Life didn’t start out very promising for Todd White. His parents divorced when he was very young. His mother worked three jobs to make ends meet. Todd’s childhood behavior was so rowdy and uncontrollable that at one point he was sent to a boys’ home. At the age of 11½ he started using drugs, and by the time he was 12, he was getting high frequently. His drug use continued to escalate and he became an addict. He was a drug addict for 22 years. Todd even joined the Marine Corps, but ended up going AWOL. As a result, he was dismissed from the service with a bad conduct discharge and even spent some time in prison.
The Turning Point
One night he met a young woman at a bar. They lived together for nine years and had a daughter. He was a drug-dealing, drug-addicted atheist. Then came the night when everything began to change. It didn’t happen overnight, but God got his attention.
Todd remembers:
I went out looking for drugs one night. The problem was that I didn’t have any money. I was actually a Christian at this point, having asked Jesus to come into my heart about five and a half months prior. But I had never gotten into the Word and did not understand how it could transform me in my relationship with Jesus. So that night I was looking for some crack, and I picked up this kid on a back street. Once I had the drugs in my hand, I told him that I was a police officer and started to read him his rights. He freaked out.
I pulled over and stopped and told him to step out of the car and put his hands on the hood. As soon as he got out of the car, I hit the gas. He unloaded a large pistol at me. I don’t know how many bullets he fired but I know it was enough that I shouldn’t be here right now. At that moment, I heard an audible voice say to me, “I took those bullets for you. Are you ready to live for Me yet?”
The Road to Transformation
I actually did the drugs I had stolen, but didn’t get high that night. It was really weird because they were very real drugs. I had smoked crack and I knew what they were. Since I didn’t get high, I went back home.
My girlfriend was there, and by this time in our relationship she hated me. She was ready for me to leave. She was an atheist also, as I had been, but since I had become a Christian I had never really represented Jesus to her. I had never tried to tell her that she needed Jesus. She told me that I needed to leave.
“You know,” I said to her, “I actually do need to leave.” That very night, I left the house.
Three days later, I entered Teen Challenge in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where I stayed for two months. During that time I had a radical encounter with Jesus three nights in a row.
The Nightmares
Before that encounter, however, Todd suffered from nightmares. From the day he entered Teen Challenge he had to deal with bad dreams. He explains:
I had horrible nightmares every night. Every time I went to sleep I was attacked in my dreams. It was the only place where satan had access to my soul—my mind, will, and emotions. Because I had these nightmares on a nightly basis, it wasn’t long before my roommates became freaked out by me. I would run around the room screaming and yelling, and then hide under the bed. It was horrible.
One day I was sitting across the street from the Teen Challenge induction center in Harrisburg. I had my guitar with me, and even though I didn’t know how to play, I just sat there strumming the strings. A homeless man came up…
To Be Continued…
Miraculous Monday: 4th September 2023
Miraculous Monday 054
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