Paul’s Testimony

I was raised in the Baptist faith and at age 10 I was saved.  That is, when others in my Sunday school class went forward to be baptized, so did I. Four years later I left the church.  Sometime in the next 40 years, anger began to overtake my life.  I was angry with everybody and everything.  I knew something was missing in my life and I knew from my childhood teaching it was Jesus.  I returned to the church, got involved with Sunday school, made some Christian friends, began to read the Bible — and even served a little. 

An associate pastor saw my anger and asked that I do an introspective:  to honestly look back on my life to see what might really be causing my anger. 

I did. 

I realized my anger was caused by some bad choices I made as a teenager,  when I walked away from the church – from God’s will for my life. With this realization the anger began to dissipate, but now I felt a terrible guilt!         

My new church friends told me that the guilt should be gone because I was saved.  Obviously, since I still had guilt, I was not saved.  On Sunday evening, March 16, 2008, a visiting preacher read from Romans 8:1: 

“There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus…”

I was broken!  The tears would not stop; the guilt was gone, and a tremendous weight had been lifted from me.  I was so at peace!  I knew in my heart that God  loved me and forgave me and so I could forgive myself.  Why then?  What was different from what my friends had been telling me?  I believe God wanted me to hear about false condemnation from scripture. 

Today I can tell you with great assurance:  13 words from scripture turned my life around. My life is no longer overtaken by anger or guilt, but is overtaken by God. My marriage is much stronger because now my wife and I love Jesus first.  I am deeply involved in serving the church while sharing the Gospel whenever opportunities arise.  I am here in this spot, at this time, because this is where God wants me.  And I am ready to share with you the gospel of Jesus Christ, if you will listen.

—Paul