Hey! My name is Justin. I grew up in The Woodlands and experienced a very typical Woodlands life. I went to a good school, had great parents, and even grew up in church. On the outside it looked like I had it all together, but deep down inside I was struggling with my identity.
I always felt the pressure to be the perfect student, the best athlete, and the model Christian. As I entered my teen years, the weight of those expectations was crushing. By junior high, I was drinking almost every weekend and regularly smoking weed to find temporary freedom from the weight I was trying to carry. By high school, my drug use had progressed dramatically, and I rarely went a day without being intoxicated.
I continued to attend church and go through the motions to make everyone believe I was on the right track; however, the duplicitous lifestyle I was living drove me into deep shame, depression, and loneliness. So, I dealt with those confusing emotions the only way I knew how… cue destructive addictive cycle.
The summer after my freshmen year in high school, I was caught smoking weed at church camp. My parents immediately put me in counseling, and I attended regularly to keep them off my back, but my drug use continued to progress behind the scenes. Nothing my family tried to do helped slow down my destructive lifestyle. On the day of my high school graduation, I took a handful of pills and drank until I blacked out. My parents confronted me and told me I needed to get sober and stay sober or I needed to leave their house. As a brand-new adult and high school graduate who thought I knew everything about life, I chose to leave. I spent the next two months sleeping on friends couches when possible and sleeping in parks when I had worn out my welcome.
After a couple of months, I decided to go to my first in-patient rehab. I conquered my 30-day stay, moved to Austin to live in a sober living facility, and strung together the longest season of sobriety since I was 13. After months of victory, I relapsed and quickly found myself worse than before - couch surfing, depressed, and hopelessly addicted. I spent the next few years searching for meaning in relationships, religions, finances, and anything else the world tells you will satisfy your deepest longings, but I found myself more hopeless than ever before. After growing up in church, I felt like I had given God a shot and that Christianity wasn’t for me. However, now that I was at the end of myself, I decided to give a Christian rehab a chance.
The night before I check in, I told God, “If you’re real I need you to show me! I don’t want a pastor or a counselor or my parents to tell me you’re real. If you’re real I need you to change me.” Just a few days into rehab, some guys prayed for me to be delivered of my withdrawal symptoms and I was healed almost instantaneously. A couple of weeks after that, I was praying about past hurts that I felt were keeping me from being able to trust God, and attended a church service that evening. After the service, I went to talk with the pastor and told him I had a rough day and asked if he would pray for me. While he was praying, he told me he felt God wanted to say something specific to me and addressed every hurt I had spoken to God about earlier that day. I was undone. Just a few weeks before, I had experienced a miraculous deliverance from withdrawals and now it was unmistakably clear that the Lord had heard my cries and cared deeply about my pain. I fully surrendered my life to Christ that night and have never been the same since.
As time went on, the desires of my heart started to change. I no longer longed for an escape from my unbearable reality; instead, I learned to run into my Father’s arms with all my pain and He would comfort me in a way drugs never could. I spent a full year in rehab learning how to be a disciple of Jesus and build healthy habits for my life. After I graduated, I decided to attend seminary to pursue full-time vocational ministry so I could spend all my time helping people find the same hope and freedom I found. In college, I continued to fall more in love with Jesus despite many relational and professional struggles, and my faith started to become more solidified. For the first time, I began to see that the pain of my past was a weapon for my future. I began to see myself the way Jesus sees me despite all my mistakes and baggage.
As my self-image shifted, I met the girl of my dreams. Now, we have been married for 10 years and have three beautiful children. If you would have told me 13 years ago that I would be living the life I am living today I would have said you were crazy. The Lord has literally taken me from death to life. I still have many hard days and struggle with things I wish I could leave behind, but I now live with a freedom, hope, and optimism I once thought was a fairytale. I continue to fall more in love with Jesus every day and have the joy of seeing my kids do the same. I’ve had the privilege of shepherding families for eight years and have seen hundreds of people find life in Christ. It’s the greatest honor and privilege I could ask for, and I hope to continue loving and caring for families for many years to come.
Justin Kessler is the Student Pastor at WoodsEdge.
