Episode 1 trial run mp3

The speaker shares their personal testimony of how they found salvation and turned their life around. They discuss their upbringing in a family that valued church and how they strayed from their faith during their rebellious years. They talk about the moment they decided to turn back to God and the transformation they experienced. They emphasize the importance of fellowship and attending church. The speaker hopes to share more testimonies to inspire others and encourage them to seek God. They invite listeners to share their own testimonies and prayer requests. They also provide information about their church and its services. They express their gratitude for God's goodness and the joy they have found in their faith. They encourage listeners to share the podcast with others, including those who may not be religious, in the hopes of inspiring and reaching more people. God is good, yes he is. He's good all the time. God is good, you know he is. He's good all the time. You can search the whole world over, no greater friend you'll find. He's not good just once in a while. He's good all the time. Oh, isn't that the truth, friends? God is good all the time. Welcome to Testimonies of the Goodness of God. I'm your host, Stephen Moore, and I'm glad to have you with us. No greater friend you'll find. He's not good just once in a while. He's good all the time. Welcome, friends. This is the very first episode of Testimonies of the Goodness of God. We welcome you and hope that you are with us every week as we publish new episodes. Each week we'll bring you new episodes of wonderful testimonies of the goodness of God and what he's been able to do for all of us, either testimonies about when we were saved and how we were saved and where we were saved or just how good he's been throughout our lifetime. We invite you to be a part of the program by dropping your testimony in email format to tgoodnessofgodatgmail.com. That's tgoodnessofgodatgmail.com. Once we get an email, we'll get right back in touch with you and see when we can set up a time to either do a phone interview or meet in person and record your testimony that way. We can meet at the church if we can set up a good time that's convenient for our listeners. Either way, we look forward to getting many, many testimonies to play for others throughout our area and maybe it'll reach even further. That's our goal. If it just helps one person, one person who's in that deep valley that's fallen away or maybe to help that one lost soul come to Christ and realize they need him to stand beside them and walk with them to get them through those low valleys. We all want to see that. If we can save one, we know what kind of rejoicing there is in heaven to save one person. One more time, the email address is tgoodnessofgodatgmail.com, tgoodnessofgodatgmail.com. We will also incorporate prayer requests. If you have a prayer request, just put it in the email along with your testimony or if you're just requesting prayer, just put us an email and we will certainly get it out to the prayer warriors we have at our church. And by the way, our church or my church, I should say, and my church family welcome you if you have a desire to go or attend a new church or if you're not going anywhere, you're more than welcome to try us out. Dodds Free Pentecostal Church, Old 122 there in Waynesville, Ohio, Pastor Jay Osborne and the rest of the congregation will be happy to have you Sundays. Sunday school, 10 a.m. Worship is at 11 and the evening service is at 6 p.m. We also have a prayer service every Wednesday at 7 p.m. Now that we have all the housekeeping items taken care of, it's time for our first testimony. I'm your host, Stephen Moore, and today I'm going to give you my testimony of how great God has been in my life and how I've become saved. It took me a long time to get saved. I was born to a single parent, to a single mom back in the 60s. Oh, what a wonderful job she did with me being a single parent. You can only imagine at that time frame in the United States that was certainly looked down upon and frowned upon, where today you see it quite often, a single mom trying to raise a child. But the fortunate thing I had is I was raised and helped through my early childhood by my grandparents and, of course, my mom. She did a fantastic job. I think we moved 26 times the first six years of my life or seven years of my life. But we lived with most of my family. Mom had 11 brothers and sisters, and the one thing that they all had in their childhood was a life in church, a church life. Most, if not all, were saved at some point in their childhood or shortly after getting out of school, but at some point they were all saved. They all had those seeds in their heart. They all knew about the Lord, and they certainly helped me and passed it along to me. And I think that is very important, obviously, throughout the life of a child during their childhood is to have that seed planted in their heart, the opportunity to go to church and to hear the Word of God and to experience the Spirit and the move of God in the church. And I certainly had that growing up in southern Kentucky near the Appalachian Mountains. We were an hour or two east of those, but we were considered in Appalachia down there where I was from. And we had a wonderful, wonderful life. We were dirt poor, but, Lord, did we have fun. And all the cousins and nieces and nephews of my mom that I grew up with just made it that much more of a great experience. But each experience and each year that I grew up, I had that seed, those seeds of the Lord planted in my heart for all to hear, for me to hear and to react to and to learn from. And it was just a wonderful time. But I never can say I was actually saved during that time, unfortunately. And mom married a young man, Ronnie Boggs, back in 1975, and we moved and migrated to the great village of Waynesville. And we married into the Boggs family there in Waynesville. And, of course, they had the same background that mom and our, the Moore side of the family did. And we were all raised in church or around church. And even if your parents didn't go to church all the time, the children certainly tried to go with the grandparents and vacation Bible schools and the holidays and those things. But we were always around it and had that seed planted inside of us. Well, as I grew up, of course, I was a child of the 80s, and the long hair and the heavy metal music, not that that had anything to do with or without my salvation. I certainly needed my salvation. But I became awful rebellious, and that's how I kept the Moore surname. I wouldn't allow my dad to adopt me at that time. I was just too stubborn and too rebellious. And while the seeds of the Lord were still inside of me, Satan certainly had a hold of my heart. And I just rebelled against authority. I turned my back with anything to do with church or learning about God and just the good things you should be doing. Now, that doesn't mean I was a bad person. That just means that I wasn't living a life that a Christian should live. I wasn't walking the path that Christ was trying to lead me down. Instead, I was on that broad path of destruction and obviously started drinking and those kind of things and got married, had two wonderful girls, and had a wonderful career. I was a deputy sheriff there in Warren County, and I don't have anything bad to say about it. I had a wonderful, wonderful career. But there about 14 years into it, and during that time, my wife, she went to church with her mom and took the children just like I was taken and planted those seeds in those little hearts. Both my daughters were saved and baptized at some point during their childhood, as was my wife. And that's just another wonderful thing, being in and around your church family and your family that does practice going to church and living what the Lord wants us to live. And that really helped out during my childhood and into my young adult life. But about 14 years into my career, I mean, of course, I was drinking and stuff during that time, but I didn't take it on the job or anything like that, and I wasn't violent at home. But during that 14th year, I finally was made to retire because of post-traumatic stress disorder. I had a bad situation happen, and I just couldn't get over it or through it. And I tell you, friends, if I would have had the Lord, I certainly would have gotten through it a lot easier than I did, ended up getting through it. Basically, I retired in 2004, a really young man. But they told me that I couldn't do law enforcement anymore. If I did, that my health would continue to deteriorate, my mental state, et cetera, and that I probably just wouldn't be able to live through it with the stress and those kind of things going on. So I finally never completely accepted it, because that's all I knew to do as an adult was law enforcement. I loved it. I still love it to this day, and I miss my friends and my comrades and my brothers-at-arms, but it was obvious that I did need to remove myself from that. And what I really needed was the Lord. I really needed to go to Him and turn to Him and repent of my sins and allow God in my heart and as my salvation. But unfortunately, I didn't. I carried on, and through all the times after I retired, it was heavy drinking, a lot of partying, a lot of brawling, a lot of just, I won't say hatred, but certainly things that I shouldn't have been doing, fighting and always looking for that fighting and stuff. And I was always yelling and screaming at home, but praise God, I didn't have any violence in me at home. I didn't mistreat my wife or children physically, although the verbal abuse must have been, and I've been told, it was pretty bad. And of course, the Lord throughout my life had pulled at my heart and tugged me and told me, you know, you need to come home, young man. You need to come to church. You need to be saved. But I just continued to turn my back on Him, unfortunately. And I became a leader in an organization. I'm not going to mention his name, but it's a wonderful organization as far as helping people, a lot of it is people helping people. But a lot of it is themed around alcohol, gambling and partying, and that's what I got into. And thought for sure I was doing good. And praise God, as the pandemic hit, we had to shut the doors for a while. And the Lord grabbed hold of me, and every time I turned the channel, I was turning it to a Christian broadcasting network or a Christian televangelist. Some of them I wouldn't listen to today, but there was a couple that I listened to. And one in particular, we grew up with back in the 70s and 80s. Mom wouldn't make us go to church, but she would make us sit and watch. Billy Graham Crusades, Jimmy Swaggart and his family, we watched them every Sunday. And looking back, that helped us. While some of the things they may do or say you may not agree with, but the one thing that we thought and still think today is that they did preach the gospel of Jesus Christ, and that helped. And so that's who I found, and I continued to watch them. And immediately lost the desire to drink, lost the desire to go party and do anything of that nature. It just didn't seem right, didn't feel right anymore. And I certainly didn't like the way my body felt after I would go drinking and partying and what have you. But I turned to the Lord, and one night I just fell to my knees and just broke out in tears and started praying and started asking, please, God, save me. Please, God, help me. I cried out for Him to enter my heart, and guess what, friends, it happened. It happened that October of 2021, and it was just a wonderful experience. And I told my wife the next day, I said, you're not going to believe what happened to me. And I told her, she said, well, good. Didn't think much else about it. And so that night I watched again and fell down on my knees, and I did this two or three times. Not that you need to do that two or three times, but it was still a wonderful experience, and I felt the presence of the Lord. I felt the Holy Spirit enter my life, you know, and enter my heart and start guiding me. And from there, you know, I knew it's time to go to church, friends. Steve, it's time to get up off your feet and go to church. But I just wasn't sure where to go. I didn't know where to go back to Waynesville. We lived a few miles out of town now over towards the Springboro area, and I just wasn't sure. So we watched more or less the TV evangelists and listened to them and read and started reading the Bible and studying the scripture, and my wife was doing it right along with me. It kind of reminded me of being home back in the 70s with mom. But we knew there was something missing, and it was the fellowship and the time and to hear the Word of God in person and to feel the Spirit of the Lord in the church during the service and during altar calls and during, you know, testimonies and those kind of things. And that's how I came up with this idea, my own testimonies in church and the testimonies I've heard of some of the saints in our church has just been absolutely tremendous. And I'm very hopeful that I can get a few of their testimonies on here as an episode and share them with you. But anyway, so we ended up going to the Dodge Free Pentecostal Church. We visited a couple other ones, but we made a decision to go there, and I tell you what, I'm glad I've never looked back and I never will turn back. I've had some low times. I've been in some deep valleys during my Christian walk, but always, always the seeds that were planted in my heart way back in the 70s, they've sprouted and they produce fruit. They become fruitful. And oh, Lord, have mercy how great that is, how fun that is, and how the joy in my heart supersedes any other joyous occasion in my lifetime. Now, my children's birth, my marriage, and plenty of other things that I've experienced have brought joy in my life, but it would have been a lot more joyful time if I could have done it as a Christian, so to speak, or as a spirit-filled person rather than a sinner that didn't know what true joy was until I was saved. Friends, that's my story, and I remember after I testified at the church, and it was one Easter, we started going on a regular basis, and I remember testifying that it was so wonderful to see the families together. My cousins and friends of mine that go to church that had their children, and their children had their children in church, and they would sit as a family in the congregation. It was just something that I desired, that I wanted, and lo and behold, the goodness of God, praise God. A year later, I had both my daughters, her husband, my grandchildren all in church with me at the same time. And one of my daughters and her husband and two kids, they go on a regular basis. In fact, they are full-fledged members of our church. And the other one, our grandkids, they come with us, and they enjoy it, and they enjoy it even more when their mom and dad is with them. So I know the Lord is working on them, and hopefully I'll have my desire, one of my prayers, where all my family will be with me during church time, and it will be just a joyous occasion to live our life on a path, that narrow way with Jesus leading the way. And praising God, and worshiping Him, and trying to help others in the same direction. But that's my testimony on how I got saved, and how my upbringing came through Christ, and how He turned me around, and how He helped me, and got me through all kinds of low points, and all kinds of trouble. And, you know, we've been preached to several times in our life, and we know it to be true in the gospel, that God will give you a way out if you're in a situation you shouldn't be in. Well, friends, I'm a living testimony to that. You can walk away. You can move. You can get out of those situations. Pray about it. Fall on your knees and pray about it. Talk to Him. Start your prayer life, and start talking to the Lord, and He'll help you. And that's my testimony, friends, and I hope you've enjoyed it, and I hope you continue to listen to us. I hope it wasn't too boring, or too out there. It shouldn't have been too far out there for you. But I look forward to doing this every week with a new testimony, a different testimony. Sometimes it may be a new testimony for me of something that may have happened, or other things that have happened through the Spirit of the Lord, and just a great testimony of how good He's been to me, because I've got many. But I'm going to try to put a good variety of different saints on here, and let you listen to and enjoy, and just regenerate you. If you're falling away, or if you're just having troubles, if you're in that deep valley, listen. Just listen to us. I hope it's not going to be any more than 15, 20 minutes. You can do it on your drive to work. You can do it at your gym as you're running on your treadmill, or riding your bicycle, or just taking your walk around the neighborhood when the weather breaks. But we hope that you use it, and enjoy it, and share it. I ask you to share it with all your friends and family. They don't have to be church. In fact, I'd love to see a lost soul listen to it, and get a little inspiration out of it, and turn to the Lord. That would be wonderful. And if that happens, friends, again, drop us a line. Drop us an email, not necessarily a line. I know that's old school. Drop us an email, tgoodnessofgod at gmail.com. I'm your host, Stephen Moore, and I appreciate you being with us. Stay blessed, my friends. Stay blessed.