TESTIMONIES OF CHRIST - JASON ROTUNNO

My name is Jason Rotunno. I do computer work at the Hospital here at Penn and I want to share a little bit about how God has used some situations and circumstances in my life to bring me to accept Him which happened about 2 ½ years ago.

In high school I didn’t think a whole lot about God. I was pretty sure He existed, but I didn’t really know Him. Throughout college, though, and especially after college my doubts about Him began to grow and my view of Christianity became more negative. I figured that anyone who was even a little bit intellectual could see that Christianity was flawed, contradictory, scientifically inaccurate and fictitious.

I saw Christians as weak, arrogant, close-minded and hypocritical. I wasn’t angry or bitter towards Christianity or Christians, but I did see many flaws. I would sometimes wonder about God and about Jesus and figured Christianity was one of man’s ways of trying to explain His possible existence.

I imagined that Jesus was an actual man with great teachings, but I had some problems accepting that He was the Son of God. One thought I had was that He had some mental instabilities and thought He was the Son of God. Another was that his claims of being God’s Son were fictitious additions to his biography. I also attributed legend as a possible explanation to the miracle stories about Him.

During Christmas when my family got together my uncle would always bring up Jesus. Me and my cousins would look at each other, smirk and roll our eyes. I would sometimes debate with him, but I always held back because…Well, basically – I didn’t want to prove him wrong.

I felt that his religion helped him a lot so I felt bad forcing the truth upon him. Being that many of my arguments were scientifically based one year he gave me a book which he thought would help me with this area. I promised him I’d read it and promptly filed it away on my bookshelf when I got home.

God eventually put me in some situations, though, which brought me to Him. After college I didn’t enjoy my job and I never really liked Philadelphia so I decided to move to New York. Since Manhattan was too expensive I ended up moving to Jersey City which is right across the Hudson River from Manhattan, but during my year there things didn’t really work out.

I didn’t like Jersey City, I hated spending so much time on the subways to and from work and I wasn’t making any friends.

Towards the end of the year I struggled with the decision of whether to move back to Philly. This ended up being one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make. I was totally torn apart inside and could not figure out what I should do.

I really agonized over the decision and prayed to God that He would help me make the right one. I finally decided to follow my original plans and came back to Philly returning to my old job.

When I got back, though I couldn’t believe that’s the decision that I made. All the reasons that I left Philadelphia came flooding back. The first few months back at my old job I couldn’t believe I was sitting back in that office. I felt like I’d taken a step back in my life. I had finally gotten out of the city I wanted to leave for so long only to end up back here.

But God had answered my previous prayers and brought me back to Philadelphia and my old job for a reason. The clinic that I worked in ended up hiring someone who I became friends with. She came to GCC and would share the gospel with me from time to time, but I heard it all before and took it with a grain of salt. Sometimes I would debate with her a bit but like with my uncle I didn’t want to force the truth on her.

She invited me to GCC a couple times, but I was hesitant to come. I eventually ‘gave in’ and decided to check it out. I was actually really surprised with the service. The message was well presented and one thing that really surprised me is that everyone seemed normal! After the service I felt that there was something to this and it wasn’t something I could just ignore. However, I was still a little resistant.

I decided to pull out the book that my uncle had given me a couple years prior. It took some time and some set backs but I slowly began to see the truthfulness of the gospel. I saw that my assumptions and arguments against Christianity had been flawed.

I realized that Jesus was in fact the Son of God and even though I’ve sinned against Him, ignored Him, rebelled against Him and did many wrong-doings against him, He still died for me because He wants me to be with Him. I knew that this wasn’t something that I could acknowledge intellectually without acknowledging spiritually so I accepted Christ into my life.

Since then God has changed me in a number of ways. He’s definitely toned me down. He’s curbed my urge to curse. To go out partying and drinking. He’s definitely humbled me as well and I’m more open to people who I would of otherwise ignored. I see things such as life and death differently, as well.

Overall, God has really opened my heart and my mind so that now I can see the big picture. He’s turned my focus from myself to Him. I thank the Lord that He provided me a way back to Him and put Himself in my path.

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