“What will be people do when they hear that I’m a Jesus freak? What will people do when they find that it’s true?
I don’t really care if they label me a Jesus freak. There ain’t no disguising the truth.” DC Talk
There’s no getting around it. I was taught about God from my earliest memory and believed what I was taught. My Grammy one day was talking about going to heaven someday, and I wanted that for myself. I decided then to believe in Jesus and follow Him. And I’ve never looked back.
Our family read Bible stories and devotions together and consistently prayed at mealtimes. I loved the stories I learned in Sunday School, summer vacation Bible school, and from my grandparents. By the time I was nine or so, I really wanted to obey God and learn more. I did Bible correspondence classes for a time, which I loved. I would complete a lesson and mail it back. Soon I’d get an encouraging note and the next lesson. When we moved to the farm and lived less than a mile from church, I was so excited to become more involved. Grammy and Grampy, of course, attended Sunday morning services, but they also seldom missed Sunday night or Wednesday night and were happy to pick up any of us Miller kids who wanted to come. I discovered that our church had programs once a month on Sunday evenings for kids with participation by kids. My friend and I once provided special music for the Junior Christian Endeavor meeting, by playing “My Jesus I Love Thee” as a clarinet duet. On Wednesdays I enjoyed children’s choir and some sort of prayer or teaching classes. Our Bible school was two weeks of mornings where, before we went off to our separate classes and snacks and crafts, all the participants met together in the church sanctuary to sing some songs, hear a short lesson, and be captivated by tales from the visiting missionary whose project became the object of our boys-against-girls offering/giving competition. At least one year I attended, my Grammy was the Bible school superintendent, whose leadership was full of fun backed her own hard work, because churches didn’t have the massive curriculum products available now. I remember learning the hymn, “This is My Father’s World” that summer because she had come up with a cohesive program that led us in studying about God’s creation. Absolutely magical!
Fifth graders at our church had Mrs. Regier for their Sunday School teacher, as well. When my brother Randy and I were in Grammy’s class, we were covering stories in the Old Testament, probably from the books of First and Second Samuel. I’m sure she taught them very completely, but what I remember most was that the Israelites were always battling the Philistines. Those darn Philistines!* I hadn’t, at that time, understood why they were always fighting. Of course, we went into depth on the stories of Samuel, of David and Goliath. In addition, she had contests among us Bible scholars to memorize Scripture and learn the lyrics to favorite hymns. If we had “extra memory verses” to say, we met her in one of the main-level classrooms after church and recited what we had learned. Then the next week, we could see how we were progressing on the board showing everyone’s progress to the finish line. When I was older, she asked me to type up these index card materials she grouped into units and distributed to her students.
*I have to mention here that my grandparents were very careful about their speech. I remember when Disney put out the movie That Darn Cat, they called it That Crazy Cat. We grandchildren were taught to be diligent in proper conversation. For example, improper grammar was caught and corrected; we were redirected if we said, “Huh?” or “um…” or “yeah.” Although he was a very funny person, our Grampy deserved our respect, so we were allowed to say he was funny but never silly.
My faith in Jesus Christ has been the one unifying part of my whole life. I have not always been obedient to what the Bible teaches, but I have always wanted to. The most important truth I trust from the Bible is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, restated by Paul in I Corinthians 15:3-5 “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: That Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” Belief in this truth restores our broken relationship with Our Creator and guarantees that we are adopted into His family and will spend eternity with Him.
