I was at my apartment, and we were having a big party. There were probably thirty or forty people there inside having a good time partying. I found myself, maybe two o’clock in the morning, on my balcony, alone. I could hear everybody inside laughing and drinking and doing all kinds of drugs and having a good time, but I was alone. I felt miserable. Out of nowhere, I felt like I heard the Lord say to me, “Jones, you’ll never be happy. You’ll never find peace. You’ll never find joy in any of this stuff. You’re going to find that only in Me.” If you have a heard the voice of the Lord, and then you hear it for the first time, it’s kind of an awakening. That was a moment of clarity in the middle of all the debauchery that was going on inside the apartment.
I heard him say, “You’ll never be happy. You’ll never find joy. You’ll never find happiness until you turn to Me.” So I did turn to the Lord. That next day I got up, and it was fresh in my mind. I knew the Lord had spoken to me, and I knew that I had it to leave the lifestyle I was in. I called my brother and said, “Hey man, I feel like I’m supposed to move. Can you help me move? I’m still in a lease agreement, but I’ve talked to my roommate, and we’ve figured out a way where I could still pay him rent but move out.” So my brother came to help me. I moved out the very next day.
So I move away. I have no friends anymore because I had to give them all up if I’m going to live this Christian lifestyle. I couldn’t get them to change with me. So I started playing the guitar, which came out of nowhere. I didn’t even know how to play the guitar at the time. I would spend every Friday and Saturday in my room at night just learning how to play and learning to sing worship songs. Spending that time with the Lord was refreshing to me. It was better than drugs or sex or that whole lifestyle.
I didn’t go back and see those guys for three months. I broke clean and then thought, “Well, I feel like I’ve developed a close relationship with the Lord. I am finding this happiness and peace, but these guys are still my best friends. I’m going to go back and see them.” Every time I would go back to see them I would always try to tell them about the Lord Jesus, and it really didn’t work. They would be like, “Aw, that’s okay buddy. Let’s go smoke a bowl on the couch and talk about this.”
They would try to bring me back to where they were, so eventually I had to cut all those friends out. I feel like the Lord replaced them with new friends I didn’t even know about. I think He was waiting for me to just cut them off altogether. I hated doing that. Looking back, I wish I would have been strong enough to go back and witness to them and have some great story where I lead them all to Christ. That wasn’t me. Instead of going to bars on the weekends, my wife and I, along with Dana and his wife, go out to eat, and we go to movies. We do stuff that normal people would do instead of going to eat ecstasy and drink all night. It’s is completely different.
Dana and I play music together the majority of the time. Dana is the lead singer for *Calling Glory. I met him at church, believe it or not. We were both on the same worship team. He asked me to play with him at a new church, so I went and started playing with him on the new worship team. Out of that our relationship developed kind of like brothers
My new best friend is my wife, who I’ve been with for six years. I met her at the first church I went to after I was saved.
*Christian Rock Band, http://www.callingglory.com/
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