What do you do to unwind after a busy day? How do you catch your breath before diving into your evening activities?

If I do not have to drive children to after-school practices or run errands — and supper preparation can be pushed off just a moment — I covet a few moments to myself immediately after I arrive home from work. It is my way to rejuvenate. My beverage of choice during fall and winter months is anything hot and decaffeinated. It does wonders for the wind-down process. So does just 20 minutes of quiet, low-key reading. I am currently half-way through the best-selling “Left Behind” series, authored by Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye. I highly recommend these thought provoking and thoroughly entertaining novels. There are nine of them and it is Christian fiction at its best.

But it was neither a cup of tea or a good book that caught my attention early this week. It was one of Oprah Winfrey’s regularly scheduled psycho-spiritual guests, instead. Needing to dive into the kitchen early, I turned on the TV with the hope I might be provided something to think about while I cooked.

“How can people positively respond to our national tragedy?” and “What can people do to combat fear and stress associated with events beyond our control?” Oprah asked at the top of the show. Such a lead-in provided a springboard of advice and I pictured a line of cheerleaders rallying a crowd.

Behave your way to success!

Take on your personal challenges and fight them!

Replace your fear by investing in people!

It is not that I could find anything terribly wrong with such advice. I believe that if you consistently practice good eating, for example, you will most likely loose extra pounds that undisciplined eating may have added to your middle. That is certainly behaving your way to success. And I am all for taking on those personal enemies. Honest personal assessment is a good thing. Stare personal challenges in the face and take on the day!

There is a problem with all of these strategies, however. To move toward success and to fight those fears, you must have some know how, a strategy, and something in reserve. You must begin this kind of work from a position of strength. The good news is this: nearly all of us can fight the good fight now and then. But I know of nobody who can, for a lifetime, tap their own inner reserves day in and day out. Not only must we be teachable and be able to discern truths from lies, goodness from selfishness, love from manipulation, but we must be able to tap into a source of outside inspiration, energy, hope and patience that marries with these foundational understandings. And that outside source must be willing to help us when we can find nothing inside ourselves to take on those fears and those weaknesses that stall or even paralyze us.

It was this practical understanding, that I was created by God with talents but also an incompleteness that could only be filled by a relationship with Him, that lead me in His direction in 1974. I was young and in many ways there is very little story to tell about my embrace of Christianity. I was not in crisis and when I decided to become a Christian and make that decision a matter of public understanding, there was no dramatic change. No fireworks. But it was the single most important and most life altering decision of my life. Like a friend commented the other day, “It must have been your ah-ha moment.” Indeed it was.

I based it on a lot of personal observing. I watched people live and I took a good look at myself, mentally placing myself in their circumstances. How would I react? What would I do?

I responded by speaking the sinner’s prayer, alone in a cabin, that summer of 1974. I had not lived enough life for a whole lot to have gone wrong, but I realized that I could work like crazy, striving for perfection my entire life, and never be able to reach a level of goodness acceptable to God. That is why I suddenly understood whyt His gift was so amazing.

So what is that gift? If we can never be good enough, what provision or alternate plan has God placed before us? Come back next week and we will talk bout what comes next after an honest bit of self-evaluation. It is step two in understanding what Christianity is all about.

Joan Bay Klope is a freelance writer and former editor of Christian books. Contact her at jbklope@hotmail.com.