Overcoming Obstacles With Godनमुना

Obstacle #2: Your Past

What physical or emotional scars from the past are you carrying with you? Are you allowing them to define you and your future?

As a gangster, there were only three destinations: a grave, a hospital room, or a prison cell. We called it, “the trinity of life.” This was our destiny. Bound by honor, we lived to die and died to live for our barrio, our neighborhood, and our people. It’s all we had. It’s all we knew, and it was all we had left. It was our familia. The only thing that united us was our brokenness.

“And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the age of this world and according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among them we all also once lived in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and we were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” – Ephesians 2:1-3, MEV

In the gangs, I was a living dead man. In my mind, I was already dead. It was only a matter of time. Death was always near. From getting out of my homie’s car to waking up and going out of my house to catch the bus to school, death was at my door. I could smell it; I could feel it. I could sense it. Death was always near, and my time was running out.

Without God as our guide, we are like lost sheep, who follow the herd even to our deaths. However, God is the great shepherd—the one who leaves the 99 for the 1—and leads us to everlasting life with Him.

I should have been dead a long time ago. At the same time, I knew something special was going on. Others saw it, too—how God miraculously protected me in situations where death was certain. Yet I still couldn’t believe it. I had seen too much violence and sorrow. I often wondered how a just God allows bad things to happen to good people. This question created so much anger and hate inside me. It was a constant battle in my head—good versus evil, life versus death. Yeah, death was stalking me, but life was chasing me as well.