Greetings to you all. It is my fervent hope that you might find this testimony of interest and that it might encourage you to seek out Jesus Christ as your personal savior. I chose the quotes above to illustrate two important facts -- namely that salvation is only through Christ Jesus and that merely attending church or simply agreeing with the basic truths of the Gospel does not make one a Christian.

A Christian has accepted Jesus as his personal Savior. Okay I know that, but what does this really mean? This question has occupied my mind and driven me from one doctrine to another in search of an answer. I would like to share my testimony of this journey with you in the hopes that you might find an answer for yourself.

I was raised as an Episcopalian in a family that while recognizing the value of the church in our lives did not speak about it much. As a child I was drawn to religion and church, but as time progressed I fell away. When my parents were divorced, my mother (with whom I lived) quit attending church -- and so did I. This was early in my teens and gradually I decided that church was okay for some but it wasn’t essential. When I was older, I would get religion, I thought to myself.

Without a relationship with God I was left to my own devices -- and brother did I put myself through a lot of hell! I was not very outgoing and had few friends. I became something of a chameleon. I would change my opinions, likes and dislikes to match whomever was my best friend at the time. I was afraid that if I believed anything differently, they wouldn’t be my friend any longer.

During high school I got involved with drugs and began a lifelong battle with depression. College made things worse. The friends I had were actively hostile to religion (although they would admit their main problem was with organized religion). My problems worsened: heavy drug use, too much partying, a string of carnal, broken relationships and even a growing struggle with pornography.

I also wandered into occult and new age thought and came to the conclusion that while a spiritual life was beneficial I didn’t have time for it right now and that when I did what was important was to find that truth or tradition that resonated with me. In other words, if it felt right, then it was the truth for me.

After college, I began my long struggle with Christianity. A good friend found Jesus through the Boston Church of Christ (aka the International Church of Christ) and began witnessing to me in the only manner that would get through to me -- his life was transformed and he had such joy!

While I wanted what he had I didn’t want to give up so much. Instead of repenting, I began to search for the form of Christianity that suited me best. Another Christian friend did some heavy witnessing to me as well, but nothing took much. I even attended a service at the local International Church of Christ but was so put off by it that I never returned.

My struggle with depression and sexual sin deepened until my life was miserable. I was alone, utterly and completely.

Then the Lord brought the woman into my life who would become my wife and start me truly on the road to salvation. When we met, Cynthia was at the end of a bitter and of a terrible marriage. He was an atheist, a heavy drug user, psychologically and physically abusive man. She wasn’t even allowed to go to church. To make things worse, he was also an adulterer. Cynthia had warned him years before that when their children were grown she would leave him if he hadn’t changed his ways.

He never did and they were divorced. I’ll never forget that time. It was ugly and he wanted to hurt Cynthia as much as possible while he still could. The marriage was so obviously broken that even her own children urged her to leave their father. I wish I could say that we waited until she was divorced but we did not. Cynthia had long since severed any emotional ties to him and we became first fast friends and then fell in love.