Nine years ago, I stopped watching pornography, reading erotica and even masturbating. However, last winter, as I struggled with lust in my thoughts and sometimes my words, I felt like I was walking through the valley of the shadow of death for me.

One morning while strapping my three-year-old son into his car seat, I had a lustful thought about him. The thought frightened me. I became determined to fight back against these thoughts by focusing on taking my lustful thoughts captive. The problem was, the harder I tried, the more lustful thoughts I had and the more ridiculous they became.

I found myself lusting in my thoughts about almost everyone and once, I even had a lustful thought about a dog. At the time I was going through this struggle, I was pregnant with my sixth child. I feared that I wouldn’t be able to nurse my baby when she was born because I feared nursing her would cause me to have lustful thoughts about her.

I read some Christian literature on dealing with lust and came to the mistaken conclusion that my situation was hopeless. I also read some books and watched a video on deliverance from such lustful thoughts. I begged God to deliver me from lust as I was worried I would somehow abuse my children. I also struggled with depression, postpartum obsessive-compulsive disorder, and schizophrenia.

Everywhere I went I thought God was judging me because of my lustful thoughts. I became convinced that if I did not abandon my husband and children, God was going to kill my children one by one to punish me.

During this time, I developed hatred toward God and found myself thinking the worst kinds of blasphemous thoughts against Him, even in my sleep. I stopped listening to Christian music on the radio because all the songs made me feel like God was going to condemn me and that He was mad at me. I even thought that He was making fun of me.

I have never felt so desperate, abandoned, and alone as I did during those months. I contemplated suicide often, but did not proceed only because I did not want to have my children think that suicide was any way to solve life’s problems.

I went to a Christian counselor who just happened to be someone who believes in radical grace. The counselor told me about Pastor Prince and so I began to read as many of Pastor Prince’s books as I could find. I especially found his book, The Power of Right Believing, to be helpful.

Slowly, God began to renew my mind about His love for me and the grace that Jesus purchased for me on the cross. I stopped calling myself a worthless sinner and started telling myself that “I am the righteousness of God in Christ” and that “as Christ is, so am I in this world,” especially when I had lustful or blasphemous thoughts.

Slowly, the lustful and blasphemous thoughts started to fade away until I simply lost interest in lusting because I wanted to focus my attention on how I could advance Jesus’ kingdom by spreading the gospel.

I know this message of grace is from God because my brother who is studying to be a preacher told me that he had prayed for me to learn about Pastor Prince’s teachings around the time I was deep in my pit of despair. Also, I notice that whenever I start to condemn myself, God will have me hear a song about His grace on one of the Christian radio stations.

I have also begun partaking of the Holy Communion several days each week, and have found that my depression has improved. I am going to keep taking the Communion and discerning the Lord’s body, as I believe that eventually I will be completely healed of depression, schizophrenia, and asthma.

Thank You, Jesus, and thank you, Pastor Prince, for teaching Jesus as you do. I am a mom who is eternally grateful that I did not have to abandon my husband and kids because of the thoughts in my head. My children are safe and will remain safe. God has assured me that I will never harm them. I am more than a conqueror in Christ Jesus!