God's plans for me working so meticulously as he led me towards baptism. I was a very weak willed person and knew I could not muster the will power to stop smoking. But three months before I was invited to Church, I was struck down with Hepatitis "A". The three weeks I was bedridden helped me kick the 20-year-old - one pack a day smoking habit.

I believe God was just preparing me and knew stopping smoking would have been one of my biggest struggles to overcome on the road to salvation, and there were more critical spiritual struggles I would need to tackle. But Satan was working overtime to block the road. His onslaught intensified when I started studying the Bible. I find no other explanation to the impurity and other sins I fell into even while I was studying the Bible, and the circumstances through which the sins occurred. But God was gracious and was sure in his plans for me.

I was a timid person with a "good guy" image who shied away from confrontation. I couldn't stand up to address even a small crowd unless I had taken a drink. But after studying sin and repentance, my sins against God, my wife and family just came bursting out of the closet and literally overwhelmed me. For weeks I was a walking zombie as I went through the pain of repentance. I saw myself for what I really was. The sin that engulfed my marriage haunted me. This was a marriage that looked intact from the outside, but which any marriage counselor in the know, would have concluded was on the rocks. The deep selfishness that my wife saw only too frequently, came out in the light- a selfishness that would lead me to complain when my son would get an asthmatic attack, because his medication was competing with my alcohol budget. I built castles in the air dreaming of wealth and recognition, yet my dreams were truly built on hot air and alcohol. Any hope I had of improving my family's welfare was lost in my habit.

My change was radical. I clearly saw all the pain that alcohol had caused me over the years. I began to realize why though I was a top student for most of my life, I had nothing to show for it. I have never tasted a drop again. When I read the book of Proverbs and see the word "fool" or "folly", the chances are it relates to my past.

Yet even after this, I felt that I was not ready for God because my life was so disorganized and full of sin. I felt I needed to "straighten out" before I would be worthy of entering the Kingdom of God. I felt like I was in the deep end of a huge swimming pool surrounded by the muck and mire of sin, and it would take ages for me to get to the surface and breath pure air. The "good guy" image had completely crumbled before me. When it struck me that I was still dragging all my sins with me and there was a race going on- a race I had not even started, I made the decision to get baptized. My wife was baptized. the same day.

My priorities have radically rearranged themselves to putting God first, my wife and children next. God continues to bless me with in areas of spiritual wealth as I continue to tap the wisdom found in God's Word and continually shed my old nature in favor of Godly virtues.