Testimony of Matthew Haith

How Bad Do You Want It?

I was an A-B student in high school. I lettered in 3 sports and was All Conference in football. After we won our homecoming game, we had a party. There was drinking and someone brought out marijuana. That was the first time I ever tried it. It was a few years before I touched drugs again.

In 1991, I was in church. I clearly remember a sermon titled, “How bad do you want it?” Meaning, how bad do you want the free gift of salvation offered through the shed blood of Jesus Christ? The Lord reached my heart with that sermon. I went to the altar and asked God to forgive me of my sins and save my soul.

For a while, I walked the straight and narrow. I became a trustee in church. But then, I began to slack off. My church attendance became sporadic. I didn’t read my Bible regularly and I slowly drifted away from the Lord.

I was in a community college. Once again, I put myself in the wrong place, at a party with drugs and drinking. After that, I started using drugs regularly. My grades began to slip until I dropped out of college.

I hopped from job to job; nothing really interested me. I began missing days because I was hung over. At one job, we did our drugs while we worked! My life was sliding in the wrong direction.

About a year ago, I began to come to my senses when I saw two of my friends die; one in a car accident and the other drowned while high on drugs. A guy at work told me about a shelter where I could get some help. It was basically a 30-day program and it wasn’t long before I was back to my old sins.

My brother in Texas knew about the Durham Rescue Mission. He encouraged me to come to the mission. In June, I took his advice. Other men at the mission began to encourage me. Gary Via, our supervisor, has been like a father to me. The staff at the mission got me back to my Bible and worship. I feel like the prodigal. I am so thankful God loves me and was waiting for me to come home.

I am also thankful for my wife, Nichelle. Through all my sin, she has stuck by me. I am really looking forward to getting back with my family and living my life for the Lord. I will graduate in June 2002.

In the meantime, I am working in the supervisor’s office at the mission and soon will take some classes at a nearby Bible College.

Today, I would ask others the same question the Lord asked me through that sermon back in 1991, “How bad do you want it?” How bad do you want the peace only God can give?

I am thankful for the peace He has given to me. Thank you for giving to the Lord; I am a life that has been changed.