Slice of Life

At the church I attend, New Life Church, each Sunday before the sermon they ask someone to come up and share part of their life. This is called a "Slice of Life," and I was asked to share a slice of my life this past Sunday. Now for the blog I have the debate of whether to talk about my thoughts on the experience or just sharing the story. After some thought I've decided to write a briefly on my thoughts then put the story.

I was really surprised how nervous I got during the first service...at one point I thought my legs were turning into jelly. I'm not sure why I was so nervous since I've talked in front of crowds, and I was talking on a subject that I am the foremost expert on (myself). It would be nice to given an explanation now, but I just don't have an idea...I was just nervous. The second service I felt much more calm, but I have no idea if it was any smoother. Besides the nervousness I really did enjoy the experience and would do it again if the opportunity presents itself. Now in retrospect it feels really cool to have been able to share an amazing story about how God directly intervened in my life.

The Story
It took place late in the winter 2004 semester. I had just transferred to Michigan for my masters and knew nobody in Ann Arbor and lived by myself. The one advantage of having no one to hangout with was that I could easy find time to get in shape. I have my own bench press and was using it on a regular basis during this period. The one day I was lifting with about 250lbs on the bar, which wasn’t too far below my max. I finished my last set and thought to myself that it was too easy and that I should do one more rep to get a nice burn. I nearly completed the lift but found that I just couldn’t quite get the bar back to the top and it came back down on my chest. I then tried again, but this time only trying to get it up to these safety notches positioned below the top. I got the bar level with the first notch, but couldn’t get it sufficiently above so that I could safely drop the weight back into the notch. The weight came back down on my chest. I decided I would make one more attempt before trying to drop the weights off to the side because up to this point I hadn’t tried cheating by arching my back. Now, whenever I attempt a heavy lift I have this habit of tightening then relaxing my muscles right before doing it. Well without thinking I did this and when my muscles relaxed the bar rolled from my chest to my neck. For those that don’t know, this is the number one way that people get killed while lifting, so as soon as it happened I knew I was in serious trouble.

Immediately I began to fight with the bar…trying to get the bar tilted so the weights would fall off or twisting my body to try and rolling out from underneath it. After some time, I really don’t know how long, I conceded that I was not going to get this off my neck since all my attempts never even got it to sway an inch. It was at this point that I accepted the fact that I only had a few minutes before I died.

The first thing that happened when I accepted my death was that all my earthly worries and concerns felt like they just fell away. The one that I remember that I thought was kind of funny was that I didn’t have to worry about doing my laundry anymore. The feeling of all these pointless worries not mattering anymore filled me with great peace and calm…honestly that moment I felt more alive then at any other time in my life. The next thought was that I was going Home to be with God. This made me just bursting with joy and excitement. I started to think about how only in a matter of minutes I would stand before the Lord. I decided that I should say my last prayer, so I said the Lord’s Prayer because honestly I was too excited to say anything else. After that I decided I would entire the afterlife praising God, so I sang a worship song in my head (but I can’t remember which one). Then I thought to myself… “man this is taking way longer than I expected” and at this point some of the excitement wore off a bit. I began to think about what I was leaving here on earth, and immediately I thought of my parents. I’ve been blessed with a wonderful Christian family and amazing parents that have always shown me love, respect, and support throughout my life. I’ve always hoped that they would never have to bury one of their children. This thought really broke my heart and I turned to the Lord and just said to Him “I can’t go Home yet”. He immediately answered my prayer because the weight on my neck was released and I felt pushed off to the side. My next memory was gasping for air as I lay on the floor next to the bench.

Besides some major bruising on my neck, which faded away within the week, I was completely unharmed. I had always hoped that when I stood face to face with death I would be ready…this experience confirmed that and that is a slice of my life.