Name: Lisa's Testimony Part 1
Uploaded: 2021-12-26T20:40:24+00:00
Duration: 19 min 44 s
Description: Hi family, this is Lisa! I’m sorry. My testimony is so long because I have so much to share about all the good God has done in my life. So, Sister Therese and Sister Jahnavi have really given me coura

2 years ago

172

Hi family, this is Lisa!

I’m sorry. My testimony is so long because I have so much to share about all the good God has done in my life. So, Sister Therese and Sister Jahnavi have really given me courage to share my testimony because in their testimonies they shared a lot of ugly stuff. And the reason it’s taken me so long to share my testimony is because I didn’t want to share the ugly stuff in my life. But listening to their testimonies made me realize how freeing it is to confess our sins to each other and still have your brothers and sister in Christ love you even after seeing all the ugly things in your life. And really it’s the ugly things in your life that make a testimony, because the ugly things show what God has redeemed us from and how beautiful His work is in our lives. And after you confess those things there’s a cleansing that takes place. And I’ve never been to confession, but this will be like my first confession, to all of you! And hopefully Mother Elisha can give me an Absolution. So, God please forgive me for all my sins, and thank you brothers and sisters for your love and prayers for me.

So, I wanted to start with my childhood. I was raised in New Mexico. The sky is what makes New Mexico so beautiful! I feel like God created New Mexico just to show off His sky. The sky looks so big, and the clouds are so puffy and it’s just gorgeous. And in my family we would drive a lot—like an hour at a time, to go to Santa Fe. So, I would be in the car on long car rides listening to Christian artist Twila Paris and admiring God’s sky. And I think the Lord on those long drives would be talking to my little heart while I was sitting in the back seat listening to Twila. And one time I had a very clear thought. The Lord was speaking to me, and He said, “What if I come back before you give your life to Me?” And I was like, “HHHHuuu… [gasp] Oh, no! Don’t come back yet Jesus!” And I asked my mom to pray with me and I accepted Jesus into my heart. And then I felt so relieved because I thought Jesus might come back before I finished the prayer [laugh]! Which was so funny.

I loved Jesus! I feel like all my life from the time I was a child, I loved Jesus. But that being said, I was misguided. I had a lot of flaws and sins that I was unaware of, because we’re all born sinful and selfish. And you know children can be selfish. So, I feel like one of my biggest sins as a child was having a self-righteous attitude. I thought myself better than everyone else and I liked pointing out what other people were doing wrong. And it’s funny seeing my kids now—they do the same. They’re always telling each other what they’re doing wrong and I’m always telling them, “Worry about yourself. It doesn’t matter what other people do; you just have to make sure you’re doing the right thing.” And I guess they get that from me. So, I didn’t realize how wrong that was when I was little.

I was also an introvert, and I was shy—not like terribly shy, but I had trouble making friends. The one good friend I had moved away, and I wasn’t told. Just one day she just wasn’t at school anymore, and I never saw her again until years later in high school. It was a miracle of God. She came up to me at a track and field event we were having with another school. She said, “Hey are you my friend Lisa from Kindergarten?” I couldn’t believe it! God knew how much it hurt my little heart to lose my best friend—my best and only friend—and He planned that just for me, because He cares about the little things. Thank you God.

So, in elementary school I would daydream a lot. And because of the daydreaming I wasn’t good in school because I wasn’t paying attention and I was lazy too. So that was a problem and I actually got held back a grade, which was super embarrassing and humbling. And it was painful too because when you get held back a grade you lose all your friends and that was difficult.

As a child I loved Jesus very much, but I was like a little kid in a kitchen trying to help daddy bake but I was making more of a mess than I was helping. And that’s kind of how I was. I loved God and I wanted to help Him, but I wasn’t doing the right things.

So then in Middle School and High School I started to get really vain. I would spend a ridiculous amount of time on my hair, and I was very boy crazy. My life was focused on finding a cute boy who would fall in love with me and adore me. And I feel like a lot of that was due to movies I had watched, like Disney movies, where they really emphasize romance and finding your true love. I didn’t realize that true love is something you need to wait for, and it’s something you need to pray for too. You don’t want to give your heart away to the wrong person, you want to wait for the person God has in mind for you. And when you wait for the person God has for you, then it’s such a blessing. So, thank God, by His mercy I didn’t marry the wrong person.

But I had two boyfriends in High School, and I realize now that I was not a good girlfriend to either of them because I was very needy for affection, and I was very manipulative to get that affection. But despite my mistakes, God used those relationships to sanctify me and grow me. I feel like I got out a lot of my flaws in those two relationships and they prepared me for marriage to my real husband. So, I’m not saying it’s good to date, but God still used it for my sanctification, because at the end of those two relationships, I started to realize, a little bit, how selfish I was and how I hadn’t really treated them very well.

So, I finished High School and then I had to decide what I was going to do with my life—and I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life. The ideal thoughts in my mind were like, “I want to marry a Christian man and we’ll go off together to be missionaries in the Amazon!” Or something like that, LOL [Laugh]. So that was in my heart, and amazingly God kind of worked it out but not at all like I expected. So, I was thinking, “What career could I use to be a missionary? Oh, well, nursing! Nurses help other people out and they take care of people in poor countries.” And it just seemed like a really great idea to me. My idea of nurses was kind people who take care of people and encourage them. So, I went off to nursing school—and that was a big mistake. My mom told me not to—she was like, “I’m not sure this is your gift.” But I didn’t listen to her. Sorry mom!

So yeah, it didn’t go well. The material was so incredibly difficult, and I did not understand anything. God has made our bodies so amazing and so complex and the stuff you have to know for nursing about all the different parts of your body and how they intricately work, was too difficult for me. Trying to learn all the material, I just didn’t even know what we were talking about. Plus, you know how I told you in elementary school I would daydream and not pay attention? I was like that in college too.

So, I did two years of nursing school and then at one point my mom came to visit me, and she took me to Disney Land. If any of you know what it’s like standing in a Disney Land line, it can easily be like an hour long wait to get on a ride. So, on one of those long waits we had a really good healthy conversation and I started to realize that nursing was not for me. But I didn’t really know what to do then. And I was still kind of in denial thinking I could do it.

So that school year went by and then it was the summertime and my mom suggested that I go and work at a camp called Mount Hermon in Northern California where the big Redwood trees are. It’s so incredibly beautiful there. It’s a Christian Conference Center, and I worked in the cafeteria as a waiter for one summer. And that was really nice. It’s such a peaceful environment where you can really meet with God. But I still had the same problems of being vain and being boy crazy. But through all of that God still loved me so much. He was so patient and understanding with me and He understood that what I was really searching for was Jesus’ love. And mentally I understood that nothing can fill the void in your heart except Jesus, but I had never personally experienced Jesus’ love. Instead, I was seeking after empty worldly love.

So, one time, at Mount Hermon, I was sitting alone talking to the Lord and I told Him that I didn’t want to do nursing school, and that honestly, what I really wanted was just to marry a good Christian man and have a family. I told the Lord, “Do You think You could bring me my future husband? And, if it’s not too much trouble, could you do it sooner than later?” That’s what I told Him [laugh]. And I kid you not, that week my future husband called me. He was a guy I had known earlier but we had never had a relationship because I was dating a different guy at the time. So, he called me, just out of the blue that week, and told me that he loved me, and he asked me if I would date him, and I was like, “Oh yes, I would love to!!!” We only dated for like three months and it was a long-distance relationship—then he asked me to marry him. I was like, “Thank you God this is just what I wanted!” So, we got married.

It turned out that he was the perfect person that God wanted me to marry. It’s funny because the perfect person that God wants you to marry isn’t necessarily your ideal person. Rather God puts people together in marriage for their sanctification. And my husband was the perfect person to sanctify me, and I was actually the perfect person to sanctify him. My husband is a chemist, and he has a very scientific mind. He’s very neat and organized, and he’s unemotional [laugh]. I’m like the opposite of all of that—I’m disorganized and very spontaneous and I was very needy for his affection. And so, our different strengths and weaknesses balanced each other out so that we had to be patient with each other. And God has really used us to sanctify each other. Looking back, I can see how my husband was the perfect person for me.

So once we got married we had kids and let me tell you—I thought I was a nice person—before I had kids. And then after I had kids I realized what a sinner I was. I was like, “Oh my goodness, I am an angry person! I don’t know how to be patient at all.” And I just realized that I was actually not a very good person, because kids just take so much patience and they’re just so ridiculous. I remember my toddler, who was old enough to know better, got into the cat food and emptied the bag out and scattered it all over the kitchen. It was bad and it took me a long time to clean up. And I got upset with him and told him, “Don’t you ever do this again!” Literally, the next day he did it again and emptied the whole bag of cat food all over the kitchen again. And I was just in disbelief, like, “Oh my goodness Lord, what am I supposed to do?” So, nothing grows you in patience and sanctification like kids do. They are a fast track to sanctification. Getting up at all hours of the night with a newborn. God, thank you for helping me through those baby years. I couldn’t have done it without Your help.

I wanted to share about God’s mercy over my first pregnancy. When I was delivering I got preeclampsia and it was a life-threatening situation. My parents were driving from New Mexico to Missouri to come see the new baby, and they hit a deer. Now, Mother Clare has taught us about Simon’s Cross—how when bad things happen—oftentimes God is taking our sufferings and turning them into graces for another soul. That’s how I feel like it was in this situation. My parents were not seriously injured from the accident, but it was a big ordeal getting their car fixed and everything. But I feel like God turned their suffering that night into grace to save my life and my baby’s life. My delivery with my third baby was life threatening too. I was due and they had broken my water, but then my contractions stopped. When the doctor went to check the baby, she said I needed to have an emergency C-section, immediately! As they were carting me down to the operating room my mind was in a panic, and I tried to remember if I had known anyone who had had a C-section before and very clearly my husband’s mom came to mind. She had had a C-section with her twins, and I had this reassuring feeling that if she could do it and everything was ok with her then everything would be alright with me too. And it was. She was probably praying for me from Heaven. Life threatening serious situations really grow your trust in the Lord. Although at this point I had not given much thought to God’s faithfulness and how grateful I should be to Him. Lord forgive me for all the times I’ve failed to thank You for so many things big and small.

So, moving on to my marriage it went well in the beginning because we were both starry eyed, in love. But then my bad character traits of being overly needy for his affection started to come out. And I was also manipulative to get that affection—and also, very vain, of course. So, we just started having more arguments and it started getting more and more difficult. And I started getting more and more hurt. My husband loved me very much, but I wanted him to love me in the way that I wanted to be loved. I didn’t let him be the person God made him to be.

So, one day the breaking point came over a very little argument. And it wasn’t the argument, it was the fact that he didn’t care about how I felt. And in that moment I came to the realization that my husband was not going to fill this void in my heart. It was a breaking moment from God. In that moment I just released him. I realized that he was not the solution to what I needed. From that moment forward I stopped putting any sort of demand on my husband. I was so extremely hurt, and I didn’t know what to do.

Looking back, I really feel like someone had been praying a long time for me, and probably Blessed Mother had been praying for me too. And that moment was the point when all of the prayers came to fruition. That was the turning point in my life—that one little argument.

So, I didn’t know what to do, but the Holy Spirit had put it on my mind to start listening to the audio Bible. And I decided to start listening to the section from Romans to Jude because I was not familiar with that section. As I listened I wouldn’t even be paying attention; I would just put it on and fall asleep listening to it for the sake of comfort. I just needed comfort, and I didn’t know how to get it. I listened to that section three times in the span of two or three weeks and as I was listening it was like I was being washed. That’s how it felt like—listening to God’s Word is like being washed. I felt like my spirit was being washed, my soul was being washed. And I just started to heal. And by the third time I listened to it I actually started paying attention to what it was saying. I started to revive, and that was the beginning of getting on fire for God!

So, after I listened to that section three times over, two things really stood out to me. First, was how many times it said not to judge others. It says that so many times and I realized how judgmental I was of other people. And I mentioned that earlier, how I was self-righteous and liked correcting other people. So, after listening to the Bible, I made a strong resolution in my heart not to say or think anything judgmental about anyone else. And God gave me a special grace to carry out that resolution, though not quite perfectly I might add, lest I fall into pride. But it was a significant improvement! Thank you God for rescuing me from that ugly attitude. And you know what the Bible says, “Mercy triumphs over judgement.”

Also, I watched some Mary K. Baxter testimonies of when the Lord showed her Hell and that really put some much-needed holy fear in me. Up until then I had been taught the “grease grace gospel” of once saved always saved. Repentance and perseverance in our faith was not taught. My church had reassured me that all my sins had been covered by Jesus’ blood. But the reality was, I had repented for hardly anything in years, and whenever I had an argument with my husband I would only apologize to him if he apologized first, and even then I wouldn’t accept his apology unless it was to my satisfaction.

In those earlier days I remember the first time I got really drunk. I probably had alcohol poisoning I was so drunk, and I remember I saw a bunch of shadowy figures with their arms outstretched towards me. I realize now that they were demons. They were trying to grab me, but some force kept them at bay. I really believe I could have died and gone to Hell that night, but God’s mercy saved me. Now Protestants would say, if you walk away from God then you were never really saved in the first place. But that can’t buy that. I know that I know that little me was saved that day when I asked Jesus into my heart. I had His Holy Spirit telling me not to watch certain bad shows, and not to do certain things but I willfully chose to go against my conscience and do what I wanted to do. Not only that but I had corrupted myself with inappropriate sexual fantasies as well as masturbation. Which is embarrassing to say, but now you can see and understand all that Jesus has saved me from. And as the Lord began turning my life around He slowly started bringing up these sins and other sins one at a time and having me repent for them. And I repented in earnest! I repented for things I had never even considered to be sins before, such as gluttony and complaining. I did a lot of complaining, and you wouldn’t believe how much junk food I could eat. And the Lord in His mercy sent me a cross of having to go gluten free because of health issues. He knew that I didn’t have enough self-control to overcome this vice and this cross was His provision for me. Going gluten free cut out the majority of my favorite foods. So, we mustn’t complain when God allows difficult things in our lives. He works all things out for our good and for our sanctification. This is easier said than done though, but God has loving pity on us, knowing our frames that we are but dust. And He has given me this Rhema many times when I have fallen. But yeah, repentance is so important. It is the beginning of following Jesus.

So, continuing on, the second thing that really stood out to me when I listened to the Bible was how much it talks about the gifts of the Holy Spirit and in particular the gift of tongues—it mentions it quite a bit. I was really surprised because I had never personally heard anyone speak in tongues or any of this stuff. But it was in God’s word. So, I told the Lord, “If this is real, would you please give me the gift of tongues.” So, I continued to ask for that and then my curiosity led me to videos on YouTube about speaking in tongues and I listened to this pastor who said, “Speaking in tongues is speaking gibberish with the faith that it is not gibberish, it is in fact the Holy Spirit speaking through you.

[Continued in part 2]

IN CASE THE CHANNEL IS PERMANENTLY TAKEN DOWN PLEASE follow us now for updates!
SUBSCRIBE -
Our Second Youtube Channel: Heartdwellers Ghana
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLwr_WlMEgGvaBJcd-jr3LA Rumble Channel: Heartdwellers Ghana
https://rumble.com/c/c-615057 Bitchute Channel: https://www.bitchute.com/channel/WoVWU1hFxOXd/

VISIT
Website: www.HeartdwellersGhana.org
Email: HeartdwellersGhana@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/heartdwellersghana/
https://www.facebook.com/HeartdwellersGhana
https://www.pinterest.com/heartdwellersghana/
Https://www.OurmotherofMercydevotion.org

BECOME A SOWING PARTNER AND HELP US BUILD THIS FAMILY!
CITY OF GOD: SACRED HEART REFUGE IN GHANA
To send check: PO Box 1113 Taos, NM 87571
to Heartdwellers, and memo to Heartdwellers Ghana

If you would like to donate towards the mission City Of God: Sacred Heart Refuge in Ghana or to this ministry 🙏🌹💓💐
Follow this link to PayPal,
https://www.paypal.com/donate/?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=CVYBNCG3XNRX4&source=url

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Do you enjoy seeing messages from Jesus???

We are an extension of Heartdwellers ministry, Still Small Voice by Clare & Ezekiel Dubois. Please visit our parent website Heartdwellers.org for over 1,000 more, with Pdf’s and MP3’s of the messages and many other benefits, like a Rhema page, Testimonies, Outreach, Books and more!

Still Small Voice (bitchute.com)
https://www.bitchute.com/channel/LFuaxHA1eF3k/

HEARTDWELLERS WEBSITE:
https://www.heartdwellers.org/ 
Heartdwellers Youtube Channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCca4gAoHXDw6ioLSMvEIAFQ

Heartdwellers Texas www.HeartdwellersTexas.org

Heartdwellers Caribbean https://godlovesus771.wixsite.com/heartdwellers-c
  Heartdwellers Louisiana https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjvXz4b129MTcvnbaGRy_hw

Heartdwellers Philippines
https://youtube.com/channel/UC1oH25MWYDyhfB6jfzPywcw

Heartdwellers Germany
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvq6vf3JRTP-gJMhXTEoe3g

Heartdwellers Russia Жители Сердца
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJT0VFPBDbYfbUcHRf7KpVg

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Follow our Translators Ministries:

Heartdwellers French
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUY6mt5yoo7TgfQwa7pI07A

Heartdwellers German
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7TjJV6bOA-nNRIey45nX3g

Habitantesdecorazon
https://youtube.com/channel/UCfh6Qcujs8CZ4oWv8B77wKA

Heartdwellers Spanish on Vimeo
https://vimeo.com/user110776759
https://www.instagram.com/heartdwellers_spanish/