The Journey Part 1

As I open my blog and myself up to people, I also want to acknowledge the journey I have been on for several years now. Therefore, the coming posts will begin to focus on my journey. As my journey is quite long, I wish to break it down into parts. Part one will focus on my childhood leading up to college, part 2 will focus on my college journey, and then part three will focus on the time after college.  

            I grew up in a smaller town in western Ohio. I grew up with both my mother and father, along with two of my brothers. By no means was my life miserable, or did I suffer, however, I also struggled immensely growing up. My mother and father constantly fought with one another and often, my mother would use me as a weapon against my father. She would abuse me, break my things, verbally abuse me, and it hurt. I struggled to find love in either of my parents because my dad kept us in the situation and my mother continued this cycle of abuse daily. School was my original escape until about fifth grade. At that point, I transferred to a private Christian school and, at first, it was great until I begun to get bullied. Thus began the cycle of never finding a safe place. When I was at school, I had little friends, and no one to confide in, and at home, I couldn’t even go to my room to escape abuse. I blamed God and refused to acknowledge my own personal faith throughout my life. As I approached Highschool, I began to date a young lady, as she was the first person to truly be there for me. She was the reason I looked forward to even going to school. Even after her parents tried to break us up, I looked forward to class because she was there. Yet, as time went on. Love turned toxic. She allowed her mother, who ironically was also abusive, to control her life, well after she turned 18, slowly forcing us apart. By the time I was set to graduate high school, we had broken up twice and gotten back together twice. I was convinced she would be the only person who would ever love me and ignored the very love of God in my life. By the end of my senior year, we had been engaged and I decided to follow her to a Christian college. However, my journey with her would soon come to an end and my journey of faith would also come to a head as well…

- The Unknown Pastor