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My newborn wasn’t eating or gaining any weight. I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t know what to do. I took my son to the doctor, and they found a hole in his heart. It was a heart murmur. There was nothing they could do but wait until he was older to do the surgery. In the meantime, I was watching my child wither away. My only choice was to turn to God. I thought, “Would He hear me? Would He answer me? Did He even exist?” I didn’t know because I was a devout Buddhist.
I had been a Buddhist for most of my childhood and all of my adulthood in South Korea. I would travel to the mountainous area near my home in order to go to temple, and I lived my life according to Buddha’s teachings. Before I had my son, I prayed to Buddha for 100 days. Every night at 10:00, I would make a bowl of rice and a cup of water as an offering to him. I would light my candles and then pray and meditate to give me a son. So when I birthed my son, I could not understand why he was born with this defect. Why wasn’t Buddha answering me to heal my son? My friends would call and visit to talk to me about Jesus and God. I would always make an excuse not to go to their church because I didn’t believe that this “God” even existed. My son started to eat less, only finishing a half a bottle a day when babies are supposed to drink 4-6 bottles. He was steadily losing weight and sleeping more than the average newborn. I was in fear for his life, and Buddha was just not fixing the problem. In desperation, I started to seek God. I prayed, weeping to Him saying, “God, if You are real and if You hear me, please heal my son. I will live my life for You if You heal my son. Please show me that You are real. Make my son fat and well.” Not too long after that, I had to take him back to the doctor. They examined him with scans and x-rays. The German doctor finally came back to me and said that he didn’t know how to explain it, but the hole in my son’s heart had completely filled. It was as if the hole had never been there. We were in the doctor’s office amazed. My son is currently 29 years old, and I am praying now that he loses weight! REAL LIFE STORIES inspire to other towards GOD, I was a changed woman after that. God heard my cry, and He proved to me that He was real. I asked Jesus into my heart and converted to Christianity. When I came to the U.S., I became a member at a local church. I hadn’t found a job yet, so I continued to serve in the church fulltime. As weeks passed, I began to notice that my friends were finding jobs. I wondered when it would be my turn, considering we all put in applications at the same places. My husband had retired from the army reserve and worked security, which was not enough for our growing family. We now had five children. It was hard getting a job, but I still believed in God to provide for my needs. I had little education, only an elementary education. In Korea, families had to pay for education beyond elementary. If your family was poor, usually it was the firstborn who continued their learning while other children worked at home or took up a trade. God blessed me to work in retail for over 25 years. I fear the Lord. It is a good type of fear, similar to how we love and fear our parents. This job has allowed me to Christian Testimonies and spread the gospel no matter what people say or think about me because I want to please God. I have had the opportunity to speak with drug dealers, ex-cons, pastors, city officials, and many more about God and what He desires of them. He has led me into a life of prayer and fasting. I pray for all those I come in contact with, including praying for the circumstances of the whole world. Each night since I have been saved, I pray into the late hours of the night and early hours of the morning. I am dedicated to serving God because He has shown me how real He is. If you want to know God for yourself, all you have to do is talk to Him and do it with all your heart. He hears us, even those who don’t know Him yet. His desire is for you to know who He is and to be a part of your life.
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This is the Process and Cost of Developing a Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book When a Church Partners with Step by Step Ministries
The process starts by teaching people how to write their testimony and placing it into a 3-fold flyer, as pictured above. The Testimony is to be between 1000 and 1100 words and provided to us in a Word Document. We will provide exact instructions as to how to properly prepare a testimony. This 3-fold flyer can then be used with our books pictured below until such a time that person’s story is in a book. There is a $25 charge per story to edit and layout the testimony in a 3-fold flyer. After editing, we send the file to the church to take to a local print shop to make copies. When a church partners with us, they can purchase and use our books at the very low price of $100 for 3 cases of books, plus shipping. There 60 to 70 books in a case, depending on which books they are. A New book will contain between 25 and 30 testimonies and have a total of 96 pages. This has proven to be the most cost-effective book size to print and distribute. We will print 40,000 copies. This is the quantity needed to keep the price down to a point of being able to afford to freely give them away. The cost of 40,000 books, including typesetting, editing, and cover design is about $16,000. This comes to about .40 cents per book (plus shipping), making the book a very affordable tool for witnessing. Just before the books are ordered, the local church pays their half, $8,000, directly to the printing company. Step By Step Ministries pays the other half, $8,000. When the books are printed, the partnering church is billed for their shipping cost, which must be paid before the books ship. At that time, 20,000 books are shipped to the partnering Church, and 20,000 books are shipped to Step By Step Truckers Ministry .When Step by Step Ministries receives their 20,000 books, we donate to 5000 of those books to another ministry called Love Packages. Love Packages loads the books on cargo containers and ships them to impoverished English-speaking people in Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean Islands. So when a local church partners with us they not only reach the local community, they reach the World! In addition to this, we have a Team of people using our books all over the United States and Canada! When a Local Church Partners with Step By Step Ministries, TOGETHER we fulfill Acts 1:8, But ye shall receive power, after the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. Disciple Makers, Jim and Carla Barbarossa Porter, Indiana 219-762-7589 [email protected] Christmas can be a disturbing holiday as the challenges of gift giving, card sending, and entertaining weigh heavily on our time, our minds, and our bank accounts. It’s easy to lose sight of the reason we Witnessing Made Easy: Yes, You Can Make a Difference xiii celebrate Christmas: to honor the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I find that if I’m not careful, my Bible reading time diminishes rather than increases just before Christmas, despite my desire to do the opposite. My only remedy has been to devote much of Christmas Day to reading Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Passing one jammed shopping mall after another during the fall of 2006, I began to wonder why no one ever thinks of giving a gift to God for Christmas. After all, the three magi had presented gifts to Jesus when He was born. Surely, we should continue to give gifts to Him. The more I thought about that omission, the more convinced I became that some people would welcome the idea of enrolling in the contest to lead more souls to the Lord as a Christmas gift to God. Having had some success in the past with putting out press releases, I took this route to share my idea in the usual way.
The response was muted. The secular press just didn’t seem very interested, and the Christian media hadn’t seemed to notice the release. After that disappointing result, I did a little online research and found that there were outlets for press releases that go solely to Christian Testimony media. I rewrote the earlier press release a little and sent it out via some of those services. I was pleased to find out that it was much less expensive to send out such a release solely to Christian media than to all media. The response was very encouraging this time. Many Christian news outlets briefly summarized the contest, and inquiries about the contest rapidly picked up. I was also interviewed for some printed articles and drive-time radio programs. Because of the long lead times involved with some of the stories, I decided to extend the end date for entries from January 31, 2007, to Easter 2007. That also seemed like a logical ending time for finishing a commitment made to God as a Christmas gift in 2006. I was delighted to find that not only had the quantity of contest inquiries increased, but the quality of the most recent ideas provided some real eye-openers, as well. I was equally impressed that the ideas didn’t duplicate one another; people were finding vastly different, effective ways to reach those who didn’t know and accept Jesus. Preface xiv Not surprisingly, the tools of mass communication appealed to some. If you can televise programs around the world where no one is now seeing Christian messages, you can begin to create fertile furrows in unplowed fields. One report showed that by spending $110 in Kenya to televise an hour-long DVD, eleven people reported that they were saved and five others volunteered to work as Evangelism Tool. That apparently low cost per person contrasted with some e-mails I received that estimated a cost of more than $10,000 per person saved for some major evangelical events in the United States. Radio was also described as a possible answer. One man reported that he had found a way to establish Christian radio stations for less than 1 percent of the usual cost. He had several stations operating in Canada and planned to expand to about a hundred more around the world. He reported that relatively few of his listeners had ever heard a Christian message before. One man wanted to tap into the tremendous flows of tourists who seek entertainment. His idea was to build a Christian-themed multimedia experience in Branson, Missouri, where believers could bring their friends to learn about God’s promises. But most people had the opposite feeling about employing mass media: They saw energizing the vast numbers of Christians as the best way to help lead more souls to Him. After all, if each Christian would speak to just a few non-Christians, the potential for Him to open unsaved hearts would be tremendous. As you can imagine, there are some amazing individual evangelists: They can walk up to anyone, quickly establish powerful rapport, and talk easily about becoming saved after just a few general sentences. Some of these people contacted me and shared their testimonies. One man even sent a book describing his methods. His approach was so well thought out that it could have been a role model for recruiting sergeants trying to find the next 100,000 U.S. Army troops. Gradually, I began to hear from people who had focused on taking insecure believers and turning them into effective witnesses. What was the lesson? Directing Christians to help lead more souls to Him is an ongoing educational task of the church that deserves to be part of Witnessing Made Easy: Yes, You Can Make a Difference xv every worship service. Yes, that’s right. People need to be reminded to share their faith during each service and to receive practical training in doing so. What’s the biggest hurdle to getting Christians to share their faith? Many Christians are delighted to be saved, but don’t feel like they have an obligation to help anyone else become saved. Without the desire to help the unsaved, there’s little benefit gained by instructing people in how to accomplish that task. The Bible says: “When someone becomes a Christian, he becomes a brand new person inside. He is not the same any more. A new life has begun!” 2 Corinthians 5:17
Say this: I am a new person. I have a new life, a God centered life. The Bible says: “Real Life Stories - All these new things are from God, who brought us back to Himself through what Christ Jesus did. And God has given us the privilege of urging everyone to come into His favor and be reconciled to Him.” 2 Corinthians 5:18 “ God bridged the gap of sin between you and Him by Jesus dying on the cross. He now has given you the honor and privilege of telling people how to find that same favor with God through what Jesus has done for them. The Bible says: “He died for all so that all who live --- having received eternal life from Him --- might live no longer for themselves, to please themselves, but to spend their lives pleasing Evangelism Training who died and rose again for them.” 2 Corinthians 5:15 . Jesus died so you could have eternal life with Him in Heaven. Jesus is calling you to now live I grew up the third of seven children, all struggling for recognition, moving often and traveling from school to school with no place to really call home. I decided early in life to build walls for protection. My parents married at the young age of 17 and started quickly popping out children causing a lot of stress just living day to day! There was certainly no way or time to learn good communication skills! Now looking back where I came from, born in upstate NY in the early 60's, I wanted to make my mark, so I had decided to excel in academics as well as sports and music.
Soon living in Florida when my dad was 24, he had a life-changing experience with the Lord, so we started going to many Pentecostal churches and Spirit-filled revivals. At the age of 13, back in NY, I was invited to a small church hosting missionaries who were showing some slides of suffering humanity in other countries. One asked the small group if anyone would ever want to help, and immediately I raised my hand and stood up and said, "I will! I will go!" Something happened to me that day, and since then, when I remember that experience, I start to cry. Still, my teenage years were filled with many family issues and self-performance striving for attention and approval...from school, boys, drugs and alcohol. At age 16, I felt trapped! In 1977, my parents took me to a clinic and made me have an abortion. I had gotten pregnant, and back then that was the thing to do. Afterward, the guilt and shame made me bitter and I lost the desire to excel in school, dropping out the following year. I see now that I was trying to run away from my problems, not facing my real issues, and was looking for love and approval in all the wrong places. I met a guy in the small town we lived in and ended up leaving home and moving in with him. We didn't really have much, so I soon broke up with him and moved to Texas with some friends of the family. I decided after being away from home for a few months, I would write him a long letter and say if he wanted to come to Texas, maybe we could get married and start a family right away, which he did. In June of 1980, our first son Michael was born. By this time we had moved back to NY near our family. The real troubles had just begun and I know that through it all, my Lord kept me safe. After 23 years of marriage, my parents got a divorce, and the very next year my older sister was killed in an alcohol-related car accident. My own marriage had crumbled and now I had a small baby to take care of along with all the stress of these family crises! So by age 21, I was admitted to a facility for a nervous breakdown, chemical imbalance, and bi-polar disorder, while my dad and step-mother took care of my son. Over five years of medication, doctors, and life without making sense, proved to me that God will never leave us nor forsake us! I'm a living miracle! The doctors told me I would never be able to drive, hold a job, or have any more children. In 1987, with no more medication and no more doctors, I was still very promiscuous and became pregnant again. During this pregnancy, I was completely healed of the chemical imbalances I had suffered. My second son Shawn was such a blessing to me and I got to have my first son Michael come and live with us. What a blessing to have both of them and to actually have my own apartment and a somewhat "normal" life! After going back to get some higher education, I met and married a fellow student at college and had a daughter Tiffany and a son Brian, which ended in divorce within five years. Throughout this time we were in and out of church and never expected that this would happen to our marriage and family. I remember desperately praying, "Please, Heavenly Father, send me a husband that will serve you faithfully and be a father to my children and love me sincerely." Well, God answered my prayer Michael and I have been married for 14 years, growing and seeking God! I believe his daughter Gabby, is also a gift God gave me in the place of the little baby that had been aborted. We are now the proud grandparents of 6! In 2016, as we were studying the Bible and growing in the Hebrew Roots of our Christian faith or Christian Testimonies, we became interested in, and started, blowing those shofar horns. I was led on-line to "The Shofar Man," Jim Barbarossa, and our lives have been so blessed ever since! In recent months, a friend came to visit and was shown by the Holy Spirit that I still had a source of bitter rejection, and through prayer and agreement with that, the Lord was able to release and deliver me at the subconscious childhood source! In moments of time, the picture I saw of Jesus was a very loving, merciful Father who accepted me without needing to perform, washing away my ugly behaviors and affirming to me my worth to Him! I am casting all my cares on Him and setting the desires of this world aside to keep him Lord of my life. I am following in His footsteps wherever He leads me. I now trust that He has a perfect plan for my life to be a witness of how He can work our messes into something good, and that His ways are far better. What He has done for me, He can do for you, too! Forever grateful, giving God all the glory, honor, power, and praise! He is the only Way, the Truth, and the Real Life Stories! Talli's Salvation Testimony was filmed live as part of the 5-Fold Ministers Discipleship/Evangelism Gathering Session #3 As You Go....Fear Not! What is the most important part of Discipleship? The most important part of Discipleship is Commitment! Jesus could not have made disciples had they not committed to follow him.
The commitment Jesus asked for was simple. Follow me! As people followed him they were discipled. They learned to be imitators of Jesus! The strength of what we teach is also based on commitment! It is not as strong as the 3 year commitment that Jesus required, but it has been proven very effective. We have been able to effectively disciple a couple hundred people over the last 3 years as a result of getting the following commitments! We have found that, if a Christian will commit to write out their testimony and commit to share it daily, that this commitment sets the stage for the Holy Spirit to disciple them! The first thing we challenge people to do in our discipleship teaching is to commit to write their testimony and be a part of a Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book or their own Testimony Flyer. The second thing we do is challenge people to carry 2 copies of the Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book or their Testimony Flyers in their hand every time they leave the door of their home and every time they get out of their car. The third thing we do is challenge them to ask the Holy Spirit to help them in the giving away of the Testimony books or Testimony Flyers! The forth thing we do is challenge them to practice what was taught in that session. In session 2, we taught on As You Go: Hear and Obey the Voice of God. The commitment to carry the Testimony Books or Flyers and the Commitment to Hear and Obey the Voice of God, As They Go is joined with the commitment to ask the Holy Spirit to help them. This sets the stage for the Holy Spirit to be active in their life! If a person is always carrying the Gospel message with them in the form of a Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book or Testimony Flyer and always practicing Hearing and Obeying the Voice of God as they go, then they are always trusting in the Holy Spirit to help them! This gives the Holy Spirit total access to all their Time and Daily Life! Sons and Daughters of God are led by the Spirit of God! What we accomplish during our 12 Discipleship Sessions is getting a strong commitment from the person being discipled to allow the Holy Spirit to lead them into Living a Witnessing Lifestyle! Jim and Carla Barbarossa [email protected] 219-762-7589 Phone or Text www.reallifestoriesbooks.com I grew up in a Christian home. We went to church every Sunday morning and evening, plus on Wednesday. I lived with my mom in Memphis, Tennessee until I was 15. I accepted Christ at a young age and was baptized around the age of 9 or 10. I believe I was sincere about my decision at the time.
As I got into Middle School, I started hanging with the wrong crowd. I started drinking, smoking, and experimenting with drugs. When my mom found out, she sent me to my dad’s in Wisconsin. I still drank and smoked with my dad’s permission, but I didn’t do drugs. After High School, I joined the Navy and got married. During this time, I had walked away from God. I got into porn and committed adultery on my first wife. She was doing it to me, so I figured I would do it to her. After the service, I started Christian Truck Drivers. I fell further from God. I became addicted to porn and got married to my second wife. I kept drinking and watching porn, which kept me from showing my wife the affection she deserved. It damaged me, and I ended up getting married again before I met my current wife. In 2010, we went back on the road and came across a Rig CD entitled “Dominoes” by James Payne. That CD lit a fire in our soul. We started searching truck stops for more CD’s. We got the “Free in Christ” CD, which God used to bring me back to him. I believe whole heartedly in media ministries. God is using CD’s to bring people to Him. I still struggle with things, but I now can call on Jesus, and He will give me strength to get through the day. Friend, you can call on Jesus too! Go ahead and call out to Him right now! Phone 219-762-7589 Country United States Website : reallifestoriesbooks.com Email :[email protected] When Real Life Stories Lighthouse Christian Testimony Book Displays are placed in business locations they become Mission Bases !
Every book becomes a Missionary ! The words “Free Take One ” on the Book Display, along with a Beautiful book cover attract the attention of business customers causing them to pick up the book and “Freely, by their own choice or will” take it home! It is not pushed on them and by their own choice they will read it ! This little Missionary has now gained entrance into a person’s home and life ! As the person starts to read the book the little missionary will be used by the Holy Spirit to now gain permission to enter the person’s heart ! Over the years, many people have received Jesus as Savior as a result of picking up and reading these “Free” Books. I was born and raised in Illinois. I’m from a middle class family. My upbringing was less than perfect. There was a lot of fighting and strife in my home. I love my family, and my parents did the best they could, so that’s all I’m going to say about that and Christian Testimonies
As a young girl and into womanhood, I was always looking for love. I wanted that fairy tale white knight that would come rescue me from all that was wrong with the world and save me from myself. This mindset directly led to the addictions I developed: alcohol, pot, cocaine/crack, prescription drugs, and eventually heroin. My search for love and my need to fill a void led to very unhealthy relationships. When I was 15, I lost my virginity to a 25 year old married man. I was this family’s babysitter from the time I was 13. I guess by the time I turned 15, this man thought I was woman enough to do as he pleased. I thought I was mature. I was for my age, but not mature enough for that, emotionally or any in other way. I thought I was in love with him, and he told me he was in love with me. To make a long story short, his wife found out. My whole world was turned upside down. I lost him, her (who was at one time my best friend), and their kids that I had grown to love like they were my own. I was more than just the babysitter. I was their friend. I hung out there every weekend, they were kind of… my life. So it was a pretty devastating time. That whole situation pretty much set the tone for my future relationships with men. From here on, it was a life of bad relationships, drugs, and alcohol. It seemed that with every new man came a new drug and a new demon for me to inherit. Later that year when I was still 15, I met my first real boyfriend. He was 20 years old. He turned out to be physically abusive and very controlling. During that relationship, I dropped out of high school and had my first child at the age of 18. I ended up leaving him when my son was 5 months old. I got a fake I.D. and starting hitting the bars. It wasn’t long before I had a serious drinking problem and started using cocaine due to meeting abuser #2. He was 10 years older than me and was going through a divorce. He supplied me with plenty of cocaine. He was nice and sympathetic to my situation, but he soon turned abusive too. The beatings were far worse than the first boyfriend. The drugs were out of control, and so was the abuse. With him I suffered physical, mental, and emotional abuse and even rape. I had two more children with him. In my mind, there was no way out. So I stayed and suffered for 10 years. During those years he and I both picked up a bad habit with hydrocodone. This was on top of the daily cocaine use. I was arrested for my first felony, picking up a fraudulent prescription in Illinois. While out on bond for that charge, I was arrested in Indiana for the same thing. I was 28. I was so dependent on the drug that the physical withdrawals made me want to die. When you are in bondage to a drug that you are physically sick without, you’ll do whatever you can to ease the pain. At the time I was taking forty 10mg pills a day. That is about 8 times the maximum amount prescribed to take in a day. I lost 50 pounds because it made me so sick I usually threw up about 5 times a day. I am very fortunate to be alive. I finally got away from him because he went to prison. However, I was lost without him. I know that sounds crazy, but when you are controlled by an abuser for so long you end up losing any existence of your own. I was with him from age 19 to age 29, so it was like he practically raised me. It’s pretty sick thinking, I know. I was left with three kids. I was evicted, had lost my job, and had no car. I was on probation for my two felonies. After about two weeks of a horrible detox, I had finally kicked the pills. However, as any addict does, I just traded one addiction for another. I was living from place to place, drinking heavily, and just continued to be lost. I had to eventually give my kids to their father’s family. I wasn’t fit to take care of them, and I didn’t have a stable home for them to live in. I still saw my kids here and there, but eventually my selfishness led me far from them. I was too focused on my path to self-destruction to care about anything else. There were brief spaces of time where I really tried to get my act together and had a game plan to make things better. I even put myself in rehab several times. It never took. I always fell again and always worse than the time before. Then entered Brad, who is now my husband. I know what you’re thinking, “Oh, he must be that knight in shining armor she was looking for all her life.” That’s not even close… Brad and I met in a bar and started seeing each other. Very soon, we fell madly in love. He was different from the others. He never hit me or called me names. He was peaceful and mellow. We had big dreams. We talked about getting married and having a home and babies. The devil had other plans for us first. Bars were our thing for the most part. He had told me about his addiction to heroin, but he was clean from it at that point, as far as I knew. Before long, his demon became my demon, and we starting using heroin together. Our lives very quickly fell to pieces, not that they were ever really together. We were drenched in sin. We stole from family and friends. We burned every bridge we had. My family completely let me go and would have nothing to do with me. I was shooting $200 worth of heroin a day. My daily life was a vicious circle of stealing, pawn shops, and getting to the west side of Chicago to get my drug. Every day was a race against the withdrawals, a panic to get my drug before I got sick. Nothing else mattered. We were homeless, hopeless, and soulless. It was a sick existence. We slept in hallways of roach infested slums on the west side. We begged for money on the street and stole from anyone we could. Heroin is pure concentrated evil. You become a slave to it. Nothing else matters, and it is the closest I will ever come to being demon possessed. I think back to the end of these days and remember how I just wanted to die. I was utterly hopeless and without purpose. I remember shooting up and praying it would be the shot that killed me. I desperately wanted to end my suffering. I wanted to end the monster I was and end the pain I was inflicting on others. I was empty and broken down so deep I couldn’t see any glimpse of light. I ended up violating my probation in both states and went to jail. After another horrible detox and 6 months in county jails, I was sentenced to a work release program. This was the turning point in my life. I have to express the sheer genius of God’s perfect plan. The program had just opened up for women. Had it worked out any other way, I would have gone to prison and would not have met the people I did. God worked through every one of them. They were perfectly placed in my life to help me grow into the person I am today. Now let me tell you about the people God used the most, to show me a way out of the darkness and into His glorious light. While in the program, I met Pastor Michael. He worked there teaching a couple different classes I attended. He is my shepherd and has been there for me through so much. I’m surprised he didn’t fire me from the church last year. I was very needy and called him as much as 20 times a day during a time my husband went thru a very hard time. I also met Adele, who was the praise and worship leader at the church. She came into the program and taught bible studies every week. Almost immediately, I felt a pull toward her. I know now that the pull I felt was actually toward Jesus that lives in her. During one of her bible studies, I accepted Jesus into my life. At another bible study after that, I was telling her some of my concerns and I was being released soon. I had nowhere to go, no money, and no one who cared anymore. I didn’t even have anyone to pick me up when I got out. Adele said “Well, I’ll pick you up. We will find somewhere for you to go, don’t worry.” To most people this probably seems trivial, but it was this small act of kindness that won my heart to the Lord. In that moment Jesus revealed to me that I was never again going to be alone. Adele saw me through God’s eyes. Through my eyes, I saw God in her. By the time I was released, I had arranged for another ride. After I was picked up, I was literally left out on the street. The person who picked me up lied about the fact that he arranged somewhere for me to stay. Once that fell through, he just left me there. I called Adele. She picked me up, and our church put me up at a motel. Adele took me, got me some food, and provided me with the things I needed. To make a long story short, I ended up going to live in a bad situation. I was reading my bible every day and going to church. I was seeing my kids every day and doing my best to block out the evil around me, but it was starting to slither back into my life. That’s what the enemy does. But God!!!! Like God does, He pressed my life once again to repentance. One day after a violent, abusive situation with the person I was living with, God said, “Enough!” I called Adele and cried out to her that I needed help. She and her husband came to pick me up and took me into their home. Keep in mind, I was pretty much a stranger. I was an acquaintance at best. They both knew that I had been a junkie, a thief, and a liar for the greater part of my life. Because God spoke and told them, “Take her, raise her up in Me, and I will do great and mighty things in her,” I am here today. All glory to God, but I also have to thank Paul and Adele for their total obedience and for heeding the voice of the Lord rather than listening to their own fears. They’ve never expressed any fears to me, but I’m positive they must have had them. During my time with them, I was immersed in the word of God and the things of God. It was because God had given me a thirst for Him. It was never forced upon me. We became family. They call me daughter, and I call them mom and dad. They taught me, counseled me, scolded me, corrected me, loved me, and never gave up on me through thick and thin. I know I can be stubborn and rebellious, but God has done a mighty work in me and He is not done yet. Now, it is clear to me that Paul and Adele were pre-destined to be my spiritual parents and me their spiritual daughter. I started writing to Brad as soon as I moved into Adele’s house. He was in prison at the time. I wrote him in one letter “Hey, ya know that thing we have been looking for all our lives? I found it!” I starting telling him about a man named Jesus. He wrote back saying, “You’re gonna be a Bible thumper now? Seriously?” Well, Brad ended up getting saved and baptized by the Holy Spirit with evidence of tongues in Prison Ministry Resources. Over the last 4 years that I’ve been saved, God has done miraculous things in my life. First of all, He saved my life and my soul. He has delivered me from drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes. I mean delivered! There is absolutely nothing inside of me that desires any of that anymore. That part of me is dead and gone. Who the Son sets free, is free indeed! He gave me a job and then a better job. All my relationships with my family have been restored. My kids are back with me and are being raised up in the Lord. We’ve gone from a one bedroom apartment to a three bedroom house and from one vehicle to two. The Lord also restored and strengthened my marriage, after a brief separation when my husband first got home from prison. The devil tried to tear our marriage apart... but God!!! My life now is to serve the Lord, Adele passed the torch, and I now teach bible studies at the program, where I got saved. I have earned my G.E.D and am now attending college to earn my bachelor’s degree in the science of criminal justice with a concentration in human services. My goal is to become a substance abuse counselor. Who better to understand addiction than a former junkie, right? Doors are being opened all the time for me to reach the unreachable. I thank God and just pray He uses me for His glory more and more every day. These are by far the best years of my life, and it’s only just begun. I have faith, not to mention proof that God can do exceedingly, abundantly, far beyond all I could imagine. He has made me the head and not the tail. He has set me above and not beneath. His plan for me is for good and not for evil, to give me a hope and a future! It’s all for His glory! And the best part of it is, if He will do it for me, He will do it for anyone who calls on his Holy name! Friend, are you searching for love like I was? Are you looking for love in all the wrong places? Has your search left you addicted to drugs or alcohol? Has your search caused you to do things you never thought you would do? Do you want the white knight that rescued me to rescue to rescue you? He will if you ask Him! Call out to Him right now! Josh’s Testimony was filmed live as part of the 5-Fold Ministers Discipleship/Evangelism Gathering Session #9 As You Go....Heal the Sick Discipleship/Evangelism That Works "Today" !!
What is the most important part of Discipleship? The most important part of Discipleship is Commitment! Jesus could not have made disciples had they not committed to follow him. The commitment Jesus asked for was simple. Follow me! As people followed him they were discipled. They learned to be imitators of Jesus! The strength of what we teach is also based on commitment! It is not as strong as the 3 year commitment that Jesus required, but it has been proven very effective. We have been able to effectively disciple a couple hundred people over the last 3 years as a result of getting the following commitments! We have found that, if a Christian will commit to write out their testimony and commit to share it daily, that this commitment sets the stage for the Holy Spirit to disciple them! The first thing we challenge people to do in our discipleship teaching is to commit to write their testimony and be a part of a Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book or their own Testimony Flyer. The second thing we do is challenge people to carry 2 copies of the Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book or their Testimony Flyers in their hand every time they leave the door of their home and every time they get out of their car. The third thing we do is challenge them to ask the Holy Spirit to help them in the giving away of the Testimony books or Testimony Flyers! The forth thing we do is challenge them to practice what was taught in that session. In session 2, we taught on As You Go: Hear and Obey the Voice of God. The commitment to carry the Testimony Books or Flyers and the Commitment to Hear and Obey the Voice of God, As They Go is joined with the commitment to ask the Holy Spirit to help them. This sets the stage for the Holy Spirit to be active in their life! If a person is always carrying the Gospel message with them in the form of a Real Life Stories Christian Testimony Book or Salvation Testimony and always practicing Hearing and Obeying the Voice of God as they go, then they are always trusting in the Holy Spirit to help them! This gives the Holy Spirit total access to all their Time and Daily Life! Sons and Daughters of God are led by the Spirit of God! What we accomplish during our 12 Discipleship Sessions is getting a strong commitment from the person being discipled to allow the Holy Spirit to lead them into Living a Witnessing Lifestyle! When the Holy Spirit comes upon us we will be His Witnesses! Watching the 12 Discipleship Videos is Good, but on their own it is not enough to make a disciple! It is the joining together of the videos and the commitment to write, carry and use your testimony that will help you to be a strong disciple of Jesus! If you would like to know more about "Making Disciples" I suggest that you study everything at this link and all the links connected to that page. For what we teach to work you must have a complete understanding of everything on this page and linked to this page: http://www.step-by-step.org/reallandi... After studying everything at the above link please feel free to ask any questions you may have. For information about submitting your testimony for our next book go to this link: http://www.step-by-step.org/wanted.htm If you would like to watch the 12 part Discipleship Video Series on line. Just send an email to [email protected] with the words "Discipleship/Evangelism Video Link " in the subject line. Please pass this information on to people in your sphere of influence ! God Bless You! Jim and Carla Barbarossa Step By Step Ministries https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcYy5stVlc0 219 762 7589 |
AuthorReal Life Stories Christian Testimony Books, Prints and Supplies Born Again Christians with a product (Books) that they can use to reach lost souls in their cities. The Books contain the testimonies of born again Christians , with the Word of God, placed on pages between the testimonies. Archives
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