Well, good morning, and thank you pastor for the opportunity to give my testimony. So I'm
actually 30 years old, 31 next month, and I've been saved since 2005, so that's a long
time ago. Some of you kids probably weren't even born then. My life started out pretty
interesting. I was born in Nambour, which says a lot. My dad left my mother before I
was born, so I didn't have a dad growing up until I was about six years old. And I
can't remember much of my life up until that stage, but I know that it was just me and
my mum, and for a little while I lived with my grandparents, the both of us. When I was
six years old my stepdad came into my life, his name's Andrew, and he was a very abusive
alcoholic drug user, very anti-God, you know, would abuse me quite a lot, physically that
is, emotionally, and my mum as well. I remember a lot of times my mum had to ring the police
and stuff like that. I used to, that's my phone ringing by the way, unfortunately, oh
no, that's my alarm actually, sorry. Sorry about that. Yeah, my mum would have to ring
the police a lot and she would tell me to run next door to the next door neighbours
to tell them what was going on and stuff like that. So I would do that. Eventually that
person would start to sexually abuse me and take that, although at the time I didn't think
it was abuse, I thought it was love and stuff like that. I had a bit of a troubled teenage
years, rebellion, I ran out of home when I was 13 and went to live with my grandparents
who I praise the Lord for, and I've been with them ever since. My early years with my mum
and my stepdad I wasn't allowed to mention God, Jesus, religion, my dad was a, you work
hard you earn it, if you don't work hard you don't get anything, he's all about himself.
But my grandparents were a little bit more lenient, they were like, if you want to go
to church then you can go to church, we're not going to stop, you just don't push it
on us, you've got your own life to live kind of thing. And I'm really thankful for that.
So I ended up getting involved, because I was a rebel at school I got involved with
a Christian youth group called Fusion. They're very way off doctrinally now, but at the time
they were fairly good and very helpful. Obviously I wasn't a Christian, but we'd go on day trips
and every Easter they had a Jesus march in Brisbane and then they'd have like, we'd go
out to Uluru and spread the Gospel to the Aboriginals over Easter, and then in July
they had what was called Youth Foundations which was a group of younger people who wanted
to be youth leaders at Fusion, so to actually run the day trips and the marches and stuff
like that. Even though I wasn't saved, I really wanted to be a leader of the youth
groups and stuff. So I actually went down to Youth Foundations twice in Tasmania to
a place called Powhatina. And Powhatina is pretty much just a full on Christian community
run by Christians. There's a lot of bartering. Not a lot of outside influence happens in
this city. It's all run by Christians. So the first year I went it was good and I become
a leader, even though I wasn't a Christian. I've still become a leader. Every day trip
after the trip we'd do lots of activities during the day and then at night they'd give
you a Gospel message. And I'd heard it, well, for a good two years and I sort of didn't
respond to it at all. But the second year I went to Youth Foundations, I can remember
it was the 17th of July 2005 and I heard the message about hell and that the only way to
get there was Jesus. I can't explain what happened but I just broke down and I just
knew that I was lost. I went to the teacher at the time and this was just before lunchtime.
I can remember it clear as day and I said, I'm lost. I'm living a lie kind of thing.
I'm a leader of a Christian youth group and I'm not even a Christian. So he took me through
the Romans road and asked me if I believed it and then said, well, if you want to pray
about it you can. And I did. I did pray out loud. Not that the prayer saved me but the
belief saved me and it was just me confessing what I believed. So when that happened, at
the time it was just belief on Jesus Christ. But I probably went through about maybe six
years of my life after that searching for the truth, like as in what about creation,
you know, rapture, just everything. Dr. Einarle wanted the truth. And I think there were times
where I probably doubted that it was just belief, especially when I got involved with
cults like Mormonism and Jehovah Witness and stuff like that where it's very work based.
So there was a lot of times there where I looked back, like I was looking back this
week where I probably didn't believe that it was just by belief only. And it wasn't
until 2011 I was listening to a guy called Mike Hoggard. Some of you guys probably know
him. And I liked a lot of his stuff. And so I looked for an independent Baptist church
because I got in contact with him and he said, oh, probably an independent Baptist church
would be the best doctrinally. So I looked for one around here and I found Sunshine.
And everyone knows about Sunshine. So yeah, I spent five years under Pastor Stevenson
and learnt more than I'd ever learnt in my Christian walk. Very strong in King James,
very strong on reading your Bible, very strong on prayer life, and just stuff that I'd never
really been, like I'd been a watered down Christian kind of thing. And he taught me
to fight for my faith and know what I believe, why I believe what I believe. And I guess
under him I also cemented the fact that it was just belief. And it's such a liberating
feeling when you finally get it. So yeah, I also did soul winning under Pastor Stevenson.
And well, now I'm here and I love being here. And I just want to say that we are very blessed
to have a church like this because there's not many these days that just preach the Bible
how it's supposed to be preached. And yeah, that's pretty much my life and praise God.