Justin J. Petrick

I was honored and blessed to be able to give my testimony on Easter Sunday.  That being said, it has caused a lot of reflection.  To get you up to speed, I had lived in alcoholism and sexual addiction for over 20+ years due to an abusive childhood.  I had to drink in order to sleep from a tormented mind, and lived a promiscuous lifestyle that would make 50 shades look like a Disney novel.  That being said,  on Nov. 7th, 2012 I went to bed drunk as I always did and I woke up healed on Nov. 8th,  free of the bondage that tormented my life.

On reflecting, what gets me is that I was not seeking God nor desiring to have a relationship with Him.  In fact, as an adolescent I decided I did not need God nor a father or parents for that matter.  Everyone had rejected me as a child.  I was so angry at God because growing up I would experience Him at youth group or at youth camps, but I would go home to an abusive stepfather and it was as if God was never around.  He would be at camp with other kids, but not at home where I was getting verbally pummuled every day and where I desperately needed Him.  So, I chose not to need Him, not to rely on Him.  I chose to forget Him.  I was angry at Him for He failed me when I needed Him the most.

On the morning of Nov. 8th I learned God did not fail me.  He came to me, He met me where I was at the morning I was healed.  He sent His presence upon me, He sent His love to consume me.  His love not only healed my heart, but it cleansed my mind.  It was as if the behaviors of even yesterday were but a distant dream of the past.  I saw God, and what I saw was completely and utterly polarized from what I thought I knew of Him.  He didn’t fail me, I just never trusted Him.  I never believed in Him.  I never sought Him.  Despite all of this, His love and peace healed me that morning and showed me who He really is.

I get asked to describe that morning quite often.  And I can not.  When asked what it felt like that morning, two verses give reason why I cannot put it into words.  They are Ephesians 3:19 and Philippians 4:7:

Ephesians 3:19:   and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Philippians 4:7:  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

I woke up and there was no room in my heart for addiction because it was filled with God’s love, the fullness of God.  I also woke up to God’s peace, which cleansed, healed and protected my mind in Christ, in His love.  It is a love and peace that I experienced that passes understanding.  A love and peace that cannot be conveyed through language, for it cannot be fully understood.  So, how do you convey this love and peace that cannot be conveyed?  How do you bring an individual to this revelation that cannot be communicated?

There is only one way.

You have to live it.

Jesus came to the earth in the form of a man to convey what is beyond understanding, to exemplify this love and peace that is beyond understanding.  Jesus sent His Holy Spirit in us that we would be empowered in His love as He was in the love of God.  This is the only way to teach a love that is beyond understanding outside of God revealing it to an individual through His goodness Himself, as was done to me through the prayers of others.  This is living as light.  This is God’s love manifesting through you into the hearts and minds of others.  This is our purpose, to exemplify the peace and love of Christ.

Nothing is a more powerful example than you showing another God’s perfect love through how you live everyday life.  That is how you teach, the only way to teach a love and peace that is beyond understanding.

John 13:15: For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.

1 John 4:16-17: We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. 17By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, so also are we in this world.