Hail to fun

The story of Rene Moonen

As a twenty year old boy I came to Eindhoven from Limburg five years ago to start with a study. It was great to live on my own, and “living just for fun” was one of the slogans with which I started to study at the college. The first years I enjoyed all a student life could offer. A lot of beer, five times a week into the night life and also the use of soft drugs took place.

A fellow student I knew was religious and followed Jesus. I had to cooperate often with him and we talked about matters of religion. I was raised as a catholic but it didn't touch me. What he spoke about was very nice for him but of no use to me.

In 1996 I returned from a half year training period in Austria and I nearly finished my study. Because of the good time in Austria I was stretching out to a new start. I was aware very well that I had to finish my study first and quit licentious behaviour. The habit of smoking weed had become a daily ritual. In the morning I felt like I could stop with it, but in the evening my bicycle would choose the path to the coffee shop. It grew this worse that I neglected my study and choose not to eat because of lack of money and to supply my daily moment of “relaxation”. I new then this had to change fast.

During that period I started to think more often about is there, would there be or not be, something “different”. And if there would exist something outside this world, than what would that be. People told so many stories and everyone shouted something: UFO-appearances, grain circles, the calling forth of spirits, Jomanda, faith, Buddha, Allah, Jesus, somewhere there had to be a connection and that's just what I wanted to know. One evening, the comet Hale Bopp stood in the sky, I started to think about all this. Pure hypothetically I assumed that this life on earth was raised by a superior race. During two or three hours all kind of thoughts came to my mind and fell together like a puzzle. My head became so loaded with information that it seemed to burst. I got dizzy because of it and thought that I had become mad. All of a sudden a warm feeling came through me and all those thoughts were gone and only one sentence in my mind stayed: God exists. A wonderful peace came over me and I fell asleep peacefully.

And yet this didn't help. I was still a slave of myself and it didn't go very well at college. And yet some information was added and now and then I prayed thinking it wouldn't do harm even if it wouldn't help. In 1997 fate turned itself against me, from all sides I was haunted and I was pushed into a situation I didn't want to be in. This was surely because it was only seven weeks until the final exams. And I felt bad and deserted. I prayed more often and called for help: if God existed, he should help me, out of my own effort I had made a mess of it.

One morning, in August I woke up on a sleeping couch, not knowing why I laid myself there in the night and not on my bed. Next to me was a pool of water and my guitar and books were all soaked. It seemed strange to me because there was no tap or something in the neighbourhood. Meanwhile I studied together on a division of Philips with my religious fellow student. A week later I opened the upper drawer of my desk and was amazed. The whole drawer was wet, soaked and mouldy. There was a letter in it that I kept there with a song with it. The writing on the envelope and the song text was totally stained, but the letter, though wet, was alright. When I told this at work to my friend, he gave me a little bible. I took it home, opened it and read john 7:38 (He who believes in me as the scripture has said, from his innermost being shall flow springs and rivers of living water).

It helped me partly, for I knew God was with me. And yet I kept blowing and I wanted to stop. At Sunday, 14 September, I prayed to God to help me with this and take the desire away. On Monday I lightened a joint and I never tasted something that foul, bah this was really awful. I stopped it immediately and never let myself being seduced again.

When I finally converted from the wrong path a new life started with wide possibilities to me. “Pray and you will be given” gave me a future with hope. God had proven it to me. During the months that followed He re-educated me and taught me to be faithful to Him without gain. In the midst of a heavy time of trials, confessing sin and getting up again and again He taught me to love and trust Him during the hardest situations. I went through many disappointments and the often I wanted to return, I knew that that was not an option, because I knew that once there would be a moment of justification to Him. I could only hope this would be over soon. It is true that one day of sadness seems longer than three days of joy. Those nine months of complete set-backs seemed like years. But this strengthened me spiritually. There is nothing impossible in this world when God is with me and when He is not; it is no doubt my own fault. Now I am graduated and have a nice job and a hopeful vision on the future, knowing that Jesus Christ really loves me and wants us to prosper. I doesn't matter which situation you have to be saved from, but with Him it will surely work. You only have to believe that He can and want to.

Looking back on my past life, I can say: it was good as long as it took. It was not the use of soft drugs that was primarily wrong, but especially the mental addiction that is accompanied with it. I used to think: “it's not that bad”, until you see yourself in the mirror and start to think: what am I doing. My re-education through Christ was a realisation of every step I make in life. If you do something, do it consciously and think before you start something. Before you know you are entrapped and no human around you that can be of help.

Rene Moonen