Pam Padgett - teacher
When I was born again I didn't understand what had happened. I just
knew that God had done "something" in me and that I was different.
I was raised very conservatively and
in the Catholic church, and had a very strong concept of heaven and hell, wanting to
eventually go to heaven. But I didn't understand the election of God ... that God chooses those who will be born again and given His Spirit. So I set out my own plans for my life ... to graduate and leave my parents' home, live as wildly as possible until I was 30, and then to settle down and do what the Catholic church taught (thinking this was the way to get to heaven.)
But when I was 14 years old a boy in my class was killed in a motorcycle
accident. This stopped all my plans for my life, for I
realized that I could die at any time. The following
scripture was drawn to my attention by the Holy Spirit, and I turned very strongly to God
asking Him to somehow help me. I knew my only hope was in God ...
Matt. 11:28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of
me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your
souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
And I started seeing changes in me. I was different. No longer
wanted to be "wild", but wanting to read the Bible. I didn't realize I
had been born again and given the Holy Spirit for a couple years,
although I knew it was like something of God was in me. When I saw the
following scriptures, it was wonderful because they described what had
happened to me!
1 Corinthians 6:19 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?
2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
Another thing ... even before I was born again, the Catholic church was "spooky" to me and I didn't like going there. I believe this was because God had chosen me before the foundation of the world and put this in my heart. (Many
teaching of the Catholic church are against what we're told in the
Bible).
No one else in my family seemed to think the Catholic church was "spooky". My older sister even found a way to order a nun's outfit called a "habit" and wore it around the house. At the time she wanted to be a nun when she grew up, although she didn't do this. (Later she ended up trying to lead me into sin as we attended the same college for she was a party girl and very popular and wanted me to be such as she was.)
Little hut story:
My older sister had been at college two
years when I started attending the same school. She dated a man who
was a member of a fraternity, and she had become a member of the
fraternity's "women's auxiliary", assisting with fraternity social
functions. She was very excited for me to join the social circles she
was in, and especially wanted me to meet members of the fraternity.
The first week of school my sister invited me to go to a student bar
where many of the fraternity guys gathered on Thursday nights. I went,
but found what was going on there to be so bad (lewdness, drunkenness,
etc.) that I was unable to stay and I walked back to the dormitory.
A week or so later my sister asked if I'd go to an outdoor luau with
one of the freshmen "pledges" at the fraternity. The luau site was
about 20 miles away near a river, and there would be a campfire. The
setting was very appealing to me, plus I was excited about having a
date, and I agreed to go.
Then, a few days before the luau, my sister told me that arrangements
had been made for one of the other fraternity guys to take me to the
luau because my date would be spending the day at the luau site
building a hut for us ... a young man I had never even met was building
a hut "for us"!
Suddenly the reality of this luau became very clear to me. This was
not going to be people sitting around a campfire roasting marshmallows.
The lewdness and drunkenness I had seen at the student bar was
probably mild compared to what would be going on at this luau ... and I
wouldn't be able to walk home.
I told my sister that I couldn't go along with this and did not want to
go, but she kept insisting that it was too late for me to back out,
that it was too late for this guy to find another date.
I turned very strongly to God, asking Him to somehow get me out of this situation. There seemed no way out.
At one point I asked God to let me have appendicitis, preferring to be
in a hospital having surgery than to go to this luau.
The morning of the luau I woke up and checked to see if I might have
any pain that would indicate appendicitis, and was disappointed that I
felt fine. I kept praying for God to somehow work this out. Time was
really running out! When I looked outside, it was raining a little,
but not much. However, the rain became heavier and heavier as the day
went on.
Around 2 pm I received a call from the fraternity guy who planned to
take me to the luau site. He told me how sorry he was to have to tell
me this, but the luau had to be cancelled. The luau site had been totally flooded, washing away all the huts that had been built, which would include the hut my date had built for us. He told me how long the luau had been held at this same site (many years) and,
although there had been rain at times in the past, nothing like this
had ever happened before, flooding and causing the luau to be cancelled.
I rejoiced, knowing that God had delivered me.