The following is a personal testimony from Nicole:
My name is Nicole. I am twenty eight years old and I have two beautiful children and a loving husband. This astounds me even as I type it.
I was born into a large family and my father came and went for years at a time. My mom supported us the best she could. She had to work many hours to take care of five children though.
When I was fifteen and desperate for a “father figure”, I met a guy that told me he loved me. Shortly thereafter I was pregnant and my mother kicked me out of her house when I refused to have an abortion. I had my son and struggled with raising him at 16. The father had disappeared. I worked two jobs and began using a drug that would keep me up from 7am until 2am (my work hours). When my family found out I was using drugs, they took my son away. He was given to friends in the family who adopted him with my consent.
This is when my life spiraled out of control. I felt like a complete failure. I had disappointed my son. I had given him up so easily, after all the struggle I went through to keep him. I didn’t like myself at all. I thought I was the worst person to walk the earth. I couldn’t stand to be in my own skin. Suicide was always on my mind. I just wanted to die. Instead, I met another guy. He was good. He got me off drugs and I cleaned up a bit. I was still a tortured soul. Dying inside.
Then when I was 19, my father committed suicide. I was still reeling from losing my son, now I lost a father that I never really had. Shortly after this time I became pregnant with the good guys child. I soon after miscarried. Then when I was 20, I became pregnant again. I had an abortion and continued on with my pitiful life. I was in such pain that I was numb. After a time the “good guy” was boring so I left him and began partying.
I was 21 and had nothing. No family, no children, no education, no future, no life. I was doing drugs, drinking and sleeping with a variety of men. The emptiness in my heart was not being filled by anything I was doing.
By the grace of God, my mother came back into my life. She told me that I needed to straighten up. By 22 I was doing better. I had a good job, I was off of drugs and moving into a meaningful existence.
Then my cousin who is a Christian began taking me to her church. It took a year, but some stuff began to make sense. When I was 23, I was in my beautiful apartment surrounded with all the things I had purchased honestly. Driving a nice car and off drugs and men. Yet I was still miserable and the emptiness was still in my heart. I was reading a Christian novel by Francine Rivers and one of the characters in the book reminded me of myself. She was greedy, promiscuous, and had also had an abortion. She was dying and right before she died the heroine in the book made her accept Jesus as her Savior. She was immediately freed from all the burden she had felt her whole life from all her sins. She then passed on and lived everlasting with Jesus.
I placed the book down and for the first time in my 23 years, I got on my knees. Tears began streaming down my face. Tears I never knew I had! I began asking Jesus to forgive me for all I had done. Please lord, forgive me for giving away my son, forgive me for having killed my child, please God, forgive me for all the men I slept with and all the drugs I took, the tears continued, then my body began sobbing. I continued on with my pleas of forgiveness for everything I had done. Please forgive me for all the lies I told, please forgive me for my entire pitiful existence!
In the next instance a peace, a calming, a feeling of FORGIVENESS washed over my whole being. I got up and laid on the couch, my body felt like 2 tons. I couldn’t move, I didn’t want to move. I wanted the LOVE that was rushing over my body and soul to last forever and ever. I was being cleansed. I was being forgiven. I was being BORN!
Jesus is my Savior. He is the son of God. He is the one who gave me a life. A true life. I continue to sin. No sin is bigger than the other the lord says. I continue to ask his forgiveness. But, by getting on my knees that day, I was given a life. I know have a loving husband, two beautiful children and a great group of friends and family.
PRAISE GOD! There is hope for the hopeless! I know because I was one of the Hopeless.
— Nicole