My Testimony

Eighteen years ago my life was a mess. I had been living my life my way, without any regard to Yahweh. I didn’t even know who Yahweh was. I believed there was a creator, known by me, as the Father, and I believed He had a son Jesus who loved me. I believed this, because this is what I was brought up to believe, not because it was revealed to me by Yahweh. I believed that truth was to be found in protestant churches. I had false ideas brought about by false teaching. At that time I was not attending any church, and as I mentioned earlier my life was a mess. I felt I could not go on living anymore. While lying on my bed in distress, I cried out to the Father in Heaven and asked for His help. I heard a voice say “Why should I help you, you never listen to Me.” At that point I realized I was a sinner and needed forgiveness. I prayed and told the Father that I was sorry that I never listened to Him and asked for His forgiveness. I also told Him that if He wanted me to go to church that He would have to show me where to go. As I mentioned earlier I had preconceived ideas about where I would find the truth. Yahweh had to teach me that my ideas were wrong, so He lead me by way of the protestant churches. I believe He did this so that I might learn the truth about protestant churches. I believe Yahweh has been with me from that time, teaching me His truth. As I am a slow learner it has taken 18 years for me to get where I am today. He first led me to a Presbyterian church. I was in that church for 7 years, during which time Yahweh showed me, through study of His Word that many things being taught in that church were not according to Scripture. The reason I stayed so long in that church was because I believed that was where Yahweh wanted me to be. At this point in time I did not know Yahweh’s name, but as I do now, I will use His name when speaking of Him. I believe it was Yahweh leading me not the god of Christianity. The reason I say this is because Yahweh showed me the truth in His Word even when lies were being preached. I used to wonder why I could see certain things in the Scriptures when others could not. This bothered me at first. I didn’t want to be different to the others. I accepted certain things taught by the ministers because I thought that they knew better than me. Though I did not agree with every thing they taught, I conformed to their teaching. After 7 years there was a split in the church over what the minister was preaching. The minister was kicked out by the congregation, because he taught that the commandments were to be obeyed. At that time Yahweh showed me that He no longer wanted me to be in that church. I did not know where to go from there and a friend told me of a Presbyterian reformed church that obeyed the commandments, of course they did not obey the Sabbath commandment, as they taught, as all protestant churches do, that the Sabbath was changed by Jesus. This teaching bothered me, but at this point I did not understand the truth about the Sabbath, and I accepted the teaching of the minister. I want to point out that the church was not teaching me Yahweh’s truth during this time, Yahweh was teaching me His truth, through the study of His Word. There was conflict between what the church was teaching, and what Yahweh was teaching. As I didn’t know any better, and thought that the ministers should know better than I, I was deceived by their teaching. This is why I believe, I stayed with them for so long. I went to the Presbyterian reformed church for about 1 year. During which time Yahweh further showed me, that they were not obeying His commandments or even listening to His teaching, but rather obeying the commandments of man. They held to the teaching of Calvin, over and above the teaching of Yahweh. One such teaching was that adult baptism was not necessary, and infant baptism was sufficient. Yahweh showed me that this and other things being taught were not correct. I wanted to know Yahweh’s truth. I prayed to the Father, that He would lead me in paths of righteousness for His name sake. This has always been my prayer since that day 18 years ago, when Yahweh showed me that I was a sinner. He was showing me slowly, as I could accept it, that what the Protestant churches were teaching was not truth but error. From there I went to a Brethren fellowship, because I heard that they taught adult baptism, and I believed that Yahweh was leading me there, because every time I read the Scriptures the word brethren jumped out at me. Yahweh was telling me that He wanted me to fellowship with the brethren. I did not know who the brethren were. I assumed that they were the Brethren fellowship. It was not long before Yahweh showed me that my preconceived ideas were not correct. The Brethren fellowships were not the brethren Yahweh wanted me to fellowship with. It took me another 2 years to understand what Yahweh was trying to teach me concerning the Brethren fellowships, that they also were not teaching His truth. At the end of 2 years, Yahweh showed me that I must keep His Sabbaths, and His Set Apart Days. He first showed me this via the teaching of the Church of God churches. I believe He led me this way, because He wanted to show me that this church also was teaching false doctrine, and not teaching the Truth. I was with these churches for another 5 years, before I finally grasped from Yahweh’s teaching, how to determine a false prophet, and discovered that Mr. Armstrong who was the founder of this church was a false prophet. Yahweh showed me that none of these churches were teaching His truth. I prayed and asked Yahweh to show me where His truth was being taught. I searched the internet for truth. This is when Yahweh led me to the truth about His name and His Son’s name. I have not yet found a church which teaches Yahweh’s truth, and I don’t believe that I will, but I do believe that there are people out there searching for the truth. Only Yahweh can lead us to His truth. We are called out of false teaching to obey Yahweh. We should reject all of the false teaching we have learned in the past, and accept only what Yahweh has taught us through His Word. It is hard to find believers who have rejected the lies and hold only to the truth. I pray that all of you desire to please Yahweh, and worship Him according to His Will, and not man’s will. I believe some of you do, but some of you are still holding on to false teaching. I pray that Yahweh will lead you all, and guide you all in His truth, according to His will. I am far from perfect, but it is my heart’s desire to please and obey Yahweh, and I also hope, that I might get to know and fellowship with others, that have that same desire. If we desire His will in our lives we will not quarrel about what is truth, but will pray to Yahweh, and search diligently to find His truth. I still have much to learn from Yahweh, and I pray that we can help and encourage each other in our search for Yahweh’s truth.

Shalom to all,
Sandra.