We did not drink or do drugs that much when I was younger.

We had a well known biker gang living there.  We had rival gangs coming to our neighborhood armed with baseball bats (not like guns today).  We had murders (My cousin Patty was stabbed to death over a small amount of weed) and of course drugs.

We did not drink or do drugs that much when I was younger.  It was all about building mini bikes, catching snakes, and hanging out at the railroad tracks.  The drinking and drugs did not come on us until we left the projects (cocaine and crack in the 90's).

There were also a couple of Christian families living in the projects and one of them was Mrs. Ziggly.  She would pick us up in her car or have the church bus come get us to go to church.  She was the one who started taking us to church and I will never forget her for that.

I do not remember how long we went to church -- I think it was a couple of years off and on, (more on then off).   We went to Sunday school, regular church services, and Royal Rangers (which was like Christian Boy Scouts).  We were not always well behaved. Sometimes we would ditch Royal Rangers and go to the store up the street to steal, and then have the brothers chase us on  the church property, but through this I did learn about Jesus, and that He died for our sins, and we could go to Him for help and He would be there for us.

I did call on His help and He was there for me.  That's why I know He is 100% real.  I was around twenty years old, living in Collinwood Ohio, with a roommate.  We were looking for some weed, and my roommate said he could get some weed from these bikers down the street, but I could not go with him because they did not know me.  He mentioned one of their names and I said, 'I know that guy.'   He did not believe me, but took me anyway, and when we got there I not only knew him, I knew a couple others too.   It was like a projects reunion of sorts.  
I was working as a security guard at the time but I lost that job because I could not get up for work because of all the drinking and drugs.  The sad thing was that I worked nights and could not get up for work.  Around this time my roommate took all my money and everything I owned and took off to Oklahoma, so I ended up moving in with my friend from the projects.   This was the same kid I went to church with when I was growing up. Looking back - all the people in our group were crooks and thieves except me and my friend.  We seemed like we had some kind of morals in us, even though we were drunks and drug addicts.  I would not be surprised if he eventually gave himself back to Jesus. Don't get me wrong -- I was no better then they were because I lived off the money that they stole.  My job was to unpack the stolen goods from the station wagon and to make beer runs, and those were full time jobs believe me -- and that's how I got the nickname Six Pack.

One night we all went to the bar, and a couple of my friends crept behind the bar and rolled out a keg of beer from the bar into the station wagon, and took off leaving me and this one guy I just met.  It was a long walk home, and on our way home the cops pulled us over and questioned us about the missing keg from the bar.  I just met the guy I was with, but we worked great together lying and denying any knowledge about any stolen keg. 
When I got home I was greeted by one of my friends who looked like one of the big biker guys you always see in the movies where there's a biker gang.  He said he called the police, looking for us, and that the police said that we told them that they took the keg out of the bar.  Now keep in mind ' the only picture we had in the house was a picture of a guy who narked on this guy a couple years ago, so the beat down started on me, coming fast and furious.  During the beating I was pleading and saying, 'I swear to God I never told the cops you took the keg!'  His reply was, 'I am God mother %@#$&@!'

I WAS AFRAID TO LEAVE 

I don't think I said much after that.  I just accepted the beating, though it didn't end there.  I was labeled a narc after that, which meant when I was at a party with them, anyone could throw me a punch to the head or wherever.   I couldn't do anything but take it without crying, because if I fought back they would have been on me like a pack of wolves.  I was afraid to leave because I did not want them looking for me, and they knew where to look.  So I was stuck there and had to ride it out.

The narc stuff died down after a while, or so I thought, until one night they came in after a big caper and poured out this bag of cash being the most money I have seen in my life. Soon thereafter, we piled into the station wagon to get some 8 balls of coke and beer.  
We got back to the house from the coke run and started to do the coke.  The guy who gave me the beat down was playing with the money and he looked at me and said, 'You know, Six Pack, we could have you killed with this kind of money,' and it did not sound like he was joking with me. 
Those words stuck with me and I knew I had to get out somehow, so a day or two later I cried out to the Lord, 'Please get me out of this mess.'  I do not remember the exact prayer I said, but it was from the bottom of my heart and I was willing to do whatever it took to get out of the mess I was in. 
The way everything happened after the prayer was a 100% the Lord working in my life to get me out.  It was not me; I was a strung out mess.   I called my sister and she said she would meet me at the corner of the street in a couple hours so I could stay at her house until she could get me in to drug treatment.  I went back to the house and told them I was going to check in to drug treatment and they where like ' 'You don't need drug treatment, Six Pack.   All you need is a job,' and I was like:   'I have to do this for myself.'
I was in a detox center the very next day with everything smoothed out with the people I was hanging with.  It was too perfect, the way things worked.   It was all the hand of the Lord.

I had been to drug treatment a couple times before this, but the difference was I was willing to do whatever it took to stay off the drugs and get my life in order.  So I went to detox, day treatment, regular treatment, half-way house and a quarter-way house.  
I was in some sort of treatment for almost a year and stayed straight for about 12 months, but after a couple years I stopped praying and stopped going to AA meetings and stopped helping others.   I was reading the Bible off and on but I quit that to.  Needless to say I went back to drugs and alcohol, so after a couple years of getting high and drinking, God drew me back to Him.  I started watching The 700 Club every afternoon while I was still getting high.  
A couple days after I made a decision to give up drugs and alcohol and seek Jesus, I started getting these demon voices in my head, saying all kinds of cursing toward God and Jesus.  The voices only lasted a couple of days and seemed to quit when I stopped doing drugs and turned back to Jesus.   I believe they where in me the whole time, but made themselves known when they were losing me to Jesus.  Why would they show their hand when they already had me on my way to the pit of hell?

This chapter of my life starts out in 2009 when my work adopted a drug free workplace.  I was a Nurses Aide working in a nursing home.  I had not done drugs for a couple years, but when they announced they were starting this program, I could not stop thinking  about getting high, which I had not done in a couple years because I had become a Christian.  My ministry was doing everything I did before, except getting high.  I would also read the bible and pray here and there, but my 'lord' was the world, video games, thinking how to get rich and watching sports on TV ' so my spiritual foundation was built among thorns, which got choked and lead me right back to getting high again.

Matthew 13:22 reads:   He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful.
So needless to say that three months later when they did the first drug test, my name was picked to be tested.  I went ahead and took the test, knowing I was dirty from smoking weed from the time I woke up until the time I went to bed (around an ounce of weed every two weeks).  After I took the drug test I went home sick, because I knew I was busted.  
I smoked an ounce of weed in two days while waiting to be called in to my boss's office to explain my test results.  I have always tried to tell the truth no matter what, so when I told them I was clean a couple years and started getting high the minute they let us out of the drug free workplace meeting, they were mortified and said it was one of the sickest things they ever heard of.  However, since I was good worker and a lot of people liked me, they would take me back if I completed drug treatment.  So I completed a two week day treatment course and learned how to pass drug tests while still getting high.

I WAS AT THE END OF MY ROPE

In early November 2009 I was at the end of my rope.  I was sick of coming home from work and having to do everything to run a household, while my wife stayed in bed all day.  On one hand, I preferred having her in bed, because when she was awake, she would complain or argue with me almost constantly.   Sadly, I thought:  What's the point of being married to her when I have to do everything myself.  I would be better off without her.  I blamed her for everything wrong in our marriage and never looked at my part.  We should have been reading the Bible together and praying together.  I encouraged none of that.

I wanted to get back to God (but I went about it all wrong).  I knew the drugs I was doing were killing me and that I would be dead if I continued using them.   I wanted a complete change in my life and I knew if I called on God to help me, He would,  because He has helped me in the past when I called on Him, so I had faith that He would help me now.

The day came when I was going to reach out to God and ask Him for help.  I was getting high all day up until it was time to go to bed, so I knew I did not want to go to God all high.   My plan was to wake up in the middle of the night and pray and ask Him for help with my life, so that's what I did.   

I woke up in the middle of the night and asked Him to send me a new wife; someone who would help me so that I would not have to do everything on my own.   I was sitting up in bed praying this prayer, when I heard what I thought was the Holy Spirit pleading my case with grunts and groans.   I also had what I thought was a vision at this time.   Now keep in mind, I never repented or asked Jesus back in to my life.  I just started with this ungodly prayer, asking for a new wife when I was already married.

So after that night I thought I was back to serving God and that He had given me a vision of my new wife.  It never occurred to me that I forgot to repent and ask Jesus back in to my life ' so I was still unknowingly serving the devil.

I told my wife in early November that I wanted her out and I gave her until January 31st to move out.   I started setting up dating site accounts, and redid my MySpace page so that I would be ready when she moved out in a couple months.  I was not going to talk to any woman on the Net because I was going to wait until she moved out -- plus I wanted to see what kind of single women were available.  I spent a lot of time doing this on the dating sites.

I decided I was never going to get back with my wife.  Yet when I read on the internet that God don't like when people break oaths with Him (We made an oath when we got married),  I was so angry that I said to myself that I would go back to drugs, alcohol and Satanism.  Now keep in mind I was never involved in Satanism, so for me to say that was out of pure anger at the thought of having to get back with her.

WE ARE IN A BATTLE FOR OUR VERY SOULS  

Allow me to pause a moment here and say that it would be EASY for me not to share publicly what happened next.  Yet I AM going to share it because I believe God wants me to, and I'm assuming the reason He wants me to is to let it be a warning to others who may be gambling with their very souls, and what eternity may have in store for them, if they don't start getting 100% serious with God.  People:  We are in a battle for our very souls, and demonic spirits are VERY real, just as God's Spirit is VERY real, and none of us know when God may turn us over to Satan to be tormented by him if we don't get serious about obeying God in accordance with New Testament commands.   God turned me over to Satan for a season and it wasn't pretty nor anything to take lightly.   If you think God would never do such a thing to a person, check this out:
Deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.  (1 Cor. 5:5). 
The Apostle Paul gave this directive to the church of Corinth because some guy in the church was having sexual relations with his mother-in-law, and evidently had little or no concern what God thought about it.
So ' upon my being angry with God, I put the Bible on my PDA phone.   I would close my eyes and scroll it up and down a couple times in the same order, like casting lots, and every time I did this, the Bible verse would be perfect for whatever I prayed for.  (I do not recommend this and I have thrown out my PDA phone and repented from this evil), but everything I did ' I followed the PDA phone.  As time passed I thought I had the upper hand on everything -- not knowing I was digging my own pit.   
I spent a lot of time on the dating sites, talking to these woman until the time my wife finally moved out. I had no problems when she was gone.  I cleaned the house, washed the walls, and I stuffed the rest of her things she had left, in the closet.   I even took her place-mat away from the kitchen table.

The phone said, 'Talk to this woman on the internet,' and so I did.  The phone said, 'Throw everything you own out in the dumpster,' and so I did.   I thought I was doing God's will at the time, but I never repented nor asked Jesus back into my life.

THE VOICES CONVINCED ME THAT I WAS A PROPHET

The voices I was hearing ' they convinced me that I was a prophet.  I would walk into the drugstore and the voice would say, 'That person is a sinner,' or 'That person is not a sinner.  One particular voice convinced me at the time that there was no greater prophet than me. The voice would also curse at God, but it said that it was training me in that as long as I did not say it with my lips, it was okay.   (Again: This whole time I still thought I was doing God's will and was a prophet from God).

A couple weeks after I kicked my wife out, the phone said I would have to take her back, so I thought I was doing God's will and that I had no choice but to ask her back.

On the day she came back, I was lying in bed, and the most evil feeling swept over my whole body.  I believed there was nowhere I could go to escape it, and I was filled with the most intense fear.   I went in to the bathroom and looked at my eyes and they seemed like they were deeper and hazy looking.  I asked my wife if they looked different, and even she said they did.

The day after my wife came back, I was getting ready to go to bed when this deep authoritative voice told me to get up and go in the bathroom and put my head in the toilet and then to lick the toilet bowel.   I did all the voice told me, because again ' I thought it was a voice from God, or God Himself speaking to me.  It was like a bad game of Simon (Satan) says.

Then the voice said, 'Go lay in your bed with toilet water in your hair.'  Then it said, 'Get up and take a cold shower.'  After that, it said, 'Change the sheets.'   Then it said,  'Lay down.'  Then it said, 'Unplug your alarm clock.'  Then the voice said for me to not tell anyone about these events, and I said I would not tell ' but it was the devil I said that to.

The voice said I would be back to my old self again in a couple days.   I had no idea what it meant because I did not know the devil was possessing me at the time.  I thought I was being trained to be a good prophet.   But that only lasted a short time, and then one night the voice said,  'You are raised up to be the false prophet,' and I was okay with that because I thought it was still doing God's will.  I thought my soul would be saved ' until I was given a moment of clarity from the Holy Spirit ' and remembered that the false prophet ends up in the lake of fire!

By the mercy of God, that's when I hit my knees and repented and asked Jesus to save me!   After I did that, the devil said that he had me and that Jesus told him that he could only have me for a short time.   He said that he was leaving me, but he kept on saying:  'Eternal life - eternal damnation - eternal life - eternal damnation' ' over and over.  The main devil left when he said that, but I was still left with demons that only slowly went away after a couple of months.

The thing that scares me the most is that I thought I was truly following God the whole time.   I was so deceived and so blinded by the devil.   Even common sense should have told me who I was really serving, but that never occurred to me.   I did not know I was following the devil, until he told me he was leaving me though I would still be serving him, even if dead.

I praise all powerful Jesus, the Son of the living God, for telling the devil that he could not have me.   It was not by my power or my strength that saved me.   It was Jesus.  Yeah -  I had one moment of clarity when I realized the false prophet ends up in the lake of fire ' but that moment of clear thinking was given to me by Jesus.

When I came to my senses and realized that the devil was possessing me, I hit my knees and begged and repented  for Jesus to come back in to my life ' with tears and sorrow; my most heartfelt prayer I think I ever prayed.   There was no joy after this like before, so I went for my Bible for a little comfort to feel better, and a loud demonic voice told me,  'Get your filthy hands off the Bible!'

Which I did, and I spent the rest of the night in full panic attack with fear and perspiration pouring off me, smoking one cigarette after another. 

Following that night, I was terrified to be by myself.  I thank God that my wife did not leave my side for several days.  When she did, I would ask what time she was coming back.   I needed assurance to make sure she came back at the time she said she would be back, because I would be counting the hours until she returned.   I went from a man who enjoyed being by myself (usually sinning) to a man who could not be by himself for a minute.

It was around that morning, or the next day, that the voices got so bad I asked God through the name of Jesus to deliver me from the demons, and He did.  They were far less than they were before ,and the sing-song demon was gone (but came back once more for one last test),  and I was left with a demon that sounded like my thoughts,  and another that was real slow and hissing in speech.  It was telling me over and over again to check my bank account, saying, 'There is a lot of money in your account.  Go buy a car and go to Lorain Avenue.   You'll find an old man in a car dealership that will be open at 8 am.  Go buy a car from him.'

"STOP LISTENING TO VOICES!"

I got dressed and went to one bank machine, which was broken.  Then I walked to another bank machine and that one was broken also.  Then I went home and threw my jacket on the chair and called my bank for a balance, and to my horror my balance was the same.   I could almost hear the demons laughing at me.   It was like a scary movie when the people think they are out of the woods, and then all of a sudden something else happens ' and then I heard a voice say, 'Stop listening to voices!'

If you are reading this testimony and putting off until tomorrow - repenting and seeking the Lord, I strongly urge you to do it now while you have a sound mind and are able to read this testimony.   You do not know what could happen.  Jesus may always be there for you, but will you be there for Jesus with a sound mind?  The devil and his demons had my mind so controlled I did not think that I would be able to get back to Jesus, or have a normal life.   I would of have followed the devil to hell, I was so blinded.

I started this walk toward Jesus as a child, because I thought I knew everything about spirituality before.   I was wrong about a lot of things, so now I know what the Bible means about being born again. 

I try to read the Bible every day, and my wife (the same dear lady I wanted to be divorced from) and I have a Bible study together six days a week to give our soul and spirit necessary food to stay spiritually alert.  

But let me tell you, it was unnerving when I first started reading the Bible again because I still had demons in me and they would say blasphemous things while I was reading the Bible.   It sounded like my thoughts saying those things, but it wasn't.  My thoughts are quiet.   I just keep on going, knowing my heart was seeking Jesus the whole time.

We also started going to church twice a week, and those demon voices would pop up during church service, which was scary at the time, but I still continued on with my walk toward the Lord. 

There was a time when I went to the Wednesday Bible study and I was a wreck.  I asked them to pray for me and they did.   I felt a little a better the next day.  Now ' my wife and I pray together a couple times a day, and I have repented of everything that came up during this time.

Some would ask:  'Did God do all this to you?'  My answer is, 'No - God did not do this to me.  Yes ' he allowed it to teach me some things, but I did this to myself by staying too long in my sins and turning my back on the Lord.   I did not turn my back on him because I hated Him.  Partly, I was ashamed of my sins ' but MOSTLY -- I wanted to keep doing the sin I was doing as long as I could. 

Do not take advantage of the Lord always being there for you like i did.  You might not be as fortunate as I was.  Ask Jesus back today while you can. 

I praise the Lord that Jesus told the devil he could only have me a short time, much like Satan was allowed by God to sift Peter for a short time.  It's only by the grace of God and His mercy that I did not follow the devil to the pit, just as God was merciful to Peter:

And the Lord said, 'Simon, Simon!  Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat.  But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.'  (Luke 22:31-32 NKJV)

I believe God allowed Satan to sift Peter to humble him, so that he would be more fully equipped to lead the Church after Jesus' departure back into heaven.  I also have to assume God allowed Satan to sift me as he did, for God to also humble me ' and also teach me and those reading this that God's grace and mercy and protection from demonic evil should never be taken for granted.   God can shut it off in a heartbeat. 

Praise Jesus' name forever and ever!