{"id":688,"date":"2015-09-23T01:24:44","date_gmt":"2015-09-23T01:24:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/?p=688"},"modified":"2018-02-10T23:47:25","modified_gmt":"2018-02-10T23:47:25","slug":"my-personal-testimony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/?p=688","title":{"rendered":"My Personal Testimony"},"content":{"rendered":"

My Testimony<\/strong><\/p>\n

I claim to be a Christian.\u00a0 This is my personal testimony of how I came to the Lord.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Every Christian\u2019s testimony is different, but the plan of salvation always includes the following:\u00a0 the realization of the need to be reconciled to God; a conviction of sin; repentance (changing the mind); a willingness and desire to accept Jesus Christ as personal Saviour; belief in His death, burial, and resurrection; and faith in His merit alone.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

The following is how God worked in my life to bring me to salvation.<\/strong><\/p>\n

While growing up, I attended church with my family every time the doors were opened.\u00a0 I was taught Bible stories and knew the plan of salvation from an early age.\u00a0 I was baptized as a youth.\u00a0 I served as janitor of the church, cleaning it every week with one of my siblings.\u00a0 In addition, I mowed the church yard and shoveled the sidewalks.\u00a0 I was in the youth group and sang in the church choir.\u00a0 At times I even participated in church services, but through all of these things I did not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The fact that I did not have a relationship with Christ was manifested by my eagerness to sin as I struggled to get out from under my parent\u2019s authority.\u00a0 My life became characterized by the things done by those whom the Scriptures describe as being alienated from God, but I was having a great time or so I thought.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The difficulty with the sin (disobeying direct commands of Scripture) and having a great time participating in this lifestyle, was the emptiness left within.\u00a0 While a student at a small college in the Midwest, I wrote the following: Love is eating away at my soul, and I can do nothing for its control.\u00a0 I wish someone could help me, but no one can.\u00a0 I\u2019m destined to die a lonely man.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

There were two things wrong with that statement.\u00a0 First, it wasn\u2019t love eating away at my soul, it was sin. Second, it wasn\u2019t true that no one could help me, the Lord could.\u00a0 He heard my cry, but He had to put me in a position where I would want His help.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The tragic deaths of four young men got my attention.\u00a0 They died doing things that I had done under similar circumstances.\u00a0 Something would happen to me, and then it would happen to one or two of these young men, resulting in death.\u00a0 The first events were over a year apart, the second set of events were months apart, and the last events were just seven days apart.<\/strong><\/p>\n

When those last two young men died, a fraternity brother said to me: That was you and me last Friday night!<\/em>\u00a0 His words became the writing on the wall.\u00a0 <\/em>I wasn’t ready to die.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I knew something had to change in my life, but I wasn\u2019t exactly sure what or how.\u00a0 My sister was home for Christmas, so I asked her if I could go back to Florida with her after the holidays.\u00a0 She consented after a couple of days of prayer!\u00a0 I had no job, no money, and no wheels, so I attended church with her where I heard the plan of salvation again.<\/strong><\/p>\n

One night in the spring of 1973 I got on my knees beside my bed and read through the Romans Road in my Bible (see blog article entitled the same).\u00a0 I admitted to God that although I knew how to be saved, my life gave no evidence that I had a relationship with Him through His Son.\u00a0 I told God that I wanted to be saved, and it was then that He not only changed my heart, He began a work in me which would change my life.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

That is my testimony of how God brought me to Christ.\u00a0 What is your testimony?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new.\u00a0<\/em> II Corinthians 5:17<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My Testimony I claim to be a Christian.\u00a0 This is my personal testimony of how I came to the Lord. Every Christian\u2019s testimony is different, but the plan of salvation always includes the following:\u00a0 the realization of the need to be reconciled to God; a conviction of sin; repentance (changing the mind); a willingness and … Continue reading My Personal Testimony<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=688"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1840,"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688\/revisions\/1840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadinghorsestowater.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}