A Will To Live

A spirit of perversion is on the rise. These are the latter days. It seems as if there are an increased number of pedophiles who are assaulting our children every day.

At the age of six, I also became a victim of a pedophile. Though I walked away with my life, the overwhelming shame caused a spiritual death in me. I had no reason to live, or at least that is what I thought. I knew Jesus before I was abused. I never had a father in my life. Jesus was the only father I had ever known. My daddy is a king. I cried out to Him during and after I survived the abuse. I had a mother who was also very abusive. She had a Bible in one hand and the barrel of a gun pressed to my head with the other. After facing the emotional death of the sexual abuse, I always had to face the fear of a physical death, because my mother was threatening to take my life. I had no one I could turn to. I was too afraid and too ashamed of my past to tell anyone.

The apostle Paul said, “Though they preach the word with selfish gains, it is still the word of God.” My abusive mother would preach Jesus and the Bible to us. She would sneak out at night to be with married men and send us off to church on Sunday morning. I thank God for those Sundays. I learned so much about Jesus. I learned that His life of love was a total contradiction of the life of abuse that my mother projected. I decided to never go outside to play in the front yard, because I was so ashamed of my past.

I spent several years emotionally and physically confined to the living room window of my home, watching my brother and sister play with the other kids in the front yard. I shed so many tears of shame in that window.

The shame became overwhelming. When school let out, I was determined to kill myself. I wanted to die, but I did not know how to kill myself, so I rode my bike onto the freeway. I stopped in the middle of the freeway crying. I closed my eyes while praying for God to take my life. I could hear the tires of cars spinning out of control while I clutched the handlebars of my bike. A van spun out of control and stopped only a few feet away from my bike. A man jumped out of a van, screaming and cursing at me. A woman jumped out of a car. She ran over to the angry man. She pushed the man away from me. She tried to explain to the man and the other drivers that I was not being a bad kid, but that I was experiencing an emotional breakdown. All of a sudden, my brother burst through the crowd and grabbed me. He had his friends form a circle around me with their bikes. He told his friends to not let me off the curb on my bike. I rode my bike in the grass all the way home.

My brother never told my mother of my suicide attempt. I had never told my brother or my mother of the sexual abuse. I knew that my brother would have killed the man that had abused me, so I never told him. I feared his going to jail for me. I really needed my brother in my life. He was the only person I trusted.

My mother was always putting the cold barrel of a gun to my head. She threatened to blow my head off. One day, I begged her to pull the trigger. She could not begin to know how badly I wanted to die. She said that she would not kill me, but she would shoot my arm off. I told her that if she could live with herself after shooting my arm off, then she should pull the trigger. She began to look powerless, because she knew that I was not afraid to die.

The day I left home, I remember my mother pointing a Snubnose 38 to my head as she cursed at me. I had just gotten a full-time job, and she wanted my whole paycheck. She claimed that Jesus was living in her. I told her that if Jesus was truly in her, He would not be pointing a gun to my head and cursing me out like a sailor. When I told her that, she got off my bed and went to her room crying. I was not afraid of that gun anymore. I was not afraid to die. 

I had suicidal tendencies throughout my teenage and young adult years, but I had a deep relationship with Jesus Christ. I knew that suicide was a sin that could keep me from eternal life with Him. My love for Jesus was my only reason to live.

A few years ago, I had the honor of burying my mother. I love my mother. She was also a victim of abuse. She did not know any better. She taught me about Jesus. I was able to see a clear picture of who Jesus was through all of the confusion. As an adult, I told my mother of my abuse. She broke down in tears. I also told my brother. He said it explained why I had confined myself to my room and the extreme isolation.

The devil tried to take my life on several occasions as a child. The Bible says to trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In my own understanding, I had no reason to live, but when God healed my broken heart, my life had a purpose.

Several years ago, I was involved in a motorcycle accident. Once again, the devil tried to take my life. I was sliding down the freeway after being run over by a four-door pickup. The bike was also wedged under the truck. This time was different—I wanted to live. I wanted to be here to protect my family and raise my children. Though I accepted my fate, God had a different plan for my life.

I was dragged about 125 feet while under a pickup truck. Five men pushed the truck off me. I crawled from under the truck with my own strength to the sound of hundreds of car horns and cheers from the crowed on the freeway. The doctors were shocked to find no internal bleeding or broken bones.

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