I got put into a foster home because my family couldn't handle me. I got kicked out of the house one night, it was this time of year, December. In Wisconsin it gets real cold, there's like 3 feet of snow. I had nowhere to sleep, because it was too cold anyway. I stayed outside all night. I finally got to my grandma's the next day, and my mom came over and said, "Let's go." I said, "what are you talking about, go where? Are we going shopping or something?"I was just being dumb. She said, "No, we're going to school." I started laughing at her because her words didn't mean anything to me any more. I did what I wanted. She said, "No, you're going to go to school." We got into an argument and she calls her pastor over. She always got him involved because my dad wasn't there, and even if he was there, he didn't know how to be, so she got him involved. I hated him and everything he stood for. We got into a little verbal argument, and then it got physical. I grabbed a steak knife out of my grandma's drawer and I took a swing. I remember the swing. I went swinging. I forgot, he used to be a police officer. Yeah, that was a fun roller coaster ride. I went down to the ground and his elbow was in my cheek, and he told me I was going to school. He called the cops over there and they came and got me and brought me to school. I didn't get it. God wasn't what I was looking for. I thought God was boring. I thought God was pointless, and I didn't want anything to do with him. I kept running and running.
Finally, my brother got in trouble for some dumb stealing, things like that. I was always slick, so I thought I would have got caught somewhere along the line. The police knew what I was doing. They threatened me a couple times, almost caught me with marijuana and speed, but I got away both times. So for me, I wasn't ready to change. My brother got caught and my name came up, and the cops threatened me and told me I'm going to jail. One of my other friends was already in jail for getting into a gang fight and he was locked up for a long time. I just wasn't looking forward to that at 14 years old. I told my mom what the cops told me. Even though I treated my mom like trash and even though I did everything I did to my mom, I can just remember seeing her cry and telling me that she loved me and asking God what did she do wrong. I just didn't care, I spit in her face. When I came to her and told her what the cops said, she said, "Well, I'm going to try and help you out." No matter what I did to her, she still loved me and still tried to help me. She still prayed for me and told me that God had a plan for me. That made me more mad than anything. I hated it. I thought if God could do enough to her she would just leave me alone, but it didn't work.
If you're a mother in here or if you're a grandmother in here, don't stop praying because you grandmas are lethal weapons, OK? I tell you, seriously, don't give up, because I was one of the kids that people look at with my baggy pants, braids in my hair, walking with that limp listening to the rap music. People would just push me off to the side and shove me like I'm nobody and act like I'm a loser and never going to make anything of myself or my life. My mom didn't give up, she kept praying for me. I remember that more than anything. She got a list of places I could go to. One of them happened to be Freedom Village. Now I'm not going to say, "Oh, Freedom Village. I want to come to Freedom Village." She kind of tricked me into it. I didn't know what it was really all about.
I didn't know what it was all about. I came out there in my baggy clothes, my new rap CDs and my knife, my blue and white bandannas, the gang colors. I didn't know what it was all about, obviously you can't have that kind of stuff, you don't need that kind of stuff there. I was there for about six months with that same mentality.
I was there for six months, that same mentality. I was stubborn, real hard headed. I wasn't going to accept God, I wasn't going to. I was going to do my year, leave, and go back to everything I was. It was right at the six month point in time where the Holy Spirit just convicted my heart and that night I knew that I was done. I knew there was no other way to live, there was no alternative, no going back, none of maybe I could do this, maybe that. It wasn't one foot over here, one foot over here. I knew I needed to give my life to Christ when I got saved, and that night God changed my life completely. Now, you know I still made mistakes after that. He changed my heart and I wanted to do what was right, and I wanted to become a better person. I wanted to help other people. He took that stone cold heart and He gave me a warm heart that wanted to love other people and help other kids. Ever since then I've been learning a lot of things and God has changed my life big time. I graduated high school this last year. I was failing my last two years, going nowhere. I got a purpose and plan in my life.
I used to treat my mom like trash and I used to treat my sister Nicki like trash. There was more than one occasion when I'd get real physical. There was a couple times when I could have done a lot of damage and maybe almost killed her, and I don't deserve to be standing up here tonight telling you what God can do in a life, but not only in my life, but what He's done in my sister's life. Because God changed my life, it took me four years before I got my sister here. He changed her life and she's making something of herself. I don't deserve to be standing here and I don't deserve to have a relationship with my sister. In the whole 14 years I was home, I treated her like she was trash, like I didn't know. I love my sister now, and God has given me that relationship that I never had. And my mom doesn't lock herself in her room any more. She's not afraid of me. She doesn't flinch when I lift my hand up. I give her a hug and tell her I love her, because it's real, because I do.
Yeah, I got a purpose in my life now and everybody that's sitting here and works for Freedom Village, you're doing an awesome thing, you don't even know how many lives you're touching by touching one of our lives, because now I've got my life straightened out. She got her life straightened out. How many people God's going to use her to touch lives. God is an awesome God, and I'm a real person, and you can touch me. This is reality here. I like to have fun, I like to joke around, but God is so awesome and He's real. He's done an awesome thing in my life. I love my sister now. I thank God so much for her.
My friends, He is able. He is able to take a young man who terrorized his entire family, and turn him around and make a man out of him. All I can tell you is that you aren't going to beat that system, young person, that system will beat you. You can't run with the wrong crowd and turn out right. Eventually, sometime, some place, somewhere, it'll be over. I would encourage you, call 1-800-VICTORY and trust Christ today, while you still are alive and can do it. Take a look at the world for what it is. It's a bunch of dead ends. The worst day that you'll ever have in Jesus will be the best day that you'll ever have in this world.
No comments:
Post a Comment