Set Apart: New Life

Last Saturday, August 13th I was re-baptized by Papa Paul and Momm Pam Hunter. Hannah and Sarah were baptized as well. And to our request The Dove Voice band came along. Before the baptism I shared some of my life and the reason for my desire to be re-baptized with the Dove boys and I wanted also to share it with you. I can honestly say that I'm a new person, I died to my old self and was raised up with Christ! Amen!

"I grew up in a Christian home with fabulous parents and grandparents that nurtured me and taught me, and brought me up to love Jesus. I asked God into my heart when I was 3 years old under the conviction that I didn’t want to burn forever in a lake of fire in hell. But I still lived like an orphan. I lived as a walking dead man on the inside for almost all my life. I was baptized by my Dad when I was 12 years old along with several other kids in our church, but it wasn’t significant for me, it didn’t mean anything to me, it was just something that every Christian did and it was cool to be able to tell people that I had been baptized.

It wasn’t until I started planning this trip last year that I realized how much trouble I was getting myself into. I realized what a mess I was creating for myself and other people by the way I was living my life.

I’ve never dated, never been intimate with any boy, I’ve never wanted to get into drugs or alcohol, I’ve never struggled with depression , I’ve never been abused… so the World would say that I’ve never experienced HARD TIMES or difficulties, and until I came to Africa I believed it. Since coming to Africa God has done a miraculous work in my heart. He has opened my eye’s to see the real me. He has used so many people here in Africa…specifically Papa-Paul and Momm-Pam, Jeff and Lyzette, my sisters Blair, Robyn, Hannah and Sarah, and the Dove Voice Band, in a very powerful way to change me….to help me turn my life around and start a new beginning. I want to live now as one who has been forgiven….I want to live like a SON not and ORPHAN. I know that fear builds walls instead of bridges, and I have let my fear build too many walls in my life (that I am now having to knock down)……but, I am God’s child, and I don’t have to be afraid anymore!

Because of my brothers in the Dove Voice Band I feel like I know how to love a brother…….I have never experienced the type of love that these guys have shown me! They loved me before they even new me….and after they new me, they could only love me more! I am SO blessed to have the relationships that I have with these men and I want to take the relationships that I have made with you guys back home with me and build relationships with my brothers in the same way! I cant even explain how much I love the Dove Voice Band, I have taken and kept EVERY thing that they have spoke into my life. They are true, serious men of God and I respect them so much!

I want to live my life wholeheartedly for God not because its the right thing to do, not because my parents want me too, not because its what everyone else is doing or wants me to do……but because its what I want to do! God Is drawing me. He is calling me, to himself, through conviction by the Holy spirit. He want's ME! He has put new dreams in my heart and pointed me in the right direction and I’m so excited to do work for HIM!

So, that is why I want to be baptized…I want to rededicate my life to the Lord….. This is a new beginning for me and I want to give it all, 100%, to Him."