Wes Peppers shares his experience of coming to accept Christ at the age of 22 after being an atheist/agnostic for several years. A rising football star at the time, he shares how he quit college football and a life of reckless living in order to go into full time ministry for the Lord. Since that time Wes has served globally as an evangelist, speaker, and teacher.

<p>Wes Peppers shares his experience of coming to accept Christ at the age of 22 after being an atheist/agnostic for several years. A rising football star at the time, he shares how he quit college football and a life of reckless living in order to go into full time ministry for the Lord. Since that time Wes has served globally as an evangelist, speaker, and teacher.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Lansing SDA Church

Wes Peppers

The Atheist Who Found God: Part 1

How many of you would believe today that by just observing the world for even just a few seconds that it could just continue to go on for the next several thousand years as it is?

How many of you believe that this morning?

If you take a look at the world around us, it is in turmoil, it is in chaos, it is in a crazy mode.

And every day it just continues to get worse.

It isn't that the human race is going to go extinct.

We believe that all the things that we see in the world around us were foretold to us by Jesus in the Bible thousands of years ago.

And that everything that we see happening in the world today, if you look at it through the Christian perspective, it makes total sense.

Everything that Jesus said 2000 years ago would happen just before his return is happening today.

And just as the events of the world were foretold and happened just like God set up to this day, we can be sure, friends, we can be absolutely sure that the coming of Jesus back to this earth soon is going to take place.

Without the shadow of a doubt, it's going to take place.

And the question we want to ask ourselves today is, are we ready for that?

What Jesus did 2, 000 years ago is the needed preparation for us today to put our faith and trust in what he did to be prepared for his soon return.

In fact, today at the end of our time together, I'm going to invite you to make that decision if you've never made that decision.

So I just want to let you know that ahead of time.

We're so glad that you're here, so glad that you would come and take the time to spend with us this morning on this special weekend.

And I'm going to be sharing my life story and I want you to know right away, right now that this story is not about me, it's about He.

I'm going to share with you some things that have happened over the course of my life, but those things are not as important as much as I want you to see, know, and experience that God has been involved in my life in a major way.

And I don't just want you to leave this place saying, wow, what amazing things God did for Pastor Wes.

But I want you leaving this place saying, wow, what amazing things Jesus has done, not just for him, but for me, for you.

If you did not get a chance, how many of you visitors, if you're visiting with us this morning, I hope that you got your loaf of bread.

Did you get your loaf of bread this morning?

All right, if you did not get your loaf of bread, Make sure that you get 1 on the way out.

Talk to the greeters at the door and they will get you 1.

We want to make sure that you're extra welcome.

We hope you had a chance to fill out that guest connection card and drop it.

If you didn't get a chance to drop it in the offering plate, just give it to 1 of our ushers and they'll be glad to take that.

We just want you to feel comfortable this morning.

We're so thankful that you're here, and we hope you'll come back.

In fact, I have another, I'm only telling half the story today.

So you'll have to come back next weekend.

Some of you may have gotten this invitation.

Next weekend I'm going to share the other half of my story.

Today I'm going to talk about the atheist who found God and then next weekend I'm going to talk about, The title is Cancer, Crisis and the Cross and it's my story of God's divine intervention in my life when I almost died from cancer just a few years ago.

So I want to invite you to come back next weekend.

There also are some extra invitations there in the foyer.

If you'd like to invite a friend, we want to encourage you to do that.

Alright, we're going to get started this morning because I don't want you to keep you too long and we hope once again that you will be welcomed.

We hope that you will stay with us for our special lunch today and we just are glad you're here.

Let's just ask the Lord's presence to be with us and then we will dive in.

I'm going to kneel, just invite you to bow your heads wherever you're at.

Father in heaven, we're so thankful today for all that Jesus has done for us.

The death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus.

But Jesus right now is in heaven interceding for us.

He's organizing circumstances that will reveal to us Himself and you, Father.

And today we believe that Jesus will very soon come back to this earth.

All the signs that you gave us to watch for, all the things you said to look for, are happening right now.

And we pray today that you would move in our hearts to help us sense our need of You.

Help us sense our need of Your presence in our lives today.

Help us sense the need of a transformation.

This world is just a small microsecond in the eyes of eternity.

So we pray today that we would be awakened by your love, we would be awakened by your moving in our hearts and that We would each make our decision today to be 1 with You, to accept You, to receive You with open hearts, and to be ready for Jesus' soon return.

So we ask this now, that You would be with us, and You would bless us, and that we would see you through the picture of my life today and we come in Jesus' name, amen.

I don't know what your background is this morning, I don't know if you were raised in a Christian home, I don't know if you were raised in a non-Christian home.

I don't know if you don't know much about the Bible.

None of that really matters today because I believe that we're all on the same level, right?

And that we all come to God in the same way.

We all experience God in maybe slightly different aspects, but the core is the same.

And I want to share with you this morning that I, my personal life, I was not raised in a Christian home.

My parents Occasionally went to church, maybe like some today, we went on the holidays, we went on the Easter Passover time, we went on the Christmas time and maybe at Thanksgiving or something along those lines, but we did not go on a regular basis.

And I appreciate what they did in my life.

Growing up, I did go to church sometimes with my grandparents.

And my grandparents were actually, 1 set of my grandparents were in a gospel singing group.

And so my grandpa sang bass in this Christian singing group.

You'll have to excuse me, I woke up yesterday just a little bit under the weather, so please forgive me if I'm coughing a little bit.

And my other, my grandmother actually played the drums in this group.

So usually the drum set would be towards the back and she would sit back there and you could barely see her over the top of it, you know, and she'd just be back there doing her thing.

And My uncle actually played piano in this gospel singing group and they had a couple other people as well.

So I had some exposure in my life growing up going to church.

And I went to church with them and my other grandma went to church.

She went to the church of the Nazarene and I would go with her many times, but my parents never really went.

Now growing up, you wouldn't know it now because I don't have any hair, but growing up my hair was about as fiery, I should have worn a red shirt so I could demonstrate it for you, but it's about as fiery red as you can imagine.

You see, having red hair is not a bad thing but having red hair with the last name peppers is not such a good thing.

And so that's how I grew up and when I was in elementary school, when I was in middle school, I was growing up and I got all the bell pepper jokes.

I got all the, thank you very much Nancy.

And I can assure you that nothing you could give to me would be original.

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The Atheist Who Found God: Part 1

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