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From Homelessness to Salvation

I can do everything through him who gives me strength.

I am a 56-year-old divorced man living in Florida.

I had a really messed up childhood, starting at the age of 3, when I was adopted. I felt unloved and unwanted from the very beginning, which resulted in a lot of trouble at school, in the service, and in my marriage of 12 years to my high school sweetheart, who divorced me in 1979.

I could not hold down a job. Every job I would get I would get fired or quit for one reason or another — but the real reason was drugs and alcohol.

Eventually I lost my apartment because I could not pay rent and ended up being on the street homeless. I stayed that way for 4 years.

I thought my life was over, and I contemplated suicide many times, but I didn’t want to go to hell so I decided against it. But I was extremely miserable and had no friends.

I finally got out of the homeless camp and broke into a warehouse, where I lived in a 12×12 room.

One night I was sitting outside my warehouse, drunk as could be, when a man leaving the corner bar came walking down my street. As he approached, I saw myself in him.

This part is hard to explain, but I will do the best I can. As he got closer, I started to weep and I cried out, “God! Help me! I cannot keep going this way! Just take me out of here! I don’t want to live any more!”

And for 20 minutes or so I wept on my knees till I was exhausted. Then I got up and flopped myself down on the old broken-down couch I used for a bed and drifted off to sleep.

At six o’clock in the morning, I was awakened by someone calling my name, “Richard, Richard, Richard, you
must stop drinking, you must stop smoking, and you must go back to church.”

And as he said that, a feeling of warm liquid flowed through my body, starting from my head to the bottoms of my feet, and I yelled out, “Thank you, Jesus!”

I knew instantly that Jesus Christ had healed me, and this was before I knew what any of this meant. But I knew that I would never need drugs or alcohol ever again! I knew it!

He put a love into me so amazing that there are no words to express it. He totally turned my whole life around.

I put my trust in him and asked him to lead me to the church he wanted me to be a member of, and he did. I asked him to find me a home and a job, and he did.

And the good news is I have never looked back. I have the same job and go to the same church that he led me to.

But that is not the best news. The best news is I know where I am going now when I leave this world — I’m going to heaven. And I know why I am here, and it’s to serve him — and I do with all my heart.

He is real! And if you don’t know him, I implore you to get to know him. He waits for you with open arms. He will be the best friend you will ever have, and he loves you very much.

God bless you! And thank you for taking the time to read my testimony.

And if you know of anyone who needs to hear this, please don’t wait! Send it to them. This might be the last chance they will have to accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal savior.

Story posted on Friday, May 9th, 2008 and is filed under Drugs & Alcohol, Loneliness, Praise, God's Love, Hope, Your Stories, Conversions, Grace, Struggles, Divorce & Marital Conflict, Suicide, Life Verse. | 1 Comment »

My New Purpose in Life

“We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,” they said.

[Acts 14:22 NIV]

Corinne R. writes:

I am the mom of Olivia Corinne Hoff, who passed away April 22, 2004. Olivia was only 14 years old. She died of a heart condition we knew nothing about, LQTS Elongated QT Syndrome, known as the silent killer of young adults.

I didn’t know how I would survive and live without my daughter. I highlighted this verse (Acts 14:22) because my daughter’s death is the most painful hardship I would ever have to endure in my life. I did think of committing suicide and going home to be with Olivia, but I knew this was not my purpose.

What was my purpose? How can there be a purpose for my life? How, with all my pain, my confusion, the huge hole in my heart, my lack of desire to go on, how can there be a purpose for my life?

Well, it has now been three years since the death of my only daughter, and here I am today sharing how God has rescued me and is revealing his purpose to me daily.

I now know that God is getting ready to put me on a journey I never thought I would go on — a journey of sharing my testimony and reaching out to other parents who have lost a child.

I believe with all of my heart that the Lord directs me every day of my life, he is in control of my life, he will show me how to honor my daughter’s memory. I just have to wait and listen.

“The best things in life are the result of being wounded. Wheat must be crushed before becoming bread, and incense must be burned by fire before its fragrance is set free. The earth must be broken with a sharp plow before being ready to receive the seed. And it is a broken heart that pleases God. Yes, the sweetest joys of life are the fruits of sorrow.”

Story posted on Monday, February 18th, 2008 and is filed under Praise, Hope, Sadness, Death, Loneliness, Your Stories, God's Sovereignty, Struggles, Verses, Suicide, Most Popular Stories. | 12 Comments »

Finding Treasures in Darkness [3:27]

Chris Thyberg, Associate Executive Director for American Bible Society, shares how sometimes God only gives us certain “treasures” when we are in the middle of “darkness”. He uses the example of his brother’s suicide and how while he grieved for a year, God revealed himself in a way he never could have done before.

Story posted on Thursday, January 24th, 2008 and is filed under Your Videos, Bible, ABS Stories, Suicide, Christian Families. | No Comments »

I Was Depressed and Suicidal

Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.

Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

[Isaiah 40:28-31 NIV]

Shay H. writes:

God loves me in spite of my shortcomings; only he is perfect. He has shown me my heart and informed me that there are many people in this world but his plan would not do without me. That’s how much you and I mean to him. God doesn’t make mistakes.

About three years ago, God brought me out of a backsliding situation. I was divorced, abused, addicted to prescription drugs, a heavy drinker, as well as an adulterous woman and suicidal. I lost everything; I was on a path of destruction.

I was so depressed I couldn’t even put my feet on the ground to get out of bed; my children were suffering because of my actions. I remember crying out to God, saying if you will just put my feet on the ground, I will follow you all the days of my life.

So, he did … and I have been following him ever since. I no longer do any of the former things I did, I am a new creation. I even quit smoking in January 2007, without one relapse. He was my strength and still is and always will be.

I re-married my husband within 90 days of that prayer, and I have been given back abundantly more than I ever lost. God has done miracle after miracle. There are so many to list. The greatest of all is that his presence saturates my life in all aspects.

I always wanted a father-daughter dance cause I never knew my earthly father. So I wrote this to God my father: “Dear Daddy, I gently take each step here on earth, to one day dance with you gracefully in heaven.”

I look forward to that day, and I have God to thank for it.

To you and yours, blessings of peace,

Shay H.

Story posted on Wednesday, January 16th, 2008 and is filed under Praise, Hope, Drugs & Alcohol, Your Stories, Divorce & Marital Conflict, Suicide, Struggles. | 2 Comments »

Lyrycyst shares testimony

Christian hip hop artist, Lyrycyst, shares a powerful story of his childhood - born to a 15 year old drug addicted mother, he’s been a victim of abuse, depression, suicidal thoughts, and homelessness. He shares how his friend invited him to church when he was 19 years old, and he became a Christian that day.

Read Video Transcript

LYRYCYST: Well, my story really revolves around my mom’s story. My mom was 15 years old when she had me. She was already doing drugs. She had three kids by the time she was 18 years old. She ended up marrying my youngest brother’s dad, who was an alcoholic, and he abused her. And I used to watch him beat my mom. Eventually my mom decided she had to leave that relationship and get out of that lifestyle. But she had no support system, so she packed us kids in a car and we left town. And this guy decided, “If I can’t have her, no one will,” basically. So he decided to follow her, and he was trying to kill my mother. So I spent most of my childhood running from this guy that I barely knew, living out of cars, living out of hotel rooms and safe homes, and all this different stuff.

That was my childhood, just kind of skipping around, and then eventually got to high school. I was pretty messed up by then, and I started dabbling with different stuff, you know partying, alcohol, girls, all this different stuff. Meanwhile my mom was kind of tired of being dirt poor, tired of living out of a car, all that stuff. So she did the only thing she thought she could do. At the time, she had an 8th Grade-level education, but she was very pretty. So she became an exotic dancer. What it did to her was just tore her apart. She felt dirty and she felt ashamed, you know the way people treated her and looked at her kind of ruined her vision of herself. So she started doing cocaine and a lot more hard-core drugs, and eventually led her to a $2,000 a week addiction to cocaine.

During this time, I was 18 years old, suicidal, depressed all through my high school years, about to graduate, and no one had ever shared about Jesus with me. No one had shared a single part of the Gospel. I did not know who Jesus was, I did not know what he did, I had no idea what the Church was, nothing. And an old party friend of mine, we used to get in so much trouble together, ended up moving away a year earlier and got saved, and I had no idea. He knew what it was like to be me, he knew my story, and so he took a chance and he called me up one night during the worst part of my life, and invited me to come hang out with him for a week. I went down, hung out with him, just had a lot of fun with him, but I noticed immediate changes and I noticed something was different about my old friend.

That Saturday night he invited me to church for the very first time, and the first time I went to church, the first time I heard the Gospel, I got saved. And it’s crazy, because I had never read the Bible, I had never read any scripture, nothing, and immediately—you know, people always talk about it doesn’t make much sense to them before they’re saved, but immediately after I was saved it was like this world opened up to me, you know what I mean? I could actually understand and comprehend what I was reading, even though I had no prior knowledge of Christianity.

So I mean it impacted my life huge. It changed me so much where I realized that Jesus was a rebel, he was bold, he was always in people’s faces, he was always telling them exactly how it was, but at the same time he was being gentle, he was being loving, you know he was hanging around the people that no one else would take a chance on. The Bible sets such an example of what Jesus did that it caused me to analyze my life and how I treat other people and try to accomplish the same thing.

Story posted on Wednesday, October 24th, 2007 and is filed under Video Stories, Hope, Lyrycyst, Drugs & Alcohol, Suicide, Evangelization, Divorce & Marital Conflict, Grace. | 2 Comments »

I’m Learning to Forgive Myself

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

[Galatians 2:20 NIV]

Danielle H. writes:

I am 17 years old, and I live in a girls group home in Minnesota. I grew up in a very dysfunctional family system and was abused in many ways. I eventually ended up in the foster care system.

Over time I began cutting myself and thinking of suicide. I acted out in other ways, too. Earlier this year my social worker picked me up and took me to the girls group home, where I am now. I was not very happy, but I knew I needed to go. I had to because I was still obsessive, sleeping around with boys, and things like that.

One night not long ago I was reading my Bible and I came across Galatians 2:20 NIV. I read it and meditated on it for a long time. And that verse has helped me in so many was.

I figured that if God can send his son Jesus to die for me and he went through all that pain for me, then I can change for him. Every time I feel like doing something I think “What would Jesus do?” and I know that he gives me the things I can handle and has control over me.

I am not obsessive anymore, and I don’t cut myself or think of suicide. I have not done that for 6 months now. I still have a lot to work on, but I know I can do it, because I can do all things through Christ. And without him I would be dead or somewhere doing bad things.

I thank Jesus every day and am learning to forgive myself. I honestly believe that I cannot be truly happy or myself without Christ. Oh, and when I get discharged, I may be going to live with my mom. God brought her back into my life! I hope that this has shown you what God can do. Imagine what he can do for any of you!

Story posted on Wednesday, October 10th, 2007 and is filed under Your Stories, Suicide, Struggles. | 3 Comments »

Seventh Day Slumber: Freedom from Suicide & Drugs

Joseph Rojas from Seventh Day Slumber, shares his powerful testimony: unpopular at school, a victim of abuse, a convicted felon, drug addict, and suicidal; Joseph cried out to Christ while on the brink of death.

Show Transcript

Joseph Rojas: I was a drug addict. I had a $400 a day cocaine addiction. I didn’t really believe in God, you know, to be honest, growing up. My mother would take me to Mass like once a year and that was like Easter, you know, and then sometimes on a Christmas Eve, you know, she would take us, but I grew up without a father. My father used to beat my mother and my only memories of my father were of the last time he beat her, you know, and I was 3 and a half years old and I was ten feet away. So I grew up with that image in my mind and without having a father in my life, a father figure, you know, to be there for me.

And so at 14 years old was the first time that I tried cocaine. 12 years old was the first time I thought about suicide. I was a fat kid growing up, you know, I never got picked for any teams. As you can see, I don’t look like Brad Pitt, you know what I mean? I always struggled with a weight problem, you know, and people made find of me a lot and so I got put down quite a bit, and drugs were a way of coping with that. It was a way for me to deal with the pain. By the age of 21 years old, I had a $400 a day cocaine addiction, and by around 22 years old I was a 4-time convicted felon, by the age of 22. And there wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t think about committing suicide. I stole from my own mother to get high, a mother that did nothing but love me and be there for me. But drugs had a hold of me.

Three years before my 21st birthday my mother met this lady that took her to church. My mom was so desperate looking for help for me that this lady just said, “You need to come to church and hear about Jesus,” and my mom went and gave her life to Christ and she came back and she would always tell me about God.

Anyway, one day I just decided that I was done living. At the age of 22 I decided that I was done living and I was going to end my life. I was tired of hurting my mother. I took a lethal dose of cocaine to stop my heart. My mother had a mother’s intuition, and she left work and came home. She wasn’t the one who was supposed to find me, but she left and came home because she was felt something was wrong. As she walked in, I tried to walk over to her to tell her how sorry I was for breaking her heart, and I took about two steps and then I had a heart attack in front of my mother on her living room floor. She was screaming and crying out to this God in Heaven that I didn’t believe in. In the back of the ambulance I felt the power of God, and I said, “Jesus, would you save me?” I said, “I don’t know how to pray, I don’t even know a Bible verse. I don’t know what to say to you but if you could make some sense out of my words then I would gladly give my life to you tonight.” That was the first time in my life that I ever felt like I got picked, and it was the first time in my life I ever knew the love of a father.

I started going to church with my mom and there was this youth pastor that spoke into my life, and he began to mentor me and tell me more about Jesus, you know. Today I’m a husband that honors my wife, Laurie, and I’m madly in love with her. We’ve been married eight year, and after eight years of marriage my wife still gives me butterflies in my stomach when I look at her. I’m a father that loves my kids more than life itself. Seven months ago I led my own father to Jesus. And God did that for me. But that’s where I was and this is where I am now, and that’s how powerful God is.

Story posted on Tuesday, September 25th, 2007 and is filed under Drugs & Alcohol, Video Stories, Loneliness, Conversions, Suicide, Divorce & Marital Conflict. | 1 Comment »

God renewed and tranformed my mind

Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

[Romans 12:1-2 NASB]

Stacy H. writes:
“This is the very first bible verse I ever heard, from my friend Gail, who led me to Christ and gave me a bible in the 9th grade.”
Stacy shares how her friend ’smuggled’ a Bible to her while she was in highschool and what “offering yourself as a living sacrifice” means to her.

[ed’s note: Stacy starts her story at the 24 second mark]

Story posted on Monday, September 10th, 2007 and is filed under Your Videos, Hope, Suicide. | No Comments »

Legal battle: God continues to strengthen me

God is our refuge and strength,
A very present help in trouble.

[Psalms 46:1 NKJV]

DMG writes

I know for an indisputable fact that the Lord Jesus Christ helps us when we desperately need him. I can say this with no doubts in my heart because of the way He has worked in my life in recent months.

I grew up going to church regularly, and was a pretty devoted follower of God until I graduated and left my hometown. For the next 20 years, although I had gained a measure of success, I lived a lifestyle far from the life that God would have liked. I was married, had two wonderful sons, and was living what I thought was a comfortable American life. Divorce brought all that to a crashing halt.

Story posted on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 and is filed under Your Stories, Conversions, Suicide, Divorce & Marital Conflict, Prayer. | 1 Comment »

The words of Jesus stopped me from suiciding

You surely know that your body is a temple where the Holy Spirit lives. The Spirit is in you and is a gift from God. You are no longer your own.

[1 Corinthians 6:19 CEV]

George writes:

In 1985 I was saved in an evangelistic crusade in India. On this particular day, I actually planned to end my life by committing suicide by falling into a big truck that was coming at me very fast. At that time though, I heard a beautiful song come from a gospel crusade that was meeting, unbeknown to me, at a nearby youth hostel.

Story posted on Monday, November 6th, 2006 and is filed under Your Stories, Suicide, Evangelization, Grace. | 1 Comment »

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From Homelessness to Salvation

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I’m Learning to Forgive Myself

Seventh Day Slumber: Freedom from Suicide & Drugs

God renewed and tranformed my mind

Legal battle: God continues to strengthen me

The words of Jesus stopped me from suiciding

Has the Bible Impacted Your Life Too?

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