Back to evading God...I was a really polite, well-behaved, conscientious evader. I did this little two-step with God, where I was leading, or at least I thought I was. Arrogantly, I sincerely thought that if God would just listen to me I could set my world right. All I needed was his cooperation. I mean, after all, it was my life for crying out loud...wasn't it?

Lo, and behold, while I was playing "Let's Make a Deal" with God, he surreptitiously sent a few brave people into my world who gently began to tell me the truth about me and how my game-show mentality would not satisfy my soul. They told me the truth about how much God loved me and showed me that love by parting with his one and only Son.

I sort of knew who Jesus was and that he died on my behalf - to pay the penalty for my sins against God, I was told - but I had a doozy of a time seeing myself as a sinner. Sure, I had lied a few times, sassed my parents, stolen a few items from a department store...but those were just small indiscretions, nothing to get all upset about. Surely not bad enough to be called "sins".

Fortunately for me, those same folks who came into my life were patient enough to lead me to the water but not try and force me to drink it. In other words, they gave me the whole story of how the first man and woman (Adam and Eve) had the entire created world at their disposal, except one little 'ole tree that God told them not to eat from. And then how they chose to believe a liar who encouraged them to open their mind to the possiblity that God was holding back from them. So, they listened to the lie and thought they could find life a part from the giver of life. Hence the beginning of sin. They brought me to the water and asked me if I was thirsty. Turns out I was.

When I finally saw myself in that story, I knew that I had also believed I could find life somewhere other than God. At that point I had to make a decision to either believe that God wanted relationship with me and provided that through his Son, or to keep on looking and hope that I would stumble on the secrets of the universe and find life on my own.

In my first entry (that sounds like I've made many...this is only my third!), I mentioned that I had been following a blog that had greatly impacted me. I have just added the link for that blog to my page and encourage you to read it. It's entitled "Eliot". Take the time to start at the beginning of this incredible story. Your heart will be stirred and challenged beyond measure.

I have never met the authors of the blog (Matt and Ginny), and probably never will. But not knowing them will not diminish the power of their story one bit. Share it with your friends. It is worth reading.

Where did I start and where am I going? Questions I hope I can eventually answer...My journey began over thirty-seven years ago. Sadly, that is not when I was born! Rather it was thirty-seven years ago that I experienced a major paradigm shift. Let me explain.

I was raised in a family where believing in God was never a question. My parents were fairly regular in their church attendance, although inclement weather or not having one's hair washed was a quick excuse not to go. However, there was never a time in my life that I wondered if God existed. While I was no brainiac, it wasn't much of a leap of faith for me to believe that the universe was complex and came to be by a being far more intelligent than me. Believing that the earth just evolved was a far greater leap and one that asked me to believe in nothing but man's own musings/theories about how the world began.

None of that is really important to my journey except to say that believing in the existence of God was an acknowledgement of truth I never did, or have since, grappled with. But the real story comes with, what I referred to earlier, a paradigm shift.

At a stategic point in my life, I was challenged to think about God and the Bible in ways I had never before. I had to reevaluate everything I believed about God and what the Bible promised. Because even though I believed in God and thought I was living a pretty moral and decent life - which means I was a good person, did kind things, was generous, loving and compassionate - I had never realized that I was living a life in direct contrast to who God was and what he promised. My hope had been that if I followed the rules (I have no idea what rules I was actually following) God would be pleased with me.

I was like all the millions of people who think their personal goodness is what God gives a "thumbs up" to. The problem for me was, I was a pretty good person. I went through all the normal rebellions as a teenager but never went to extremes even in that. But even in all my self-perceived goodness there was an emptiness as wide and deep as the Grand Canyon.

There certainly were many things that contributed to my emptiness. You know the "if my life were different and I had..." "if...were out of my life I could be happy". But even on the very best of days the emptiness gnawed at me. However, instead of acknowledging the ache, I ran away from it as fast as I could filling my world with things I thought would give me life. The funny thing about "running away" was I couldn't get rid of me. Nor could I evade God, and believe me I tried.

It has taken me awhile to figure out exactly what blogging is. Actually, I'm still not sure if writing one's thoughts for strangers to read makes much sense.

I have been journaling for many years, stashing my journals away so no one will accidentally pick one up and read the things I have written in private. However, I have been encouraged to join the world of blogging by someone who is very important to me. Also, I have been following several blogs that have been extremely impactful as well as thought provoking and hope the same may be true of this one.

As my title states, I have been traveling in the same direction for a very long time now. In spite of that, I still tend to get off track and even terribly lost at times. In fact, there have been many moments over the years when I just quit traveling altogether. My journey has not made the headlines, at least not yet, although if I shave my head like Britney I might make a bit of a splash in my pond yet!