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View NewsletterChanged Lives...Jennifer S.
My Testimony (given on June 27/04)
I grew up in a family that did not believe in going to church. My parents told me that they believed in God but that they did not need to go to church in order to believe and that they did not need to go to church in order to pray.
Because I did not know any better I spent most of life not really knowing or caring about God. I knew that he existed but took on the view that if I was good then I would go to heaven and that nothing else was required.
I have always been a larger person and when I was a child I was fat. I was teased almost daily at school and I remember thinking that if there was a God why did he let me be a fat kid and why did he let other kids tease me. I remember feeling that if that was the kind of “person” God was that I didn’t want anything to do with him.
Throughout my life I didn’t think much about religion or God with the exception of the few times when it seemed nothing else would work and then I would pray (prayers of desperation).
My teenage years were difficult. I was fat and extremely depressed. I contemplated suicide on many occasions. I had a hole in my life I couldn’t fill. I couldn’t understand it. I did well in school, I had a job, I got all the clothes I wanted, pretty much anything I wanted. I had wonderful parents and a brother. My family was like this perfect TV family, we rarely fought, my parents always said they loved me, they were and still are the best parents ever. Still I had a hole. When I was 17 I bought a car. A souped up Mustang. I was the cool chick with the cool car. Still I had a hole. I got a boyfriend. He was a fantastic guy and we were together for 3 years, but still I had a hole.
When I went to college I had a boyfriend that was Christian. He was the first Christian that I had ever really hung around with. He took me to church. I was going not because I wanted to but because it got brownie points with his parents.
It was not until into my first year of college that I met a girl named Jennifer Havercamp. She was a Christian and she would openly would tell people that. She was the first person I ever met that was Christian and wasn’t afraid to admit it, not to mention she was a really cool person. Until that point I thought Christians were bible thumpers and no fun. Jennifer changed my view of Christians. By hanging around with Jennifer a seed was planted. I started asking questions about being Christian. When Jennifer realized that I was interested she showed up with an NIV Bible, brand new, that she got from her church. This was the first bible I ever had that I could actually read (none of this King James hath and doth stuff). Jennifer went further and invited me to bible studies. I went and enjoyed it but often felt that I wasn’t good enough to be going. I continued going to church and bible studies but never made a commitment.
My journey came to an end shortly after college finished. The boyfriend I had been seeing and had become engaged to, the one I went to church with, well we broke up, he cheated on me. I was broken and so angry. I said if this is the way Christians are then I don’t want any part of it. So I withdrew. Didn’t go to church anymore; put the bible away in a drawer. The hole in my life was back with a vengeance. I grew very depressed, more than I had ever been. At one point I had the pill bottle in my hand and was going to kill myself but my parents came home. I hit rock bottom that year. I hated myself, I hated God, and I hated those Christian hypocrites. On New Years Eve going into the year 2000 I was at my lowest. I was in bed at 11:00 at night, I felt like I was so alone. I was so desperate that I prayed. I prayed that God would help me but most of all I prayed that God would bring a man into my life that I could spend the rest of my life with, a man that would fill my hole (you see I still didn’t get it, I thought materially, things or people could fill in the holes). The very next day I met Werner and four and a half years later we are here and married. What I didn’t realize then, but would learn through my relationship with Werner, was that God did not send Werner to fill the hole I was feeling. God didn’t send Werner just to give me a husband, he took it a step further and sent me a person that would show me the love of God. God sent a Christian man, a man that loved God and believed in him. A man that could help me see that the only way the hole in my life would be filled would be if I accepted Jesus into my life. God sent Werner to show me that Christians can be good people. God sent Werner to show me love, not just love as a man and wife, but the love of God. I would like to think that God sent in the “Big Guns”. He knew Werner could get the job done. Oh, and later he sent in Thom to make sure the deal was sealed. Werner has shown me patience, love and forgiveness that I truly believe no human being could show. God has worked through Werner and without God I am sure Werner would have never endured this relationship with me.
Prior to and after marriage, Werner and I went to church together, we attended the Mennonite church that he grew up in. I found this church boring; I felt a need in my heart to continue on this journey of Christian faith, to further my relationship with God but that my needs were not being met at this church. After Werner and I married I asked Werner if we could switch churches, go to a church that was perhaps a little more exciting, to a church that we could call our home. For Werner this was a great sacrifice as he had attended the same Mennonite church since he was a child. But Werner knew what I needed, he knew I needed Jesus. Werner and I attended New Hope Church for the first time in March or April of 2003. I felt the presence of God in this church. I felt like I had never felt before. Werner and I met with Thom about a week after attending New Hope Church for the first time, at the Beacon Harbourside and at that time Thom and I prayed and I became a Christian, this was of course after several alcoholic beverages. From then on I have I tried to follow that path, I have fallen several times already, but I keep on truckin. That hole isn’t so big anymore and as I travel on this road with God, the hole in my life gets smaller and smaller. I only hope that one day I can make a difference in someone’s life like Jennifer, Thom and Werner have made for me. I thank God everyday for working in my life and for sending in his disciples, Jennifer, Thom and Werner, to show me His love.
In conclusion I would like to sing a song. The song talks about trading ashes in for beauty and I interpret that as trading in sin for eternal life with Jesus Christ and for me that is what today is about. The song also says “at the foot of the cross” “I am made complete,” and for me that refers to the hole I feel and how only Jesus can make a persons life complete, only Jesus can fill that hole.
Jennifer June 27/04