I love fall. I am a New Englander by birth. I was brought up in Western Massachusetts. Some of prettiest fall foliage on this earth can be seen in the Berkshires from late September to early November. The mountains surrounding the Housatonic Valley are truly spectacular as the trees are all decked out in their harvest colors.

There is another reason I love fall. It is the time of year that I became a Jesus freak. I use that term unashamedly because that’s what a few of my acquaintances began to call me after my conversion experience “back in the day”. I think they probably labeled me aptly. I was never really someone who took their faith half-way serious. For me, for whatever reason, it was “all in” from the start.

My family was not perfect. Whose is? My dad died of cancer when I was nine and my mother remarried a wonderful man two years later. She and my step-dad made sure we had more than enough and raised us in a very strong moral home that I will always be grateful for. My mom made me and my younger siblings attend Sunday School every week. We went religiously to Old Parish Church in the center of Sheffield.  I went without a fight because I could go to Silk’s Drugstore right afterwards to buy candy. One of my Sunday school teachers was King Hunt, a basketball star for Mount Everett. I don’t remember if he was a good teacher but I do remember it was easy to divert him from the lesson to talk about basketball.

It was at Old Parish that I encountered Percy Holmes. Mr. Holmes was an old man in his seventies by the time I got to him. Every sixth grade boy and girl had to go through Percy Holmes’ class. He was the first teacher I had that used the Bible… not the little books everyone else had used. He spoke of Christ like he knew him and of a coming judgment like it really would happen. His words and manner of life impacted me. His faith was real, alive, life-changing.

Soon, the dominant thing in my life was sports. Really, from the sixth grade on all that was important to me were the three balls; football, basketball and baseball. It seems silly, but I went to school to play ball. I wish I could say I excelled at any of these but in reality I was only an average athlete. I envied my friend Steve Brown who could throw a football nearly fifty yards in the air (the coaches moved me to running back because it was clear I was never going to beat him out for the quarterbacking  job). I could only dream of being like my friend Peter Gunn who was the same height as me and could nearly dunk a basketball (I struggled to get half-way up the net with my best jumps). I longed to pitch a baseball like my friend Randy Koldys who threw hard with pinpoint control (I did, however, break-up a Koldys’ no-hitter in Little League when he mercifully threw me a knuckleball). Still, sports were a major source of happiness for me.

In the fall of my freshman year of High School my family received Billy Graham’s Decision Magazine in the mail. I don’t to this day know how we got it and who it was addressed to if anyone in my house. I picked it up and read almost the whole magazine. I didn’t understand much of it but was annoyed by what I did understand. Graham, a world-wide famous evangelist, was really down on the world. His message was one of “get ready, Jesus is coming soon”. I thought he was too negative, yet his faith seemed much like Percy Holmes’ faith. It was real, it was alive. It was life-changing. I determined that I was going to find out what was up with Graham and his message.

One of our assistant football coaches at the time was a man named  Robert Duchardt. We called him “Coach”. He was also the team trainer. I had heard through the grapevine that he was “religious”. Almost immediately after receiving the Decision Magazine I started  conversing with him about Graham, the end of the world and his Christian faith. After my annoying questioning he invited me to join him and his family and two senior football players for a trip upstate to visit his brother at a Christian retreat center. The next day, having been defeated by Haldane 36-6 on Saturday, we all got into his VW van and journeyed upstate.

Arriving at our destination on Sunday morning we went to an evangelical worship service. The music was alive. The people were real. It was different from what I had experienced in my religious world. After dinner the three footballers and the coach sat and talked about matters of God, Jesus Christ and faith on a dock overlooking Schroon Lake. Coach Duchardt shared with us the same message that Mr. Holmes had shared, the same message Billy Graham’s Decision Magazine had communicated.

Opening the Scriptures, Coach talked about the fact that all men are sinners and that I was a sinner. I needed no convincing. The depravity of my sailor like mouth and the filthiness of my lustful mind and heart already told me I was a sinner. The Bible verses he shared just confirmed it (Romans 3:23). He also shared that all of our sin in general as well as my sin in particular separated me from God and that ultimately it would lead me to a permanent separation, an eternal damnation (Romans 6:23). I had always thought that whenever the Judgment Day occurred my good works would be weighed against my evil deeds and based on how the scale tipped I would go either to Heaven or to Hell. That day I understood that it is by God’s grace alone (God’s undeserved favor) through faith that a person is made right with God and that my good works we not the basis for having a relationship with Him. (Ephesians 2:8-9).

As our conversation continued, Coach Duchardt read the Scripture that powerfully points out,  “But God demonstrated his love towards us in the while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.”  Put in the simplest terms, this verse states that God loves me and that Christ died for my sins. I had heard He’d died for the sins of mankind but hadn’t made the connection. It was for Dave Watson’s sins that He died and rose. It was personal.

The last verse we talked about was John 3:16. Perhaps the most famous verse in the world but it was new to me. It states, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” Duchardt encouraged me to insert my name in the verse to see how personal it is. “God so loved Dave Watson that He sent His only begotten Son that if Dave Watson would believe in Him Dave Watson would not perish but have everlasting life.“

Having personalized this verse, for the very first time, I believed that Jesus Christ died for me and my sin and that I could have a relationship with God because of Him.  I opened my heart to Christ by praying a very simple prayer. I said something like this:
“God I know I am a sinner, I know I deserve to be separated from you because of my sin. I believe Jesus Christ died for me, taking the penalty for my sin. Thank  you Lord that you rose again showing that God accepted your sacrifice. Jesus, come into my life to be my Lord and Savior, forgive me of my sins and change me from the inside out.”

I very much wish I could adequately convey what happened to me on that dock. I walked off knowing that I was a forgiven person.  I was clean. I rode home that day knowing God’s presence was real in my life. It was more than a feeling. I went to bed that night knowing I was a different person and that I had eternal life not because of what I’d done but because of what Jesus had done for me. I wish I could say I have lived a perfect life from that day until now but I haven’t. I am sure that to my friends, family and classmates I seemed over-zealous, argumentative, judgmental, and arrogant because I probably was. I was also a high schooler whose life was radically impacted and I wanted to share my new-found faith with others.

The day I have described here was October 7, 1973, 41 years ago today. That was the day I became a Jesus Freak.  It was then, and remains until today, the most significant day of my life. I have never been the same. Thank you Lord.
Dave Watson