Program#0012
It is my great honor and pleasure to have Joseph here with us, to share his great testimony with you. Joseph was approved by God and appointed by God as a youth leader at the age of 16. In 2014 he was given the position to call the leaders in Canada to lead revival crusades. Joseph is an Evangelist working with Omega Ministry that has a passion to see lives transformed and the lost reconnecting to our Father!
Q: Joseph, I heard that God has done a lot of amazing things in your life. Can you tell us more about it?
Joseph: Sure. I would be more than happy to. I would like to start my story off with some significant events that took place in my life which helped me recognize God’s involvement, influence and guidance which has molded me and taught me the fear and love of God. Before I start, I would just like to say that none of what I am about to tell you is exaggerated.
Joseph: In my younger days as far back as I could remember, majority of the memories that come to me are memories of stealing. I was a thief growing up. I loved to steal and was really good at it too. It didn’t matter who it was. Whether it was my family or friends, I would try my best to steal. I even stole money from my uncle on his wedding day. While he was getting married in the living room of his house, I went up to his room and took a $20 bill, which was a lot back in the early 90’s. Both sides of my family were hindus, and even though they were not as religious as others, they did not believe in changing religions. They thought that becoming a Christian by believing in Jesus was changing religions. They did not know God, therefore, they did not know what religion itself was. In the book of James1:27, it says,”that true and undefiled religion in the sight of God, is to visit the orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.”. No matter which background or demographics of that area an individual comes from, this is what true and undefiled religion is in the sight of the true and living God. Believing in Jesus gives us the gift and privilege of living and having a relationship with our Maker and Father. There was a lot of pride in my family and this was a hindrance for them in coming to Jesus. It’s not like they were dull and it did not make sense. The bible is the most accurate History book in the whole Universe so it makes more sense than anything else. And my dad studied in England and my mom was raised by a world war two vet of a father who gave his children freedom from the age of 12 to gain confidence. So it’s not like that at all. It was their pride that became a hindrance. God’s word is true and He convicts.
Let me start giving some dates so I can draw this out a little better. One day in 1995 or 1996, my family was invited to a Christmas party and initially we were not going to go, but because of the persistence of an amazing aunt, my mother along with my brothers and I went. My dad, however, did not go that day. Once entering the venue where the party was being held, I noticed that there was a movie lying on the floor with a picture of two cartoony looking children on the cover of the video cassette. Back then, we did not have DVD’s and CD’s. It was a cassette. And more than stealing just anything that may be useful, I loved stealing movies. I could sit in front of the tv and watch cartoons the whole day. Yes, I was pretty excited. Having experience stealing things I immediately drew out a plan of how I was going to steal this movie. This part of my story is really interesting. After sitting on Santa’s lap, I asked my mom if I could use the washroom and headed out to the front area of the building where the video cassette was laying on the floor. Nobody had returned to claim the movie so I quickly picked it up, ran to my mothers car outside and put it in through the window of the car as it was a little lowered. Once we all got home, I was so excited to watch this new cartoon that one of the first things that I did was to go andget everything set up. And thenasIstartedpullingthemovieoutof it’s casing, It felt like it was seperating like pages in a book. I took the movie out of it’s cover, only to find out, that it was not a movie. It was a Precious Moments Children’s Bible. I was shocked and didn’t know what to do, because I had stolen someone’s bible. It looked really expensive with a nice off white cover. Even the pages felt rich and smooth. I could tell by the quality and how the pages stuck together that the bible was new or close to new. Not having interest in the bible, I put it under the Christmas tree that we had and just left it like that for a few days or it could’ve even been weeks. Then one day, for some reason, I decided to open it up and read it. That day, I was reading the first chapter of Genesis and my eyes opened up.
Q: When you say that your eyes opened up, what really happened? What was the very first thing you felt about at that moment?
Joseph: I felt God’s presence and felt awake. I understood that this bible made sense compared to what I was taught growing up. I was taught about these idols that our ancestors prayed to which were made by man’s hands and was told that I have to pray to them for money and so on. However, it could not explain the wonders of God and that God is not just a mighty God. He is an Almighty God! I was reading the story of Adam and Eve and how God created the Heavens and the Earth. Just having a little revelation gives me the goosebumps. But that’s pretty much as far as I got in that bible because of my dad. My dad soon found out about the bible and threw it away. He didn’t want anyone of us in the family to become Christians. In fact he said that if any Pastors come to the house, that he would punch them or shoot them.
Q: Then what happened? Did you try to search for the bible? Or asked someone for a bible?
Joseph: I never thought too much about the bible after that. I was young and loved to go outside and play. One day as my brother, his friend, and I were walking to the mall, two elderly ladies approached us at a busy intersection as we were crossing the street and handed us a pamphlet. It was similar to a track that had some writing in the front explaining what God did on the cross for us. After quickly preaching the gospel to us in a way that we understood, they asked us, if we wanted to receive JESUS as our personal LORD and Savior. The three of us heard about Jesus at one point or another in our lives and the elderly ladies were kind and loving, so we said “yes”. They held our hands and asked us to follow them in prayer to confess our sins and to ask Jesus to come into our lives. I was probably around 12 or 13 years old at the time and I don’t remember everything, but I do remember this, that I did feel something that day. It was a good feeling. And the truth is that one touch from Jesus, and you will never be the same. I was never the same after that. Around that time or shortly after I was invited to youth meetings by my cousin who had just come to Canada and accepted Jesus as His LORD and Saviour. I would ask my mom without my dad knowing if I could go and secretly leave to these meetings. God’s presence is truly amazing. Jesus said in, Matthew 18:20, “For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.”.
My parents would take me to their religious temples and I would walk in feeling empty and walk out feeling empty, but when I walked into church I felt His presence. I would walk out feeling like a somebody. Like I am a someone and meant something. It is a refreshing and renewing feeling. That we are wanted and loved by God. We are important to Him. This is the truth. We are precious to Him. It says in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever shall believe in Him, shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” Being interested and drawn to Jesus, I asked my cousin’s sister how to pray. She wrote down a prayer form etoread and pray at night from the book of Matthew chapter 6. It goes like this, “Our Father which art in Heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Please Give us each our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil ones. So I started reading and praying that prayer every night and still do to this day. One night as I was laying on my bed about to fall asleep, I reached for my blanket which was at my feet and as I was pulling it over to cover myself, I heard God’s voice for the first time audibly. He said, just like you are covering yourself with that blanket, I am covering you with My shield and I am calling you Joseph. So, I talked back or you can say responded by saying, how am I going to tell my parents who named me that You are changing my name. and He said to me don’t worry, just take care of My work, and I will take care of yours. Back in the 90’s I didn’t know how I would go about changing a name, but I did make a promise to God that night saying that when I get older I will change my name. From then on, I just carried on my days going to school, playing and studying while keeping that conversation in the back of my mind. Throughout my life even though I didn’t know too much about God, God would send significant people into my life to help guide me and pick me up to go to church. During this time, I became interested in Jesus and started reading the bible. I got a job working at a gas station when I was about 16 years old and my aunt would pick me up from my house and take me to go to church on Sunday mornings. Sometimes, when I had to work on Sundays, I would close the gas station, put up a “be right back” type of sign, go to church, sing a song or half a song and run back to work. I did this to show God that I wanted to put Him first. My church was not too far from where I worked.
Around the end of January of 2002 my aunt told me that they were going to be baptizing people on a Saturday in the beginning of February. She just mentioned it to me as if it was just an event that was taking place and didn’t ask me to come. I thought about it and knew I needed to go and get baptized because Jesus said to. But the problem was that I was working during the time that the Pastor was baptizing people at the pool. When the baptism day arrived, I felt this urgency in my heart to go and get baptized. Nobody knows when Jesus was going to return, but I had to be obedient to God’s word. So, I called my mother and asked her to come to the gas station. I didn’t tell her why, but when she arrived, I gave her about ten minutes worth of training and explained how she could authorize customers to use the pumps to fill gasoline into their vehicles. Then I called a taxi and headed to the store to buy a change of clothes, a towel and to get baptized. When I had arrived at the pool the Baptism was just about over. The Pastor was baptizing the last or second last person and I just ran in line behind the last person. There were a lot of people there with their families. The Pastor turned around, not knowing who I was, asked if anyone else wanted to get baptized. I said I did and asked if I could be called Joseph. They laughed, clapped their hands and then I was baptized. If you’re wondering what happened to my mother, she was fine. There was just a long line up leading outside the door, and cash and paperwork were everywhere for me to sort out, but it was well worth it. When you run to put God first, don’t worry about what’s happening behind you. Don’t look back! Just keep moving towards God. It’s always worth the risk. He is worthy. He is more than worthy and He deserves your faith! He deserves your faith!
My aunt was one of those significant individuals in my life. She would say, you can pray and whatever you ask for in Jesus’s name, He will give it to you. Just that simple. She said, whatever you ask in His name, He will give it to you. Again, at this point I still did not know too much about God and I don’t think I nor anyone else can fully understand God, but I believed in what she said. She said to pray for a house for your family everyday and ask Jesus. He will give it to you. A very faithful aunt. As you know, everyone on both sides of my family were hindhu including my parents except for my aunt of course who had recently received Jesus as her LORD and Saviour. I have to flash back for a bit here to understand this story a little better. Since 1992, my mom would ask me and my brother to go and ask my dad to buy us a house and each year, he would say next year, but would never buy a house for the family. Instead through the years he bought a condominium unit for rental purposes and a piece of land to make profit off of a business. However, in 2002 after getting baptized and praying to God, something happened. God influenced my unbelieving dad to buy a house. It was surely a miracle. During this point in my life, even though I believed in Jesus, and got baptized, I still loved to drink alcohol and smoke. I think I was addicted to drinking and smoking because even though I tried to quit, I just couldn’t. So, I would come home drunk, walk into my room late at night, fall on my knees and say sorry to Jesus. Despite having these habits, I did read the bible a lot during the day. I would close the room door and just spend time reading the bible. It got to the point where my mom would tell me to put the bible away and do my homework. She would even call my aunt and complain, saying he’s always walking around with the bible. At first, I didn’t understand too much of what I was reading but as soon as I prayed, saying, “Father in Jesus’s name I come to you. If you don’t give me the understanding to understand Your words, then I will never be able to understand Your words in the Holy Bible.” And then immediately after praying I would receive understanding. I received a lot of revelation. For example, God was teaching me to be obedient to my parents. I was a rebellious boy growing up. I guess one of the reasons for my rebellion was because of how I was treated growing up. When my mom and dad got into a fight my mom would say, “your dad didn’t like you when you were born because you were dark skinned and threw you on the bed.’, and in my dad’s defence, he would say, “your mom wanted to kill you while you were in the womb when she found out that you were going to be a boy and not a girl. I was born in rejection and felt like a slave or servant growing up. I had to do my dad’s laundry, fix the sheets on his bed, get him water to mix with his whisky among many other things that I had to do. My older brother was very fair skinned like my dad and was not required to do much. And my little brother was the baby in the family and was really loved, therefore no one really asked him to do anything either. Whenever we went shopping for clothes my brothers would get new clothes, but I would get the used hand me downs. Don’t get me wrong, there were times I did get some new clothes but it was usually used hand me downs because I had an older brother. It just didn’t feel good. It felt like they did not care about me and that maybe I just didn’t think about it, but it really hurt. In fact it added to the feeling of being rejected. I am definitely not the type to cry because of what I’ve been through that my heart had hardened. But the feeling of rejection really affected me. I can remember one day coming home seeing that these guys got new clothes and I just went into my room, put my face in the pillow and screamed. I was more upset that I couldn’t swear because I was at home, so slowly tears just started rolling down my cheeks. Some teacher in school recognized the hurt in my life, set me up with counsellors who soon took me out of the house. I was in a shelter or some sort of foster home for a period of my life. I also grew up with a lot of anger and didn’t know how to forgive or show love.
About a year later as I was praying and asking how to forgive, God answered and showed me a vision. He said if your enemy fell into a ditch and you’re the only person around, will you look at him in the ditch or would you show mercy, feel sad for his life and pull him out of the ditch. He asked me to envision my actions, and I saw myself turning around and picking the enemy out of the ditch and saying, “it’s okay.” And Jesus said at that moment you have forgiven him. You have forgotten at that same moment what he did to you, showed mercy and kindness by helping him. So, in this way I learned to forgive and at times it was easy because Jesus forgave me for my sins which were a lot. He explained to me through the book of Hebrews that forgetting is a part of forgiving. It says in Hebrews 12:8, “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” God forgives us and forgets our sins! He’s so amazing! What an amazing God we serve!
He also took me to Luke 2:51 where it says, “Then He went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But His mother treasured all these things in her heart.” I am sure you know this part of the story, but I’ll quickly explain:
Every year the parents of Jesus would go to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover, but in the 12th year when His parents were returning home, Jesus stayed behind. His parents thought that Jesus was with them but about a day into their journey home, they realized that Jesus
was not with them. They returned to Jerusalem and found him three days later in the temple courts listening to the teachers and asking them questions. When His parents found Him, they said that they were anxiously searching for Him, but He said, `Didn’t you know I had to be in My Father’s house?”
But His parents did not understand what He was saying to them, and then the it says in verse 51 that He then went down to Nazareth with His parents and was obedient to them. Understanding this, I forgave my dad and was more obedient to my parents. It was something that I had to bring into practise. However, there were no set rules for somethings that my friends were doing, so I also picked up the bad habits and did things that my friends were doing thinking that it was cool, such as getting my ear pierced. When I got my first piercing I knew in my heart that it was wrong, just like drinking and smoking. So, within a few weeks I took it off. Then after the piercing hole closed, I would decide under the influence of my friends that it wasn’t that bad and get my ear pierced again. My friends would pierce their nose, get tattoos and do many other things that were really wrong, so I would say to myself, that what I am doing is not that bad. I actually did this about three four times. In the summer of 2004, I remember coming home one night drunk and asked God to help me to stop drinking and sure enough as that prayer was sincere and from the bottom of my heart, that temptation that I had, just left me. I stopped drinking hard liquor and beer. The main reason that I wanted to stop drinking is because of what the bible says in the book of Corinthians. 1 Corinthians 3:1617 says, “Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is sacred, and you are that temple.” God’s temple is sacred! And we are that temple! The last time I got my ear pierced which was probably the fourth time, It felt like my heart got pierced. At that same moment the stud was getting forced through my earlobe, I felt like this sharp feeling in my heart. So, while I was sitting in the seat getting pierced, I said, “LORD, if this earring falls off within two weeks without me taking it off, then I would never put it back on. Shortly after speaking that out of my mouth, I moved out of the city. I moved into a city near the border of the United States and started partying. Partying almost every day. More so like 3 times a weeks until we got bored of it. In this place of partying I picked up drinking again, but stayed away from beer and the high percentage liquor and drank the highest alcohol percentage wine as an excuse to get drunk. This was also to show that I was cool and to mingle with the drunks. It’s hard to have a conversation with a drunk without being drunk. Their conversations do not make sense, or just have to have a lot of patience to talk to one that is really drunk. My lifestyle here went from bad to worse. I soon found myself in a fight for my life and asked Jesus to rescue me, and sure enough He did. At the end of the night my friend walked towards me with a stud in his hand saying, “your ear is bleeding”. He said that he couldn’t find the back piece to hold the earring in place in my ear. I walked into the washroom and as I was looking at my reflection in the mirror and attempting to poke new holes in my ear, I heard God’s voice saying, “Do you remember when you said, ‘in two weeks if your ear ring falls off that you will not put it back on. I was so shocked that I never put it back on. It was in the second week that my earring fell off. In the days following I also heard Him say, “I sent you here to set an example for the rest, but instead you are mingling with them.
After that, I didn’t really hear God’s voice and didn’t feel like He was using me anymore. I felt that God had rejected me and stopped drinking any type of alcohol from that day on. In beginning of the following year, I moved back to Toronto and to my mother’s house. When I moved into my mother’s house I didn’t want to go to church because I let God down and couldn’t really hear Him. I felt more like that He really was not using me anymore. My aunt called me one Sunday afternoon saying that she wanted to go to church but couldn’t go because she didn’t have a ride or someone to drive her to church. So, I said to myself, that even though I didn’t want to go to church, it’s not nice not to help her. So, I picked her up and drove her to this new church. She asked me to come along, so I agreed to go inside with her and join her for that service. About halfway into the service the Pastor said, “God is calling someone, you know who you are, please come to the front. I felt something in my heart like as if it were me, that God was calling, but I didn’t go. I looked around and noticed that some man went to the front. Then the Pastor said, no, God is still calling someone to the front. This time, I felt an urgency in my heart and felt that it was me for sure, but still did not go. This time two or three men went up to the front. Again, the Pastor said, “God is still calling someone to the front, but this time before I can think, I found myself walking to the front and joining the other men. Once I got there, the Pastor began praying for each person starting from the first person that came up. When he got to me, he stopped and asked the worshippers to play another song. I was nervous because I was standing there by myself. I didn’t know what to expect. Then he stopped the music and came to me and laid his hand upon my head and spoke as if God were speaking to me directly. He said, “My son, I am going to lift you up again.”. When I thought God was no longer going to use me, God said, “My son, I am going to lift you up again.”. Hallelujah! Surely God will never leave us nor forsake us. Let us praise the LORD with all our inmost being! Psalms 103:1 5
“Praise the LORD, O my soul: all my inmost being, praise His holy name.
Praise the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits
who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion,
who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.”
After the Pastor prayed for me, I fell deeper in love with Jesus, and started praying according to His word. Jesus said in , , “Follow me and I will make you a fisher of men.”. And then set out to fish. He trained me on how to cast, who to speak to, how to speak to the people, what to say and what not to say. Jesus said in John 12:49, “For I did not speak of my own accord but the Father who sent Me commanded Me what to say and how to say it.”. He gave me specific words and taught me that when I pray, that it should be from my heart. I also went to church regularly and recognized that I was a true worshipper according to John 4:2324. It says in that verse, “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth. I learnt and recognized that I was a true worshiper at church one Sunday. I remember when the worship was over, I was so in love with His presence that I found myself asking God for another song to stay in His loving presence. I wanted more of Him. He is so beautiful and so loving. He also explained to me through this verse that our prayers should be truth, meaning from the deepest part of our heart. I would go out almost every chance I got and He would use me with the experiences and testimonies that He had given me, to bring many souls into His Kingdom. My heart and my speech was filled with conviction. Many people were surprised, but couldn’t refuse or refute God’s word and was drawn to our loving Jesus.
Q: What else has God done in your life?
Joseph: One day, I wanted to go to my cousins house and finally after gaining trust from my mother over the years, I asked her If I could take her car for a drive down the street. She said okay. The reason why she didn’t trust me with her car was because many years prior, during my adolescent and rebellious days, I noticed that she had left her keys in the car and went in the home before leaving for work. So, I quickly jumped in the car and took off and never brought it back for three days. During that time, I really didn’t care for life, nor took thought to the consequences of her not showing up to work for three days. But getting back to the story, she let me take the car for the first time in a while, and so I drove to my aunt’s house to visit my cousin. While at my cousin’s house, I heard God say, “Go to the Hospital.”. I didn’t know why, but in obedience, I got up and started driving to the hospital. I checked the emergency section and no one I knew was there. So I started heading back home and on the way back, I seen a tall man of the darker skin tone with his hood over his head and carrying a big hockey bag over his shoulder on the overpass of the highway. As I got closer to the man, I heard God say to pick him up. It was around 1:00 in the morning, really cold outside and thoughts crossed my mind. Like what if he shoots me or robs me, so I just drove past him. But then said to myself, God is with me and I have to be obedient. So I took a Uturn and pulled up beside him and when I pulled the window down to talk to him, it looked like that he was more scared of me than I was of him. I asked him if he wanted a lift wherever he was going. He said yes and got in. From the place I picked him up to his home, it would’ve taken him about 30 to 40 minutes to walk home in the freezing cold weather. I couldn’t help but talk to him about Jesus on the way home. I told him that it was Jesus that asked me to pick him up. The stranger said that he was new to the area and didn’t know the bus schedule because the buses were not running at that time of night in that area. He said that he was grateful and wanted to attend church. So I connected him with a church that he would feel comfortable with. By this I could see God’s love on that cold night. He really thinks about His children and feels for their pain. God used me to pick up a random or maybe a not so random person off of the streets and guided him to a church. Like this God used me to bring many souls into the Kingdom. God has given me many stories and many testimonies. It’s true what it says in Psalms 40:5, “Many O LORD my God, are the wonders you have done. The things you planned for us no one can recount to you; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare.” They really are too many to declare, so let me continue because the longing and excitement continues. In 2005 I prayed for a specific car with specific things that I wanted in or on the car. I also prayed for a future partner. You can say wife, but I am just telling you what I said in my prayer. And may get time today or another day to share that story. When I prayed for a car, I didn’t have my full license at the time, nor did I have enough money. But, I believed and prayed deeply to get a car. Whenever I felt that my prayer was more repetition, rather than being filled with faith that reaches to God, I would stop and start praying again from the beginning or pray a second time. I also prayed, saying that if I get a car, I would pick people up and take them to church. I kept telling my mom that I had changed my life and I wanted to buy a car to get a job and make some money. I just want to make a quick correction here, it was not me that changed my life. It was Jesus who changed my life. One day, my prayer was answered. I used to sleep in the basement of her house and she came down the stairs with 100 $20 bills. Yes, that was enough for my car. God brought to remembrance a phone number of a driving instructor that I used in the year 2000 and I got a hold of him to get some driving lessons. I didn’t have his phone number, but five years later, after many heart and faith filled prayers, this number came to me. I called it, and sure enough it was him. He taught me how to drive on the highway, I got my full license and got low insurance for a short time. Before I got the insurance, I started driving around outside without insurance and picking people up, but not to take them to church. Instead I would hang out with them and take them to the liquor store. No I didn’t drink. I completely stopped drinking any sort of beer or alcohol drink in 2004. Even though I stopped drinking, I was helping others get their hands on things that would most likely keep them away from God. One night, I got pulled over and the police officer asked me if I had my license, ownership and insurance. I was able to provide the license and the ownership but not the Insurance because I never got Insurance for the car. He got into his police car and started searching and possibly calling numbers and told me that I didn’t have insurance on the vehicle. I was scared because the officer called a tow truck as well and said that if I move the car, he would double my fine from $5000 to $10 000. It was cold and I was so far from home that I kept praying and telling the police officer that I used to line in another city and the insurance package was being sent there, in hopes that he will let me go. After going back and forth talking to the officer, I got a ticket summoning me to court because he could not give me a ticket for anything over $5000. It is a straight summons to court.
I did technically lie to the officer because I did not get insurance. Even though the Insurance Package would be sent to another city due to me leaving the address unchanged at the old address, I still lied to the Police Officer and was in big trouble. This all happened on a Friday night, so I couldn’t run to an Insurance broker and ask them to get me an Insurance slip with this date on it. I had to wait until Monday to see an Insurance Broker. When Monday came around, I walked into the Insurance office and asked the agent to back date my Insurance Policy to the date that the Police Officer gave me a ticket. He said no, that they could not do that and signed a temporary slip with the current date. When the time came for me to go to court, they asked me to provide my Insurance slip, so I handed them this temporary slip with the wrong date. But thank God, the Police Officer jumped in there before the crown and before the court was in session and said that this is not a real Insurance slip and threw my slip across the desk. Had he of just taken the time to at least read the date, I would`ve been convicted and charged over $10 000 because the date was set after he gave me the ticket. The amount that came to my mind was around $15 000 and revoking my drivers License. Yes, this is how it works, because it happened to my friends, but my case was more serious because I lied and drove off in front of the police officer. But for argument sakes, let’s just say the fine is around the standard amount of about $5000 which is still a lot of money. The officer was telling the crown to just reschedule the court date so I can go back to the Insurance Company and get a printed Insurance slip rather than one that is signed with pen and ink. By this time, I had accumulated more tickets on top of the alcohol in blood tickets that I had from years prior and my Insurance went up to around $720 for basic coverage so I just couldn’t pay for it and it went to the collections agency. I thought to myself, what a great idea, I could just take these papers from the collection agency saying that I owe this money because I did pay the insurance company and the police officer and crown would just feel sorry for me and let me go. This my friends is called wishful thinking. This is not hoping in God. Of course it did not happen the way that I thought. The court date was rescheduled yet again. By the time the date came for my court appearance, I had done a lot of praying and asking for forgiveness. The day that I had to go, God spoke to me. He said pick up your friend and take your friend with you to court. I am going to do a miracle for you. I was not sure which friend, but two came to mind that did not know Jesus. I called the one and he couldn’t come, so I called the other who was a troublemaker and he said yes. I used to talk to a lot of trouble makers and tell them about Jesus. So, when I picked up this trouble maker, I told him that this is the situation and God is going to do a miracle for me today. When we got to court, I was a few minutes late and doubts would try to enter my mind, like, what if they already called my name and just charge me automatically for not showing up to court. I fought that thought off and went and took a seat in court while it was in session. As I was talking to my friend, the police officer went outside the courtroom to talk to the crown. My friend looked over my shoulder and said, hey, the officer is calling you outside of the courtroom. So, I was scared and nervous, but just got up and went outside. The police officer looked at me and said, “Today is your lucky day.” So I said, why what happened. He said that the court has lost all my paperwork. Hallelujah! What an awesome God we serve!
It didn’t end there. I was having a hard time understanding all of this. I told my friend, let’s wait to see if the police officer is leaving the court because maybe he just wants me to leave and then charge us when our name is called saying that we didn’t show up. So, we went outside and waited for the Officer to leave the building. Once the officer left, we went back to the courtroom and asked the crown to pull up my file. The Crown pulled up my file which was a white folder with large writing in the front of it saying, “No files` with a circle around it. I was in awe. God surely did a miracle for me. Not finished yet, then my friend, who did not know Jesus, said that when the police officer called me out, he was
Praying for me. He said that while he was sitting in court, he just prayed a simple prayer, saying, “God, good things happen to good people, show your goodness today for him.” And as we were walking outside he said that he felt this feeling. I told him that the feeling that he is experiencing is the presence of God`s Spirit all over him. That was surely a memorable day for both him and I. Hallelujah!
It’s amazing, how God works. He said that he would write in the tablet of our hearts. Even though my friend didn’t know how to pray, he just prayed a simple prayer in his heart and it`s actually along the lines of what is written in the book of Psalm 125:4, `Do good, O LORD, to those who are good, to those who are upright in heart. Through these situations I understood who God was calling to himself and learned to put more trust in Him.
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