Four personal testimonies from individuals undergoing baptism at Grace Community Church on August 17, 2025. Each person, including Olivia Patel, Levi Richmond, Jason Maisie, and Tiana Marie Makavinta, shares their spiritual journey, highlighting their past struggles, their discovery of saving faith in Jesus Christ, and the transformative power of God's grace in their lives. The overall theme emphasizes public declaration of faith, repentance, and the new life found through Christ, with the ceremony symbolizing an outward expression of an inward spiritual change.
Introduction
Well, tonight we have four that are coming because they have taken the cross of Christ. And we're going to hear four different testimonies of how the Lord used believers to come into their lives and they heard the gospel of Jesus Christ and were saved. They're coming tonight into these waters to give a public testimony of what's already taken place in their hearts and how they are becoming more like Christ each and every day. The first to come is Olivia.
Olivia Patel
Good evening everyone. My name is Olivia Patel. I'm standing before you to proclaim Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior and to be baptized in obedience to his word. I grew up in a Christian home that experienced some traumatic events in my early childhood. Consequently, I was extremely shy, timid, fearful, and anxious. When I was in high school, I experienced my first panic attack, which marked the start of my struggle with anxiety and at times depression. I relied on medications, secular therapy, and psychiatrists to help me cope with the mental and emotional battles. Despite my profession of faith, at 19 years of age, I never sought the Lord, nor had any fellowship with him. I preferred prescription pills and worldly counseling over the self-examination of my heart in the faith. My desire for the world and its temporary joys far outweighed any zeal for the pursuit and eternal love of my savior. According to to Jeremiah 17:9. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick. Who can understand it? Sadly, I lived as a self-deceived and unrepentant quote unquote Christian for many years. In God's common grace and undeserved mercy towards me, I experienced an 8-year reprieve from the anxiety and panic attacks during which my beloved husband and I welcomed our two precious children. However, in December of 2023, I became Extremely overwhelmed by the weight of my role as a stay-at-home mom and plunged into my worst trial with anxiety, consumed by unwavering fear and paramount loneliness, I sought the Lord for help rather than the world's pathway for mental health. I prayed and cried incessantly as I battled the tormented thoughts and relentless panic attacks which God perfectly used to bring me to saving faith in his son, Jesus Christ. On Christmas Day, in the late evening hours, I prayed with my sister Elizabeth and genuinely repented of my rebellious, sinful, disobedient, prideful, and distrusting heart towards my heavenly father and savior. According to Romans 5 6 through8, for while we were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. My longing for the world and for my own sin immediately vanished and was replaced by a passionate desire to obey Christ and pursue his love, holiness, and righteousness. In the months that followed, God's abounding grace and his perfect power healed my mind, renewed my heart, and restored my soul in Christ Jesus. His promise to sustain me in my trial was fulfilled as stated in 2 Corinthians 12:9. My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Whenever my flesh tempts me to doubt his faithfulness, I recall to my mind. Genesis 50:20. As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. My heart is now peace and rests in my King, my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
I now baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Levi Richmond
My name is Levi Richmond. I was born and raised in a Christian family where morals, obedience, and excellence were all priorities. However, My family was misguided in our pursuit of Christ. We moved from church to church while I was growing up. Almost all of these churches had something in common. The gospel was not central. Sermons were always tips to be a better person and did not did not directly address sin. Throughout this whole time, I felt I was a moral guy, so I must be doing good and God must be proud. In my sophomore year of high school, I fell deeper into sin and really struggled with my position in Christ. I questioned how I could say I live for Christ. Christ and yet live for sin. I was completely wrapped up in a double life. Then through the American Gospel documentaries involving John MacArthur and Paul Washer, my family finally saw how misguided we were. We switched churches and my youth pastor started mentoring me. The following summer after my junior year of high school, I went to camp regen and heard Austin Duncan preach on Mark 8:34 through 38 where it says, "For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul? In his love and sovereignty, I realized I was living for myself and my own pleasures and that I was ashamed of God. I fully realized Christ's work on the cross to pay for my sin and that his perfect life will take my place in the time of judgment. I rejoice in the knowledge that Jesus's power over sin allows me to be justified and now sanctified. Since that time, I have had new desires. I continued to meet with my youth pastor and began reading through holiness by JC Riyle. In my pursuit to glorify God with my life. I decided to attend the Mast's University. I have been there for the past two years to grow my knowledge and love for my heavenly father. He has been gracious throughout my life and drew me to him. I am here to publicly profess my love and dedication to the great God who saved me.
Levi, we're thankful that you have trusted in Jesus Christ and for your testimony of how he saved you. And based upon that testimony, I baptize you in the name of the Father, Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Jason Maisie
My name is Jason Maisie. Growing up Catholic, I wrestled with practices like confessing to priests that clash with the Bible's call to go straight to Jesus. My life was a train. wreck, chasing the wrong crowd, getting into trouble, and landing in legal messes. That rebellion, seeking meaning in all the wrong places, left me lost and desperate for something real. At 19, I felt Jesus's presence like he was pulling me through a storm. Mark 4 captures it. A fierce gale of wind developed and the waves were breaking over the boat. They woke him and said to him, "Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?" And he rebuked the wind and said to the sea, Hush, be still. And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. God's hand was on me, guiding me through every bad choice. Without him, I wouldn't be alive, nor would I have met my wife, Tracy, or been able to have our son, Jacob. Those trials shaped me. I accepted Jesus as my savior then, but I didn't fully get it, thinking good deeds earned my salvation. In 2022, everything changed. I met John MacArthur and our constant talks flip my world. He showed me salvation is through Christ alone not works pointing to Ephesians 2 8-9 for by grace you have been given you have been saved through faith and this is not of yourselves it is a gift of God not a result of works so that no one may boast that's when I truly turn from my idols self-reliance and wrong influences to serve the living God since surren ing to Christ in 2022. My life's been transformed. In 1 Corinthians 15:3-4 anchors me. Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures. Jesus's resurrection yanked me from chaos and God sanctifying me, molding me to fight sin and love him more. He's blessed me with Tracy, who was my rock since I was 21, and Jacob, who is a true gift, who fills my life with joy. Joy and purpose. Despite growing up without a father, God's grace has made me a devout husband and father, Jesus's grace saved me, and I feel his work in me daily, refining me to be more like him. I don't complain about long days or hardships anymore. I see them as divine blessings woven into my story to make me whole. Tonight, I am eager to obey the biblical command to be baptized and to publicly confess that Jesus is my savior and Lord,
Jason, thank you for your testimony and we're grateful that you have a heavenly father who loves you and that he used Pastor MacArthur to talk to you about the Lord. The Lord uses many to talk about the gospel so that you heard it. It's based upon your testimony of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ that I I now baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Marie Makavinta
Hello everyone, my name is Iana Marie Makavinta and this is my brief testimony. me that I would like to share before you all. A few months after I was born, I was baptized Roman Catholic. However, as I grew up, I didn't truly understand nor fully grasp who Christ is and what his death really meant for me. In my early pre-teen years, I then became a bit more skeptical, leading to a life where I would live and serve for myself, following my own understanding and pursuing what I generally deemed was the norm for my peers. I became agnostic atheists, prideful and skeptical about God, and I struggled with the thought of how to give my life purpose. Though I was repelled by the idea of Christ, deep inside I was restless and unfulfilled. By God's grace, he used my family here in the States who patiently planted seeds in my life starting back in 2015. Over time, Christ began softening my heart and I started doubting my old worldview. My initial fear of hell eventually led me to a deep yearning to know the joy found in Jesus. In 2019, during my last high school retreat, I sincerely prayed for faith and God answered and gifted me the desire to seek him. Although my journey has been imperfect, as there are times where I have stumbled, his patience and mercy has very much gradually transformed how I lived and view the world. My biggest prayer is that I would continue to desire to live life that pleases him. Albeit knowing that nothing I could do could ever compare to what he has done for me. I've come to see that Christ alone is enough and that true fulfillment is found in him alone. Repentance was the key to opening my heart to a genuine relationship with Jesus. Acts 3:19 reminds me that through repentance and faith, my sins are wiped away and I am refreshed in his presence. The gospel is this. Jesus Christ Christ fully God and fully man lived a life per perfect life and shed his blood on the cross to atone for our sins. His resurrection proves that God accepted his sacrifice giving us a new life and reconciliation with him. I am eternally grateful for this undeserved gift and joyfully declare that Christ Jesus is my king and my savior. Thank you for all for listening and have a blessed evening.
Tiana, thank you for your testimony and we're thankful that the Lord used your family to talk to you about the Lord and share the scriptures with you. And it's based upon your testimony of your trust in Jesus and how he saved you that I now baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Prayer
Let's pray. Lord, we are thankful for Olivia, for Jason, for Levi and Tiana. Lord, thank you for their testimonies of how you have saved them and for this display of being buried with Christ and raised to walk in newness of life. It baptism pictures that what has already taken place in the heart. We pray that you would help them to to continue to grow, to be sanctified in the truth, to become more like Christ each and every day, and use your body of believers here at Grace Church to come alongside, to stimulate them to love in good deeds. We give you all the glory in Christ's name. Amen.
