John Gilmartin

When I was growing up, my parents took me to church every Sunday, but I was never exposed to the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.  When I was 12 or 13 I started t o question everything that I had been taught.  I also started to read and study all sorts of different philosophies.  Basically, I was a very confused teen and decided that there was no such thing as absolute truth.  Because of this I figured that everyone was able to decide what was true for themselves based on whatever "worked" for them.  I also thought that as long as a person wasn't deliberately hurting others, whatever they did was right.

Believing these things, I started drinking and using drugs (what drugs? It didn't matter anything to get high was fine.) when I was 14.  By the time I was a senior in high school I couldn't get through a day if I was sober.  Living like this I naturally started hanging out wherever it was easiest to get the drugs I wanted, and being around rock concerts, especially Grateful Dead concerts was a great place for me.  I was nothing if not selfish.  Regardless of all of this, there was a void in my life, but I didn't know what or why.

In 1991 I got married, thinking that the stability of a wife and kids might fill that void in my life.  It just made my selfishness more intense.  It seemed that whenever I wanted to go to a party or just go get stoned my wife would "get in my way".  By late 1992 my wife and I were in counseling trying to save a crumbling marriage.

By mid 1995 it was clear that nothing was working and that our marriage was going to crash and burn at any time.  Just then I got a call from an old friend who had moved to Indiana from Connecticut (where I live) years before.  We had always had great times partying together.  My friend wanted to know if I wanted to go to Indiana and see the Grateful Dead together one more time. Seeing that I felt there was no chance anyway to save my marriage, I jumped at the chance.

While I was there, I met my friends brother.  He was studying to become a minister.  I thought that was the most whacked career choice I could think of and told him so.  To my surprise, he didn't get argumentative or abusive, but told me that since Jesus had died for him, the least he could do was live for Jesus.  I didn't understand that at all and told him so.  He explained that since we ware all sinners and guilty before God (Romans 3:23) that on our own we deserve to go to Hell for all of eternity (Romans 6:23). That was the bad news. But he went on to say that since God loves each and every one of us so very much (John 3:16) that he sent His Son Jesus to earth to live among us, suffer, and be crucified to pay for our sins (Romans 5:8). He also said that if I would confess to God what He already knew, that I was a sinner and receive the sacrifice of Jesus as my own that I would be forgiven and be assured a place in Heaven when I died.

Well, all this sounded rather silly to me and I spent the next 4 or 5 hours arguing and debating about this.  Finally I said no way, this isn't for me, and I went to get a drink and a joint.  I thought that was the end of it.  But that night, no matter how much I drank or smoked, I couldn't sleep.  The conversation I had earlier kept going thorough my head.  Finally around four or five in the morning I said to God "All right, if this is what you have for me, I'll do it".  The next morning I prayed to receive Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior (Romans 10:9).

When I rode back home and told my wife about it, she told me that she had become a Christian when she was 17, but had stopped living for the Lord before she met me.  It seemed as if Jesus healed our marriage overnight.  We started attending a Gospel preaching church and look forward to serving the Lord and seeing Him work in our lives every day now.  Not that we are perfect, but we rejoice knowing that we are forgiven and that Jesus can still use us, flaws and all, if we let Him.

PRAISE THE LORD!!!