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Maris Vitols
My life in God’s story
Maris Vitols, (see profile) BPI student of 2011
draft. Before interview Maris prayed to God that his story would bring out God
and glorify Him, not Maris himself. Maris’ story is about God’s greatness and
power ina man’s life.
I was born in the country, in Nereta. For a long
time I thought that I was born in a very good family. Every child considers
their mom and dad to be the best people. When I was a year and a half old I had an accident – dad
through me against the wall in anger, and I was paralyzed. Two months I spent
in the hospital and miraculosly when mom started praying to God, I got up and
started walking. They say that children don’t remember anything but as the
years have passed, I have understood what these months in the hospital did to
me not just physically but emotionally and spiritually as well. For many years
I have tried to overcome it, to receive healing. When I have experienced such
moments of inner healing at the church, I have had great emotional pain about
having been rejected as soon as I was born and got to know this world. You lie
there by yourself, cannot talk yet, cannot cry, there is darkness around you
and you feel like nobody wants you, unnecessary. During my teenage years I
created a macho image in order to hide my personality weakness.
My
parents used alchocol time to time, and I saw emotional and physical abuse
around me that I as a child could not understand. When they drank, they stopped
taking care of me. My clearest childhood memory is being by myself at night and
going to look for my parents. It is dark, and I am very afraid that I have been
abandoned once again, and once again nobody needs me. Of course, I always
miraculously found them, and everything ended well.
In kindergarten and first grade they knew what
had happened to me and treated me with understanding, not discussing my
weaknesses, lame leg or other things. When I was eight my parents moved to
Riga, and I experienced how cruel children could be. I understood what it means
– to experience pain, humiliation and tears. This nightmare continued till 9th
grade. In the beginning I defended myself, fought back. At some point I stopped
defending myself because realized that will be guilty in the eyes of children
and teachers, and if I hit back when they hit me, in the end it is even more
painful. If I did not defend myself, they beat me and I could go home crying.
At home often times nobody was interested what is happening with me. Nobody
cared that I was constantly humiliated and called names at school.
In
my teenage years I found friends who were also from risk families, and they
encouraged me to smoke, to drink and to wander around. Those were the first people who accepted me as a person.
I did not remain there long. My mom removed me from these people.
As
I suffered, I saw others suffer. And I wanted to do something for others. Then
I did not know anything about God; for the most part I lived alone. I was
making business plans and dreamed big about having a house where I will hide
those that are made to suffer by others.
I pictured that I will take them abroad, that I will have several airplanes.
Dreamed about changing peoples’ lives. These dreams fell apart very quickly, of
course. I understood that nothing is permanent in life and that sooner or later
these same people will disappoint me.
This is what my childhood was like. As the time
went by I understood that I do not want to live here, that this world is evil,
a mistake. I also considered suicide. In the Eighties esoteric literature that
talks about happenings beyond the threshold of death was in vogue. It did not
talk about Christ, and I used to think that I will find happiness there,
release from this nightmare I suffered in.
In my teenage years we had to read Victor Hugo’s
„Les Miserables”. I only read the first part but this book influenced my life.
I was fascinated by what the priest did when he rescued the prisoner without
any apparent reason. I started thinking about this man’s motivation when he
saved another person. It was not formulated in the book so clearly, only
mentioned that he was a very good person. I did not quite understand why he was
so good – can people be good on their own? But I accepted it as an ideal
meaning that I could also become this way. A light, a spark of hope entered in
my life.
In 1991 many spoke about God, and I also started
consciously looking for God. A woman invited me to the Church. During the
service I noticed the beautiful girls that were singing in the choir, and not
so much the message. I was often depressed during then because of my life. In
one of these emotionally difficult moments as I was walking down the street, I
asked to myself – who are you, God? It was an answer – God is love. I heard it
in my heart, I did not understand who is speaking to me. Now I can name Him –
the Holy Spirit who spoke with me, who turned my life upside down, who totally
changed me.
Since everybody in my family are nominal
Catholics I decided to become a catholic. I started regularly attending
Catholic church, started studying in Catholic high school. There I felt a call
to serve God. During the Night Adoration as I was on my knees praying for a few
seconds I heard thousands of voices that were calling for help. First I looked
around to see if anybody else also had heard. I had a feeling that those who
cried for help were in Hell. When I told others about this they said that I
probably had fallen asleep. But I also understood that this took deep root in
my heart. I started having great compassion for lost souls.
In 1994 I entered Riga Catholic Spiritual
Seminary – studied there two years. I was very active, maybe too active. As
soon as I started studying, I got a lot of respect, they came to me as a future
priest for advice. Then I either got puffed up or simply was not emotionally
mature enough. I walked away from there and had deep crisis in my faith. I felt
guilty for rejecting my calling. Calling is like a part of you, that lives in
you, is like your heartbeat, you cannot put it aside. I tried to quench it,
thought about going to study somewhere else and forgetting my calling to lost
souls. Everything else I tried to study seemed flat. I did not want to lose
years studying something I will never use. I started using alcohol, living
promiscuous life. These four years in my life were lived as a nightmare of sin,
I lost everything I had – friends, their respect that I had gained, all my
money and household items.
In the summer of 2000 after getting really drunk
I woke up in my home where everything was sold for alcohol and dirty, I had
sold my last dresser. In that moment I realized that I have to find God. All of
these four years I had looked for God but could not come back to Him – sin was
pulling me back. I kept going to church, kept feeling my calling but felt unworthy
of it all, put it aside, and tried not to think about it all. Once I went to
Christian bookstore where I got to know its owner Aivars who has been my close
friend ever since then, and who helped me come back to Jesus.
In 2003 I met my wife Agnese. I put my ad in
dating section of Christian site www. Church.lv. Several girls wrote long, beautiful letters.
There came another short letter – call me if you want. I called and we met.
When I first saw Agnese I had a feeling that my life will be connected with her
in some way. She did not share my feeling. After the first meeting she did not
want to meet with me again. I wrote a letter to Agnese with the parable about
the rich merchant. Jesus shows him pearl that He has cherished, polished and
prepared for him for years. Merchant sold all of his other pearls in order to
get this one. This letter moved her greatly. We started dating. After two years
got married. In 2006 our first daugther Estere was born, in 2010 second –
Katalina.
I love my wife a lot. She is the most beautiful
woman in the world; she is like this beautiful pearl that the Lord’s hand has
formed. When I feel sad (I often feel that way), when I think that nothing is
happening in my life, then I picture my wife before me – God has given me such
a treasure! Even if He would not have given me anything else, Agnese is a gift
that is like a proof of God in my life.
She is also my greatest example of faith. She is a person that taught me
Christianity for real life, work, relationships. She taught me how to serve and
love. She is my helper, I share everything with her..
I am very thankful to God for being able to study
at BPI, to fulfill the calling that God has given me. When I read about Open
House at BPI, God spoke to me as I prayed, He reminded me of His calling. It
had never been separated from me, I live with it. When the bishop spoke in Open
House meeting about the nation of Latvia, people, feeling pain for the lost,
every word resonated. I said, „God, here am I, send me!” Studies at BPI, and especially
fellowship with the other guys makes my character mature. We mature, we learn
to deny ourselves, to put aside our ambitions. We learn not to compete but to
serve one another.
All my experiences, everything I had done, fought
with, all the life in the darkness, has broken, wounded my personality. I know
what it means when Jesus puts you together for a scartch. It is like learning
to walk again like a little child, looking at things differently. Sometimes it
is very hard. I have to learn to understand that people are not my enemies.
Only Jesus can take me through this healing process. Everything that happened
to me including physical abuse Satan wanted to turn into my defeat, but God has
transformed it into my greatest weapon.
It is my sword just like Satan tried to turn Christ’s cross into His defeat,
but Christ turned it into a weapon that overcame the world. Likewise,
everything that has happened to me God has transformed into my weapon, my
sword. If I keep it in sheath and complain that my sword is not like somebody
else’s sword, it is pointless.
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