My Testimony » God's Purpose for Man

God's purpose for man

News & Updates

My Testimony

My Testimony

My name is Frank Overholt; I was born on April 29 1941, in Hartville, Ohio, to an Amish Mennonite Family; when I was almost four my folks Frank and Marian Overholt moved to Virginia, to a little town called Kempsville and joined “Kempsville Beachy Amish Mennonite church”.
When I was eleven years old, my folks along with some other families started another church later named “Providence conservative Amish Mennonite church”; later the name “Amish” was removed.
In February 1953 a preacher named Noah Miller came and preached revival meetings in our new church. The first night he preached February 23 I came under deep conviction; but I did not go forward that night, so I felt like hell fire was all around me in my bed, so I promised God if He would spare my life I would go forward the next night.
At eleven years old on February 24 1953 I gave my heart to Jesus Christ

When I was a very young boy, my mother would take me into confidence, and tell me things that I was to keep secret; I would never betray my mother’s confidence.
When I was five years old, my mother told me to feel her stomach; my little sister was in there kicking; that was when she told me where babies came from.
My mother liked to read to us kids: I could listen to her read Bible stories and fairy tales for an hour or more at a time, while my brothers would run and play after the first one or two.
I am not sure at what age she told me about the age of accountability but it was at very young age: she told me that I was innocent; but soon I would have to make a choice to receive Jesus as my savior: that time came when I was eleven years old.

I was very teachable as a young boy if I could see the truth of a thing; but it was impossible to get me to change my mind if a thing looked wrong to me.
When I was about 10 years old, my health book in school said, that it was unhealthy to use a pillow, so I taught myself to sleep without a pillow; to this day I can not tolerate a pillow.
When I was about 10 years old, I was a sugar fiend: I hardly liked anything that was not full of sugar; my older brother said to me, that I was restricting myself a very narrow range of foods, and would find it difficult to be satisfied in the future; I saw the value in what he said: so I purposefully chose to learn to like a wide range of foods; now I can eat almost anything.
As a young Christian I would not surrender to peer pressure; but the few times I did, the punishments quickly changed my mind; because I stood for what I believed, I soon became an outcast even as a very young Christian.
I prayed often off and on all day long, and one day on the school bus I was praying when one of the students asked, “Are you praying”? He spread the word that I was praying all over the bus; I was not trying to let anybody know, but could not be hid.
As a child I did many things wrong; but I got away with very little: God was making sure I got the training I needed.
When I was almost eighteen I begin dating girls; I had kept having failures with the ones I liked and the ones that liked me I had little interest in; my soul (because of failures) became a little raw inside.
When I was twenty a girl (sixteen years old) moved into my church that made a vow not to date till she was eighteen; so I saw an opportunity to win her: I had a year and a half to win her. I made eye contact with (E) for the next approximately a year and a half until I thought I had won her; when her time was almost up, I started to take her with me to pass out tracts on the streets of Sarasota.
I had some confrontations with her father on the subject of “eschatology”; so he tried to break us up, probably because of my belief; but he only succeeded to drive us together. I learned that her father believed that if a couple were engaged that it was as binding as binding as marriage; so I contemplated asking her to marry me, to take away the pressure, but God forbade me to do it.
I wrestled with God all day long, I said, “God it would solve my problems”; but God continued to tell me no; but that night I ask her anyway knowing it was against God’s will. When I asked her to marry me, she said, “Yes if it is God’s will”. We told her parents that we were engaged, we had peace for several weeks, then her father asked her how she answered the proposal; when she said, “If it be God’s will” he saw a way out, and my troubles returned and my spiritual life begin to spiral downward.
We spent the next thirteen months trying to win her parents blessing and when we did not get it we eloped; needless to say, my spiritual life continued spiraling downward. I tried to have devotion with my new wife; but she only fell asleep. My wife did not like to go to church so I persuaded her to go at times, and she persuaded me to stay home at other times.
My spiritual life continued to spiral downward, and my wife begin to go into deep depressions.
Our first son came at ten months of marriage; fifteen months later a daughter; twenty one months later a son, two years later another son; and five years later the last son.
After our first son: my wife’s depression deepened I kept continually falling further and further from God till I no longer believed in God: I became an agnostic. After our third child my wife begin to run around with another man, and I became a nudist.
After our fourth child: I met another woman, and we decided to marry each other; but as I got a divorce and she failed to get a divorce the whole thing fell through.
About a year after my divorce I met a girl (H) at the restaurant that I hung out in, and thought she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen; so I ask her if she would like to go to certain concert with me, and she agreed to go. (H) Asked me to come over in a few nights for a spaghetti dinner, so I accepted and after dinner she led me to the Lord.
(H) told me a month earlier she was living with a man in the state of Washington; but she and a girl friend had decided to hitch hike to Florida where (I lived); they got a ride from a truck driver headed to Montana, so she decided to visit her aunt at Helena. (H) Stayed with her aunt three weeks at which time her aunt led her to the Lord.
At Sarasota, Florida where I live she got a job at the restaurant where I hung out at. After I was saved I went to church with her a couple of times; than she said, I needed to go back to my former wife. I felt I could not live this Christian life, I started date one of my old girl friends; but God had other plans, He sent a cousin to me all the way from Ohio to talk to me.
(L) My cousin told me I needed to get my old friends out of my house and referred me to a church in the neighborhood that I could attend that would help me; I felt such Life coming from (L) that I followed his advice and started to attend the church he recommended.
(L) Recommended a church started by Samuel Drew Fife who I came to love very dearly.
At that time I developed a tremendous hunger for God’s Word, and just devoured it hour after hour. A month or two later I received the Baptism in the Holy Spirit, (which all four Gospels say only Jesus can give), and a month later I surrendered all to the Lord.
After my full surrender I begin to hear God speaking to me again, and after some working out I remarried my first wife. After our remarriage my wife had a couple affairs with the man she had been seeing for years; so we moved to Mississippi for a year and than Minnesota for two years, before returning to Florida.
While I was in Minnesota God gave me a dream: I was standing by a picnic table; on the table were two plates, each contained a piece of bread fixed differently, and brother Sam walked up and asked me if I had anything to eat? I pointed at one plate and said, “That one is for you”, I knew the other one was for me.
Brother Sam took his plate and turned his back on me sat down and begin to eat it; I wanted to eat my bread, but decided one piece of bread was to little for a hungry man so I restrained myself; but I wanted it so bad I finally took a bite. Brother Sam turned and I asked him if he wanted more and he said, he did; so I gave him my piece and he again sat down and he turned his back to me and ate it; I was surprised that he ate it after I had taken a bite, but he did.
After brother Sam ate my piece he put his arm around me and gave me a good word. After brother Sam blessed me he walked off to a train station; I remained standing through it all.
I than knew that God was going to lead me a different way; but Brother Sam would have approved of it had he known about it. The train station probably was predicting his death which occurred a little over a year later.
At this point I wanted to move to Alaska; but my wife wanted to move back to Florida; the elders agreed with my wife, so I took it that God wanted us to move back to Florida, so we returned.
In Florida after about a year God told me where I was to go to church, so we attended “Grace Fellowship” for fifteen years; than my wife wanted to go to a different church, so we changed churches. After about three or four months my wife wanted to change back, not wanting to keep changing churches I resisted; but when it became troublesome in the home, I ask her to set up counseling who she chose: so we counseled the pastor and his wife of “Grace Fellowship”.
The pastor counseled us to find a church we both liked, so we changed to “Light of the World”; it was then I learned she was having an affair with her former boy friend. When she told me she having an affair I went about trying to save my marriage bringing in the pastor who than sided with her; later I learned the pastor was also having an affair with another woman in the church. The affair the pastor had destroyed the church and it no longer exists.
On October the first 1995 my wife left me and moved in with her boy friend. In December she filed for divorce which was final on January 8 1996.
I tried going with a few women in the last ten years; but none of them were what I was looking for. I had interest in others some I lost in interest in, some God warned me against, and some had no interest in me; whatever the reason God was in none of them.
I decided that I would not fall in love unless I knew for sure God was in it. For a woman to make it all the way to marriage with me: she must be totally surrendered to God; she must be willing to loose all earthly things and reach for the very highest call in God she can reach; there must be some fruit to show it; and she must pass every test God places her in to prove she is the right one: any other standard would only limit the call God has put in my life.
I may not ever find a woman who can pass such a test; so I am prepared to remain single. Ideally if my first wife would quit living with men, and get her life in order with God, she would be the right one; but I don’t see it happening right now.

Masturbation

Now I confess that there have been besetting sins in my life, even up to the present time. I spend a lot of time with God, and as long as I keep my deep fellowship with Him all my besetting sins that I have overcome to date, I can keep under; but if I allow Satan even a little room it almost always ends up in me falling into one of them.
I believe the first besetting sin in my life that has caused me enormous grief is masturbation: I was introduced to it the first time by a close childhood friend; I did not know it was wrong for about two years, and by that time I was so hooked I knew no way out.
As a young Christian, when I was tempted I would sometimes close myself in a room and begin to pray as much as an hour; but than I would get up and do it anyway.
I thought that when I got married it would just go away; but my flesh wanted illegitimate sex not legitimate. One time I had it cast out and I felt clean and fresh for some period of time; but I let it in again and was worse off than before.
While I was married I counseled with my pastor and his wife, and was free for about eight years; than my wife left me and I made it for about six weeks, than the pressure became so great that the last two weeks I just cried myself to sleep, finally I was overcome, over the next year I lost most of my ability to resist it
I took a class twice: a cleansing seminar in which at the end we would take active cleansing retreat: again I was free for year; but the pressure returned and again I lost the battle.
Then I learned that if I got rid of my television and concentrated on spending a lot of intense devotional time with God that I would get so into the Spirit that my desire for masturbation would completely go; as long as I keep up that closeness to God I have no desire for it.
I found Satan tries to get me to indulge some worldly thing: watching a movie trailer; look at a magazine; or some other such thing and soon I find my resistance it is gone.
I find that I must continually guard my soul lest Satan get the advantage.
Time spent with God: causes you to put on God’s Armor and the Fruit of the Spirit; both of which are devastating to Satan’s attacks. Staying in the Spirit keeps Satan from being able to get past your armor.

Pornography

The next besetting sin that I fell into as a child was pornography: I was about fifteen years old when one of my older sisters brought home a stack of magazines. My sister was working out cleaning houses and the man of the house gave her a stack of magazines to take home with her; I loved magazines so I went through the stack and found a couple of pornographic magazines; I took them and hid them, than I would look at them once in a while.
When I was a young man I was always told what was wrong, and I never connected shame and sin; so I developed besetting sins not knowing that it even was a sin.
After a couple years I realized it was a sin; but by then I was hooked. Seeing the same pictures over and over soon lost its effect so I had to get new pictures. When I fell away from God I soon lost the need to hide it and did it openly and even subscribed to playboy.
Than I beginned to work out at a health club and the owner became my friend; we would get together and watch hard core porno movies; he also introduced me to a nudist colony and I became a member.
My conscience did not bother me in the least, even when I committed adultery, for I did not even believe in God.
My life was spiraling out of control downward and I could not stop it; so I was completely ready to receive Christ, when the young lady led me back to the Lord.
Now that I am back with the Lord I find that the same thing that worked for masturbation also works for pornography.
I have no other solution for any Christian to overcome besetting sins except much Quality time spent with God: thereby putting on the armor of God and the Fruit of the Spirit; also check to see what triggers it and avoid it.

If you find that you fall; confess it and repent immediately and than forget it; get back in the Spirit right away, you have to much work to do to let the devil keep beating you up.

Looking with Lust

The next besetting sin I got was looking at women with lust: when I was seventeen years old, I worked all summer with some other guys about my age, and they made a big fuss whenever they saw a pretty girl; so I soon learned size a girl up and when I realized it was a trap it was to late.
I thought getting married would solve it just as with my other sex sins; but I soon realized that what my flesh wanted was illegitimate viewing not legitimate viewing.
This sin I have had more problem then with any other; but God has the solution for this one also.
God told the children of Israel not to conquer all the enemies at once lest the beast of the field rise up against you. God instructed the Israelites occupy each piece of land they conquered it before conquering another; this is good instruction for us also: when you conquer a besetting sin, make that land secure than go and conquer the next sin.
Do not let pride arise as though you conquered it yourself; but humbly admit it was only through God’s Mighty Power.
Do not look down on another who has not yet conquered their besetting sins.
If you will contact me and let me help you with your besetting sins; you can also help me with another of my besetting sins.

This is my testimony and I will likely add to it from time to time as I feel led.
God Bless You Richly as you go forth more than a conqueror through Christ Jesus.
Your brother, Frank

| Bookmark