About a year and a half ago, I was desperately searching for a new church family. I had been disappointed with a lot of things that occurred in my own church and during my search, I approached other churches, ministers, sermons etc. with a great amount of skepticism. I became a "faith critic" over-analyzing every word, questioning every impression. But that was because I didn't want to end up regretting my choice - I wanted to go where God wanted me to go. It took a while ... over a year, I believe, to find a church but, eventually I did. I knew it wasn't perfect. It was different from where I was coming from, pretty small and not quite as noisy or "hype". But I felt it was where God wanted me to be and I certainly felt the love.
The first time I visited this church, by the end of the service, I basically met every single member that had attended that day; people just kept on introducing themselves to me and embracing me. In particular though, I remember meeting this one guy for the first time. I noticed him as soon as the service ended, and I was somewhat surprised at his appearance. I believe he had on a white t-shirt and a pair o jeans (something I wasn't quite familiar with seeing at church) ... his hair was high and uncombed (it was clear that he should've gotten a haircut weeks before). Well, he came over, seemingly confident and all, and introduced himself. I did the same and I remember asking him where he worked. When he told me, I said to myself "Please God, keep me away from this one."
Either God didn't answer my prayer or I didn't let Him - I'm still not sure which one it was. But, that guy and I gradually became very good friends. We were such good friends that when I was applying for college in the US, I considered the fact that I didn't want to leave him "alone" because I didn't want him to fall away. I wanted to be his support, to encourage him to continue living for the Lord. And I knew deep down that his relationship with the Lord, if it were legit, should not have depended on my friendship with him and that I didn't need to be around him all the time. But I just wanted to be there ... he had fallen away once before and I didn't want that to happen again.
As we spoke, as our friendship grew and as we discovered our similarities, it became very difficult for me to avoid liking him despite KNOWING that I did not want a relationship at that time. In addition to my desire to keep things platonic, the fact that he liked one of my friends made my attraction to him seem unthinkable ... just not something that should've existed. I tried to kill it, choke it, stifle it, drown it ... I did everything I could to get rid of my "like". But despite all my efforts to run away, I couldn't. Eventually though, it came to light (by mistake) that we liked each other and that's when we realized that if we didn't both back off, we'd have a situation on our hands that we didn't want ... or at least that I didn't want.
We attempted to cut down our 4 hr convos every day to 2 hr convos (lol) and then to 1 hr convos and then to every other day convos and it was TORTURE. And we failed miserably many many times but, we still tried. Plus we had a good old pastor to continuously tell us to "RUN" ... lol. Along the way though, this guy did things that caused me to constantly question his liking for me (and maybe my own insecurities added to the pain of it all) but, we sorted those issues out and continued. Funny enough, even though we were running away from each other, it just seemed like we were in a pseudo-relationship just waiting on the Lord to say "Yes". Ha ... I really wanted that at one point, I really wanted him to be the guy God wanted me to be with - or so I thought for a while.
So to cut a long story short, I'll say this. Life happened. I started med school, he got a job promotion and started going to evening school and we just got really busy. But he still called. I just didn't always return those calls - and even when I did, I kept our convos really tight. The thing is though, med school wasn't the only reason I was "busy". Sadly, I began to compare this guy to another guy friend of mine - one that seemed to be more mature and way less of a flirt. And because of these differences, an internal battle was induced. My heart was still with my friend but, I was no longer sure if I wanted God to say "Yes". I didn't know what I wanted.
I said I was cutting the story short so here goes. We stopped talking for a while. I sensed a threat i.e. that he wanted to be with someone else, and told him I no longer felt the same way (kinda to protect myself). He ended up in another relationship, started doing things he stopped doing when he came to the Lord and ultimately, he fell away. Fell away just like that. It was like a total change and I was in denial for a while. Then I got angry and finally, confused and hurt. I began to wonder though if I wasn't there enough ... if I had caused the very thing I wanted to protect him from.
I now know that he made a conscious decision to depart from God and though I sense that maybe I hurt him (which I totally regret doing), I can't continue blaming myself for what happened. I miss him though, more than I thought I would. Regardless of the fact that I liked him, we had a great friendship and he was a passionate man of God. But all I can do is hope and pray that he will return to the Lord.
Maybe one day I'll get my friend back but, I can no longer blame myself.
