Hi, my name is Julia Mills. I grew up in Frederick, Maryland but moved to Laurel after getting married in July 2017. My husband and I began attending Grace shortly after, and it has been such a blessing in our lives.
I was christened as an infant and attended Sunday school for many years as a child, until slowly my parents stopped bringing us. I feel fortunate to have had that early exposure to Jesus and some foundation for me to build my faith upon.
Even though there was a period of ten years or so where I was no longer regularly attending church I was definitely still seeking Christ, but it took me a while to find Him. During that period I found myself going through the motions and ‘checking boxes’ of things good Christians would do, like praying at night and reading the Bible. I felt like I knew about Jesus, but looking back I certainly did not KNOW him.
I didn’t truly begin my walk with Jesus until my third year of college when my best friend invited me to attend her small group. After several meetings I was finally beginning to understand what it meant to be a Christian and began to more fully trust Jesus in my life. In God’s infinite wisdom, this newfound faith came at the beginning of a critical moment in my life: college graduation and the search for my place in the world.
Throughout my academic career I had never really experienced any major failures or setbacks and was used to being one of the best at whatever I did. Following graduation I no longer had this academic environment to provide this sort of gratification. On top of that, I no longer had academic goals to strive for; I needed to find a job and I didn’t exactly know what to do. I applied for what seemed to be a dream job, but the process to actually get the job was long and uncertain.
In the meantime I accepted another job that I really did not like, and that only made me more anxious about the other job working out. I thought that if I could just get that job then a lot of my problems would be solved and I would feel professionally fulfilled.
I prayed and prayed that I would hear news about the other job, and would pray that God’s will be done…but that I really hoped that his will and my desires would conveniently be aligned. Finally, after a really bad day at work I began praying and prayed for God’s will to be done without my little caveat attached to the end. I no longer cared whether or not I got the other job; I just wanted God to show me what his plan was for me and that I was ready to follow that path. Just a few weeks later I got the call I had been waiting for, and started the job I had been wanting for what seemed like forever.
Even now that I finally got this ‘dream job’ I of course still find myself going through hard times now and then. It serves as a reminder that no matter what the situation is I am not going to find the happiness I am seeking anywhere other than in Jesus. And I know that when I do find myself in a valley that he will always be there to lift me up. Accepting Jesus into my life has not only freed me from the grave, but also from the everyday worry and the need to impress others that used to plague me, and I have never felt more alive or more full of hope. I am so excited to finally declare that I have accepted Jesus as my savior and have relinquished all control to him.
— Julia Mills, Baptized April 2019
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