I’ll be updating my testimony soon. For now, I’ve replaced the older version with what I shared at my baptism at Grace Community Church on February 27, 2022.
My name is Jeremiah, and I was born into an East SF Bay Area home in which my parents professed Christ. I grew up learning what it meant to be a Christian at home, at school, and at church. Additionally, I had prayed the Sinner’s Prayer many times, but no change ever occurred. My life did not fulfill Philippians 2:12-13, which says that by God working in me, I would “work out [my] own salvation with fear and trembling.” I hated my younger siblings and would beat them, sometimes for the joy of it, and I was rebellious towards my parents, often getting disciplined. As a child of the devil, I responded with rage, shouting words of violence against my family. I was an annoying boy, led by my emotions to carry out whatever act felt satisfying to my flesh. At this point in my life, God had not yet changed my heart; my faith was dead.
When I was 12, I went to Sequoia Brigade Camp, and I had a conversation about hobbies with a camp counselor, who would become my mentor. Seeing how my hobbies were internet-based, he asked if I was involved in a certain area of sin. Upon my admission, we conversed for a while and ended in prayer. That day I decided to seriously have a relationship with Christ because He renewed my heart with a desire to love and please Him.
After camp ended, as I started reading God’s Word daily, the Lord began to sanctify me, giving me a love for His Word and the church. As a result, I stopped beating on my siblings, and my attitude toward my parents over the years improved. Since then, Yahweh has helped me learn to communicate with others and to respond to my emotions with contentment in Him. To this day, I still struggle in these areas, but I know that as I follow Christ, that He will preserve me in Him and transform me into a mature man of God, ready and able to glorify and enjoy Him, so that everything works out for my good and His glory.