**Testimony Revised*** I have went back and added to my testimony. I am getting braver in sharing my heart, so for those who would like to, feel free to read again! Thanks for supporting my endeavor of being more transparent. 🤗

I was tagged by Stu to share my testimony. Thank you, Stu, for thinking of me! 😄 You have been through a lot brother! God’s love (and grace) always covers a multitude of our sins! For that, we can ever be grateful!

Check out Stu’s testimony here.

⬇️

https://stubaby777.wordpress.com/2019/04/14/april-testimony-tag/

This month is a special one in the fact that it is Easter, and we get to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. To go with the celebration of His resurrection we get to share our testimony. 

After reading Stu’s testimony first, and then mine, please follow this thread of tags and read everyone else’s testimony.

Here are the rules:

• Thank the person who nominated you to participate.
• Link back to the original post.
• Use the original featured image.
• Share your testimony in your own way, this is a tag meant for reflection and sharing the amazing gift God has given us of redemption.
• Nominate one or more people to participate.
• Enjoy the rest of your month! 

 

Here’s my Testimony:

Point Blank, I was living a terrible, miserable, and depressed existence. Just barely over the teenage mark, at 19 years of age, I surrendered my life in an old-fashioned altar, over to the God who can be touched by the feeling of our infirmities.

It was the year of 1988, just two years after graduation. I had moved in with my sister and brother-in-law after a state of rebellion took over me and caused a riff between my father and I. I had started hanging out with people who smoked pot.  I wasn’t totally into all that, but had gotten mixed up with the wrong guy and was hanging around on the fringes. Sin will definitely take you farther than you want to go. For the sake of my children, I choose not to divulge too many of the shameful details.

My father was an older man, who was strict and old-fashioned. I know now, that he was the best father ever! He was being fiercely protective and loving in the only way he knew how, but I could not see this at the time.

My father and mother had a big family! I mentioned before that I had 4 brothers and 2 sisters. Half of my family had already gotten married and moved out when I came along. There were just 3 of us left at home, when I was growing up.

Being they were both from an older generation, my dad didn’t know how to show affection. It was the way he was raised. I knew without a doubt that they both loved us all very much, and there was no question about that. I just needed to hear it. And it affected me deeply. Mom somehow made up for it, and we were told we were loved by her on a daily.

He wasn’t a cruel man by no means and never raised his voice to us or abused us in any way. We were disciplined in the correct way and taught respect. But through all of this, I grew up longing to please my father and set out to earn his love. I couldn’t understand why he never hugged or told us that he loved us.

So, I made good grades, tried to behave well. I was a good kid, for the most part. Everyone said I was my paternal grandmother’s Mini-me. She was a very humble woman! I can remember she never talked bad about anyone, was for the most part quiet. And when she did have something to say, was always positive. She was a loving person who smiled a lot. And she loved cats! This is where I inherited the ability to tame every stray cat that came along apparently!

The search for that love that I longed for brought me into some rough patches in my life. My mother passed away when I was 15 with cancer. My father, younger brother, and I had watched her daily slip away from us. There again, this was very traumatic for me, but especially for my brother. Mom had lost so much weight that her skin hung on her bones like a skeleton.  There were many days that I would tip-toe to her bedroom door and watch her breathing to make sure she was still alive. I was a wreck inside. I didn’t know how to cope. In the afternoons, when my aunt would leave to go home, after taking care of her all day, I was left to give her the next dosage of morphene. Take into mind, I was only 14 at the time and up until then had been  very sheltered. One time, I forgot to give her that dose of morphene, and Mom cried out in terrible pain. It’s something I can never forgot even till this day! I never again forgot after that. It really messed me up seeing Moma like that. None of my friends understood, so most nights I would cry myself to sleep. Then, right before she died, I prayed the most unselfish prayer to God. I told him to please take my mom home to be with Him so she didn’t have to suffer anymore. I felt a peace come over me. 

After Mom’s death, I spiraled into a deep depression, I lost weight, and  I contemplated suicide many days. I even tried jumping out of the front passenger seat of my car when I was 18, while my boyfriend was driving. A group of us were drinking and riding around. I had opened the front door and swung my legs out and was getting ready to jump. If it had not been for my little brother’s girlfriend leaping over the front seat and grabbing me, I probably would not be here to tell the tale! I was ashamed of the things I was doing. I knew it was hurting my dad terribly, but out of that rebellion, I didn’t care anymore. What was the use? I could not please anyone, no matter how hard I tried, not even myself.

Through all this, God was working on my father, brother and I. My dad changed. One day out of the blue, he told us he loved us and hugged us. Mom’s death had changed us all.

Some time after the riff with my dad, after moving in with my sister, my aunt, (my dad’s sister) began inviting my sister and I to church. At the time, the church was praying and fasting for souls to be saved. There were people getting healed and being filled with God’s Spirit.

One day while hanging out with my boyfriend,  I caught him and another guy doing a line of coke in the kitchen of one of his friends. It scared me so bad, I got into my car and left! I broke up with him shortly after that. I thank God that I didn’t go down that road. It was only by prayer and the grace of God that I didn’t!

As I laid down at night, a deep conviction and fear would grip my heart that the Lord would come back while I was sleeping, and I would be left behind. I would cry and pray, “Please God, don’t let me be lost! The only way I can describe what I was feeling at the time is by the scripture, “If I be lifted up, I will draw all men to me.” I literally felt His loving Spirit “drawing” me to church. It was no wonder, because the church was having great revival and lifting Him up in worship.

I started reading the Bible, and my sister and I began attending Sunday morning services. One morning after hearing the preaching, in a powerful church service, I decided I wanted to be baptized right then!

That particular morning, the baptistry heater had not been turned on, and the water was so cold my teeth were chattering! It was February! When I went down in the water it was cold, but when I came up!!! I felt a warmth flow through my body like I had never felt before! It felt like a fire of electricity! I didn’t receive the Holy Ghost that morning, but did later on. Jeremiah 20:9, explains it like this: “…But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones…”

After that, a deep hunger came over me to learn more about God. I listened to the preaching, but felt led to search the scriptures for myself. My sister would wake up and find me in the living room at 2 in the morning, searching the Bible, and would make me go to bed.

I read the passages found in Acts 2:38, 39. “Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.”

Easter is a very special time of year for me, because it was the time of year that I repented of my sins and was baptized. I received the Holy Ghost into my heart in March of that year. I can still remember the Easter message, Does He Still Feel the Nails. The evangelist had brought 2 railroad stakes and used them as an illustration. As he clanked them together, I could visualize Jesus as they nailed him to the cross. Conviction was so strong, I gripped the back of the pew!

It was a life-changing experience for me! I’ve never been the same since! I had finally found what I had been looking for all along! It wasn’t in boyfriends, drugs, drinking, or sex. God filled the longing to be loved that I had searched for deep down in my soul! I no longer talked the same, walked the same, or enjoyed doing the sinful things that I had before. I’m still a work in progress, and have made mistakes along the way, but none ever made me want to go back to the lifestyle I lived before He found me!

I guess because I have walked down some dark roads in my life, I see others with love and try to never judge them for what they are doing or going through. God had mercy on me, so who am I to cast a stone?

Since then, I have seen God do many great things in my life. I wrote about one incident in the following post: https://hearttokens.home.blog/2018/11/20/counting-my-blessings-naming-them-one-by-one/

I saw my father give his heart to God and served Him on up till the day He passed, as well as my little brother and other family members through the years. I also discovered something about my father the day of his funeral. He had gotten remarried since my mother’s passing. So my second mom told us that day that not a night went by that she and my father didn’t open their Bibles and read before bedtime. When my Dad would finish his reading, he would close the Bible and kiss its cover! I cry now, thinking about how much my father and I shared the love for God’s Word.

I have been through a lot of good and bad times in my walk with God, but He keeps holding on to me! I am waiting and looking for the day when He carries us to the place that He has prepared for those who love Him–Heaven!!! I don’t deserve the grace He has shown me, but I am so glad that He loved me enough to die for me! I want to be counted in that number!

Sorry for the book I have written. It’s hard to fit 31 years into a small page! God Bless you all! Looking forward to reading your testimonies!

**Credits: Dollfaced Writer & Purple Rose ,

the creators of these monthly tags.

I choose to tag the following:

https://beetreegathering.wordpress.com/

Please do not feel obligated to participate! Only if you want to or have the time. God Bless!