1. Before I Found Jesus.
2. How I Found Jesus
   
3. How Jesus Changed My Life.

I was very rebellious, and I became addicted to drugs and alcohol for ten years after my best friend Steve unexpectedly died. Partying became my way of life, helping me escape into a world of wild parties and avoiding facing reality and the pressures I was feeling from school and even competitive basketball as a teenager. Unfortunately, I fully embraced that way of life for many years until I was 26.

But before I became addicted, I was heavily involved in high school basketball, and I got pretty competitive after playing for many years. But once my addiction got hold of me, I was only concerned about what pleased my flesh. I did whatever drugs I could get my hands on. Actually, I even tried doing aerosols, angle dust, and acid. To explain how I was, I would say ~ simply wild, and I did not know how to stop. I became self-centered and sinful and was heading for big trouble, and I was focusing on only what I thought could make me happy or would be fun.

It Was Like I Was A Train Going Downhill Fast With No Brakes.

I do not know how I did not overdose if someone had shot me, or I do not know how I did not commit suicide when I was 16. I was a train wreck, ready to go off the rails. Thankfully, my mom always seemed to help steer me out of getting in trouble, or now I can say it was God watching over me through my mom and others. After realizing that I hurt people physically and emotionally, including myself, I was ready to ask God to change me from the inside out. I was an absolute mess because I stole some things, lied, had sex before marriage, etc. sex before marriage, etc. – I was a real mess. During these years, God put many people in my life to wake me up. I went to meetings for alcohol and drug treatment, Dewey Center for alcohol and drug treatment, 12-step meetings for both NA and AA, and jail and psychiatry care, but until I had ears to hear, my heart was far from God, and I had no way out.

#2 HOW I FOUND JESUS

The Holy Spirit told me not in audible words but in my heart and mind that I was not living right and was heading for hell, prison, a mental hospital, or even death if I did not change my ways.

I was not a stranger to God, but my relationship with Him before I was Born Again consisted of attending church on Sundays and trying to be good while still living according to my own will rather than for God. It was not until God placed me in a long-term drug and alcohol treatment center, and on June 25, 1986, after smoking my last marijuana cigarette while still in treatment, that I felt convicted right then and there.

I knew I had hit my bottom and needed God’s help. I have dodged too many bullets in the Russian roulette game I was playing with my life. After I finally realized that I needed help. After pleading with God to help me, I told Him I would cooperate with the treatment program. It was apparent to me that God was speaking to me at this point because He opened my ears. God gave me another second chance, but this one was real. When things started to change, I was determined to have God remove my addiction and sinful life.

It was almost like how consumed I became by the addiction. I put that same energy into living my recovery and new, clean, sober life with God’s help! I realized I could not keep living the way I was and that I needed God’s help, without any doubt or question. After I put all my chips in, I stopped holding any back. I finally got serious and knew what powered my life was something new to me: the Holy Spirit!

God took away the clenched fists towards Him and replaced them with an openness to doing His will rather than my own. He gave me a new heart since my old heart was contaminated with sin. God gave me a desire to read His word daily, to pray, to journal, and to have fellowship with other believers. He rescued me from my life, giving me a new life – what the Bible calls Born Again. God gave me a desire to encourage others by pointing them to Jesus.

How Jesus Can Change Your Life Too!