“I had decided to take my own life”
Changed by Jesus #40
By Rusty Taft, Shoreline campus
When I was 21, I was a chronic drug user, an alcoholic, and sexually promiscuous. In November of 1994, I had enough.
I was physically, spiritually, and emotionally bankrupt and void of any hope. I had decided to take my own life. While in the process of loading a shotgun at a party, a friend came into the room and tackled me. I ran out of the house, jumped into my car and took off, drunk out of my mind, just to end up at another house, snorting lines of meth.
Days later, binging on drugs and alcohol, I finally decided to go home to my parents. My parents confronted me as soon as I walked through the door. With their help, I checked into rehab. When I got out, I attended Alcoholics Anonymous almost daily. While being a member of AA, my sponsor, Tom, was always talking about this Jesus dude and wanted to share his word with me. He would try to get me to go to church with him, and finally I gave in. But I didn’t stick with it.
I met a gal at an AA meeting, and we became sexually involved, which resulted in pregnancy. My son was only three months old when he came to live with me. You see, his mom was also an alcoholic that just couldn’t stay sober, and I felt my son deserved better. After a year and a half, I was awarded sole custody of my awesome son Chase.
One day my son and I were driving home, and I noticed the church where I had gone before. I felt so empty inside! I drove into that church parking lot and checked the service times and made it back to that church on Sunday.
When I walked in, something felt right about it. And even though inside I felt worthless–unworthy of what they had to offer–I stayed anyway. One of the announcements was for a singles Bible study for people my age. For some strange reason, I forced myself to go, and wouldn’t you know it, there were people there just like me. We went around the room to tell a little about ourselves. When it came to me, I just let it all out. I was in tears. To my surprise, I didn’t scare those people away. I had made friends with a small group of people there and am still friends with them to this day.
During that time I grew to love Sundays, church, and my new friends. In time, most of my friends started going to a different church, and I found myself feeling disconnected. I stopped going to church. And after much pushing and encouraging from my friends, I made the move to Mars Hill.
Somewhere along the way, something clicked. God was always trying to work in my life, but for some reason, I just couldn’t hear him. Today I can’t wait for Sundays, and I even host a community group at my house. My house has never felt more warm and comfortable now that God is in and around the home that he provided for me.
I have asked God to forgive me for my sins and asked Jesus into my heart. I still feel undeserving of God’s love and grace, and will probably always feel that way, but it is also heartwarming to know that he loves me unconditionally. I pray every day that he will soften and change my heart and use me for his will so that I can reach out to other people that were like me: spiritually bankrupt without Jesus.
Rusty was baptized on Easter at the Shoreline campus.
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