Sick and Tired of Dying

“The first time I shot heroin into my veins it was like it just took me out of the world.”

Donald struggled with drug addiction most of his life. He started using when he was ten, soon after his mother died.

He recalls, “What drugs did for me, they basically helped me escape reality and the pain of things.”

Over the next 34 years Donald used every type of drug he could get his hands on. He was also a drug dealer, and spent years behind bars…but he could never admit he was destroying his life.

Donald says, “I never came to the knowledge or the truth that what I was doing was harming anyone or myself. It’s like an endless cycle.”

That changed one day, when he almost overdosed on heroin.

Donald remembers, “I knew I was dying and I just basically said, ‘God, you've got to help me.  I need your help. I can't do this anymore. I’m sick and tired and I can't live like this anymore.’”

Donald survived the near overdose and soon faced another arrest. He was convicted of drug distribution and faced 25 years with no parole. Waiting to be sentenced, he cried out to God.

Donald says, “If you get me out of this mess, I'll try to do right by you."  And I heard this whisper in my ear and it said ‘Ecclesiastes.’ It totally stunned me.

I looked around, I was like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, what's going on here?’ I said, ‘Are you talking to me, God?’”  

Donald found a bible and started reading through the book of Ecclesiastes. He repented of his sins and surrendered his life to God.

Donald recalls, “It's like the words off of the Bible came alive and it's like they come up and they shot straight into my soul.  I started weeping like a baby and crying and I got down on the floor with my face to the floor and I said, ‘God, I have no doubts that you just spoke to me and through your Word.’  I said, ‘So whether you get me out of this mess or not, I want to do right by you, but I don't know how, you have to show me how.’”

Donald says God also delivered him from his addiction. But two weeks later he began to feel sick and went to the infirmary. A blood test revealed he had hepatitis c from his years of intravenous drug use. The doctor told Donald it was the worst case he’d ever seen.

Donald remembers, “He said, ‘But you'll be lucky if you live past six weeks.’  And when the doctor gave me that report, I quoted the word of God back to him. I said, ‘You don't know who Jesus is, do you?’  I said, ‘Jesus is my Savior.’  I said, ‘Not only is he my Savior, he's my redeemer. Not only is he my redeemer, he's my healer.’”

Donald says the doctor didn’t prescribe medications because believed his illness was terminal. Donald was quarantined and while alone in his cell, he began reading healing scriptures and trusted god for his healing.

Donald says, “And I would just literally take those scriptures into my spirit and I would speak them out and as my spirit got stronger I believe that's what pushed the disease out of my body, because the one working in me was stronger than the disease that was on me.”

Six weeks later Donald says he woke up one morning feeling different.

Donald recalls, “At this time when I knew that I knew that I was healed I just got the revelation of it. It's like I woke up one morning and the light just came on, ‘You're healed. It's done.’”

Donald went back to the doctor for a check up. He was so sure of his healing he asked to be re-tested.

Donald says, “When the doctor come back with those tests, he's scratching his head like this, he says, ‘I do not understand this.’ He says, ‘This first report says your liver was totally deteriorated.’ And he said, ‘But this test here says it looks like you got a brand new liver and I don't understand it.  You're the most healthiest person I've examined in a while.’  And all I could do was look at him and say, ‘I told you Jesus was going to heal me.  I told you.’”

Donald went before the judge a short time later and all charges but one were dropped. He left prison after just five months saved, delivered, and healed. Today, Donald is married to Kathleen and they travel the world sharing the gospel of Jesus and the message that God still heals.

Donald shares, “When Jesus said it was finished, he means IT IS FINISHED.  And because of the miracles God has worked in my own life, we've seen God work miracles in others' lives.  It's His will to heal, to deliver and to always set people free and simply because He loves us.”