The Story of Jesus-Matt and Vicki Style

*****Disclaimer:  This is our PERSONAL story.  I am not casting out judgement on other's lives.  Just using our experience to tell OUR story.******

This should have been the very first post I ever wrote on my blog.  I felt like it was time to share our personal journey.  Matt and I started dating in highschool.  We have been together 17 years and we are only 33 years old.  We always joke about this.  Being together over half of our lives.  It is a sweet thing!  We had lots of fun in high school.  There were many drunken parties and well nothing else, just lots of drinking and partying.  It was fun, I ain't gonna lie to ya.  Then I went to college and Matt and I hung out on the weekends.  The partying continued as we would go to bars with our older friend who bought beer for us.  Again, good times and sweet memories.  Matt and I got married in 2002 and we lived life to the fullest.  We bought new cars, hung out with friends, had a nice house, went shopping, went to parties, lived the American dream.  We went to Catholic Church every once in a while.  While we were doing this my sister had moved to Des Moines and had started going to church and falling in love with Jesus.  Whenever she would come home she would tell us about books she was reading, activities she was involved with.  We could tell her life had changed.  But we didn't want none of it.  Blah, blah blah.  Jesus stuff, whatever.  But she continued on.  And slowly I started reading some of the books she mentioned.  But still, hardcore for Jesus, no way.  In fact I was very bitter about her constant joyfullness and her no worries attitude.  I didn't get it.  I didn't understand passages like this:
"For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do-living in debauchery, lust, drunkeness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry."  1Peter Ch 4 vs 3

We were living for ourselves, solving our own problems, making our own way.  And we were doing well.  We had a good business, nice stuff, why did we need Jesus.  I remember one day I was on my way to a doctor appointment and I was praying.  I clearly remember my prayer being one of asking God why I was so blessed and what was I supposed to do about it.  I remember fervently praying because I felt an emptiness inside.  Like I had so much goodness but yet I wasn't fulfilled.  His answer was very clear, you see I was on my way to a doctor appointment because I was 16 weeks pregnant.  I had been pregnant right before this and miscarried.  So this was a hopeful thankful wonderful pregnancy.  I got to the doctor and found out the baby had died.  His answer to my prayer, DEPEND ON ME!!  YOU NEED ME TO FILL YOU!!  Not stuff, not parties, not your husband, not your job, just ME.  This happened in November, this holy spirit conviction stuff and then in February we stepped foot in our church.  And guess what 2 months later I was pregnant with my Mayzie.  God is alive, God is real, God is working!!  We started going to church and experiencing Jesus in new ways.  We started living differently.  Our lives were wrecked for Jesus.   He had gotten into our hearts!  We got very involved with everything in the church.  We were soaking up all we could. We got baptized in July and gave our lives to the one who gave his life for us.   And well, the rest is history.  It is the transforming work of the spirit.  We started to read the bible, pray, and attend church regularly.  We started to understand how Jesus gave his life for us, how he died on the cross for us to take away our sins and how this was far more important than just praying a prayer but that it required us to be ALL IN for Jesus.  And we were done, wrecked for Jesus!!  And so that led to plans for adoption and eventually 3 new kiddos in our home!  I have to say that our whole journey was in part decisions we made but mostly it was God's spirit working in us.  He works in all of us even when we don't know it.  He was working in Matt and I and we had no clue.  He is always working.  Always.  And we are SO glad that Jesus wrecked our life.  We are amazingly blessed.  We have passion, joy, faith and hope that fills us up in ways nothing else can.  We love Jesus-Matt and Vicki Style!!