March 21, 2005 - True Grace

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True Grace
By Bradley Titus
March 21, 2005

This is a story for all those that blew it. I’m one of those that really screwed up (I’ll talk about that later). But for all of you that feel like you’ve messed up too much, or you’ve ruined what God called you to do (again, I can relate), just listen to what I have to say and let me encourage you a little bit.

I was born and raised in a Pentecostal home. I was dedicated as a baby, and grew up in the United Pentecostal Church. I have great parents who love me, each other, and God with all their hearts, and they have always done everything they could to help me. They involved me in Bible Quizzing, with the youth group, and even in the music ministry at my church. From a child, I grew up learning the Word of God, and when I was about 14 years old, I felt a calling to the ministry.

When I started college, I became involved with the College Republicans, and, eventually, connected with the Indiana State Republican Party. I started meeting all the right people, I knew all the right things to say, and I was getting invited to more and more functions, parties, and fundraisers. The more involved I was with the politics, the more I wanted to fit in, so I started drinking and smoking at the parties. Eventually, I started smoking on a regular basis, found myself hooked on the nicotine, and began drinking nearly every day. This behavior lasted for about seven months until my parents found out, and I vowed to quit. I never stopped going to church, but I was spiritually dead.

I spent the next four months clean and sober, and was able to get reinvolved again at the church. Things started going well for me, but I never turned back to God, and I never gave my life completely over to Him. I continued to be involved with the Republican Party, started writing a weekly column for the school paper, and stopped focusing on church and the work I was doing there. To make a long and highly personal story short, I found that I still wasn’t happy, and still felt like something was missing, but there was no way that I could get back to God.

Things grew worse, and after a weekend spent battling depression in a drunken stupor, I’d had enough. On Sunday, I cried out to God, and really got a hold of Him. I prayed through for the first time in a long time, and asked Him what I needed to do. I knew about a program in California, a men’s drug and alcohol rehabilitation program called Lifeline, sponsored by the Family Life Center Apostolic Church. God spoke to my heart in an incredibly clear way, and so I obeyed, and flew from Indianapolis to California for a year to enter rehab.

I left my friends, my family, my church, and my schooling to follow God’s call, and I found something out—you can never fall so low that God cannot pick you up. Here I am, writing this from rehab. I have been here for four months, and God has done a marvelous work in my life. Since I’ve been here, I have had the opportunity to travel to other churches and minister with a band of other residents in the program (my pick-up line: “I’m in rehab and I’m in a band.”). I’ve represented the program at court when some of the other residents have criminal cases pending, and I am the Coordinator of the Junior Bible Quizzing program. I thought my life was over when I left Indiana, but I’ve found that God has so much more in store for me than I could ever imagine.

There is nothing that God cannot overcome, and His grace is sufficient for all your needs. It doesn’t matter what you’ve done, His blood can cover your sin. His blood can cover your alcoholism. His blood can cover your drug addiction. His blood can cover your lies, and your infidelity, and your abuse; no matter what your past holds, His blood can still flow. All you have to do is accept His love, accept His grace, accept His mercy, and allow yourself to be forgiven. If God can forgive me, and still use me, and if God can forgive the apostle Peter (John 21), and still use him, then I know that God can forgive and use you for His kingdom.

ninetyandnine.com

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Bradley Titus is a 22 year-old resident of Lifeline Outreach Ministries. When he has finished his time in the program, he plans to return to Indiana, finish his Bachelor’s degree, and attend Indiana Bible College. He enjoys sunsets and long walks on the beach.