Wake Me Up

One of my favorite songs is by a band named Further Seems Forever. The name of the song is called Light Up Ahead. This song is very special to me because I first heard it when I was going through one of the toughest times in my life. This was in 8th grade. I was failing school, messing around in class, not listening to teachers, not doing homework and worst of all I was moving away from God. I hardly prayed. I didn't feel the need. I felt like God didn't care about me and was punishing me by not helping me with my grades. My parents every night during dinner would tell me that I needed to buckle down and work harder, but I never really listened. To tell you the truth back then I never really cared. I felt I could get along in life without good grades in school. So I chose to give up. I chose not to work hard and give it everything that I had.

My parents told me that I better pray to God to help me realize that I need to work hard in school. My parents also took it a step further by telling me that if I didn't get my grades up they would pull me out of this school that I begged my parents to send me to over a year ago. This got me going. I started to work harder and try my hardest in school but nothing was happening. I began to feel that nothing was working. So during this time of stress, I knelt down for the first time in over a year and I prayed. I prayed asking God to help me do the best that I could to work hard and not give up in school. I told Him that I was giving up everything that I had that had moved me away from Him. I told Him that I would no longer mess around in school and give up on my homework if He helped me to get good grades for the rest of the year.

During one of my prayers a song on the radio began playing. It was the song called Light Up Ahead by Further Seems Forever. As I prayed I heard the lyrics of the song, " Take this heart of darkness, I give it up. And all the emptiness, you fill me up. The times I feel like nothing, you bring enough. So I can live for something, you lift me up! And all these bad dreams, I wake up to the light. And when I can't see, I wake up to your eyes. Wake me up!"

These were the lyrics I needed to hear. This song gave me renewed strength to carry on and work to get good grades. The lyrics taught me that I needed to wake up and turn away from not working hard in school so that I would be able to get good grades. It also taught me to trust in God that He would take care of me during this hard time. It also taught me that I couldn't do anything without God and I was wrong to criticize him for my own faults. I knew that He had been trying to help me but I did not open myself up to Him. However, this was definitely going to change.

Slowly I let God back into my heart. Ever since I let Him back in and trusted Him to help me with my grades everything began to fall into place. I began to pick up my grades and work hard in school. Now I pray everyday and ask God to be with me throughout my day helping me to grow closer to Him and continue to pick up my grades.
I must always remember that God is always near me. I just have to want to be near to Him. I must always remember that with God all things are possible. Thank you God for coming into my heart and helping me through my difficult time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s43ZIDSXgw0