A Beautiful Testimony...

Every day in school we hear awesome testimonies of people's lives being changed. This story was shared this afternoon...

The curriculum from my school is being taught in several maximum security prisons in the United States. Today during class, one of our leaders read a letter from a man whose brother is in one such course.

The letter was written by a man named "Johnny"... (all names have been changed to protect identities). Johnny and his brother are both serving time in prison for murder, in separate correctional facilities, about 100 miles apart. Johnny admits to murdering a man in a gang-related crime, and to stabbing several men while in prison, also in gang-related altercations. He also admits to having engaged in satanic worship while in prison.

On a recent occasion, Johnny was given permission to visit his brother, who is now a follower of Jesus, and is enrolled in the BSSM program at his correctional facility. During the visit with his brother, Johnny also gave his life to Jesus!

His brother told a few people on the outside, one of them sent a copy of Supernatural Ways of Royalty, (one of the books written by our school's founder, Kris Vallotton, and which is part of our core curriculum), to Johnny, when he returned "home" to his respective prison. The book never arrived, so she sent another. Both books ended up arriving the same day; around that same time, Johnny's location in the prison changed.

Johnny decided to see if anyone in his new cell block would share the second book and study with him. He found a man named "Gary", who seemed vaguely interested in studying with him, but was rather rude and sullen. He finally agreed to study with Johnny, and confided in him that he had given his life to Jesus, but was having some internal conflict because his brother had been murdered, and he had sworn himself to avenging his brother's death, by killing the man who murdered his brother.

"Gary" was soon released on parole, and left a note for Johnny. In the note, he explained that Johnny was the man who murdered his brother. Having seen how completely changed Johnny's life was as a result of receiving Jesus' love, Gary decided to emulate Jesus, and forgive Johnny. He not only forgave him, but called off the hit on Johnny's life.

Johnny then finally realized the depth to which he had been forgiven, by both God and people, and finally forgave himself.

I almost cried when I heard this story. The grace, goodness and kindness of Jesus, and His power to radically change lives, never ceases to amaze me!