A Personal Confrontation With Reality, Chrissie Zampa

I was born in Zonesville, Ohio, March 25, 1955. My growing up years were spent on the farm, until I moved away in my college years to the city. As for God's place in my youth, our family Bible stayed on a small table next to the couch, but no one ever read it. It was for appearance sake. We were supposed to see it there and know its contents, and...be good. My mom was Catholic and took my four brothers and I to church and Sunday school every week, where we were told by our teacher that we were going to hell and had little hope of life in heaven, because our dad was not a Catholic. This caused a certain turmoil which mostly, I hid within, especially when we were disciplined for doing wrong.

Dad believed God was “up there”, though he only went to church with us on holidays. He would tell us how he felt closer to God in the woods than in a pew. So, I've always considered both my mom and dad to be believers in God (objectively). Only, their differences left me with a big question mark inside, toward God.

In my teenage years I met people who seemed to have a close relationship with God, and deep inside I couldn't help being attracted. However, I was convinced by my family that these people were “freaks” and had over-stepped by reading the Bible too much.

Over all and for the most part, I've lived a sheltered life, though I've seen a lot of things. And, I believe God's mercy kept me from participating in many evils, to any greater extent than what I did.

My first shelter was my parent's farm. Then, there were a few years in between, when my only restriction was my conscience within which was being destroyed little by little. My second shelter has been the local church.

In the few years in between, my seeking heart experimented with a few religions other than the Catholic faith. During that time, I saw many half-hearted practices, and deep inside I wanted to believe that God was `bigger' than this. By age 21, I vowed that there would be no more “church going” or religion for me, yet I couldn't let go of my conscience.

One day after finding a small Bible laying open in a car I was working on (at my place of employment), the words that caught my eye, “Jesus answered and said...” began to work in me like a sewing machine needle, until finally I purchased a Holy Bible at the local bookstore, and began reading it. This word began to expose things in my heart, and I became more and more dissatisfied with my human living.

Then in my most desperate days, at almost 24 years of age, the merciful God sent a brother in Christ to work at my place of employment. His faith and his living attracted me. He met with believers not once or twice a week, but every day. This moment by moment God was what I needed for the moment by moment trouble in my conscience. Could this living God, so real to this brother, be as real to me? I invited myself to this brother's church meeting. This was a big step for me who once vowed never again to go to a church. But I found this people so different from any other; their love for God was genuine. God was not a form or practice, nor a place to go to, but their very life and living. For the first time in my life, my conscience was touched and convicted, and I opened up and received this wonderful Person, the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, my first joy and duty was to write home to my folks and let them know all about my ENCOUNTER, and that there is hope in Christ for all who have air to breathe.

Now it's been over 20 years since that initial encounter. And my heart is only more in love with this living Christ. I thank the Lord for the local churches, and for the ministry of Watchman Nee and Witness Lee. Through this ministry, I am brought into one accord with other believers, by focusing on nothing other than the living Person of Christ, who is our eternal salvation.

What a pleasure to have been given the employment of planting the seed of life wherever I go, and in all that I do. It satisfies me deeply to share with others this wonderful Person of Christ, that others might be brought, not into a work or organization, but into a growing and intimate relationship with this living Christ, whose blood makes available an eternal fellowship.