I got saved when I was about 12 years old after hearing the gospel repeatedly in youth group at church. Just before I got saved they showed us a video about how awful hell is, and also preached about it, and it really rattled me. The fear of hell finally took root, and they had repeatedly preached to humble ourselves and ask Jesus to save us. So I decided to believe that Jesus is the Christ, and the only way to heaven like the Bible says, and I called upon Him to save me in the shower at home. I felt so relieved at that point, and youth group was a lot more fun for me after that. But sadly, like most people I was as the 9 out of 10 lepers in Luke 17 who were healed by Jesus, but didn’t turn back to give glory to God. My discipleship was very weak for a long, long time.
I knew I was saved. I knew that salvation was by grace through faith, not of my own works, and that I was sealed by the Holy Spirit unto the day of redemption no matter what. But I lost the joy of my salvation because I was out of church for a very long time, and wasn’t reading my Bible, or even praying that much. I’ve suffered greatly over these disobedient years, yet the Lord has been very merciful to me in so many ways. I think I’ve received mercy because the Lord knew that I would eventually come around like the prodigal son in Luke 15.
In August of 2016 I heard a man who claims the name of Christ talk in a YouTube video about how wonderful a committed marriage is. I’ve never been married, in large part because I had no serious interest in any woman who isn’t a believer, and I was never around them because I wasn’t going to church. Many times over the years I thought about how the solution to all of my problems was to get right with God, and that day I finally decided to get back into church to begin that process. In short order, through my reading online I figured out that the King James Bible is the only inerrant translation of God’s Word into English. I’ve been attending KJVO IFB churches since August of 2016, and I am currently attending Temple Baptist Church in Jacksonville, NC.
I found out about Pastor Steven Anderson by watching New World Order Bible Versions on YouTube. I was getting tossed about by every wind of doctrine back then, starving and searching for good preaching to learn from. I was listening to 4-6 hours of sermons every single day for many months. Eventually I noticed that I had lost interest in the other preachers I had been listening to. Pastor Anderson is such a great teacher and preacher, I think I’ve listened to about 400 of his sermons at this point. Pastor Steven Anderson and others like Pastors Roger Jimenez, Donnie Romero, David Berzins, and Manly Perry motivated me to become a soul-winner through their fervent preaching. I watched many of their soul-winning training sermons and seminars on YouTube. I worked on memorizing soul-winning Bible verses, put tabs in my Bible to help me to be more concise in my presentation as a beginner, and one day on my lunch break the Lord finally used me to win a man named Vernon Hailey to the Lord on March 1, 2017. I’ve led about 15 people to faith in Christ Jesus as of 07/21/2017, what an amazing honor to be used by Almighty God in that way! I’ve been traveling to soul-winning marathons as much as I can since then, and I will continue to do so. I’m very excited to travel abroad to highly receptive places like Malawi! There’s a lot more to tell, but I’ll get into that through vlogs on my YouTube channel (jmccallister1769) as time goes on.
It’s an honor to be a part of the Faithful Audio team to help get God’s Word out to more people, especially His gospel message of the free gift of salvation received only by simple, child-like faith in Jesus Christ!