Happy 17th Spiritual Birthday to Me!

The summer of 1993 started out like any other.  Since 1989 had I had started doing magic professionally and summers were a chance to be on the road a bit more.  The picture in this post is me with Harry Blackstone Jr taken in June of that year.  One thing that was different in my life was I had started reading the bible on a daily basis back in March.  The primary reason for that was a girl I had met named Lisa who unlike me was excited about God, church, the bible, etc.  I really liked her and was drawn not just to her beauty, but also this sense of peace she had in her life.  She attributed it to Jesus…I doubted that because I went to church every week and I certainly wasn’t excited or peaceful about any of it.

That all changed on July 27, 1993.  Like today July 27th fell on a Tuesday that year and like today the heat and humidity were high.  I arrived home from working at the magic shop and made myself some dinner and was planning on watching the Orioles game on TV.  The door bell rang…”Hmmmm wonder who that could be?”  Standing at the door were two men from the church Lisa attended, which I had attended as well the previous Sunday (side note:  I hated it because they played drums and guitars and the preacher walked around instead of standing behind a pulpit the whole time…sort of ironic huh?).  To make a long story short, Keith Skidmore and Marvin Bower shared that night with me what it really means to be a follower of Christ and for the first time in my life it all made sense.  Standing there on my front porch I prayed and asked Jesus to forgive me of my sins and to become the leader of my life.  The rest as they say is history…little did I know that day how much Jesus would change my life.  17 years…wow what a ride it’s been…can’t wait for the next 17 and beyond.  Thank you Jesus for all you’ve done for me!