About The Author
My name is Eric Brown, and I was born and raised in Northeastern Ohio. Our family was for the most part what I would consider secular Christian. My father was raised Catholic and at the age of 19, when he entered the Navy, he never went back to church after that until he had children. My mom was Lutheran and always wanted us in church as we were growing up. My dad would occasionally go along, as you can imagine. Eventually, our family was only going twice a year (Easter and Christmas) and as we continued to get older, we all together stopped going to Sunday service. It would be fair to say that I hated going to church, and pretty much anything that had to do with faith. I couldn’t stand the Lutheran Church that we had been going to. The long robes, organ music, and the boring sermons were nothing but noxious stimuli in my environment. So, when I finally got to college.…….
Below I would like to share with you a broad overview of the journey of what my life was like before declaring myself an atheist, up to my acceptance of Christ as my Lord and Savior.
A Doctor Meets The Great Physician
Zoology 101
As a youth and young adult, I had a distinct dislike for the issue of faith. I avoided church at any and all costs. By the time I went to college, I still didn’t think or care much about such things until my freshman year, when I met my zoology 101 professor. On the first day of class, he announced to everyone that he was an atheist, and put forth a concise summation of why his position over one of faith in God was true. From that time on, I moved forward as an atheist, even though I invested little time in understanding what it meant to be one. What that professor spoke about rang true in my mind and heart. It was all I needed to excuse myself from further consideration of a need for faith in my life.
During my college years, I developed a hatred for most Christians, mainly over the hypocrisy I saw in their lives. In those days, I enjoyed sparring with anyone who cared to try to convert me to Christianity. I used the Lords name in vain on a daily basis, and for years, I absolutely refused to believe that God could even possibly be real. However, by the time medical school started, I somehow found it more practical to hold a worldview of agnosticism, since I knew I could not prove he does not exist.
Conversion & Funnel Clouds
During residency, my wife and I met a new friend who lived two doors down from us. Soon after meeting, she and Robin became very close friends. They spent hours together, and over the course of two years, she led my wife to the Lord. Knowing my feelings about faith, she never had any specific agenda with me. I simply had an opportunity to hear their conversations. Without being pressed to accept the faith, what I heard about the Lord slowly started to soften my heart. I had never heard anything like it before, and found myself thinking how beautiful it all sounded. I was beginning to wonder how I could not want something so wonderful for myself. During my last year of medical training, I actually started to pray on a rare occasion, asking God to reveal himself to me.
That next year, I became a new attending physician at Medina Hospital ER. It was during this year that my wife got baptized, and when her ceremony came around, we drove back to Toledo for it. The drive in took us through one of the most terrible storms I had ever experienced. While waiting at the church for the baptism to begin, they came in and announced that a funnel cloud was spotted outside of the church, and they had to cancel the event. We were rushed into the gymnasium and quickly sat up along the wall, waiting for the danger to pass.
Two Roads Diverged
It was this very moment that I felt a sense of fear over my destiny. If all my wife had received was true, and we died that day, she would be in heaven, and I would be in hell. I remember thinking how it no longer made sense to avoid faith in God. What I had heard over the past two years was beautiful, and the alternate was unthinkable. Even if there was only a small chance that it was true, what did I have to lose?
My transformation from an atheist to a follower of Christ occur during the busiest years of my life. It was in no way an intellectual conversion, nor one driven by “hitting rock-bottom” from depression. My life, although strained with my pursuit of a medical education, was overall a great life. I had parents who loved and sacrificed for me, plenty of great friends, and I never faced any serious tribulation. I had a beautiful wife and an amazing career with a great income. In the eyes of the world, I didn’t need anything else, but that was not the case.
The Great Physician
The reason that I came to Jesus was simply because of the beauty of what I heard, as well as a healthy dose of fear over the alternate future I could face if I continued to turn away from it. All I had to do was accept the amazing, free gift of salvation that God has offered to all people. The years that have followed my receiving Christ as Lord and Savior have seen many failures, yet there have been some significant victories. I had to accept the shame of now becoming one of the hypocritical Christians that I once condemned. It took learning the lesson of humility to be able to accept in faith that perfection is not His expectation of me. I now try to be more aware of my failures and always maintain a desire to repent. The Great Physician has truly transformed my heart and mind. I believe that if you sincerely seek Him, He will transplant a new heart in you as well. He makes all things new!