How A CRC Helped Save My Life

My Journey with Jesus from Jail Cell to CRC Pulpit

This Sunday I preached on Genesis 3:17-19. We focused on the fleetingness of life, the triumph of the cross, and the hope of the coming kingdom of God. My wife, our two young children, and I were invited for lunch. We finished the afternoon with a walk and some Curious George. It was a great day. 

Six years ago, I could have never dreamed of having such an amazing day. I had a terrible drug addiction that had left me mentally-ill and unfit to be a functioning member of society. 

I was 14 the first time I used. Pretty quickly I found myself doing anything I could just to feel good. Opiates at fourteen turned to a debilitating cocaine addiction by sixteen. By seventeen I was using every single day, I was on a year-long binge. 

It destroyed my mental health. I went from a healthy, run-of-the-mill, teenager to an unrecognizable addict in just a few short years. 

My parents had done everything right. Christian School, church every week, youth group on Sunday evenings. But none of that had stopped me from using. 

I ended up being kicked out of high school. I regularly found myself being remanded to a psych ward or locked up in cuffs for the night in a jail cell to sleep it off. 

Somewhere deep within me I knew that each time using could be my last time. Honestly, I didn’t mind that thought. 

I seemed to be trapped in a never-ending cycle. I hated myself because I used and I used because I hated myself. There was no hope in sight. 

Until the last time I was ever in jail. There was something different that time. The way I had gotten there was the same. The cuffs were still on too tight. The concrete slab that was my bed was still uncomfortable. The same pain filled my body as the drugs wore off. 

But there was something different the last time I was in jail. I didn’t realize it at the time but it wasn’t something different. It was someone different. 

I realized I didn’t want to live this way anymore. I knew that death was waiting for me. I was brought to the end of myself. So I prayed, and said, “God, if you are real please save me from myself.” 

Christ came to me that day; a poor, strung-out, drug addict young man who had messed up every chance he had ever been given. But our God is the master of comeback stories. He shattered the chains that kept me ensnared, and he shook the prison walls of my heart. 

“God, if you are real please save me from myself.” 

It would take six more months of challenges, overdoses, and trials, but six months later I was signed up to head to rehab for a year. 

There was just one problem. The $1000 entrance fee for the year. I certainly didn’t have the cash. 

Without hesitation, my parent’s church paid the bill. Looking back on this moment, I can see how God used His people and their generosity to help save my life. I am truly grateful that God’s people responded to His call. 

Rehab wasn’t easy. It was tough for me to adjust to the rigid system of discipline and the strict rules. My behaviour almost got me kicked out after two weeks. 

I recently talked to one of the staff who has been at the centre for over twenty years. He has seen thousands of guys come and go. He told me, “Ryan, you were one of the ten worst people I have ever seen walk through those doors.” 

It wasn’t until the fourth month of my year-long stay that I bent my knee to Christ Jesus. I remember calling my dad and being distraught. I kept saying this sinner’s prayer with every guest preacher that came, but nothing was changing. He explained that part of following Jesus is submitting to Him. 

I went upstairs to the dorm room I shared with 15 other men, tucked myself behind some closet doors and bent my knee to the sovereign Lordship of Christ. 

A few months later, I was called to the ministry. I tried to say no, but God was persistent. Once I said yes to God, I knew that I felt called to give back to the people God has used to help save my life— the CRC. 

I went through Bible college, met my wife, and we started our family. Exactly five years to the day from when I first walked through the doors of rehab, I walked through the (digital) doors of Calvin Seminary to begin the MDiv program.

I serve four CRC churches in Ontario in running a combined youth program. My philosophy for ministry is simple— Be the influence for Jesus I needed as a teenager. 

I look forward to the future of our denomination. I am forever grateful for the fact that God helped use a CRC to save my life.