My Testimony

Today, I discovered a  link to my blog from another website. On this website they have taken a picture of my son and I, posted to a blog post, and written some very hateful comments about my son, myself, and my marriage, without any foreknowledge of my life or my testimony. You can view the post here, but I will warn you that this site claims to be Conservatively Christian, wherein it is exactly the opposite, quite vulgar, hateful, and quite frankly a joke at the expense of Conservative Christians.

First of all, many of the comments were blatantly racist. This I deal with regularly, as my son is biracial. Honestly, it has come to not bother me at all. If someone wants to live their lives in such ignorance, that is their choice. They will miss out on meeting a lot of great people and a lot of great opportunities in their lives in the name of hate. What bothered me most was their use of my biracial son to discredit my marriage through Christ and commitment to my husband at this time without knowing my testimony or my life in Christ as it is now.

I will warn you now that my testimony is not pretty, and I will be blunt. If topics such as child abuse, drugs, alcohol, etc are too much for you, I would suggest you take precaution in reading my testimony.

And now, for my Testimony:

I grew up in a household wherein my father would take us to church, but my mother would rarely even step foot into a place of worship. My father has been a major alcoholic for as long as I can remember. The first thing he did was make his way to the porch to get a whiskey and coke every morning. He is a farmer, and would continue his drinking through the day and start hitting the whiskey harder in the evening. He never laid hands on my mother or my sister, but beat me profusely for the tiniest infractions. I remember having to sleep some nights on my stomach because of the amount of painful welts on my back, usually from the metal part of my father’s belt.

When I was 11 years old my mother picked my sister and I up from school one day and announced that we were moving away from our father that day. My parents were divorced that year, and my mother began to go out drinking on the weekends. My mother worked nights, so we were often alone in the evenings. When I was about 12, my mother started dating other men. I knew she was having sex with some of them. Eventually we moved to another town, away from the group of children I had grown up with, to live with a man she would soon marry. I was rejected in school by many of the children, but eventually was led into the “wrong crowd”. By the age of 13 I had already taken my first drink of beer, witnessed people smoking pot, and had my first cigarettes. My mother’s new husband was a “meth head”, and I thought of suicide often, attempting it once. My cry for help was barely heard. By the age of 14 I was smoking pot, drinking, and having sex on a regular basis. During a weekend visit to my father’s, he tried to bring up the issues of not smoking and not having sex before marriage. I just rolled my eyes at him. How could he tell me not to smoke, he himself was a smoker! And about having sex, I was ruined anyway. I had already had sex and it was too late.

There is much more that happened in this time of my life leading to when I met my husband. I haven’t the energy to type it all out at this moment, so I’ll pick up at that point.

My husband and I met online. We were both pagan, and moved in together 2 years before we married. On April, 16th 2005 we were married by the justice of peace. I was 19 and my husband was 28. Our first year of marriage was horrible. My husband lost his job because of his marijuana use, and began to drift into depression of self pity that I couldn’t get him out of. He didn’t have any interest in his new wife. I regretably began to search elsewhere for what I considered at the time to be love and affection. On a night out on the town, I ran into an man I had dated just before meeting my husband. Our meeting soon turned into an affair. A few months later, overcome with guilt, I told my husband about the affair. He was heartbroken, and only weeks later did I find out about my pregnancy. I told my husband that I would understand if he left me, but if he stayed he would have to agree to rebuild our marriage and father our child. He wanted nothing more than to rebuild and so we began the long process of healing the wounds.

During my pregnancy, we sought counseling and made great strides in our relationship. We rebuilt trust and came to terms with our family to be. My husband has never been anything but the father of my son. He is on the birth certificate, and he is a far better father to our son that any man on this earth could be. After the birth of our son and the rebuilding of our marriage, we thought we had all the pieces put back in their places, until January of 2007, when our lives were turned upside down by the calling of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

In January of 2007, I received a very hateful message on my telephone from my father-in-law. While listening to that message, all of the emotions and guilt from all of my past sins came over me. For a time, I had thought that I could go on and bury the past, that I was indeed a “better person” now. At this moment in time, I realized that there was nothing that I could do on this earth to erase the sins that I had committed against my husband, against those I love, and against God. I was overcome with the weight of my sins and their eternal consequences. And a thought came to me, one I had sort of heard before, but never really understood. I cried out, “Jesus, you are the only one who can take away my sins, you are the only one who can make me a new person and make me whole.” I cried to the Lord and begged his forgiveness and mercy. It was if someone had taken my hand and placed me on my knees, as I wept to the Lord. It was also at this moment that I was in Christ. I had received him, and I was made new. I was cleansed.

Just one week later, my husband came to Christ. I thought it was impossible. Just weeks before he was saved, he told me of his belief in Norse gods and rune stones. The Lord had called him to his new life in Christ and it is still absolutely amazing to us to this day.

My sins are washed away, and I am made brand new. I no longer have to revel in the sins of my past. My son has two fathers, one in heaven and one on earth. Lord thank you for renewing me. Lord thank you for saving me from my life of sin and self destruction. Lord, THANK YOU.

You can read our Quiverfull testimony HERE.