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pstrdebi -> RE: Testify!!! (7/20/2008 10:32:50 PM)
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How do you testify to a gift that keeps being opened. As if it was one of those little Chinese mystery boxes with all the secret compartments. Just when you think it is opening... you find another mystery compartment.
My life has been comprised of ever evolving change.... growth... new adventures. Adventures With God!
I think I have shared before that I was raised Catholic. My mom was a tough woman, a product of her upbringing. My sister who was 17 years older than me, married a Baptist man and converted her faith. She raised me for a few years when my mother took ill... and sent me to a Christian Camp in the San Bernardino Mountains in California when I was 13. It was there that all my thoughts about Jesus came to light... and I received Him as my Savior.
When I went home to my mom however, and told her of my conversion, she pointed her finger at me and said, "You were born a Catholic, and you'll die a Catholic." I was even afraid that that time was going to be then! [:o]
My mom wouldn't support me in my faith, would not allow me to attend church with my sister, and the youth group. So, at the ripe old age of 15, I rebelled and decided that I could do better on my own.
I ran away and got into as much trouble as I possibly could, did as many drugs as I could possibly find, and so on and so on. There were days that I didn't even know how I possibly made it through the night.... and after waking, and finding myself in the state I was in... wished I hadn't.
Between here and the next part (fast forward several years)... there are many other "testimonies" during that part of my life... but, suffice it to say that one day at the age of 29... I was passing a little Baptist Church (I am not a Baptist... but the Baptist Church will always hold a very dear place in my heart)... and thought, my kids need to be in church. So that Sunday... I dropped them off! [:)]... As I drove home with my two babies (the older two went to church)... I felt a tapping on my shoulder and a small voice saying, "You need to be in there." Of course I ignored the voice, assuring myself that I loved God and He loved me, and all was well. The next week, the same thing happened. And the week after, and the week after that... til finally I said, "OK!" And I went... and the minute I walked through the doors of that little church, I felt like I was home... and I just wept.
There are many that might say of a kid like me... that I probably wasn't really saved. Or, there are those who might say, since I had backslidden, that the Holy Spirit left me.
Well... I am here to testify! The heart of that skinny little 13 year old blonde sincerely received Christ as her Savior... but even more... Christ received me into His loving arms and made me, that day, His heir! At the moment I received Him... ALL His promises were mine. And one of those promises was, "I will never leave you, nor forsake you."
Secondly... The Holy Spirit is God... and when God says, "I will never leave you, nor forsake you" He means it. God is not a man that He should lie. It is us who distance ourselves from God... He is always there, waiting for our return. When I placed myself within hearing distance; in other words... had a soften heart to hear, then I could hear the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit never left me... He was always there. Protecting me, covering me, hiding me... through all of the awful times I put myself through... and those that others put me through... the Holy Spirit was always there.
Praise God for His faithfulness to us... even when we are unfaithful. When all we deserve the most is to be dropped like a hot potatoe... He picks us up and carries us home.
I have been serving Him ever since... and I have never looked back! [:D]
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