My name is Kelly. Here is something that happened to me that I hope blesses you….
In 1984 after struggling for years with pornography and masturbation, I was a youth pastor in the Midwest. Working for my brother the pastor. I fought and fought with my thoughts and finally went out in my car and purchased porn. Felt horrible and tired. I was so frustrated. I tried and tried to live a clean life and just failed over and over again.
“Damn, what is the point?” I asked myself. I then sat there alone in my room and calmly prayed a new prayer to God. This was a prayer that I’ve never prayed. I prayed that He would get out of my life. I prayed that I would not be a Christian any more. I prayed and boldly asked the Holy Spirit to leave.
Then I sat there alone in my room feeling even more alone. The desire for porn was gone and it felt that God was gone too. I didn’t feel guilty but I did feel very alone.
Day after day I walked in an Oak grove talking with God. I didn’t feel like a Christian anymore and it was a weird experience talking to him outside of the “family”.
One day I felt like the Lord asked me to pile up all my sins on a scale. I piled them all up. All the selfishness, porn, etc…it was quite a pile. It was huge. My pile of sin weighed down the scale. Then the Lord asked me to put the sin of rejecting him on the other side of the scale. I did. Suddenly the scale shifted and my one sin of rejecting God outweighed all the years of porn and masturbation.
I was shocked to hear the Lord say to me, “Kelly, you hurt me more by rejecting me than all your sins of P&M. I’d rather have you part of my family all messed up than to have you free from P&M and not be part of me. Don’t ever leave me again.” I swear that I heard the heartache in His voice.
I was shocked and dazed. He wasn’t ashamed of me. He wanted me even if I was messed up and sick.
Isn’t that amazing? He’d rather have us addicted or not than to lose us. I no longer cling to him because I’m afraid to go to hell…I cling to Him because it hurts Him if I don’t.
~ Kelly