My Testimony

I originally said a, "sinner's prayer" in July of 1990. Since that time, sometimes I would be attending Church sometimes not. My life seemed to clean up a bit ( I had previously been involved with gangs and spray painting graffiti on trains), but in hindsight this was more due to the girlfriend I had at the time. She didn't like that stuff, so I wanted to keep her happy.

A number of years later I went on to spend time as a Youth Pastor, and then went on to Pastor a small home church. On the 25th of April of 2002 I literally came to my knees, crying my eyes out. This was after coming face to face with the fact that I had never repented of my sin. Oh I knew generically that I was a sinner, and I'd said "that prayer." But for 11 years I had been what scripture calls a false brother, a false convert! You know something, I could talk the talk just as good as anybody else and better than some. But nobody knew what was going on behind closed doors. I'm too ashamed to even mention the sins I was partaking of, then trotting off to supposedly lead young people in a relationship with God. I was a hypocrite! Jesus said you will know them by their fruit, and my fruit was rotten!

Now to the observer (except those who look for true biblical fruit) I seemed to have a heart to serve the Lord. I read my Bible a lot, and I mean a lot. But the Pharisees studied the scriptures intently and still remained hypocrites. I prayed fervently, but so does the Buddhist monk at your local Buddhist temple. I was even out on the street trying to witness to people, but so are the Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons. None of those things are biblical fruit of a true Christian!

2Timothy 3:7 described me perfectly; I was "always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth." It was always about the next new thing. You name the movement, I was in it. Whatever weird and crazy thing was happening, I wanted to be involved. And I was always trying to fill my head with NEW revelation of the "deep things of God." But I wasn't even fulfilling the basics. I have 100s of Christian books, and I'm not saying it's wrong to have Christian books. But for me, I was always trying to learn something new ( I also had a large number of self-help books). When I got soundly saved (I thank God for His mercy on me), I no longer cared about all those things. I just wanted to DO things for God. I wanted to serve Him.

This whole experience was the most devastating experience of my life. Thinking that I was a Christian for so long, having been in ministry, and even seen miraculous healings etc. It took me almost two years to come to terms with the fact that I'd been living a lie. I'm so thankful for Matthew 7:13-27. It made everything very clear!!!

I thank God that he has counted me faithful, putting us into this ministry. I will not stop until the whole Church of Australia has heard the message of Hells Best Kept Secret & True and False Conversion. Even beyond this; in the words of William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, "while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I'll fight - I'll fight to the very end."

I pray that you find my story of some benefit,

John Legg

All praise and honour be to Jesus Christ our Lord, who has saved us from hell and death, and given us the privilege of preaching His blessed gospel. The gospel that has the power to turn blasphemers into people who give God the glory, and to this end we strive, we pray and we preach - to the glory of God! So, what activity can bring God the most glory? Let's preach "the glorious gospel."