Kari’s story of transformation started when she was 13 years old in junior high school. Experiencing the typical junior high girl traits, she was moody, emotional, insecure and wanting to be liked more than anything. Her life was about to be turned completely upside down.
Perfectly normal to tumultuous
“My dad went from being seemingly very happy and normal to going through major depression and having suicidal thoughts,” she remembers. He fell in love with someone much younger.
Their home went from perfectly normal to tumultuous and unstable. Her parents were headed for divorce.
To escape from it all, Kari started hanging out with much older kids, going to parties, drinking, smoking and dating several guys. “I became so depressed. I would go into my room at night and fantasise about my death and funeral. I thought things would never get better, and my only alternative was suicide.”
An unexplainable sensation
Kari planned her funeral and typed up her obituary. Fortunately, her friend’s parents loved her like she was their own child. “I guess they noticed signs of my attempted suicide and told my mom,” she recalls. Her grandma and mom drove her to a psychiatric unit about an hour away from her house.
She says these were the worst days of her life. The night before her release, she was alone in her room, finalising her suicide plan in her special notebook. She sat there feeling so sorry for herself.
And then an overwhelming, overpowering, unexplainable sensation came over her and led her to open the nightstand drawer and read the Bible placed there by The Gideons. She opened it to Psalm 22:1 (ESV) and read, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?”
That was precisely how she felt. Kari kept reading until she got to Psalm 27:1 (ESV), “The Lord is my light and my salvation…” And then Psalm 27:10 (ESV), “For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in.”
“You have no idea what that verse did for my soul. There in that hospital room in Minnesota, I gave my life to Jesus Christ. The only One who will always love me unconditionally and never leave me.”
Alive in Christ
Today is much different for Kari. “The Lord gave me a wonderful, godly husband and family. We are very active in serving our local church together.”
For Kari, having a personal relationship with Christ has been the difference between life and death. She says, “Without Christ, I was literally on a path of death—and with Christ, I’m alive. Without Christ, I was lost and hopeless. And with Christ, I’m found and full of hope.”
Source: Gideons International
