Jeff’s Story: Finding God in the Storm
By Jeff D’Alessio
Southeast Elizabethtown Campus member
Do you remember the first time you felt God in your heart? Not just in your mind when you are praying that He provides His hands of comfort for a suffering loved one, and certainly not when you have prayed to Him to get that promotion you want because, after all, it would be a nice boost in salary and professional status.
I do. I was on a riding lawnmower in our Elizabethtown backyard in October of 2017, about two months after my wife and I had begun attending Southeast Christian Church’s local campus.
As I always do, I had my phone on, listening to music—if it’s not from the 1970s, it’s Christian or Country. As I circled one of our three large trees that night on the John Deere, I was thinking of some family issues that my wife and I were dealing with regarding our son. We were really struggling.
And then the song, “Eye of the Storm” by Ryan Stevenson, came on. The timing couldn’t have been better because the storm we were in as a family was fierce and unrelenting.
“In the eye of the storm You remain in control
In the middle of the war You guard my soul
You alone are the anchor
When my sails are torn
Your love surrounds me
In the eye of the storm’’
I had felt alone in the many prayers, tears, and heartache leading up to that night. As the song continued to play, I sat there atop the mower and cried. And cried. I cried tears of joy, not tears of despair–for the first time in a long time.
It was then that I felt God, when I was at my lowest one moment and fulfilled the next. I felt God surround my heart, more than my mind. It was then, after 57 years of living, that I had God completely in my heart. Me, a sinner, an often-on-the-fence believer, had God in my heart.
It had to be a “God thing.’’
God’s timing is always perfect. I knew then, as I know now, that God loves me and that He knows our hurt. Sometimes it just takes tough times to realize what a powerful, forgiving, and loving God we have.
I was baptized on January 27, 2019. It was one of the best days of my life—publicly accepting God as my Lord and Savior and getting dipped under water by Pastor Michael Kast with my wife, Lisa, by my side.
It has been a long, crazy journey from being raised as a Catholic to not attending church to feeling bitter and then completely finding God while on a lawn mower with the right words in my head in a time of need.
I’m not perfect. Far from it. But I believe in God and I know now more than ever He is with me in good times and bad. I have never felt more content in my life.
As I heard during a sermon soon after that October evening, “God’s WILL is always bigger than our circumstances.’’ My heart knows that, now.