Alan Davis's Story

Filling the Void

Something inside of me sensed that there was only one thing that could fulfill me - one thing to fit the hole in my life, but I tried to fill it with anything.

Story Tags

guilt, identity, success, approval, depression, relationships

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I would often, like many teenagers, search for a meaning and purpose for my existance. I would often look to the media or pop culture to see what they thought I would do, and try things that they said were what you were supposed to do to fill the void of meaning in my life, but they never did anything to completely satisfy me.

Because of this, I would invest my time in things that were not of any lasting value. I would wake up in the mornings with a depressed attitude and had no real motivation for anything. For example, grades in school reflected my attitude, and my attitude damaged relationships with my family and friends. I was very apathetic about almost anything except for myself and my position in the world.

The lowest part was the month before I became a Christian. I felt a sense of nothingness and no purpose at all in my existence, and found myself waking up in the morning and just wanting to die, mainly because I though that I would end up in heaven, but I was way off. My satisfaction in life came from my peer's opinion of me, and I established that by doing ANYTHING to gain their acceptance.

Looking at the road my life was taking, a few years from this point I see myself either dead or close to it. I would have eventually moved on to more serious things such as more serious drugs, and would probably have fathered a child or caught some disease. I would be living on my own as well, probably not in college anymore.

I saw God working in the situation when my closest friends began to become interested in deeper things and got involved in a cell group, and they became Christians. God began to move in their lives and they began to share it with me, and I slowly became interested, even though I thought I was already just like them as a believer. See, I thought that I was a Christian. I knew everything that I was supposed to believe, but in no way did I live like I was a believer. Turns out, I never really knew anything at all. I went to this cell group with them, and it was a complete turn-around for me in my life. I felt things inside of me that I had never experienced before, and it was amazing. I realized a lot of the stuff I did was not what I was meant to do, and I felt a lot of guilt about it.

The highpoint of my story is now, looking back at the changes that I have gone through. I see myself as being a passionless, purposeless attitude and existence to realizing God's purpose in creating me and the work He has done in my life. Sure, it hasn't been a perfectly smooth road all the way, but I would not trade it for anything in the world. I can see the Holy Spirit working and dealing with me in my life.

Since then I have learned more about myself and my nature and my purpose. I continually discover things in my life that do not match up to what God has called me to be, but that deepens my appreciation and thankfulness for the grace and mercy of God through Christ Jesus. I truly realize what it means to live now, but I also realize all the more two main things. One is that it is all about God and His glory, and nothing about me. The second is that I am continuously and eternally dependent upon the grace of God, for I am nothing without it and can do nothing without it. I realize my purpose for being here and being created.