A few of you have either mentioned how much Cooper’s testimony meant to you, or expressed a desire to read it. Here it is, reprinted with Cooper’s permission. His baptism, along with two others that day, happened this past Sunday, and it was…well, I’m not sure I have a word for it. Cooper’s life, well-being, and faith are things I have prayed for fervently for many years – and often with hopelessness. But God…

He chose Cooper before the foundation of the earth and also chose Robert and me (and many others) to pray for him and has now granted Coop “the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” Those of us who’ve been in on this story got to rejoice together and marvel at God’s glory on Sunday.

So, maybe the word is glorious. God is all-glorious. It was a glorious day.

Here’s Coop’s story:

The timeline of my conversion is one that I always wish was less murky and more cut and dry, but in retrospect it seems that God opened my eyes to him in a way that I am completely unable to receive any credit for. I was raised in a conservative Christian home, my dad is a pastor, and I was educated through high school in a Classical Christian homeschool program. Needless to say I was exposed to the gospel and the Christian faith from the moment I entered the world.I struggled a lot in my upbringing with submitting to my parents and working hard enough in school. I’m thankful that God allowed me the ability to have academic success in high school and eventually attend college, but again I feel as though I can’t take any credit for this either because God pushed me to succeed through my parents, mainly my mom, who knew what was best for me in the long run and never gave up on me even after nasty arguments and lots of frustrating days at home.

When I was a junior I took part in a year long leadership program that ended with a mission trip to South Africa – all of which I was not mature enough to enjoy or get anything out of. I was required to share my so-called testimony on that trip at a couple of very big churches. I distinctly remember lying in my bed in a hotel in Durban South Africa and having no idea what to write. I had no idea how or even if I was a Christian, if Christ had saved my soul, or if I was even going to be able to break through the numbness I felt towards the Christian faith enough to become a child of God.That’s what I felt towards the gospel, absolutely aware of my need for it, and yet completely numb to it, having heard the gospel preached my whole life. It wasn’t real for me by any stretch of the imagination. I wrote whatever came to my mind that night and it was fine, but I was happy it was over when I got back to the states. All I wanted was to play in my basketball game and talk to that cute girl at youth group. I don’t even consider that potentially profound trip a part of my development of faith at all. I feel a lot of regret for that. A verse that for me describes the numbness I used to feel towards the gospel is John 5:39-40:

You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.

After that I continued to idolize things such as basketball and an unhealthy relationship with a girlfriend that started my junior year. What happened from then on is essentially God himself tearing down the things I loved most in the world one by one, and looking back I couldn’t be happier that He did. It started with basketball. I worked unbelievably hard at basketball in high school. I remember long summers that I spent at the Southwest UMass courts shooting a basketball for hours, setting up cones and doing different drills, reading about basketball, lifting weights, running cross country just to get in shape, and riding my bike three miles uphill to play basketball outside in the snow because there were no indoor gyms to play in. Looking back I don’t even understand why, but I was searching for a way to identify myself in this world. Something to give me a purpose and a drive.

My freshman year I played for a Christian Homeschool team in Austin Texas during a family sabbatical. I was too short to even score against the huge high schools in Texas, and my team never even won a game that year. When I got back home I tried out for the Amherst high school team two times in two years. Both times opening a letter from the coach saying that I didn’t make the team. I went up to my room and shut the door both times, sobbing and actually cursing God. “Why should I work hard in school and being in good relationship with my mom when you won’t even let me play the sport I love no matter how hard I try?”  This was the thought I remember having that night. This was a deeply seated anger that I literally feel the lasting effects of to this day every time I step on a basketball court to play for fun. These feelings still produce an unrighteous anger in me when I compete. To this day I struggle with feelings of anger towards people that have success in sports in college or others. Without even knowing them I make the assumption, “I worked harder than you. It’s not fair.” I didn’t experience anything near the pain that some kids experience, and yet I didn’t understand God and I wasn’t content with how He was letting my life play out. I remember a particular lie that I told in high school about the level of physical intimacy I had with a girlfriend that deeply damaged trust between my parents and me, something that I also painfully regret to this day. I was terrified of death and of hell. I sat during family devotions each night and actually lashed out in anger at my sister whenever she would ask a question about what heaven is like, because I was genuinely afraid that I wouldn’t be there with my family.

It’s pretty funny now, but some of you may remember “Snowtober” when there was that snow storm with snow and lightning that blacked out the power. I’d had a panic attack and confessed every sin I’d ever committed because I thought Jesus was coming back. No joke. There was also a time freshman year when I panicked over the same thing during a late night thunderstorm while we were living in Texas, much to the amusement of my pastoring father. What can I say, the Thunderstorms in Texas are insane. Needless to say I was so fallen and so broken and very scared of God’s wrath.To fast forward a bit, I miraculously made it through my high school years and was actually granted the opportunity to take a “gap year” in the Coachella Valley of southern California with my aunt, uncle and two very adorable toddler cousins. My year in California proved to be very meaningful and very challenging in a lot of ways. I loved the weather and I loved the state of California, but I was extremely lonely and trying to maintain a still unhealthy long distance relationship with high school girlfriend who was in Mass. I’m filled with regret about this as well. I could have been cultivating meaningful friendships at church there and exploring the area with friends. Instead, I spent a lot of time pathetically feeling sorry for myself and just waiting to go back home to this girl who I knew could provide my every need and desire. FAKE NEWS.I began working at a country club in California where my uncle was the superintendent, a very wealthy country club. I started in the grounds crew department. I worked very, very early mornings and very, very hot days with Mexican immigrants, most of whom did not speak a word of English. These men were actually for the most part very kind to me, not just because my uncle was their boss, but they were just for the most part very kind and joyful people. They sang and laughed throughout the workday, enjoying community with each other and excited about working together.

I still think about Eduardo, a 20 year old immigrant I met that had dropped out of high school and was working there. We worked together the majority of the days during that time for long, long hours. He was so kind to me in showing me the machines and encouraging me in the hard work each day. When I think about him today, I find myself praying earnestly for him and his brother, that God would take care of them. Eduardo was the first person I prayed for every single night, even though I knew that I was not in right standing with God.After three strenuous months in the grounds crew, I moved to valet parking and outside service at the clubhouse, working with college-age guys like myself for much higher pay and much easier work. I observed that the obscenely wealthy club members were actually not so joyful. They complained about the most minuscule details of the golf course and all had pretty negative or mean things to say to the staff. I learned what it really meant to work hard, and I learned about happiness. I met people who retired and sold their companies to Bill Gates at the age of forty and drove a Bentley to play golf and drink at 9 in the morning every day with their friends. Most of these people seemed  miserable. Some of them had all the money in the world and were dying from terminal cancer. Some of them were very nice, but I could see a lack of hope in their eyes as they came out of the clubhouse after a dinner party and slumped into a Mercedes.

This was all very unsettling to me, but I didn’t think too much of it. I spent a lot of time playing guitar and writing sad music in my free time. This was my passion and I relied on it as a way to process my emotions and express what I was feeling.  I was basically a wannabe Bon Iver, if you know who that is. Pretty depressing. When I wasn’t doing that I was working or playing basketball at the gym, I was refusing to initiate with God. I knew He didn’t want me to be dating that girl. Completely my fault. I’m so stupid for that. I came back to Amherst after a year in Cali. I had made a pretty good amount of money and I was sure that now that I was back at home I could finally be happy. Wrong. I didn’t adjust well to being home. This girl kept telling me I was different. We didn’t get along like we did before I left. I felt different but didn’t exactly know why. I still felt the melancholy feeling I thought would go away when I was back with friends. Then on May 21st ,2016 I had an absolutely crippling anxiety attack while playing guitar with some friends. It felt like I was dying and for a year or so afterward I convinced myself of every fatal illness I could think of as an explanation for the anxiety attack, but I was actually totally healthy. My mental state was in a dark place. Sometimes I would think about how illogical it actually is to be a Christian and to be as afraid of illness and death as I was during that phase of terrible anxiety and depression. And I was right, it didn’t make sense, and revealed a huge part of me that was not in right standing with God or myself.

Anxiety taught me so much about true peace. In reality, anxiety and depression are responses to the world that are medically problematic, but the anxiety and depressive response is actually a very proportionate reaction to the world. I became aware of how dark life could be when viewed through a lens of humanism. I realized how selfish I was to spend my life thinking only of myself and whether or not I was “okay.” This is a terrible way to spend your time, and I would have never broken out of that mindset if I had not been shaken awake by that experience with anxiety, which is ongoing to this day but nowhere near as hard as it was then.

I once visited Austin Stone church in Texas with my mom and brother Kory and the pastor talked about the same kind of numbness and familiarity he felt regarding Christianity and struggled with when he was young. My mom emailed him and told him that the sermon had been meaningful to me, and he said that he would pray 2 Corinthians 4:6 for me, which says:

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.

There was no emotional experience that pushed me over the edge into my life as a follower of Christ. I have always been a very deep and creative thinker. This is what led to the melancholia and anxiety that I experienced, but from this God gave me eyes to see the world around me for what it is. Because I’m so introspective, I am well acquainted with the sin that is in me from the most obvious sinful actions to the most subtle sinful motives behind them. God gave me the gift of a strong sense of logic and a very high sensitivity to the world around me. I am saved because God made clear to me the reality of myself and the world around me insofar as it is transcended and permeated by sin.

As I came to know these realities the only logical response was absolute desperation for a savior. Absolute desperation for the gospel of Jesus Christ. I realized that I am nothing without the gospel.  I’m so thankful for the theological conversations I get to have with my parents at the kitchen table. I’m thankful that they had those conversations with me even when I was young and would have rather been doing anything else, because they instilled in me a wealth of wisdom that has enriched my life and enabled me to speak truth into others’ lives.

I’m also thankful for Corey Kline, who is reading this right now. Corey encourages me In my faith and shares my views of the world more than any friend I have. We both love Ben Shapiro, and he still can’t guard me in basketball. I’m overwhelmed in how blessed I am by God’s placing of these and many other people in my life. Upon my acceptance of the forgiveness that he has offered me and the faith that I have placed in Christ, my anxieties and hopelessness have become almost irrelevant. I am able to love people better than ever before. God has altered the tracks of my reasoning from going off the rails and placed them on a track that leads to a place of complete peace. That’s what I look forward to most when we dwell on the new earth with our savior. God has blessed me with the opportunity to study accounting at a great college and even though it may be an irrelevant anecdote, I’m happier now than I ever have been.