When I came to the Carson Valley, I knew it was a growing season for me. I had a personal relationship with our Lord, but I knew it wasn\u2019t enough. I longed for a deeper commitment to His Word. When I found Carson Valley Christian Center, I was immediately drawn toward the people in the church family. They had something I knew I had to have. I couldn\u2019t say exactly what it was that they had, but I knew it existed and that I had to have it too.<\/p>\n
A short time later, I attended Pastor John\u2019s Discovery 101 class. I heard him use the phrase Friends Helping Friends Follow Christ.<\/em> I immediately realized what it was that the church family had: they had a commitment to helping people find Christ. They cared! I felt I had been selfish. I hadn\u2019t really encouraged others to find Christ. If an inviting, \u201ccomfortable\u201d situation came along, I would agree or confirm my faith. I was hesitant to share my belief with non-believers or those of other religious beliefs. I chose to stay in my \u201ccomfort zone.\u201d After all, I didn\u2019t want to offend or make anyone feel uncomfortable. I was also afraid of embarrassing myself. I had not attended a Christian college and was not very good at verse memorization. I felt that I should leave the sharing or teaching to those with more experience. Then I envisioned all of the people I had come to know over the years that didn\u2019t know Christ. I thought of the possibility that they would be spending an eternity without Christ. I thought of the pain, the suffering, the emptiness, and the sadness they would have for eternity. I was ashamed that I hadn\u2019t been bold enough to step out of my comfort zone. I hadn\u2019t obeyed God\u2019s Holy Word.<\/p>\n I realized that if I wanted to grow in my relationship with him, I needed to obey and serve him. I made a commitment to share my faith and help others to find Christ. Feeling extremely unworthy and incompetent, I gave the matter over to the Lord. I prayed that I would be a useful tool in his ministry. It was amazing! The Lord put people and circumstances in my life that allowed me to serve him, and at the same time, I was growing too. I learned to share my faith and grew more knowledgeable in His Word. I began to feel a closeness to my Lord that I had not experienced before. This was the beginning of a new obsession for me. The closeness to my Lord and the ability to lovingly serve Him is something I never want to lose. I feel that I am now living my life\u2019s purpose and am truly blessed by God.<\/p>\n D.J. Bratsch<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When I came to the Carson Valley, I knew it was a growing season for me. I had a personal relationship with our Lord, but I knew it wasn\u2019t enough. I longed for a deeper commitment to His Word. When I found Carson Valley Christian Center, I was immediately drawn toward the people in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_editorskit_title_hidden":false,"_editorskit_reading_time":0,"_editorskit_is_block_options_detached":false,"_editorskit_block_options_position":"{}","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[112],"featured_image_urls":{"full":"","thumbnail":"","medium":"","medium_large":"","large":"","1536x1536":"","2048x2048":"","woocommerce_thumbnail":"","woocommerce_single":"","woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":"","yarpp-thumbnail":"","trx_addons-thumb-huge":"","trx_addons-thumb-big":"","trx_addons-thumb-medium":"","trx_addons-thumb-small":"","trx_addons-thumb-portrait":"","trx_addons-thumb-avatar":"","trx_addons-thumb-tiny":"","trx_addons-thumb-masonry-big":"","trx_addons-thumb-masonry":""},"post_excerpt_stackable":" When I came to the Carson Valley, I knew it was a growing season for me. I had a personal relationship with our Lord, but I knew it wasn\u2019t enough. I longed for a deeper commitment to His Word. When I found Carson Valley Christian Center, I was immediately drawn toward the people in the church family. They had something I knew I had to have. I couldn\u2019t say exactly what it was that they had, but I knew it existed and that I had to have it too. A short time later, I attended Pastor John\u2019s Discovery 101 class.…<\/p>\n","category_list":"Become Engaged<\/a>","author_info":{"name":"Dr. John Jackson","url":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/author\/drjohnjackson\/"},"comments_num":"0 comments","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2849"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2849"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2870,"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2849\/revisions\/2870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drjohnjackson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}