Tom's Testimony: How Jesus changed my life

My childhood:

Growing up, our family went to church sporadically; Easter, maybe Christmas and a few other times during the year. We were a "good" family, but we didn't submit our lives to Jesus. If you were to ask me, I would have said that I believed in Jesus, but I also believed that we all just evolved and if there was a God, He was WAY out there and didn’t have much to do with us. I heard that Jesus died on the cross for us, but Jesus basically wasn’t part of my life. I didn’t know Him personally.

College years:
By the time I had gone away to college, my relationship with my parents had soured. I would say, “You can pick your friends, but not your family”. We argued constantly and I never wanted to be around them.

The effect of my parents' salvation upon me
After I graduated from Medical School, my parents gave their lives to Jesus one day, and were both dramatically changed.

Suddenly my Mom started calling me again and again, wanting to confess her sins, and to ask for forgiveness. This made me very uncomfortable! What happened to my mom? She was different. I told her, “Mom, I don’t know what you are up to, but I just want to let you know that I am not sorry for a single thing I ever did.” I suspected that something was up. You can’t just change like that, and be a totally different person, can you? My wife and I were sure that this supposed “change” wouldn’t last. Later, I asked my Mom, “Why are you and Dad so different now?” Apparently she told me the good news about Jesus and how I could have a new life, but I wasn’t listening.

Pacer's playoff games, and events leading up to the Billy Graham Crusade
In the spring of ‘99, my Dad invited me to all the Pacer’s home playoff games. He had to sit next to the most obnoxious Pacer’s fan ever! I took this gigantic bullhorn with me and screamed obscenities at the players during the entire game. I knew that he was “religious” and sometimes I wondered how he could sit next to me, with the way I was acting. It was then that I knew he loved me, and he made Jesus more attractive to me. One time I asked my Mom, “OK, what is the bare-bones minimum that I have to do to get into heaven?” She said, “Believe in Jesus.” I told her, “Fine, I believe in Jesus. Now why are you guys always talking about Him?” She told me, “Tom, when you believe in Jesus, you love Him. And you can’t help but talk about someone you love.” That really struck a cord in me because I didn’t talk about Jesus, because I really didn’t love Him, which meant that I must not have believed in Him.
One day, I saw a bus drive past me with a billboard on it that read, “The beginning is near.” And it had a picture on it of an older man. Well, I thought, “The End was near”, with Y2K coming up. And who was this man? I had a hard time sleeping that night. I laid there thinking about “The beginning is near” and what that meant. Somehow I felt like The Beginning was near for me, but the beginning of what?
Later, my Mom called and invited us to the Billy Graham Crusade. I had never heard of Billy Graham before. She said he was an evangelist. I had heard of “televangelists” and told her I didn’t want to go. It sounded ‘religious’. She told me he was “the real thing”. That also impacted me because IF he was the real thing then there is a fake religion, a religion that doesn’t do anything for your soul. I had thought all religion was about the same. But to think that there is a real thing got me thinking. Nevertheless, I turned her down and said I wouldn’t go. But God wanted me to go, so He worked out a combination of miraculous events that included my wife’s mom, and so we decided to go to the Crusade with my parents.

The 1999 Indianapolis Billy Graham Crusade
It was Friday June 4, 1999. The Crusade started at 7 PM, and by 8:40 PM, Billy Graham still hadn’t come up to speak. I was incredibly irritated. I leaned over to my wife and said, “This is annoying. I came here to listen to Billy Graham and all these people keep getting up, talking about their religion, singing and waving their hands in the air.”
(Little did I know that “The beginning was near.”)
Then Billy Graham got up to speak. It was as if the Holy Spirit grabbed me by the throat and told me to listen. I was sitting on the edge of my seat. He told me that I had a hole in my heart that was created by God and it could only be filled by Jesus! With 50,000 people in the audience I felt like he was talking directly to me! He said, “The reason why you have so many problems in your life is because you haven’t made Jesus Lord over your life.” Then I could see my life, and what I had made of it using all of my God-given talents for myself. My life was all about Me, and I thought highly of myself. But I didn’t think much of most people. I yelled at them while I was driving. I talked bad about them when they weren’t around. And I put everyone into 1 of 4 categories. They were either rude, stupid, weird, or ugly. And most of time I thought they fit into more than one category! That was my life. There were other things that I wanted to change about myself, but I couldn’t. No matter how hard I tried, there were sins I couldn’t stop committing because I tried to do it myself, apart from Jesus. I was in a desperate situation—I saw that I deserved to go to hell. I turned to Jesus and asked Him to save me.
Then Billy Graham asked us to stand up, come down and invite Jesus into our heart.
When I stood up, God filled my heart with love for everyone. I suddenly felt an intense love for my parents and I can praise Jesus by telling you that today my wife and I and my parents enjoy a wonderful relationship. Jesus has changed me! I am a new creation! The old Tom Eads is gone. “I have been crucified with Christ, therefore I no longer live, Jesus Christ now lives in me.” Jesus has turned the water into wine.

Changed lives
Today I am happy to say that I am a new man. Jesus has not only changed me and given me a love for others [instead of "categorizing" them], but He has also changed my relationships. I have a renewed relationship with my parents. I am a better father, husband, and worker. I am certainly not perfect, and continue to sin, but it is powerful what Jesus can do to your heart and life. Thank you Jesus for changing me, and straightening out a life that I couldn't straighten on my own. Thank you Jesus for dying for me.

Call for a commitment
If Jesus can give up His life for us, then we should be able to give our life to Him, shouldn’t we? Maybe you’re here today thinking, “I’m nothing like that guy. I go to church regularly, I get along with everybody, everything’s fine! But then again, something’s missing. Life hasn’t turned out to be as fulfilling as I hoped it would be…. But I’m a good person. I believe in Jesus.” But you don’t really KNOW Him, do you? You can’t honestly say that in your heart, you love Him… But Jesus loves you!
You cannot get to heaven by being “a better person” or by being “more religious.” God wants to have a personal, one-on-one relationship with you! You cannot enjoy this relationship as long as you think you’re “OK” and don’t want to give your whole life to Jesus. You’ll always be on the outside looking in, wondering what it is that all these people find so fascinating about Jesus, and why they keep talking about Him. But the instant that you submit your whole life to Jesus, you will begin to see why it is said, “With Jesus, there is meaning and purpose in my life. With Jesus there will be meaning and purpose in my death.” Please, Give your life to Jesus today. The Beginning is here!

Reproduced with permission from the author.
Source: http://www.eadshome.com/TomTestimony.htm

Joseph testimony

Joseph works for the Lord in an unreached area of Maharashtra, India. This video is his testimony on how he faced hardships and insults before he could plant 25 churches and 28 mission stations. He is also supported by the Gospel for Asia organisation in India. I just found this on their website and I thought I should share it with you. Click here or the picture to view the video.

Jesus healed me

It was a cold January morning when I walked into Oconomowoc Memorial Hospital. I was scheduled to have another surgery on my right knee. It was not a complicated operation.

The surgery went according to plan and in the recovery room I was actually feeling very good considering what had just taken place. Before I could be released I was told I would have to use the restroom just to make sure everything was operating correctly. I figured this would be just a piece of cake considering how well I was feeling. However it was not as I imagined. While in the restroom I felt a sharp pain in my head, like an immediate headache, I felt dizzy and knew with out some assistance I would no doubt pass out. I was taken to the emergency room and after a doctor looked at me it was decided that a CAT scan was in order, just to rule out the possibility of a stroke.

It was after they read the CAT scan that the doctor came in and told me that they had found a colloidal cyst in the FOREMAN area of my brain, located in the third ventricle. It was 5MM in size. I was instructed to see a Neurological Surgeon after my release, and this I did. I brought the CAT scan with me. The surgeon that I saw was the director of Neurology at St. Luke’s hospital. He had no problem identifying the cyst on the CT scan and made arrangements for an MRI. This I was told would give him a clearer idea of what the cyst was attached to, blood vessels and the like. While I was with him he shared some of the procedures used to remove cysts. I found none of them appealing.

The more I learned about my condition the more apprehensive I became. At my age looks have passed away and I am hopefully using what knowledge I have acquired through life to survive and make up the difference.

Midwinter camp was going on the week preceding my MRI at St. Luke’s. It was at a Tuesday night service and the ministering brethren in our district as well as others present prayed for me. I cannot say that I felt an electrical shock or any such thing but I believe it was that night that God performed my miracle.

The MRI came off much easier that I imagined it would since I am very claustrophobic. I have to confess that the double dose of valium they gave me before the procedure helped. It was a week before the MRI and my appointment with the surgeon. Many thoughts and feelings raced through my mind I truly have to say that I was not so much concerned about dying. It was leaving my family behind, and not enjoying the many doors which have opened to me in the last seven months for ministry. I also feared that my memory might be affected, and all the cherished lessons of life as well as the Word of God that were there might be lost. Would I be able to communicate clearly.

The morning for my appointment with the surgeon did come. My wife Lisa my brother Rick who is my senior pastor with went with me to hear the surgeons report. All the slides were placed before us on lighted panels for our viewing. The original CAT scan was placed on the lighted panels as well. It was the surgeons next comment that sent our emotions spiraling upward. They could not find the cyst on the MRI. Their was nothing to even suggest that anything had even been there. No shadows, no clouding absolutely nothing. We had one film , (the CAT scan that showed it very vividly) and the others were completely void of any presence at all.

I looked at my brother and he was smiling as broadly as I was, maybe not quite as big but pretty close. The doctor admitted he was frustrated and had called the radiologist for his comments on this development. Let me clearly state that the surgeon was totally persuaded that a Colloidal Cyst had been present. The opinion of the radiologist at St. Lukes was that calcification had taken place on the cyst. Calcification does not show up very well on MRI’s. I say a 5 MM calcification should show something, a displacement or shadow. However who am I, I am certainly not as skilled in this area as they.

It was when I was back working at the hospital, (Oconomowoc Memorial) where I am chaplain that I thought of getting hold of the radiologist that first read the CAT scan. Incidentally I still have in my procession both the MRI and the CAT scan films. I reached him on the phone and mentioned that the MRI taken at St. Luke’s had not shown any evidence of a Colloidal Cyst. I asked him if he was sure of what he saw when he viewed the scan. He was somewhat taken back and stated he had no doubt at all of what he had seen and what he had written in his report. He mentioned to me that he himself would call St. Luke’s radiology department and find out what was going on. He did page me several hours later and his attitude was somewhat more reserved. The MRI scans he mentioned showed no evidence of a Colloidal Cyst. “They believe that the Cyst may have calcified” he said. It was then he asked me if I was still in the hospital. This I answered in the affirmative, “do you have the Cat Scan and the MRI films with you” he asked. My answer was yes to both questions. “Is it possible for you to go downstairs to radiology right now and have one of my colleagues look at those films”. This I was delighted to do and did.

The Radiologist I was to meet with stopped immediately what he was doing when I came in and put my films up on the lighted panels. I could tell that the brain was a very familiar area for him in study. He had no doubt of a colloidal cyst being present in the original film. However he said it was his opinion that the cyst had calcified, or dried up. A cyst, he said, has thick fluid at its center. It is living and grows. However in this case he felt sure that it had died and calcified and would never live again. That is the reason it did not show up on the MRI. “Chaplain you do not need to worry, once there dead they our dead and do not live again”, he said.

In either case God performed a miracle. I would like to believe that when we come back and do a follow up CAT scan in six months they will find no calcification at all.

You cannot imagine the joy that I feel! God operates in his own ways and according to his own divine direction.

Praise the Lord!

(Pastor Steve Kielley)

Reproduced with permission.
Source: http://alc1.org/testimonies/steve_kielley.htm