This happened April 23, 1999
I remember in high school something happened and I was really starting to settle in on how I wanted to live my life. I knew that I wanted to live a holy, clean life and to marry someone who loved the Lord as much as I did and to raise my children in the truth. I'm not sure what really clicked or changed me, but I remember that happening. It was around 10th grade when I really knew this about me. In 1999 I was in 10th grade and that is the year of the Columbine shooting. Well, you know how things go if one person does something everyone else has to try and copycat. Well, of course people started calling in bomb threats at our school. I remember we were sitting out on the front lawn waiting and waiting for them to let us back in the school. Slowly more and more people began to leave. They would just get their stuff and leave, well really their stuff was stuck inside the building so they would just drive home, or wherever, without their things. I was just sitting there on the lawn just watching everyone and this guy that I knew in passing and who was a year behind me sat down beside me. He just started with small talk and we chatted for a bit. I commented on how many people left since we came outside. He said yeah but it doesn't matter because if it's their day to die then they'll just be in a wreck. I said yes that's true because there is no way to escape death. Well we continued to talk and he said something about being saved and he asked me if I was saved. I told him no because I don't believe that. He asked me what I did believe and I said, "Well, I believe you you live right, repent, get the holy ghost, and then you are saved." (Remember this is 10th grade.) Well with that he took out his Bible and read a verse to me. Then he "explained" to me that this verse meant that everyone goes to heaven and they have a choice whether or not to stay. I told him I didn't believe that. (I didn't know enough to really explain to him why that was wrong and I just didn't want a debate.) Eventually we ended up leaving because most of the day was wasted by sitting outside. Well I kept trying to remember what verse that was that he read me, but all I could remember was that it was in the New Testament, it was Chapter 3 and Verse 9 and that it started off The Lord is not slack ... but that was all I could remember. I remember being really excited about it because I knew God had set that situation up, but I was disappointed because I could not remember that verse. I told my mom, Aunt Caroline, and Pastor John about it because I was really excited. Well, I went to bed thinking about it and really wishing I could remember what verse it was. It was on my mind so much that night that God gave me a dream. In the dream we were all sitting around at someone's house and Aunt Ellen and I were sitting kind of off to the side looking at a Bible. On the very page we were looking at was the verse that that guy had read to me, so in my dream I quickly looked to see where we were looking and I found out it was in Peter! Right then the dream ended. I had to get up early the next morning (Sunday) because I was getting ready to go to Aunt Lee Ann's with Amy P. Well, my mom had gotten up with me and while I was in the shower I asked her to read Chapter 3 Verse 9 in 1st and 2nd Peter, so while I was in the shower she read them to me. When she read 2 Peter Chapter 3 Verse 9 I was so excited because that was the verse. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. I remember telling Aunt Lee Ann and Amy and some others about it.
I learned that God would give me an answer even though I didn't really ask a question because it was more like a passing thought. I still remember the way I felt that morning when I found out where that verse was, I remember thinking, "Wow! God answered ME. He gave ME a dream because he cares about ME." I know that this was part of the change made in me really getting rooted in the truth and wanting to know God.
