Wonderful testimony, God has always been there for you, and always will. May the Lord continue to bless you and your family, keep the Faith brother..Peace
i am blessed my your testimony!! may God continue to show Himself strong & may you continue to be a witness...God can use anyone, anytime & anywhere!! Be Blessed!!
What a powerful testimony you have! I pray that God will continue to work wonderous miracles in you and your family's life. I also pray Holy God that you would have this couple draw ever nearer to You, that You will continue to change them from Glory to Glory. I pray for a supernatural hedge of protection around them and those who You send to them. I pray for You to help them prioritize their lives for the most effective service, worship and Holy walk with You Lord. All for Your Glory! I thank You that You have answered this prayer. What a Mighty and Powerful God You are! In Jesus' name I pray in full confidence that it is finished.
-Amen
Hi John,
Your testimony blessed me so much. God has truly made Himself known in and through your life. Keep the faith, and be encouraged that everything you put your hand to will be blessed of the Lord.
I pray God continues to bless the work of your hand!
Take care my friend,
Michele
I will pray for your jail ministry.I know what a blessing it is.I gave my life to serving God while serving time.Now I go back in every sat. with the gospel.Oh, and happy late birthday! mine was the 26.
Congrats on your invite to Pakistan! There is a awesome Bishop on the site who has done a lot for Pakistan. I'll get you his name if you'd like to connect with him! Blessings, Theresa
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John David's Testimony
fs20 I grew up in middle Knoxville; the neighborhood was Lonsdale, As a young/boy I was hard to control. At five years old I would run around the neighborhood. My older sister had to watch me; she could not keep me from doing what I wanted to do. My mother would take me to church ever Sunday, but I would not get much out of it. As I got older the word started to get through to me. At 9 years old I was saved and started to read the Bible. I felt God working in my life; the other kids in my neighborhood would tease me. There were a lot of gangs that ran around where I lived. If you did not joined one of these gangs they would beat you up every day. After a lot of beatings I would try to avoid the gangs, but I had to go to school, outside to play and to the store and other places. I wanted to serve God but the life in my neighborhood started to pull me down. I started to run around with some of the gang members, They would teach me how to steal and fight. I started to drink beer at 12 years old, getting wilder all the time. At 13 years old I joined a gang, called the Travelers. We where well known for carrying knives and using them, I was cut more than once, I would also cut other people if I had to, and I picked up the nickname "knife". I started Rule High School in the seventh grade 1966; it was the first year in that it was integrated. There were only 12 blacks that first year. The police had to lead the blacks to school every/day. The first day of school I was suspended for fighting a black guy. I was showing off to the other gang members, Rule High School had grades 7 through 12, which meant 13 years through 19-year people where put together. I quickly developed a name of being one of the tough guys. I was suspended so many times at Rule that they had papers ready before I even got to the office. I quit school in the 11th grade, I met my soon to be wife Sheila that year. I fell in love with her quickly; she came from a large family five brothers and five sisters. We dated for two years and got married, a short time later my daughter was born. Having that responsibility started to change me, I went to work at Trailways bus station. I did pretty well for four years, At 21 years old I joined the Knoxville Fire Department. I went to fire fighting school and began working at fire Hall No. 5 in the worse part of Knoxville. That same year my dad was diagnosed with cancer, I watched him slowly die for a year; we were not that close but watching him slowly die of cancer really did a number on me. I started to see some of my old gang members; they were into drugs at this time. I smoked my first joint of marijuana; it made me forget most of my problems. Before long I was smoking every day except when I was working. I started to try other drugs like L. S. D., uppers, downers, but marijuana was my drug of choice. I tried cocaine, almost any drug you can name I tried. People in the drug business that knew me trusted me so it was not hard to find the best marijuana. At first I would buy just for my habit, but other people would ask me to get their marijuana too. The people I was buying from told me that I was crazy to sell at the price I was paying them, I started selling for more than I was paying. I started to make easy money; more and more people wanted to buy marijuana from me. The big-time dealers saw that I was good business and they could trust me. Soon I had people selling for me, Before long my job on the fire department was getting in the way of my marijuana business. So I quit the fire department after four years of service. I started selling marijuana full time, importing pot from Mexico, Columbia, Jamaica, Africa, Thailand, Hawaii and buying from local growers. There where two other dealers that I was friends with, Moonlight and Kenny, We where like three brothers. Moonlight was one of the best people I ever knew He would do anything for you, People would take advantage of his good heart. One of his so-called friends wanted to steal his drugs so he gave him an overdose of LSD. His parents had sent him to the University of Tennessee to get a college degree, His head was so messed up, and he was so ashamed he put himself in Eastern State Mental Hospital, When he found out that his parents were coming to get him he committed suicide by hanging himself. I had lost other friends that were killed in fights but this was like losing a brother. About six months after I left the fire department I was arrested for the first time. I was living in a trailer on a farm in West Knoxville. The Knoxville narcotics squad served a search warrant on my trailer and fount over 5000 dollars in marijuana, Today 5000 dollars worth of marijuana is not that much, but in 1977 it was one of the largest busts of the year. I was taken to Knox County jail, spending about 24 hours before making bond. The first thing I did was hire the best lawyer in Knoxville. I bought my way out of the bust. So this did not change much about how I was doing business, I would just move into a different location. By this time I was smoking from the time that I awoke to the time I went to bed. The marijuana that I was smoking was always the very best available, I would pay what ever the going price was for the best. I was making so much money that I could buy anything I wanted. Money meant nothing to me! I would go on spending sprees with hundreds of dollars. We would go on vacation to Florida for three weeks at a time, We would go to the beach, Disney World, Sea World, rent a boat to go fishing in the ocean at 500 dollars a day. We would stay in hotels that charge three hundred dollars a day; sometimes I would spend ten thousand dollars in a week on vacation. I was well known by the Knoxville narcotics squad, so I had to keep on the moved. Sometimes I would rent more than one house at a time; I would live in big apartment complexes so that all the people coming and going would not be noticed. Kenny and I were doing lots of business together. He was into hard drugs like downers and cocaine. He knew a lot of the motorcycle gangs and introduced me to them. I became friends with a lot of outlaw motorcycle members. They liked me because I was never scared of them. And also I had the best marijuana that could be fount. Kenny was in a middle of a divorce, and was hiding from the lawyers that were after his money in the divorce. He came to my house one night really messed up on his motorcycle. I told "Him you are going to kill yourself riding messed up". A week later he wrecked his motorcycle at over 100 miles hour on Oak Ridge highway in Karns, he was killed instantly, I had to bury my good friend. Now the people I was doing business with were not friends and could not be trusted. I met some growers in Newport Tennessee that where members of the Dixie Mafia. They had heard of me and knew I could be trusted. So before I knew it I was doing business with the Dixie Mafia. So one hand was doing business with the outlaw motorcycle gang, while the other hand was doing business with the Dixie Mafia. I was living in a house on the Lake in West Knoxville in 1979 when the Knoxville narcotics squad served a search warrant on my house finding marijuana and downers. Here I was in jail for the second time. So I hire my good lawyer again and got out of this bust too. So I moved back to Lonsdale for a short time. It wasn't long before I was doing business as usual. I have three brothers Bill, Jack, Bob, the oldest was Bob then Bill, Jack and I was the youngest. Bill had gone into the Army, while he was there he had a nervous breakdown. My mother went to get him; she had to stay at the hospital with him for three months. He had a problem with alcohol; the whole family would try to get him to stop drinking. He felt so bad that he couldn't stop that one-day he took a lot of pills and hung himself. My brother Jack fount him, I really feel bad that I didn't see the pain he was in. I was too busy getting high and making money. By this time I had bought a farm of 30 acres in Dandridge Tennessee. I had a Corvette, bass boat, my daughter had a Trans-A.M., and I had a four-wheel-drive truck. The farm was very secluded, and out of the Knoxville narcotics territory. I kept telling myself that I could quit smoking marijuana anytime I wanted to, but I always would smoke every day. Finally I realized that I couldn't quit on my own. I started to pray to God to help me, but I didn't know how he would do it. One day a man called me and wanted 50 pounds of marijuana, I knew he could not be trusted but greed and being so high took over my judgment. I didn't know it but God was about to get my attention. I told him that I would meet him at a house on a farm that was close to mind. I knew something was wrong but I couldn't stop myself. He came to look at the marijuana and took a sample he said to show his partner that was waiting at the interstate. My mind was telling me to run but my body would not move. I was looking out the window when I seen all the policeman coming, it was the FBI, TBI narcotics squad. Here I was in a house with all this marijuana so what did I do I set the house on fire. The FBI was trying to knock the door down and I was trying to keep them out all the time the house was burning. Now when I look back at it I know Angels were all around me protecting me from death. At the same time that the FBI was serving the search warrant on the house I was in they were serving a search warrant on a trailer that was on my farm. I had told Sheila if the police came up our driveway to set the trailer on fire. She saw the police coming up the driveway so she did what I told her. I had money, guns, and ammunition by the box full in the trailer. She poured gasoline that I had left for her throughout the trailer and set it on fire. The FBI was trying to get in and she was trying to get out. The door she was trying to get out of was a steel door that I had put in so no one could kick it down it had several locks one at the top that Sheila couldn't reach to this day I know there's no way she could have got out of this door so I know God opened this door. Somehow her clothes caught on fire but Angels were protecting her. She got out rolled on the ground and put her clothes fire out. Her clothes were badly burned but there wasn't one spot on her that got burn not even one hair on her head. The FBI had broken down the door on the house I was in pulling me out of the burning house by the hair of my head. They put handcuffs on me with a gun at my head; I could see the flames in the sky coming from my trailer at the other farm. I can hear gunshots and I didn't know if Sheila was alive or dead. I didn't know it but what I was hearing was the ammunition exploding in my trailer. I asked the FBI if my wife was okay but they would not tell me. I thought I was on my way to jail but they didn't take me there at first, they took me to a motel room off the interstate. They wanted to try and make me a informer, they knew that I was involved with the outlaw motorcycle gang, and the Dixie Mafia. If they could make me talk they can bust a lot of people. The one thing I learned over the years is if you do the crime you do the time and I was not going to talk on anyone. When they saw that I wasn't going to break that easy they took me to the Knox County jail. They put me in a cell with 30 people sleeping on the floor. They were so many people I didn't have a place to lay down. So I stood up all-night and watched the news the next morning when my face on the TV. I still didn't know if Sheila was alive or dead. Finally I got to make a phone call and I found out that she was still alive. They took me to a court hearing that day and I made 25 thousands dollar bond. I had hit the big-time and God was getting my attention. When I talk to my lawyer he said getting out of a federal charge was near to impossible. So I had to come to realization that I was on my way to prison this time. My wife Sheila and daughter Melissa got on their knees with me to pray. I was praying for God to take away by drug addiction when I could feel Gods hands on my shoulders as he took my addiction away. From that day in 1989 I have not took drugs. I started going to church at West Haven Baptist every Sunday. My brother Jack was a member there; he had always tried to get me to do what was right. My daughter Melissa was saved during this time. I started to feel the power of God in my life. My wife Sheila was saved at this time to, they wanted to be Baptize together and my mother was so happy that they had been saved she wanted to be Baptize with them. So I got to see my mother and my wife and daughter Baptize at the same time. I still knew I was going to jail soon but I also knew God was going to take care of my family and me. But Satan wasn't through with me yet; about six weeks later early one morning I was looking out the window of my house and I saw the FBI and TBI coming up my driveway again. I knew I had not been doing anything wrong but also knew how much they wanted me to talk. They knock on my door and this time I let them in. They had a warrant to confiscate my farm; truck, car and everything in my house even the clothes. They also had a warrant for arson on the house that I had set on fire charging me. They also had warrant for Sheila charging her with arson for setting our trailer on fire. They took both of us to Jefferson County jail, setting our bail at 100,000 dollars each. I had been to jail before but Sheila had not even had a parking ticket so to set her bail so high was just a way of putting pressure on me to talk. One of the narcotics officers came to my cell to see if I was going to talk. I told him no matter what they did to me that I was not going to talk. So he made a deal with me that if I would not make bond that he would lower Sheila's bond to 10,000 dollars. By this time my lawyer was at the jail so I told him to pay Sheila's bond and he did. They had me locked up in the maximum-security unit and my roommate was a doubled murderer. I was at Jefferson County jail for 30 days, there were plenty of drugs in the jail but God was helping me to not do them. I had a bond hearing and they reduce my bond to 10,000 dollars. I made bond going home after being in jail only 30 days knowing that I had to spend five years in jail was hard to do. My federal indictment was for conspiracy to distribute 800 pounds of marijuana and for procession of over 50 pounds that did not burn in the house fire. The federal prosecutor was asking the judge to give me the maximum at least eight years. In the federal system you do 87 percent of the time not like the state system where you do 30 percent of the time. I went to my court date and pled guilty and the judge gave me the bottom of the time which was 63 months allowing me to stay on bond until they decided which prison I would be going to. I knew God was working in my life. I still had to go to my state court date. And Sheila had to go to hers. The lawyer made a deal with the state that I would plead guilty to arson if Sheila would get probation and they said they would do it. They wanted Sheila's probation to be intensified where she would have to get permission to go anywhere. The day of our hearing we prayed together and went to court. I went before the judge first and he asked me how much time I had in my federal indictment and I told him 63 months, he said do you need any more time on this charge and I said no. He said I am going to sentence you to four years to run with your federal charge. Thank God! Sheila went up next and the judge reduced her charges to burning personal property given her unsupervised probation for two years. Isn't God great! I would be allowed to turn myself in at the federal prison when my letter came. Finally the letter came from the marshals service telling me to report to the federal prison camp in Marian Illinois which was the toughest prison in America. People that had killed other prisoners and guards,had escaped, or troublemakers were the kind that was in the main prison there. The federal prosecutor was still trying to pressure me. I talked to my lawyer and he told me once you were designated that you couldn't get it changed. Well he didn't know the power of God. My whole family was praying for a miracle, my brother Jack called a Tennessee Senator who said he would try to see what he could do. The next day I got a call from the marshals service asking me if I could change the prison that I was going to which one would I choose. An I said Atlanta GA and he said I would be getting a new letter telling me how to report. Two days later I got a letter telling me to report to the Atlanta federal prison camp in two weeks. God has done a miracle again in my life. Well finally it was a day before I was to report. My wife, daughter, and my nephew drove to Atlanta GA, I did not have to report till the next morning at 11 a.m., but I wanted to see what the prison looked like. Coming down Boulevard Street you run right into the Atlanta federal penitentiary. The main prison consists of 28 acres with a 40-foot wall surrounding it, guard towers on all sides with armed guards. The prison camp was beside the main prison sitting on another 40 to 50 acres. When I saw the 40-foot walls of the hundred years old prison my stomach started doing flips. We drove back to the motel to spend the night, knowing that I would not be going home was one the hardest things I ever had to do. The next morning we went out for breakfast and they drove me to the prison. They tell you not to bring anything but the clothes on your back. I went to the receiving building and had to say goodbye to my wife and daughter not knowing how long it would be before I would see them again. My wife and daughter were crying as they left me there. I watch them drive away an I prayed to God to take care of them. The guards told me to take all my clothes off and to put on the uniforms of the prison. They keep everything that you bring in a box till you get out. They tell you a bout all the rules of the prison. If you break the rules you will be sent behind the walls of the mind prison. If you break the rules they write you up and this is called a shot. They took me to the laundry and for my blankets one packet of toothpaste, a toothbrush and that was it. The camp consists of eight dormitories with 72 people in each one. I was assigned to dormitories C in the back part of the camp. Inside the dormitories were cubicles holding two men each. They were two beds a locker between them and nothing else. If you fail down on one side of the cubicle you would hit your head on the other side that's how small it was. The walls came up to chest level, so when you stood up you can see the whole room. I started to put the sheets on my bed when I heard a voice saying whats your name. I turn around seeing this huge man looking at me. I said my name was John and he said his name was Bill. Then he asked me if I was a Christian, in my mind I was thinking what to do. I started to pray in my head asking God to help me make the right decision. So I said yes I am a Christian. He said good I am to and there are a lot of good Christians in this camp. But there are also a lot of mean people that doesn't like Christians. He said I have a lot of Christian books if you want to read them. And we have Bible studies in the Chapel Tuesdays and Thursdays nights and you're welcome to come. There is some man that come to the prison to teach the Bible. I know God led this man to me. There were all kinds of people in the dormitories, white, black, Spanish from all over the world. Bill took me on a tour of my new environment. We went to the cafeteria, the Chapel, the activities building, tract, and softball field. He introduced me to some of the other Christians in the camp. He told me that it was getting close to count time an I asked him what that was, he said at 4:00, 9:00, and all through the night you will be counted. At the 4:00 count you had to be in your cubicle standing up. When you first get to the camp they give you a number my number was 11388 -074. They tell you that your name is a number now. If they asked you you're number and you do not know what it is you will go to the lockup. The lockup is in the main prison behind the walls. They call it c house. I was sitting in my cubicle when I heard a loud voice say count time; I immediately jump to my feet. This was my first count but not my last. At count time you could not talk or move. After the count they would have to clear the count before you could leave the dormitories. At about five clock over the loudspeaker I heard count clear and every body started running out the door. I didn't know what was wrong so I went out the door and every body was running toward the cafeteria. So I went to the cafeteria an I found out why every body was running. There was a line with hundreds of people waiting to get supper. It took me over an hour waiting in line to get supper. The food was very bad. After supper I walked around the tract trying to clear my thoughts praying to God asking him to guide me. I went to the dormitory TV room to relax, there was 25 people in the room. They were all fusing about what to watch. So I went to my cubicle to read my Bible. I tried to sleep that night, but every time that I would get to sleep a guard would shine a light in my eyes to count me. At 6 a.m. I heard count clear and every body started to run to the cafeteria again, so this time I also ran. This became a way of life for me. After breakfast I had to go to R&D to get my job assignment, everyone in the prison camp has a job. I was assigned to landscaping, cutting grass, raking leaves, picking up trash or any other thing they needed done to keep the grounds up. You do get paid for working and my salary was 11 cents an hour. They would send us out in-groups of five with one-man in charge. My job for the first day was to cut the grass in the graveyard. The graveyard was for men that died in the prison that didn't have family that wanted to take their body home. It made me sad to see all these graves of men whose family didn't care where they were buried. The graveyard was behind the prison way back in some woods were no one could see it. So they only time that anyone would go there was to bury someone are cut the grass. So after that day every time I went to cut the grass I would take some flowers that grew on the grounds and put on the graves. Thu. was the day that Dr. Grum came to teach Bible study. He had been a missionary in India for 50 years and had came to Atlanta to retire. But he and his wife would come to the prison to teach inmates a bout the Bible every week not missing one-week the whole time I was there. Talking about men of God he surely was. He would take his time to answer any questions that you had no matter what they were. He had a way of explaining the Bible that you could understand. There was a commissary in the camp that you could buy things like shampoo, toothpaste, soup that only needed water, a few food items and ice cream. You were allowed to have 10 dollars in quarters at one time. The money you made working went into a acount and you had a card to use at the commissary. Making only 11 cents a hour didn't cover what you really needed to survive. So I was having two asked Sheila to send me money once a month. I knew that my wife and daughter were having a hard time making ends meet without having to send me money. So I started to pray to God asking him to show me how to get by with out asking for money. A few weeks later a man in my dormitory asked me if I knew about Uncor warehouse and I said no. He said that it paid a lot more than landscaping and he knew the main guard that worked there. They needed a clerk and if I wanted the job he would help me get it. God had answered my prayer again. I got the job as a warehouse clerk making 90 cents a hour. Later on I would work my way up to 1.35 which was the highest that you can make. Not only was this enough for me to survive, but I could send money back home to Sheila. On Saturday and Sundays you could have visitors from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., I was soon to learn how hard the weekends would be. The men that have visitors would cleanup early waiting to hear their names called over the loudspeaker to go to the visiting room. The man that didn't have visitors had to watch you go wondering were their families were. When you got to the visitors room you had to check in with the guard before saying anything to your family are you would get a shot. You were allowed to embrace your family one time at the beginning and the end of your visit. Seeing Sheila and Melissa that first time in the visiting room was really hard knowing how far they had drove to see me knowing they had a long drive back home without me. We were visiting at a table trying to catch up when we noticed a lady with a child that was maybe six or seven come in. They call for her husband to come to the visiting room and when he got their the lady had to restrain the little girl from running to her dad. He check-in with a guard and finally the little girl ran up to him throwing her arms around his neck. The whole day she would not let go of her dad. We had a pretty good visit up till the closer 3 p.m. got. People in the camp had told me how hard this is but until you experience it you really don't know. Having to say goodbye to Sheila and Melissa was hard without what I was about to see. The lady with the little girl was trying to pull her from her dad the whole time she was crying asking Daddy come home with me I miss you, I need you please come home with me, the man was trying to keep his self together telling his daughter I can't come home we you today but I do love you. The little girl said if you really love me you will come home with me today. The man tried to comfort his daughter telling her how much he loved her, but she wouldn't let go of his neck the mother had to pull her from him while she was crying Daddy Daddy Daddy please come home I love you did I do something wrong please come home with me I need you. The mother took her daughter crying to the car and I could see the hurt in the men's eyes. We walked together down the hill to the camp and I learned his name was Jim, he was in a bad way and I knew he couldn't take much more at this time. When you come back from a visit they would strip search ever other person and I knew if they did this to Jim he would break down and you never wanted to breakdown in front of a guard because they would send you behind the walls. I started praying walking down the hill asking God to let them picked me and not Jim. As we got closer to the camp I saw a guard that was call bullethead he was the meanest guard in the system. When he would strip search you most of the time you would be bleeding. I was thinking no God if he strip search Jim he will breakdown so I kept praying let me be the one that is strip search. When we got to the guards they padded me down and I thought God there going to strip search Jim but when bullethead Got to Jim he started to put his hands on him when he got a strange look on his face and he did not touch him saying just go on without a strip search God does answer prayers. I knew Jim still was hurting so I guided him to the chapel. When we got their we went down front and I asked Jim if he had ever been savied and he said no. By this time he was crying from the bottom of his heart and I told him that only Jesus could take the pain from him. I took a booklet that shows how to help someone come to Jesus. I read the prayer to Jim and he said it backed to me I watched him look up to the cross hanging on the wall and he started saying Jesus Jesus Jesus please help me and all of a sudden a comfort came over him. That was the first man that I saw come to Jesus at the camp but not the last. Jim looked at me and said I am going home.I though he had lost his mind. I said Jim don"t try to excape and he said weres your faith? About six weeks after Jim was saved he heard from his lawyer that he had won his appeal in court. A day later he was released to go home to his family praise God. When Jim was going out of the camp he looked at me and again said weres your faith? I knew that I didn"t help him he help me with my faith. A a lot of people think that federal prison camp is like a country club, but if you had to stay in one for a week you would find out it is not . When you lose your freedom and the ability to take care your family not knowing if they're really safe is one of the hardest things a man or woman will ever have to face. But Jim showed me that if you have faith in Jesus you can face anything! I would need Gods help to make it through many hard times in the years to come. I got into a routine of going to Bible study on Tuesdays and Thursdays and going to church services on Sunday at the chapel. I would study the Bible every night and was doing pretty good but the devil wasn't done with me yet, I was standing next to my dormitory when a group of guards came running by, there had been a fire in a dumpster behind my dormitory. They came back by and started to grab people and they grab me. I was taken to the main prison and put in the hole which was the oldest part of the prison. A lot of the Windows were broke and it was really cold. It was five stories tall with cells on each level. Each cell would hold two man the one they put me in was empty at this time. They would keep you locked down most all the time. The cell was so small that you could touch the walls at the same time. There was a bunt bed and at the end of the bed there was a tollet. Each level had a trustee that you had to get anything you needed. I was looking to see who was the trustee on my level when he came walking up to my cell and it was Rusty A man I knew from the camp. When I was in the camp there were some men who made fun of all the Christians and Rusty was one of their leaders. There was a man named James that Rusty would harass. Rusty was giving James a very hard time one day and I told him to let him along.Rusty said you make me and I knew by being called out if I didn't fight him it was going to be very hard for me to survive. So we went to the back of the dormitory and had a fight with me coming out the winner. Almost every time you get in a fight you will be sent to the hole but this time there was a bigger fight in the camp. So I didn't get sent to the hole thank God. But here I was in the hole with Rusty looking straight at me. He said John I want to ask you something so I said OK and he said Will you forgive me, he had got into trouble a few weeks after our fight and was sent to the Hole and had been there for a long time. He told me that he had started to read the Bible and had been saved. What a good God we serve. He asked me if there was anything that I needed and I told him a Bible was all I needed. He told me that anything to read was hard to come by. When you spend all your time looking at bars and walls something to read even a Bible for non-Christians was very valuable. So he said I will see what I can did. About 30 minutes later he came back carrying a blanket some soft drinks and a Bible. You don't know how hard these things are to come up with. But with gods help I found them. This Bible was gave to me by a man that was saved after reading this Bible for six months in this hole. I started reading this Bible thinking what a joke when God's word started to change me soon I was on my knees asking God to save me. This Bible has been here in this hole from the early 1900s and a lot of man have been saved reading this book there tears are on a a lot of the pages. This Bible means a lot to me but I am going to do what other good man have done before me so I giving this Bible to you hoping you will pass it on to someone when they need it. I can't believe how much God has change this man. Rusty you will be blessed by the things you are doing in here thank God we got to ask each other for forgiveness. I settled down in my little box reading this Bible seeing hundreds of the names of man wrote at the front and back telling the day's they were here so I wrote my name and date down. The next day Rusty came back and told me the warden was mad about the fire in the camp. The word was that you and the other man are going to get diesel therapy what they do to you is put you on a prison bus and drive you a round the United States from prison to prison never staying more than one day at a time. When they put you on the bus they put chains on your legs and arms that are hooked together so that you can't run but also when you go to the bathroom you can't reach behind you so you can't clean yourself. It doesn't take long that you develop a bad case of diaper rash which never heals after a while men hurt so bad they try to hold it in which you can't do. You never get to call your family to see how they are your mail never gets to you this is a way to punish you and I have seen hard man break down after a few months of this. I thank Rusty for telling me a bout what I was facing. I asked him to pray that this would not happen to us. That night I got down on my knees and started to pray please Jesus don't let this happen. This place I was in was so loud people would holler all the time day and night twenty-four hours. You could not even hear yourself think. At night it was really bad you would here young man that were being attacked crying out for their mothers and God to help them. One day as they were taking us to the cafeteria to eat a young man that had been attacked by a older man has somehow got a hold of a piece of fiberglass that was maybe 18 inches long he had rub it to make it sharp. He came running towards the older man from behind and stabbed the man in the back and the fiberglass knife went all the way through this man he pull it back out and stabbed and stabbed him over and over the blood was flying all over the walls and the people around including me. I had never seen violence this bad but this was not unusual for the place I was at. Here was a man dead and a young man no really a child maybe 20 years old that would spend the rest of his life in prison this makes you realize that not only is there a God but also a devil. When I got back to my box I had to try and get the blood off of me by washing out of the top of the tollet. After a couple of weeks in this box with no quiet twenty-four hours a day it started to work on my mind I was reading Acts in the Bible down on my knees praying God please let me just have a little quite time when I felt a cold breeze and heard what sounded like angels singing Amazing Grace I thought that I have lost my mind I got up and looked out the bars down on the lower level I saw three young man singing they were practicing to sing at church that day. I have not noticed at first but the hole place had got quite and all you could hear was Amazing Grace you may not think that miracles happen but I know they do Rusty came by later and told me he had been there six months and he had never seen anything like this. Usually maybe 20 man go to the church services but this morning almost 200 went and they were many man saved that day. There was only one phone in the hole for 500 man you had to get on a list to use it. I asked Rusty to get me on the list and he did. I had to wait five hours to talk to Sheila for 10 minutes all the time I was talking man would holler your time is up. There was always a lot of fights at the phone there was a man stabbed in the face with a ink pen the day I waited. I was in this box 30 days when one night the guards came and got me and the other men that had came from the camp at the same time I did. I said to myself God give me the strength to take the diesel therapy. They took us out of the prison and put us in a van they didn't tell us anything but drove off driving us back to the camp miracles do happen thank God. No one ever said anything to me why this happen. I got my job at the warehouse back like nothing had ever happened. I got back into the same routine of going to Bible study and church like before. Sheila and Melissa would come to visit maybe once a month you would worry a bout their safety knowing that the prison was in the worse part of the town. There was a man in my dormitory whose wife came to see him staying in a local hotel that night three man broke into her room beating her and raped her and she almost died, thinking about things like this when your family came to visit you was so hard. The man that's wife was attacked would have nightmares waking up screaming three or four times a week. His screams would send chills down your spind. Sheila was having to work 12 hrs. a day seven days a week to pay the bills. Doing this and dealing with me being in prison finally was too much for her. I was talking to her on the phone one night when she started to cry and couldn't stop Melissa had to take her to the hospital she had a nervous breakdown I would not get to talk to her for almost a year. You think that the man that goes to prison is the one being punished but their families are punish to. Little but little I would get to talk with her. This was one of the hardest times of my life but I would think a bout what Jim had said were is your faith and this would help me. One-day bullethead came into my dormitory and called out 11388-074 so I got up and said that's me. He said how many brothers do you have? I said three with one dead. He laughed and said wrong two dead he laughed and said come on breakdown I like to take you to the hole. I just looked at him and said nothing. He said report to your counselor so that's what I did. She told me that one of my brothers had died and I said which one. She said that I would have to call home to find out. I was thinking it was probably Bob cause he was the oldest but when Sheila answered the phone she told me that Jack had had a heart attack and died. When you have a family member die and you are in jail there's nobody there for you but Jesus. I asked my counselor if I would have a chance to go to the funeral. She said I could but I would have to go in chains with two guards and my family would have to pay all the expense. I knew that my family didn't have the money and I knew that I'll would not put my mother through seeing me in chains when she already had to bury her son. So I told my counselor if I had to go in chains I'll would not go. She said she would try to get me a furlough but I had not been there long enough to get one. I got with some of the other Christians in the camp and had them to pray with me. The next morning I was called back to the counselor and she told me I don't know how but your furlough has gone through thank God. My daughter Melissa called the airport and they told her you could fly for half if you were going to a funeral. So they bought me a round-trip ticket from Georgia to Knoxville having the ticket left at the airport for me to pick up. I left the prison in a taxi going to the airport with nothing but a prison ID. When I went to the ticket counter and they asked me for my driver's license I had to tell them all I got is my prison ID you should have seen the look on their face. Not only had I not ever been on an airplane but also the taxi ride was the first time I had been in a car in over two years. I flew to Knoxville and my daughter Melissa pick me up, Sheila was working and could not get off . We pulled out of the airport and I saw all the restaurants I had not had anything but prison food for over two years so we pulled in to captain D's you don't know how much little things mean until you don't have them. I had to go home and get ready for my brothers funeral. Sheila was not over her breakdown so it was very hard on her and me. We went to the funeral and seeing the pain my mother was in broke my heart. My furlough was for three days and went by fast. So here I was flying back to Georgia to turn myself in again at the prison. The next year went by fast they were groups of Christian bands and singers that would come to the camp for services this was such a blessing to the man here. I had to deal with Sheila's dad dying and they don't count your father-in-law as close family so i was not able to go to the funeral. A short time later Sheila's grandmother died and I was not able to go to that funeral. Not being able to be with Sheila to help her at her time of need was hard. So I remembered what Jim said where is your faith and I'll would trust God to be with her. My daughter Melissa graduated from high school and started college and I was not there for this either. I was in my last year when Sheila told me that my brother Bob was a dying from cancer and only had one or two months to live. I went to my counselor and asked if I can get a furlough she told me I would have to talk to the camp administrator. So went to talk to him and he told me either go see him while he's alive or go to his funeral but not both. I tried to talk him into letting me do both then he said you should have thought a bout things like this before you did your crime. So I said I want to see him alive to be able to tell him how much I love him. I got my furlough and flew to Knoxville again to see my dying brother. I got to talk to him for a long time saying goodbye. Sheila was still having a hard time and I didn't know if she would ever forgive me. I flew back to Georgia turning myself in again. Two months later my brother died and I knew I'll would not get to go to his funeral. I pray to God if there's any way possible intervene. Somehow my daughter Melissa had got a hold of someone in the prison system asking them to let me go to my brothers funeral. The next day my counselor called me back in telling me I don't know had your doing this but you have a furlough thank God. So here I was flying back to Knoxville to bury another brother to see my mother's hurt again. Sheila was a little better but not over her breakdown. I flew back to Georgia and turn myself back in to prison for the last time. A few months later my counselor called me in to talk about halfway house she said you can get up to six months and she would let me know soon. If I got six months I'll would be getting out in March so I was praying hard for this to happen. A week later my counselor called me back and told me I was only getting three months halfway house. This was a big letdown but I remember Jim Again and turn it over to God. I told Sheila and Melissa what had happened and they were down to. Melissa would not take what the prison said and she went to work finding a way to help me. She got a hold of someone in the prison system again somehow she talked them into letting me have six months halfway house. My counselor called me back in saying I've never seen this but they have gave you three more months halfway house which meant six months praise God. So in no time March was here and I was going back to Knoxville I didn't know if Sheila would take me back and I could not blame her in she didn't. I didn't have a job waiting and had not worked for anyone other than prison in a lot of years. They put me on a Greyhound bus heading back home not knowing what God had for me. When I got to Knoxville I checked in at the halfway house. They would let you go out and look for a job and they would let you go home on weekends if you had a job. My brother-in-law talk to a man he knew and told him a bout me he said he would give me a chance and I could work in his warehouse. I talk to Sheila and she said I could come home on weekends. It was hard for Her and me at first but God brought us back together again. I worked at the warehouse driving a forklift and as a clerk in less than two years I worked my way up to assistant warehouse manager. I was supposed to stay at the halfway house for six months but they gave me home confinement after one month and I was supposed to stay on supervised release for four years but the federal judge released me after two years. People say there is no such thing as miracles but I know better.
John David's Testimony Info
Which categories of people did you belonged to before you were saved?
The Partier, The Abused, The Hippy, Other
Who have been your best examples?
friend' David and Martha
Lisa and Bill
List books, music or ministries that have helped your walk:
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