TJ

“I was a straight-A student and an athlete. We had a really good basketball team.  We went to the state tournaments my sophomore, junior, senior year.  I was also involved in the church, like most of my basketball team, they were also part of my church family. My family was not involved in church at all. There was a church, I'll never forget, Williamsburg Baptist Church. They had a summer camp.  My parents dropped us off there just so that we were not home for the weekend. I got a taste for what church was about.  I saw all these people that loved Jesus.  They just seemed like they were happy and had something that I wanted.  

As children, my brother and I were not happy because of what we went through.  My mother and father got divorced.  My mom and dad were raging alcoholics.  My mom was also a drug addict, those were the type of men that she brought around the house. I had never touched a beer, joint, or anything until after my senior year of high school. After I graduated high school I started smoking pot and drinking.  Shortly after that came cocaine, pain pills, the whole nine yards.  Drugs took away the ability to hold a job. I didn't even have the desire to hold a job.  I would run out of money, and I would go steal.  I went to prison for being a thief.  I went to the penitentiary in 2004 and got released in November of 2023.  I only spent five years out of prison. 

In April of 2024 I was going back and forth to a suboxone clinic.  I told them, ‘I'm done doing this. I'm getting high at the halfway house. I want to do something better. Can you get me into a sober living place today?’  They got in touch with a detox facility. I went there.  I was in my room. I literally hit my knees and cried.  I begged and pleaded with God.  I said, ‘God, please take the obsession to do the things that I've been doing to myself and to my body away from me, I promise you I will follow you. I will do whatever it takes. Please take it away from me. I don’t want to do this anymore.’  God talked to me that day! He was like, ‘I got you. I got you.’   I laid down that night and had never slept so well. All I wanted to do was praise Him.  I surrendered that day.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before Him He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1

There are times that you may feel like God has turned his back on you.  Look at yourself in the mirror and take accountability for what you've done and then hit your knees. God never fails and He never will. He just wants you to come to Him. Don't blame Jesus. Jesus isn't the reason that you are in the shape that you're in. God knows everything about you. He knows exactly what you're going through.  All Jesus wants is for you to ask Him for help.  He will.  My name is TJ, I’m human, and I surrender.”