I lost my mum at the age of sixteen. Even though I was the last of nine siblings, I still felt lost and lonely. So I crawled into a shell where I met with masturbation. Gradually, I fell deep into it to the point that I could masturbate five times a week. This continued for years and into my adulthood. Even after I had received Jesus Christ as my personal saviour, I thought I had to go for a special kind of deliverance to be free from the addiction of masturbation. This I did but, it was like the Devil was out for me.
As a young adult, I was a virgin in the sense that I had not slept with a man, but I was deep in this addiction. It was like part of my everyday meal. The guilt I felt after every act was eating me up, and I did not like living that way. I would sometimes go on dry fasting, denying myself of happiness, thinking that it was by what I did, or by my own righteousness that my deliverance would come; but as I was breaking my food fast I was also breaking the masturbation fast. I could not receive the gift of the Holy Ghost at that time because I felt I was not worthy, and the kind of message I heard then was enough judgment for me.
Thank God for The Carpenter’s Church, and for my sister who brought me here. When I started attending services here, it took me a year to start the Believers’ Classes because the messages from the pulpit by Pastor Charles and Pastor Nkechi were too good to be true for me. I was locked up in my religious mind, but God delivered me through His undiluted Word preached here, crushing down every stronghold in my mind. My mind got renewed gradually; though I would still fall into it, I stopped wallowing in guilt instead I would pray for forgiveness and most importantly accept God’s forgiveness.
Thank God it is over four years and I am free from masturbation. The best part of it is that it is not even a temptation to me any longer. There is God in The Carpenter’s Church, and He is working wonders in our minds, body and the totality of our beings.