KEVIN MCGUIRE
I have always thought of myself as a “good” person. I have never killed anyone, never gotten in fights, and never been a drunk. Yet I had always felt that there was something missing in my life.

I grew up in a fairly religious family, my parents made sure that we went to church and attended classes provided for young people, but I was never personally committed to anything that was taught there. After I graduated from High School, I pretty much left all of that religious stuff behind. As a student, and then young adult, working for a living, I did pretty much as I pleased, but there was always something missing. I even got involved once in a church, but it was for all the wrong reasons.  Once the situation changed, I again left God behind.

I then met the woman that I eventually married, and I thought that all would be well. It wasn’t! I still had all of my old insecurities and was still missing something in my life; in fact we both were.

We tried staying busy with all sorts of things; work, other people, organizations, alcohol and even drugs, but nothing filled that void. I managed to struggle through 15 years of marriage with a nagging hole deep in the middle of my heart.

My wife decided and I agreed that perhaps we should start going to church. We chose a small congregation where we knew some people. We went for a while, and I even made a “commitment” but there was no real change in my life. As our lifestyle began to encroach on church, we attended less and less, and then stopped altogether. I continued my selfish life, thinking more of my own wants and desires and not the needs of my marriage. Unknown to me a crisis was brewing! My wife was becoming increasingly dissatisfied with our life and me in particular. She had met someone else and had decided that she could get her needs met elsewhere than our marriage.

She came to me and told me that she didn’t love me anymore and wanted a divorce. My life had come completely apart and in a month's time I was alone.

Through family and friends from the church we once attended, I turned to the only comfort that was left, Jesus Christ. I relearned that I was shut off from God by my selfish and evil desires, but he sent his son Jesus, to this earth to die a painful death on a cross made of wood. This selfless act made atonement for all of my wrongdoing, and all I had to do was to ask God for forgiveness and make Jesus the leader of my life. I had nowhere else to turn and decided that I would take God up on his offer. I prayed to accept his forgiveness and asked Jesus to become the Lord of my life. I knew I had made a mess of my life and had displeased Him at almost every turn.

God had not only been working on my heart, but also on the heart of my then ex-wife. We began to talk, and then discuss reconciliation. We began to search for a church where we could grow as real Christians. I was baptized and Vonna rededicated her life to Jesus.

After 6 months of hard work on our relationship with each other and with God, we were remarried. Both of us are now using our God given talents as volunteers in the church we attend. We still have ups and downs and I still struggle at times, but through God, our marriage is back on track and I am less selfish. The best thing that has come from all of this is that I now know for certain that I have God’s gift of eternal life.