Salvation through Jesus

The Lord Jesus spared my life from self destruction at the young age of 19, like so many of wiseguys that grew up in the Bronx. I was on a one way path to hell until the Lord reached down and rescued me. I wanted to be that cool guy with all the girls hanging out at the corner candy store. Little did I know that Jesus had a different plan for my life and I am glad He did.

Back to my walk with the Lord. Salvation came to me in 1969 at the house of a Full Gospel Businessmen named Mike in Coos Bay Oregon. Yes, that is right from the Bronx NY to Coos Bay Oregon. I remember repenting and praying to the Lord Jesus to forgive all of my sins and to be my Lord and Savior as the Bible has stated in Romans Chapter 10 vs 9 & 10. I remember the day I was born again and given another chance at life. The journey began with a stay in my Aunt's house in Salt Lake City Utah, then on to San Francisco, and then to Oregon. Mike worked for a logging company and opened his house to troubled teens of whom I was one. My good friend Tommy from the Bronx was there as well other people from the Northeast, about 10 in number.

This one event changed my life forever and led me on a pathway of reading the Bible, learning about God and walking with Him every day. The Lord Jesus has been merciful to me all of my life and I give Him the Praise and Glory. My stay in Oregon was a short one,maybe a few months in which I learned about about prayer and the Savior's love for me through the four Gospels.

Upon my return home to the Bronx being a new Christian was really a challenging adventure. I was on fire for the Lord with zeal for lost and unsaved spreading the Word of God to all my friends and family, telling all who listen about Jesus. At that time there were not a lot of Bible believing Churches in the area and fellowship with believers was non existent. I hungered to gain knowledge of the Bible and fellowship with good Christian people. With that purpose in mind I set out to find a Bible believing Church.

Then a friend told me of a Church group, the Way International and Victor Paul Weirwille who was the leader of the organization. Little did I know of what I was about to get into. What a way to start out, I became involved in a cult, all the while thinking that it was a Christian Church, wow was I deceived.

I went to some meetings because of the hunger to gain knowledge in the Word of God. At each meeting more and more pressure was placed by the twig leader on those who attended to take the class. The indoctrination of the cult became very apparent and didn't sit well with me.

Talk about shepherding, you could not make a move without approval of your twig leader. Then there was the insistence of taking their mind control course disguised as a Bible study class; in which those in attendance would become the next twig leader to get more converts to join the cult.

So that's how it worked more converts to the cult equaled more money for headquarters to keep this false cult rolling. Through all of this the Lord protected my mind and gave me the strength to leave this cult and truly follow Him. Praise the Lord forever!!!!!!!!!

So what is happening in the Charismatic World? The year is 1984 my daughter was born and at that time I felt the Lord tugging at my heart. It was time to get serious in studying the Bible and re-commit my life back to Jesus. A 10 year period had elapsed since backsliding and running from the Lord Jesus had begun, but He knew where I was and how to get my attention. Which He did very easily, a broken foot in a cast, some time off from work, and a Bible was all the Lord Jesus needed to get my undivided attention.

As the broken foot healed my wife would always put a Bible by the chair that I would sit in, one day I opened it up and started to read. The Lord's mercy is so gracious. His love and forgiveness jumped out from the pages of the Bible and I knew the Holy Spirit was calling me back.

I found out many of my wife's family were born-again Christians and so my entrance into the Charismatic World began. First there were my two terrific brother-in-laws in the Lord Gary and Rich who loved the Lord Jesus and started a home Bible study that developed into a large prayer group, and eventually into a public access TV show called Decisions. They were both very instrumental in pointing the way back to walking with the Lord .

Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship was thriving at that time in Connecticut and I was invited to a dinner. For the first time I was able to see men sharing their testimony about how Jesus changed their life and prospered their business. There were many outstanding Christians that I met through Full Gospel and love very dearly, people that love Jesus and have a servants heart. I will never forget all the people that helped during my family's time of financial struggles. When a poor business decision on my part almost wiped us out financially.

The problem within Full Gospel became evident all too soon, that sound Biblical doctrine was not the cornerstone of the ministry, but spiritual experience was. When given the chance to share a popcorn testimony at a dinner. I was told not to sound too preachy at the podium because we wouldn't want to give the first time attendees the wrong impression.

Wrong impression wait a minute, what the heck is going on here, the object of the dinner was to win the lost to Christ. How do you tell someone who is lost in sin that Jesus saved your life from destruction and hell without sounding too preachy. Give me a break please!!!!!!!!. After that episode let it be said that my assignment as speaker on the FGBFMI circuit was hastily curtailed. That was alright because I would rather obey God rather than man.

Once again questions began to surface in my mind about where did Jesus fit into all of this. The dinners were set up to win the lost to Christ but what it turned into was a platform for the next hot shot speaker to sell his tapes, books, or outlandish testimony of out of body experiences, of someone going either to hell or heaven.

Full Gospel in Connecticut had some of the wildest false prophets that came through town, on the other hand there were numerous authentic brothers in Christ who gave up their time to speak at the dinners and share their testimony of how Jesus changed their life.

I remember one dinner where I was sitting next to Paul Cain and not very impressed at all with this so called prophet. Little did I know that in the near future he would wreck havoc on the Body of Christ through the Kansas City Vineyards movement.

There were many more false prophets such as Cash Money, and John L who had the anointing of John the Baptist and Elijah. Another speaker on the circuit was Tommy Hawk who after finished his testimony of how Jesus saved his life went to the back of the dinner hall and began selling his latest product a protein drink.

Then at a table set up for all his tapes books and whatever else he could peddle, the question that kept coming to my mind was, where was Jesus in all this self promotion? Talk about making merchandise of God's people this guy was a pro, it was like a feeding frenzy at a shark tank.

The FGBFMI organization had many flaw's, one of which was when once a person got saved at a dinner. The new convert was not encouraged to attend a specific Bible believing local Church or join a Bible study . In other words if you were a Catholic and received Christ as your Savior, it was alright to go back into the Catholic Church to attend services. Now how could that be good for the spiritual growth for the new convert ? It was not conducive for spiritual growth at all

The reason for this is that the FGBFMI was more concerned with the big tent idea of unity, where all denominations would fit in, thus leaving most doctrinal differences outside the door and never discussed. I didn't realize it at the time but, the foundation was being laid for the Ecumenical and Charismatic Catholic movement to go through Full Gospel Businessmen's Organization with the false vision of unity as its vehicle.