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Testimonials By Name
Patricia Baker - Pain Needn't Be Forever
Lib Ballard - The Road Less Travelled
Anita Bellesfield - Don't Be Foolish and Wait, Like I Did. Tomorrow May Be Too Late.
Don Bellesfield
Dominic Binks
Sam Blair - Whatever Satan Told Me To Do - I Did
BODEN - My Testimony, May It Glorify God!David Brollier - Born in the Shadow of Death
Patricia Baker
Emmaus, PA
EMail: dhammett@xc.orgPain Needn't Be Forever
Everyone has a story, and each of us has someone or some circumstances that we credit with having influenced our lives. The influence and circumstances in my life were not very positive and left me with no sense of self-worth or self- respect. That's not a lot different than a number of other people. However, there is always a result from negative input. The result for me was a fierce pride that said I can do anything you can do and do it better. I also developed an independent streak, that said I don't need help, I can do it by myself. I also had an overwhelming fear of failure that said I had to be the best, I had to exceed all expectations.
But, there was an emptiness in the very heart of my soul. It's the kind of emptiness that makes you ask why? What is life all about? What is the purpose?. And knowing you can't find one. It seems life is just a matter of being used, or of finding a way to be so strong no one will be be able to take advantage of you. It just made no sense to me. There was nothing, or no one, that could fill that empty space. I kept looking for someone, or something, that would help. Someone to give me a sense of meaning, of being accepted just as I was, with no demands and no criticism -- to let me live
by my rules of honesty, ethics, and morality. Like many people, I thought that while I may not perfect, I was probably better than most. But compared to God's standard, like all people, I fell very short of the mark.
The pain and the emptiness were always there. There was no relief and there seemed no way of escape from it..
Since nothing else helped, I looked for satisfaction in my work. Like a lot of other workaholics, striving to succeed, I was chased by my own personal devil, that fear of failure. I constantly felt I had to exceed expectations and goals. It hurts to keep trying and trying but never feeling you have reached an acceptable level of excellence. It hurts to want to cry on someone's shoulder, but being so afraid of showing any vulnerability, you just can't. Needing help, but being unable to ask for it, or to accept it, is like trying to walk on water. Sooner or later you know you will sink.
Sometimes, when my life was so derailed it didn't seem possible to get back on track, I turned to God -- broken, shedding tears that no one else ever saw, or would have believed were there. Just like a lot of other people, I took it for granted God would be there. After all wasn't God supposed to be available on demand? It never occurred to me God wanted me or expected anything of me. Those who reached out to me were rejected because I questioned their motives. The rest only made me strive harder for acceptance. Funny, but I always wanted approval where it wasn't given, and I seemed to reject what was there for me.
I had acceptance among my peers and my employer, but that only intensified the pressure to perform. At work, it seemed I had it all together. But my personal life was a wreck. The devil always knows what buttons to push.
The pain never left me. It was like so much baggage I strapped on myself each day. I had a distrust of others, and a will to never let anyone use me. I had a drive to never fail, and an inability to laugh at myself. I had a pain that I believed there was no release from, that I could not escape.
There seemed to be no way out.
But I was wrong, there was a solution. There was a way out.
One day a young man who had worked for me called and said that he would like to speak to me. He had just returned from the military and I supposed he wanted to ask me for a job. So my response was, "Sure, anytime." I prided myself on knowing what was going on with my employees and our customers, on never forgetting anything.
When he came to speak to me, he indicated that he only wanted to share with me something wonderful that had happened to him while he was away in the service. I knew him pretty well, and knew he had been pretty wild. He began to tell me about having found Jesus Christ, and how his life had changed. Well, this was not exactly what I had been expecting. Like most people, I listened politely to him...and thought he had gone over the edge. But there was something different about him. He had changed. He had a peace that was so evident on his face and in his actions. He invited me to church with himself and his wife. I went, but I wondered if I knew what I was doing, since I was of a different religious belief than this church, and not in the habit of attending regularly. After all God was supposed to be available on demand when I could no longer cope. Otherwise, I didn't want any "shalt nots" in my life. But what I saw in him and his wife, and what I heard them say, was different than anything I had heard before. No one had ever before looked at me and asked if I died today, did I know if I would go to heaven? But he did. Like most people, I answered, "I sure hope so." Never flinching and looking me right in the eye again, he said, "Would you like to know so?" Much to his surprise, as well as my own, I listened to what he had to say.
So, in 1983, I professed a belief in Jesus Christ and His resurrection from the dead, and my life began to change. The emptiness was gone. It had been replaced with hope. But, I had never faced the enormity of my sin.
In 1987 I was transferred to Allentown, Pennsylvania. I immediately found the Lehigh Valley Baptist Church and began attending regularly. My life was still changing. I was growing in knowledge.
In the summer of 1990, I was miserable, the Pastor was preaching and teaching, and exhorting us to be all that God wanted us to be. He asked if we had truly, with all our hearts, repented of our sins, all wrong-doing, all behavior so unacceptable to a Holy God.
One Sunday in July of 1990, I was overwhelmed with the enormity of my past behavior -- of living by my own rules, and by my own sense of honesty and morality. On that day in 1990, I asked God to please forgive me, and to wipe my past from before His face. I know now that He has done that.
There is a hymn called, Love Lifted Me,.. and love has lifted me, the love of that young man for his Savior and for me, the love and mercy of God, the Father, and His Son, Jesus Christ, the Savior.
I'm not saying that I'm now perfect. I'm not. Sometimes I still do things that are wrong. But, I feel it when I do, and I'm truly sorry. God is chipping off the rough spots and rounding out the corners. My life has changed in ways I could not have done by myself. And, it is still changing, by the power of God. The pain is gone, the emptiness is gone, I trust people now, and I no longer feel life has no meaning. Life is precious, and each of us is precious to God,the Father, even me.
Well, that is my story. What's yours? Are you living in hell and longing for heaven? Is there an emptiness in your soul? There really is a cure for it all. Just ask, you too can be helped.
Lib Ballard
EMail: ehballard1@juno.comThe Road Less Traveled
I know without a doubt in my mind that jesus was watching over me long before I ever knew him. I can see how He held me in the grips of his awesome fingers and never let me slip away, because He knew back then what I would be doing for Him tomorrow.
God has been so good to me all of my life, I wondered for many years on the popular road. The road that everyone traveled. I have broken all of the commandments at least once. I have abused drugs and alcohol and lived much of my life in the realm of darkness.
I suffered major depression and wanted to give up. When I cried out for God He came to my rescue and now I plead daily for a closer walk with Him.
I thank God for sending his son to die on that old rugged cross for a sinner such as me. He has turned my life into something beautiful and has given joy unspeakable. Each day is a shower of blessings on my life and I praise His holy name.
God has set my foot on the rock of salvation and I long to serve him daily.
Lib
Anita Bellesfield
Emmaus, PA
EMail: dhammett@xc.orgDon't Be Foolish and Wait, Like I Did.
Tomorrow May Be Too Late.As a young girl growing up, I was somewhat of a tomboy. My family moved a lot and every new neighborhood was like the last - all boys and no girls. Therefore, I ended up hanging out with the boys. The only time I ended up looking like a girl was on Sunday mornings. I had to go to Sunday school and church, even though I always found the sermons boring and never wanted to go. But, my mother believed that going to church on Sunday mornings, and especially on religious holidays, would make me a better person. Once I turned 14 and was confirmed, though, I decided that religion wasn't for me.
At age 16, I became pregnant and married my baby's father. When I was five months pregnant, he walked out on me. Soon after my daughter was born, my mother insisted that the baby be baptized. In my family, you did this as soon as possible, because they believed that if any thing happened, and the baby died young, the baptism would assure that the child would go to heaven. I neither understood, or agreed with this, but I did have my daughter baptized.
During the years I was raising my daughter, there were a few occasions I went to church services with a friend or relative. These were usually weddings, or a confirmation, or some other special occasion. Just as when I was younger, the services left me bored. Those few times in church only served to turn me further from wanting to go back. I just couldn't understand what people got from a 45-minute "story time" sermon that did not apply to the scripture cited.
At the age of 27 I got married again. My husband was the most loving and patient person I had ever known. Spiritually, though, my husband was where I was - we had no religion. We both believed that God exists, but we couldn't get past merely talking about going to church. After we had been settled in our home for a while, our neighbor's son, who was a pastor, came over to talk to my husband about God and other spiritual matters while I was out for the evening. He was still there when I returned home, so I sat down and listened to what he had to say. I took to heart what I heard that evening and was determined to find a church to attend. Again time just passed by and we did little more than just talk about church.
About that time a co-worker began to talk to me about the need to be saved. She showed me in the Bible, in Acts, chapter 2, verse 21, where it said, "And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved." (Note: "Saved" is a biblical term referring to the forgiveness of sins by God and the rescue of a person from the power and penalty of that sin. This is God's requirement for everlasting life.) But, remembering my past experiences with church, and the emptiness that I was left with, I told her she could keep her religion to herself. Deep down inside, though, I was curious as to what "being saved" was all about. Like in many families, though, I grew up thinking that if you had a Bible in the house you had to be "all right" with God.
I worked for a nursing home for almost 19 years. Every morning they had a 20-minute church service which came over the public address system for everyone there to hear. What I basically heard was, just be a good person and you will get into Heaven. While I still thought about what my co-worker had said about the necessity to be saved, I did not want to believe that either.
In 1987, I was away for a three-day weekend of drinking and partying. I was very involved with the union I belonged to and this weekend was typical of the way I spent my time. Halfway through the weekend, I found out my younger sister had been killed in a car accident. I was devastated. My heart was broken and a part of me seemed to have died with her. I remember the minister at the funeral service saying that she was in heaven because she had been a good person. I wanted very much to believe that was true. I kept wondering how I could find out if that was the truth. I could only hope that she was at peace.
A year later, I was still questioning whether my sister was in Heaven - and whether that would be where I would go.
In July of 1988, two men from the Lehigh Valley Baptist Church knocked on our door, saying they wanted to talk to us about our eternity. I was recovering from minor surgery that day and my husband asked them to return in a couple of weeks. I really did not expect them to return, partly because of my past experiences with church, and partly because of what they might say about where my sister was. They did return, though, and we sat and listened to what they had to say about how we could be sure of our eternity. My questions about heaven, and where I would go when I die were answered. It says in the Bible, in John, chapter 14, verse 2, "In my house there are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you." My husband accepted Christ as his personal Savior a few months after that. He began to show me verses in the Bible and tried to convince me that I needed to be saved also. But, I always had excuses for putting it off. It was hard to shake my past experiences, and I was sure that nothing would be different in my life even if I did get saved. I was now sure my sister was not in heaven. For many restless months I pictured her in hell with all the other members of my family that had passed away. I also realized that my loved ones who were still alive were heading there themselves.
I was haunted by the thought and knew that I did not want to go to hell. Finally, one night I knelt by my bed and asked God to forgive my sins, and I accepted Christ as my personal Savior. Finally, I knew I was saved and that I had a place waiting for me in heaven.
I became a new person that night in June of 1989. As the Bible says in Second Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 17, "therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; Behold, all things are become new."
Soon my interest in union activities and the drinking, partying and weekends away from my husband vanished. I no longer used foul language and I no longer had the desire to be like the rest of the world. I had been a lost person because I loved the world more than I loved God. First John 2 15-16 says, "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the father, but is of the world."
It was clear to me that I had been so caught up in possessions, work and money, that I had neglected my spiritual needs and the need to know for sure where my spirit would go when I died. At age 37, I became a child of God and my whole outlook changed. For my whole life I had not wanted to believe I was a sinner. But the scriptures spoke to me -"For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God" Romans 3:23.
Please don't be foolish and wait like I did. Tomorrow could be too late. "Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little while, then vanisheth away" James 4:14.
Don Bellesfield
Emmaus, PA
EMail: dhammett@xc.orgWhen I look back at my childhood, I guess I didn't grow up much differently than most kids. The only difference I remember was that my parents separated when I was very young. Even so, I wasn't without things to do, and I had the things most kids had. Like most kids, my mom made me go to confirmation classes. I went because I had to, and remember learning very little. I was very happy when they finally came to an end. After that, I don't remember going to church again until I got married.
At that time, I believed that God existed, but I never thought about going to heaven or hell when I died. I just thought everyone went to heaven when they died. I figured it was automatic. Nobody talked about going to hell, unless you were a murderer or something bad like that.
When I was about 18, I met a girl and started going steady with her. In 1965, we got married and soon after we had our first son. Three years later we had another son. During those years, I was not very happy with my life or my marriage, even though I was mostly to blame for my misery. I certainly wasn't able to put the blame on myself at that time, though.
When I was 21, I got a part-time job as a taxi driver. This was perfect for me, because I got paid by the fare and did not have to account to my wife for the amount of time I worked, or the amount of money I brought home. That way, when I was supposedly at work, I could quit after a few hours and spend the rest of the night running around and drinking. I never wanted to be at home. But, I wasn't truly happy with this life either. I can remember many times being surrounded with people I knew in places I loved to be, and still feeling lonely inside . Needless to say, after a few years of this kind of life, my marriage ended in divorce.
After about five more years of the bar scene, I began to get tired of it. It seemed as though there had to be more to life than blowing your money on booze every night and ending up the next morning with nothing but drunken tremors and a hangover.
By this time, I had met another young lady and we began living together. We had my boys almost every night, and this helped cut my drinking drastically.
Anita and I got married in 1979, and things really started to look pretty good to me. Between the two of us, we had a good income, and we wasted no time spending it. I had all the toys I wanted. First it was camping gear, then a pop-up camper, then a travel trailer. I had four motorcycles in two years, and a pop-up trailer for motorcycles to boot!. I remember feeling that life doesn't get any better than this. You would think that with all the things we had, and spare change on top of it all, that we would be content. But, there seemed to be something missing. I did not know at the time that what was missing was the Lord Jesus Christ in my life.
In 1986, my wife and I went through a major crisis in our marriage. I found out very quickly that there are some things in life you just can't easily make right. I had been a very selfish person thinking mostly in our marriage of things that would make me happy. My hobby is trains, and if I wanted to go off for a weekend alone to watch trains, I just did it. I did not give a lot of thought to what make my wife happy. When all this came to a head, I could see this marriage crumbling around me. Feeling helpless, I began to do something I had never done before. I began to pray for God to help me straighten out my life.
God did straighten out my marriage - and my whole life, to an extent I could never have expected. Shortly after this, my wife and I started to talk about going to church. It turned out to be more talk than anything, as we spent the next two years talking to anyone we thought could help us figure out what church to go to. I remember praying to God and asking him to just send us to the right church.
In 1989, two men out visiting from the Lehigh Valley Baptist Church, knocked on my door and asked if they could be of any spiritual help to us. I was interested in what they had to say, but my wife was recovering from minor surgery and I asked them to return in a couple of weeks. To my surprise they did return, and in the course of our conversation they told me something I had never heard before. They told me I was a sinner, and that my sins would keep me from going to heaven. They told me the only way to get there was for God to forgive my sins. What I had to do, they said, was to truly repent of those sins and give my life over to the Lord and call on Him for forgiveness. They said that Jesus had already paid for my sins by dying on the cross. I believed what they said, but I could not imagine God forgiving my sins. There were just too many of them. I did not believe God could
forgive anyone as bad as I was.
These men showed us what the Bible has to say about our eternity. Even after a few more visits from the two men, I had trouble understanding how I could be forgiven. These men had no idea how bad I really was. It also occurred to me that if we did start going to church, we would have to change our lives. I guess I would not have minded changing a little - I knew I needed that. But I certainly did not want to become a "holy roller". I figured that then I could never have any fun anymore because I'd always have to be in church, and I did not relish that thought.
About six months after the first visit, I got a card from one of the men inviting me to a men's night at their church. My wife had ceramics that night, so I figured "Why not, I'll go". There were four speakers that night. Soon after the first was done, I began to wonder what I was doing there. I knew it was going to be a long, boring night. The first preacher didn't interest me at all. The second was a bit better. I was grateful to be able to take a break and sample some of the food the church ladies had prepared for us. Then the preaching started all over again. By this time, the third preacher was sounding pretty good. It was only a few minutes into the next message, though, that I knew God was having that speaker preaching directly at me. I knew then that God had answered my prayer and that I had found the right church. Little did I know that the Lord had one more surprise for me.
At the end of the preaching, everyone stood up with their heads bowed, while the question was asked, "Do you know for sure that when you die, you'll go to heaven? If you don't know for sure, come to the front of the church and someone will take you and show you from the Bible how you can know for sure that heaven is where you will spend eternity". I knew I wanted to go forward, but I was so scared I was shaking. I guess the man that invited me saw me shaking and he asked me if I wanted to go forward. I said "no" - and immediately knew that was the biggest mistake of my life. My pride, though, kept me standing where I was. My friend asked again, saying, "Would you like me to go up front with you?" I nodded "yes," and on that night, Jan. 20, 1989, I was, as the Bible says, born again - forgiven of my sins and saved from the pits of hell.
God forgave me of all my sins the moment I admitted to Him that I was a sinner, and that there was nothing else here on earth that I could do to pay the price for my sins and be allowed to enter the gates of heaven when I die.
I wish that my words could be adequate to have you understand the joy and peace and happiness that I have in my heart today. I no longer have all the toys. The motorcycles, and the trailer , and the excess money are gone. But, I would never return to the lifestyle I had before God saved me.
I found out that heaven isn't automatic. Where we spend eternity depends on what we do about our sins here and now. I have never experienced happiness as fully as when I knew heaven would be my home. You can have the same happiness and assurance.
Dominic Binks
Bristol, U.K.
EMail: dominic@aethos.demon.co.ukI come from a non-christian background. My parents were both forced to go to church (my Dad in a boarding school, my Mum in a convent). I guess they felt pushed into going and that the whole thing was largely irrelevant for them. I grew up with the attitude that Christians were boring - not that I really knew any of course.
At the age of 13 I met a guy who had a similar taste in music to me (heavy rock in a period of new romantic was definitely uncool). We go talking and got on pretty well. He played guitar and appreciated my favourite band and I appreciated his playing and his favourites too. A while beforehand I been a `boy scout' but mostly for the purpose of having a bit of a chase around and rough and tumble with some other like minded young teenagers.
I was encouraged to go to a similar thing at the local church on a Thursday evening. I went, I had a good time. I knew one or two people but not many. By this time I knew this original guy, Simon, and a whole group of his friends (from church) - with hindsight you can see God move, isn't it wonderful?
There was a catch to this fun time however, going to Sunday school. I went it seemed irrelevant and dull. Not really boring I just had no idea what people where getting at. I dropped out.
1985, July and Billy Graham came to Sheffield. I was encouraged to go. I went. As Billy Graham spoke I though that what he was saying hung together in a way I hadn't really understood. I sat in the soccer ground thinking I've got to find out more about this. When the call was made I kind of went along with the crowd. I didn't feel that I necessarily wanted to go, but now when I look back I know I would have followed anyway. I had decided what I would do to find out more. I made the committment prayer, not really understanding what it was all about but I was nurtured and grew as a christian.
I am not sure that I became a christian that night, but I definitely have committed my life to christ now. It was really instantaneous, it's more a continuing thing for me, I just keep finding God wants me to give more of myself to him and I try to give.
I certain am grateful that I found the love of God. Knowing how I struggle day to day now I know I would probably have been deeply confused by now if I had not have found God.
Praise be to God.
Sam Blair
Emmaus, PA
EMail: dhammett@xc.orgWhatever Satan Told Me To Do - I Did
I was a man filled with sin until I invited the Lord, Jesus Christ, into my heart when I was 72 years old and my life was changed forever. I was saved by his precious blood and I know I have been forgiven of my sins and, by his grace, I will spend eternity with him. (Note: "Saved" is a biblical term referring to the forgiveness of sins by God and the rescue of the person from the power and penalty of that sin. This is God's requirement for everlasting life.)
I'll start my story when I was a little boy. I was brought up in a Christian family near Philadelphia. My mother and father were both saved. My father died suddenly in the flu epidemic of 1918. I was seven years old. It happened overnight. Every man on the street died except one -- and he was a heavy drinker who lived next door. When my father died, we had nothing. My mother had to go out and get a job to support the family. She had really wanted a little girl, not a boy, and she started dressing me like a little girl. She was very dominant -- so much so that she corrected my every move. I vowed to myself that I would get as far away from home as I could when I
grew up.
When I got out of high school, she had already gone to the bank across the street to arrange a job for me -- so she could look out the window to see when I went in and came out. The bank had me drive checks to Philadelphia every day in an old Pontiac. I passed the Keebler Cookie Plant each trip, and decided to stop in and ask for a job. Well, lo and behold, they hired me a week later.
At this time I was still living at home. I can remember going into Philadelphia with my aunt's three boys, and they all professed to be saved. My mother immediately threw that up to me and asked why I wasn't saved. I kept going in to listen to the evangelists and it was always the same story when I got home. "Didn't you get saved? Why aren't you saved?" Well, finally I professed to be saved even when I knew I really wasn't. Every Sunday the Brethren would take communion. I had to sit in that circle - and I knew if you drank out of that cup and you weren't saved, you were drinking damnation to your soul. I went a few more Sundays and then I dropped out.
About that time my company transferred me to Allentown, Pennsylvania. I was almost 18 and I was finally out from under the influence of my mother. I joined every club I could. I had no time for God or the church. I started drinking - and I smoked cigarettes. I was under the spell of Satan. Everything Satan asked me to do, I did. My sins were like the grains of sand under the sea - so many I could not number them. I know now, though, that the Lord had them all jotted down. I went on like this for decades.
One day in 1980, about two weeks before Christmas, on a routine visit to my doctor, he told me he was sending me in town for a couple of other doctors to look me over. When I got there, I saw by their sign that they were cancer specialists. What a rude awakening. Half my mother's side of the family had died of cancer and my mother had had cancer earlier. They took a biopsy and told me to come back the next week. When I left that office and got out onto the street, my whole life came right back in front of me. I was thinking, "Here I am, all these years without paying any attention to my soul.. I think it's too late. I don't know whether the Lord will have me or not."
I immediately started reading my Bible again - looking to the scriptures. I called the Billy Graham crusade and someone on the other end of the phone told me, "Now just say that you believe, and you'll be saved." Well, that wasn't good enough for me. One Sunday I was watching Dr. Harold Henninger of Canton Baptist Temple in Ohio. I heard him say, "are you sitting there watching and listening to me? If you are, and you don't have a church, you need to get up off that seat and go out and find an independent, Bible-preaching, King James Version Baptist church. Don't sit here in front of this TV listening to me." I knew I was in soul trouble, so I went out the next week and got a newspaper and picked out the Lehigh Valley Baptist Church. Then I couldn't find it. I went to the police station and they sent me to the wrong place. I went back to the police station and a woman there said she thought it was on the other end of the town across from the bowling alley.
By this time, a week had gone by and I went back to find out the results of my biopsy. The doctors told me they had good news for me. It was only scar tissue in my stomach. I didn't have cancer. I got out of that office and got down on my hands and knees in the street, at the corner of Sixteenth and Liberty and thanked God for sparing me and and imploring Him, "My God, I want to be saved".
I started reading my Bible more than ever and I went to the Lehigh Valley Baptist Church. The first four seats I sat in, people told me I was sitting in their seats. "Well," I thought, "they must pay for their pews in here, I better leave". On my way out some one stopped me and told me that wasn't the case and he got me a seat. Of course, I then heard the gospel being preached, and a couple of men followed up with me and I told them I wanted to be saved. They said, "just say you believe and you'll be saved". Well,I just couldn't do that. I thought back to those years long ago when I gave a false profession.
One night I was reading my Bible and I thought, "what am I ever going to do? " I asked God to please hear my voice. In the morning, I got down on my knees by the side of my bed, and I said, "Oh, God, what must I do to be saved? I want the Lord, Jesus Christ to be my own personal Savior. Come into my heart, Christ Jesus, and save my soul." At that precise moment, without a shadow of a doubt, I stood on the shed blood of Jesus Christ, and I knew I was saved. I could hardly believe it. He and I met just like that. I was "saved by faith - not by works, lest any man should boast"(Ephesians 2:8). It was a gift of God. I was saved by the blood of my crucified Lord. I got up and shouted, I'm saved. But who was going to believe it. Here I was by myself, with no one to share it with. I went up the hill to a neighbor lady who did cleaning for me and said, "Sadie, I just had my soul saved." She looked at me like I was crazy and said, "That's nice. We'll see how long that lasts". That was 1983.
It so happened that a couple of men from church came down to see me to see what I was doing about my soul. I told them I was saved and related the whole story, and told them I wanted to be baptized. They asked me to come up and tell the congregation about it. They didn't tell me I was going to have to be up in front of the whole congregation. But, I did it, and I got baptized.
As I look back at how I was at Satan's beck-and-call, it's still amazing to me how God had to strike me down before I would listen. From that day on I never had any desire to smoke another cigarette, or drink another drink. No desire whatsoever.
My Lord, Jesus Christ, paid for those sins of mine that I committed over all those years. He paid it all for the sanctification of my sins. And now I know I have everlasting life and will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
BODEN 102721.3667@compuserve.com
EMail: 102721.3667@compuserve.comMy Testimony, May It Glorify God!
God blessed me by delivering me into a Christian home from birth. I grew up in the Presbyterian Church and was a darn good fence riding, Sunday Christian.
Once I was in college my inability to navigate on my own road rather than on Christ's path became evident. I was in a foul relationship, I was unhealthy spiritualy, physically, and mentally. When I decided to eat my shotgun, God saved me from certain death. I gave him the glory for that but I was not willing to completly give my life to Him.
Finally the Spirit spoke to me through a friend who was willing to dicuss our faiths even though they were a bit different. I saw the answer,it is just that simple. My eyes were finally opened and I was Plowed Down by the Glory of God. I was baptized by a Christian brother in a Church of Christ and save into the family of Christ that very night!!!— Acts 26:13-18 When the light of God shines on you it will plow you down.
Now my life is for Him. What are 70-100 years compared to eternity?
How am I saved? Because I do good things and don't wallow in my sin anymore? Because i help the poor and listen to Christian Music and because I go to church at least 3 times a week?
NO,
NO,
NO.
I am saved because I was baptized into Christ, and into his Death, Burial, and His Glorius Resurection! I go to Christ to be forgiven of my sins because in sinning I slap God in the face. And I repent this to God and Christ Jesus intercedes for me and through his sacrifice. I am saved by the Grace of God, not for my works.
Praise God!
Dave Brollier
New York, New York
EMail: sonburst@juno.comBorn in the Shadow of Death
This is a story about a baby that, by all accounts should have died during birth. It is about the shadow of death that hung over him and how that shadow was dispelled by the light and love of Jesus Christ.
When my mother started to give birth to me (I was her first child) my dad rushed her to the hospital. The necessary calls were made and the pediatrician arrived on the scene. By now I had shifted into position and began entering the birth canal. But there was a problem. She wasn't dilating. Obviously I'm telling this from the accounts received from my mom and dad. I don't have THAT good of a memory.
Anyway, I had moved into the birth canal, but had no way out. I was trapped and literally smothering in the same womb that gave me life. The doctor didn't seem to notice or didn't think things were all that bad. Had God not intervened I would not be writing these words to you some 45 years later.
God moved upon my dad with an urgency so that he literally ordered the doctor to use the foreceps (the salad bowl spoons, as Bill Cosby referred to them) and I was pulled to life. So innocent were my parents, and grateful, that they didn't stop to think that this procedure may have caused problems. I looked healthy in every other way. In fact I weighed in at 8 lbs. 14 oz. Some of you mothers out there can empathize with my mother at having so large a baby as her first.
Well things did look normal. I was contented. I liked to dream (I still do) and seemed to be the "perfect" child. I even became a Christian at the early age of 6. I accepted the teachings of the Bible, the existence of God and the need for a Savior as far back as I can remember. Then one night during Daily Vacation Bible School at our church, it was Wednesday night, the speaker gave an invitation. There were no flashing lights or trumpets blaring or stuff like that. It was almost as if Jesus had said, "Okay, David, tonight's the night." So I accepted Jesus as my Savior, just like that. For those of you who think that there wasn't much to this experience let me tell
you what happened when we broke up into our little groups. There were these 2 girls and they had also gone up to be saved. One said to the other, "Wow, that was neat, I'm going to do that again tomorrow night." Inside I got real angry. I knew that salvation was a lifetime commitment. So you see I had some good spiritual training. Most of it came from my mom and dad, but I had some great Sunday School teachers. I also became sort of an adopted son to a missionary nurse to India.
She's great. So I got a really great start in my spiritual life. If only the rest of the world could get the chance to know people like I knew and learn from them maybe we wouldn't be facing the mess we're in today. But there was this shadow, this foreboding that seemed to hover over my life. I developed a temper that none of you want to hear about, trust me. I felt like "Jeckle and Hyde", two opposing people inhabiting the same body. Then when I was 14 or 15 I had my first epileptic seizure.
I was with my brother, who at first thought I was joking around (I was and am still quite a joker) and then thought I was dead. So he ran out of the room and began yelling to my mom, who happened to be on the phone, "David's dead, David's dead." This isn't the kind of news you want to hear. And she may have come closer to death than me.
For those of you who have never heard of epilepsy or are not sure what it's all about and stuff, let me just say that it's almost like an electrical short. You're brain gets over loaded with worries, frustrations, all emotions good and bad until it can't handle it, so it shuts down. When it does so in what is called a "gran mal seizure" the body collapses and the muscles throughout the body begin to flex involuntarily. If it does so in a "petite mal seizure" usually the eyes roll back and the person just phases out for a few seconds. Some episodes are worse than others. I know of people that cannot get their seizures under control.
Anyway I woke up laying on the floor looking into the face of a policeman and a volunteer ambulance worker. My mother was pacing in the background. There was at least 12 inches of snow on the ground and they put a towel over my face when they carried me on the gurney out to the ambulance.
But God had things in store for me. There was a kid in the ward with me that was in a coma for over a year. Seeing him there reminded me to pray for him. He was from my high school and got hit by 2 cars. He attempted to cross the street in front of a bus and was hit by a car in that lane as it passed the bus. That car tossed him into the other lane where he was hit by another car. He never did come out of his coma, but I guess something snapped in me. I began to see how fragile life is and have compassion for those who were physically less equipped than I to handle life. I was gifted. I had all my fingers, all my twos, plus the appropriate appendages to which they are attached. I had good eyesight, good hearing and a good voice. I was strong, but now I was laid out on a hospital bed the same as this other kid. I was "rocked" onto a level playing field where all God's children are made equal in God's eyes.
As you can see from my writing, it was around this time that God seemed to at first be far off, but then poured out His love towards me. He sent people who found the right prescription drugs to handle the epilepsy. I haven't had a seizure since 1968 (except for when I decided I was healed and threw my medication away, another time when I took my medication with a cold medication and a third time that I had missed over a days medication). So I'm what people would call the lucky one. But I'm really not lucky, I just have a Father who loves me. And it was during this time that God really began to draw me near to Himself.
I struggled to get free, but it wasn't until I was 17 that God REALLY turned my life around. My mom suggested that I go to a Christian folk music concert. Ordinarily I would have jumped at the chance. I mean I had just gotten my license a short time ago and I loved music. But I was so "fed up" with God not answering my prayers that I didn't want togo. My brother, on the other hand, wanted to go. So guess who took him to the concert? You get three guesses. :-) I did just what the old sinners would do in church, I sat WAY in the back. If I were any further back I would have been out in the lobby. Up front there were these people looking a lot like a rock band, long hair and all. I could also hear people talking all over the place. As the concert began the room fell to a hush and the soloist began to sing. Well there was one group that hadn't stopped talking. A group of girls way down front. I couldn't see them, but I could hear them. The guy singing stopped right in the middle of the song. He walked away from the microphone and said, "I'm doing the best I can for my Jesus and you're doing the rudest thing you can to me." His words were direct. He walked back to the microphone and turned to them, this time with a smile, and said, "but I still love you." In an instant it was as if God were saying to me, "Dave I've done EVERYTHING for you, I've done the absolute best for you and YOU are doing the rudest thing you can to me ... but I still love you." That night I broke before the Lord. I remember hanging out, talking to people about the Lord, sharing. I even helped the band with their equipment. There was this one girl who didn't want to get "hooked into this Jesus thing" because religions had done nothing but hurt people. She wanted to help people. Some well meaning people were trying to argue with her. Suddenly I knew what to say. I stopped the counselors and had the girl look me straight in the eye. Tears were streaming down her face as she fought off the moving of the Holy Spirit. I said, "If you really want to help people, don't you think you can do more with God on your side?" She looked at me like I had just dropped the winning card in a card game or pulled a rabbit out of a hat or something. I had to leave so I just told her to think about it. I really believe that God had His way with her.
The miracle didn't stop there. All of us that attended the concert were given a copy of "The Cross and the Switchblade", by David Wilkerson. It was great. But even greater was the fact that I knew I needed to be refilled with God's Holy Spirit. I had to get a prayer life going that was going to work, because the way I'd been doing it in the past didn't work. I was a bit afraid, because I had spoken in tongues and thought I might end up faking my way through it. So I asked God for 2 things. I asked that my pastor preach on the Baptism in the Holy Spirit that Sunday and I asked that I be given a different language than the one He had first given me. This may sound strange to some of you who do not believe in these things, but I knew what I was doing. I wasn't asking for myself, but that what I received would be from God. Well Sunday came and the pastor preached on ... that's right, the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. I went forward for prayer and as I opened up my heart to God I began speaking in a new and DIFFERENT language. God had answered BOTH of my requests, although He was not bound to do either. I learned something else. Just because it doesn't "feel" like God hears you doesn't mean He doesn't. If I believe that God is everywhere, knows everything and is all powerful, then I must also KNOW that God heard my prayer regardless of what I felt. What a tremendous discovery.
It was about this time that I was given a paraphrase version of the New Testament called Reach Out. I began with Matthew and read straight through Revelations. After doing this I decided to try reading the Old Testament. I didn't have a contemporary version so I used my King James Version. There were parts that were really dry, and I still have trouble getting excited over them. Like who cares if so and so had so many sons and was the son of such and such. But the stories, the teachings, the incredible life of the Word of God began to come alive to me. I remember reading Joshua and was almost couldn't put the Bible down. Then with Judges it was even better. All these judges, all this action. It was fantastic. Let me tell you, there's not a book or movie anywhere that has as much action in it as the Bible. But there was more than action, there were people just like me doing fantastic things. I think of a frightened Israelite named Gidean, hiding out in a cave where he threshed his wheat and how the angel addressed him, "Hail mighty warrior of the Lord." You see we get things backwards sometimes. We see how frail we are and tend to give up. God sees the end result and urges us towards it. The Bible has been very precious to me.
Also during this time a man in the church took me under his wing to help him with home Bible studies. These were for street kids, kids on drugs or with alcohol problems or whatever. We went and met with these kids and "rapped". That's when "rapping" meant talking to somebody, not syncopated poetry put to music. God used me as He taught me during this period. It especially helped in college. I wasn't the "A" student that parents want their kids to be, but I was respectful of others and learned how to have fun within the "boundaries" of Christianity.
That part of my life was essential to everything else in my Christian walk, because it was then that God placed me firmly on His foundation. I went to Evangel Liberal Arts College mostly because it would be a way for me to begin breaking out of the home into the world for myself. That's where I met Barb, who later became my wife. We were married on 7-7-73, which is significant to me. Sometime look up the 7th book in the New Testament, the 7th chapter and the 7th verse. And realize that entering into this marriage were Barb, myself and Christ who unifies us all. That is where the 3 comes from.
After college I found it difficult getting a job. Barb had a good job with the phone company, but I couldn't get one and keep it. These were my frustration years. I moved from Springfield, MO to New Jersey and later found a job in New York City. Two very special things happened during this time. One happened on 6-22-77, the other on 12-27-79. They are the birthdates of my son and daughter, respectively. Brent is currently attending Wheaton College and Carrie is getting ready for her senior year of high school. Shortly after Carrie was born God spoke to me again saying, "I was in prison and you visited me." God called me to work as a Federal Correctional Officer.
God is still working in my life, and believe me it needs it. But miracles are something that I am coming to expect, not be awed by. Don't get me wrong. I'm overawed by the greatness of God, but as far as the miracles that He performs in my life and in the lives around me I am coming to expect as the fruit of His marvelous grace.
So I live in the shadow of death, as well all must, but I say with the psalmist, "Yea tho I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, thou art with me." I know my God is alive and that He cares for me, regardless of what it looks like. Knowing that I can move on one step at a time. All glory, honor and praise belong to the Lord Jesus Christ and to God my Heavenly Father.
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