Part Two - Life Gets Hard

In the fall of 2005, my family drove four hours to move me into my dorm. I didn’t know it then, but the next four years would be some of my hardest years, but they have had the most impact on my walk with Christ.

My freshman year was amazing. I worked all winter to be the #1 pitcher on our team, and not only did I earn that title, but I was also named Rookie of the Year and Pitcher of the Year in our conference. Along with my success on the field, I plugged into a group of Christian friends and I was growing in my faith and making life-long friends. The next three years were a different story.

My catcher called on a Saturday morning in March during my sophomore year to tell me one of our teammates had been killed in a car accident on her way home. I had never lost anyone up to this point. I didn’t know how to deal with the pain her death brought. I even questioned whether God was real. That summer my parents invited me to attend church with them, and I refused every week, because I didn’t want to praise the One who allowed so much pain.

When I returned to school in the fall I got plugged back in with my group of Christian friends and began venturing back to church. By the winter of my junior my heart was beginning to heal, but I was still hesitant to trust God. My junior season came and went, and then it was summer. This year, I was going to stay in Minnesota that summer to hang out with friends, get a job, and train for the next season. I thought it was going to be a fun summer, and it was, until July. 

One Sunday in July, a group of us were heading out to a Bible study get-together. I jumped into the third row of a van and one of my best friends joined me. As we drove I was debating on whether I would go tubing or not. I knew there was a risk I could injure my shoulder and not be able to pitch the following spring, but I also wanted to have some fun. I had been named Pitcher of the Year for our conference all three years, so I felt added pressure to make smart decisions. Ultimately, it didn’t matter, because we didn’t make it to the get-together. God was about to destroy my identity, and it would take me many years to find the truth.

Read Part 3 tomorrow to see what God did.