Esther, Australia, Age 35
I had been brought up in a Christian home and had made a personal committment to Him at age 17, but I left home at 18 and backslid and got heavily into drugs and alcohol. I met my partner and fell pregnant with my 1st child at 21. During my pregnancy I abstained from taking drugs and drinking but went back to it after my child was born. The same thing happened in my 2nd pregnancy.
When my 2nd child was born I became very down and depressed as none of my family was around for support. I allowed myself to be dragged back into the drug lifestyle. I got to the point where I became very depressed and fed up with the way I was living. I finally made a decision that my life was going nowhere. I believed my family didn’t care about me as they were in a different state, and they made no effort to help me. I felt there was no point in me living like this, so I decided the best thing I could do was to end my life and the lives of my children.
I decided to ring my mum one last time, not intending to tell her what I was planning to do. On the way to the public phone box, my 2 yr old son, whom I had never mentioned anything about God to him, said to me right out of the blue, “Mummy, Jesus loves you.”
This simple sentence from my 2 yr old son completely astounded me, and I burst out crying, knowing in my heart that Jesus was speaking to me through my 2 yr old child. I ended up ringing my mum, still in tears, and told her what had happened.
She prayed with me and explained that even though I believed there was no way out because I had been so bad, and even though I believed God wouldn’t want me, I was exactly the person whom Jesus had died for. He had taken my sin on Himself so that I could be called a child of God. God loved me!!
The verse from the Bible, John 3:16, came to me; “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes on Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
I knew then what I wanted to do. I cried out to Jesus, thanking Him for dying on the cross for me and confessing my sins to Him and asking Him to forgive me. I trusted and believed that He would forgive me from all my sins. I asked Him to take control of my life and asked Him to be the Lord of my life, accepting Him as my Lord, Saviour and best friend.
It has been 11 years since then, and life has had its ups and downs. Both through the good and bad times I have known Jesus has been right beside me holding my hand. He has been there for me to lean on and take comfort from. I know deep in my heart that Jesus loves me unconditionally and there is nothing I can do that will make Him love me any less.
“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).