Revelation 12:11 (NIV)
They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.
There is an incredible power in testimony and today we
need to begin to unlock that power. The church sits in slumber because none see the miracles within. In light of that, this is my testimony.
Take a moment and read 2 Corinthians 12:7-10. What an awesome passage. Here Paul is telling of a weakness he has--a weakness allowed by God.
As I grew up and became more aware of the world around me God allowed me a weakness; or perhaps it was simply a consequence. It all began a number of years ago when I was about ten years old.
I grew up believing
I could be everything I could be--that is to say, I believed that I had to earn grace and buy my passage to heaven. Until later years I always just figured since I went to church I was, (obviously) going to heaven. And perhaps if I brought my Bible to church every week and learned my memory verse perfectly and did all these things just right, God would love me more. I looked down on most people taller than me, and
everyone shorter than me--I thought I had it all. Yep, I was pretty snobby.
As I got older I began to realize that I was alone. Sure I had my family--you can
never be alone with seven siblings. I had plenty of cousins kicking around too, but that's about all they really seamed to do. And then there was my church. I grew up into it, I knew everyone in it, but the only real friend I had really had then moved away. I was socially challenged, besides, I already knew everyone and didn't know how to go from there. At any rate everyone my age either moved away or was a girl and at that age, this was quite a predicament.
It was about this time that, due to a
suggestive movie, I fell innocently into lusting after fleshly desires and soon became addicted. For the first six months or so I argued with myself that what I was doing wasn't wrong--and won out. But as I became hooked on porn in the wake of this, my arguments sounded more and more hollow.
Overcome by my new secret and loneliness, I fell into depression and turned even more toward my lustful habits for comfort. At the same time I was getting scared. I was convicted of the sin in my life and I knew that if I did not stop my habits, I was going to hell. But I still believed I could earn my way to heaven. So on June 24, 2004 I was baptised--my safeguard on those pearly gates. I thought that baptism was more than a symbol--that baptism was the action itself which it should only have represented.
Even though I was baptised I did not feel any different, but now I did have an excuse. When I messed up I could say, "It's okay! I'm baptised! I'm going to heaven anyway!" But even in that I found little comfort. I continued to sink further into depression due to my loneliness, dark secrets, and the feeling that God had abandoned me.
2006 was a note-worthy year for me. I was very depressed. I had vowed that year to end my lustful habits, but that vow would not be kept. Because of this I felt that God was failing me--for the simple reason that I was failing him. I was still very tied in to the beliefs that I had to earn God's approval--especially now that I had dark secrets.
I thought often of dieing. I didn't have the guts and still believed that even if I was a lost sinner forever I could do something with my life, but these couldn't hold out forever. I remember often praying and crying to God that he would even just send me a friend I could talk to, but no answer seamed to come.
It was mid-fall of '06 that I met
her. Over the last year I had turned to a virtual world on the internet in which hundreds of thousands of people interracted. It was a desperate attempt to gain something of a friendship. I was pushing further and further away from reality and had nothing to do with anyone if I could help it. Brenna was a Christian girl slightly younger than me from the states, and amazingly enough she was in the same time zone as me. Though I never met her in flesh-and-blood, we soon became friends.
Brenna was like no one I had ever met before. I told her all about my past and my depression; she didn't judge but loved--did not turn her back but proverbially took my hand and walked me through. She introduced me to a Christian website--little more than a basic blog, but here I met many other young Christians with a faith much like Brenna's; strong, steadfast, based on an undeniable love of God. By the new year I had caught hold of this faith and God began to lift me out of depression.
