First and foremost, Ray Comfort and the Living Waters Ministry didn't literally save me, but their impact on my life was profound and pivotal in my walk with God. I give God the glory, honor, and praise for what He did in my life. However, I would be remiss if I didn't also give credit where it's due to those servants whom God has called and who have chosen to be obedient to His call on their lives.

Let's take a step back and talk about my salvation experience. I was in the 6th grade when my dad came back to the Lord (after backsliding for the better part of 20 years). I grew up in a home that was not without its challenges. I am one of 5 kids; my oldest sister was a teen mom, my brother struggled with drugs, and my parents fought all the time. My dad was on drugs, and he was a drinker. My mother did her best, but it was just chaos. A lot of that started to change when my dad rededicated his life to Christ, and we started attending church. The first church I ever attended outside of the occasional Catholic Mass from when we attended Catholic School for a period of time was a predominantly African American Church on the South Side of Chicago, in an area known as the Wild 100s. I attended that church, but I didn't have a real experience with God.

It wasn't until I was in 7th grade when a music and culture teacher in my school wanted to teach us about Transcendental Meditation. I had been a 'Christian' long enough to realize that this was a misguided idea. During class one day, she encouraged everyone to meditate. Knowing about this ahead of time, my dad gave me some scriptures to "meditate on" rather than participate in what the class was doing. During the actual meditation time, I was terrified. Not having a grasp on spiritual issues, I assumed that as all of these kids were meditating, they were just inviting demons to fly around the room. I sat there in my seat with my eyes closed, praying under my breath. It wasn't long before I felt this warm sensation starting at the pit of my stomach start to consume me. It was a very comforting feeling, but then I started to panic because I didn't know what it was. I thought the demons were attacking me. But the more I tried to panic, the calmer this feeling made me. I couldn't explain the strange feeling of trying to force myself to panic while this presence just settled my spirit. I had no idea what the Holy Spirit was, or Baptism in the Holy Spirit or anything like that. Let's just say that the pastor of the church we attended did a great job of hyping everyone up, but I can't remember a single thing I actually learned about the bible during that period of time.

When I told my dad and pastor about what happened at school and the feeling I had, they just laughed and said, "Boy, that was the Holy Ghost!" It started to make more sense to me. That moment really started to transform me. I wanted more of God, but I still didn't really know Him. I knew that having God was better than not having God, but I couldn't articulate why. All I knew is that God changed my family, and I wanted everyone else I knew to have that too. I wanted to witness to people but didn't know how.

Fast forward a couple of years, my family decided to attend a mega church in the south suburbs of Chicago, to give us kids a better opportunity and more programs to be a part of. This change was immensely beneficial for me. I got involved in many ministries, bible studies, I made a lot of friends, and this is even where I would eventually meet my wife. I learned more about the bible during this time than I ever did at my old church.

I responded to 'salvation' during nearly every altar call held by the youth group. I was baptized (twice), I went on mission trips, and I even took part in a summer ministry Internship at the church.

But here is the rub. It was one of those Word Of Faith, Prosperity Gospel, Type churches where the senior pastor rubbed shoulders with guys like Mike Murdock and others. This was a big part of what I began to learn as a young believer. One year during the Church's annual conference where all of the big-name speakers came to preach (and take an offering), Ray Comfort was a guest speaker. Honestly, he stuck out like a sore thumb. The thing that struck me at first was his sense of humor. I don't really remember what he spoke on during that conference. But I remembered some of his gags and even the Million Dollar Bill Tracts he had. I went to his merch table, bought some tracts, and a book that I thought was interesting about Scientific Facts in the Bible. I thought the information was really interesting. I never knew how to defend my faith to someone. This was my first glimpse into the world of Biblical Apologetics. I searched his website later for more resources, and that's when it happened.

In my quest for more resources on Apologetics, I found an MP3 disc called "Classic Comfort" with tons and tons of Ray's teachings. I was hooked. I must have listened to Hell's Best Kept Secret more than a dozen times. I never grasped the full gravity of my sin. I never fully understood how to effectively share my faith. That all changed when I started listening to all of his teachings.

In the recordings, Brother Ray encouraged the duplication of the materials, so I copied that disc and gave the teachings away to as many friends as I could think of. It was the first time in my life that I had a real understanding of what a True Christian conversion looked like, and I fell on my face before a Holy God like I never had before. For what felt like the first time in my life, I really gave my heart to God, and I was radically transformed like never before.

I met Ray on two occasions. One was the second and last time he spoke at my church. Once he learned the type of organization it was, he never returned. And I don't blame him! When he did visit, my youth pastor introduced me to him and told Ray that I could preach Hell's Best Kept Secret better than he could. While I appreciated the compliment, I don't know that it was received as well as it could have been.

The second time I met him was when he was holding his own Evangelism Seminar in the Chicago Area (the above picture is from that event). I stood in line to meet him and I was honored to be able to make him laugh using one of his own gags (I printed off a business card from his website that said "My Card" and handed it to him).

This story takes an unfortunate turn at this point.

After my wife and I were married in 2007, we experienced some major church hurt from that mega church. We ended up losing a lot of our friends, and we were shaken to our cores. We left the church, and we did end up finding another church to attend after trying a few different congregations in the Chicago suburbs where we lived. Eventually, we moved to Minnesota where my wife is from, and we had a hard time finding a home church.

 It was years of searching and just not going to church at all for a period of time before we finally found a good home church.

During that time that we were searching, we realized how much we were really hurt by the church. We later found out that a lot of other people ended up leaving for a host of different reasons. Sadly, many of the others that left the church also left the faith entirely. The membership of that church ended up dropping pretty significantly over the years. It's now under a new name with new leadership. I hope and pray that they operate under a different spirit now.

As we healed from the hurt we experienced, I looked back and reflected and came to the conclusion that had it not been for the teaching and ministry of Ray Comfort and Living Waters, I may have found myself in a similar situation of "deconstructing" my faith. Through his ministry, I learned the truth of salvation, sin, heaven, and hell. We were down but not out because we still had Jesus, and we knew He was on the throne.

As a youth pastor, I always teach my students that they need to put their faith in Christ alone and not in people or institutions. People and churches will almost always let you down at some point, but God never will.

I don't trust in Jesus like I trust in a parachute to give me a smooth flight; I trust in Him like a parachute to save me from the jump, so I put Him on to save me from the wrath to come.

Brother Ray, thank you for obeying the call God has on you to bring Biblical Evangelism to the world.