Rick's Testimony-High School Days Radical Life Support

[Spoiler alert: we learned after this podcast, not to record on garbage pick-up days.] 😊
The first podcast discussed that the word radical means back to basics, fundamentals, extreme, far out there. Take your pick. Is it extreme or fundamentals? When we talk about a radical life, we mean a basic fundamental life that is lived with one thought in mind, to glorify God and lift up Jesus. That is what we want to do here at Radical Life Support.
We launched on April 8th because its a memorial day.  For Rick, it was the day that his dad went to be with Jesus. As hard as death can be, it was a beautiful day. The family stood around and prayed and read Psalms 23. For Robin on that same date her son stepped in front of a train and his life ended. Learning that they both had the same memorial date made it one that could be shared together.
To begin the podcast on April 8th represents a beginning of life not a memorial of death. You can wonder when someone is gone, does life go on, does it continue and it does. Jesus is the Way the Truth and the Life and we believe like Him we will one day after our dying, we will rise again.  We will be alive like Him forever.
With so much talk and fear of death weaving its way through the 7 billion people on the planet, the tragedy isn’t that people are dying or going to die. The tragedy is to die without Jesus. Because without Jesus you do not enter into eternal life or to that place of rest, peace, paradise, heaven. The bible is so plain when it comes to eternal life, it is not a mystery. He didn’t place us on earth to get it all figured out. He came to show us that it is figured out and that Jesus is the answer still today as it was 2000 years ago. 
Rick began living his radical life on journey on July 9, 1976. There was a radical difference between pre and post July 9th. He gave his life to Jesus Christ and dedicated his life to Him at a bible camp in Minnesota. He prayed for the first time and asked Jesus to come into his heart and be born again as it says in John 3:3, “unless we are born again, you cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” When that was shared with him, he knew he wanted to live forever with Jesus.
There were three events that happened right after the bible camp in one afternoon that really cemented the change upon the other:
1.    First, was when a fellow classmate who had also been born again at the camp explained on the bus home that things were going to be different when they got home. She specifically mentioned that not all of their classmates would be as excited as they all were to be born again. She prompted Rick to kneel in the bus in front of everyone and pray for their new journey with Jesus and pray for their friends and family.
2.     Second, after the bus ride, he was picked up by his mother and taken home to the farm with his sisters. When asked by his mother how camp went, it was his first time to share of his decision to accept Jesus in his heart. He was saying with his lips what was going on in his heart and in his mind. 
3.    The third thing that happened was that his friends came to invite him to town to go drinking with them. Rick explained that things had changed and he wouldn't be drinking any more. When he said drinking wasn’t going to be a part of his new life, his friend said, “They got to you didn’t they, you have become a ‘Jesus freak,’ a ‘holy Joe,’ a ‘bible banger.’” 
These events sealed something inside Rick’s heart, something locked as to who he was going to be and how he was going to be. This fresh encounter with God filled his life with new purpose, meaning, and resolve. He knew that if he was going to follow Jesus, he had to take it seriously. He knew he was called to reach out to those around him.
Living a radical life with Jesus means taking a courageous step to identify yourself with Him.