Hi... my name is Marty but my biker friends call me LongRider. That's because I used to put alot of miles on my Harley when I lived down south. But that is not what I am here to talk about. I am here to tell you about my life before and after I met the Lord, Jesus Christ.

I first came to know Jesus in 1982 while working in the defense industry. Some of my co-workers had a prayer meeting every day in the parking lot prior to work. It took the more than six months of praying for me before I felt the leadings of the Holy Spirit to give my life over to Christ. Before then, I lead the life of a stereotypical biker... drugs, alcohol, violence and crime. I don't believe in going into details about this portion of my life because I feel it falsely glamorizes it and in no way glorifies the Lord. Let me just say that I was either drunk and/or high every night and spent more than one evening in jail. I followed the Lord for several years before I found myself backsliding. I guess I had never totally given myself to the Lord. I still had the urges to use drugs and alcohol and I was trying to control them myself. To this day I can not pinpoint the exact "how" or "why" I strayed for the Lord, all I know is that after I had turned my back on God, my life was in worse shape than it ever was before. I kept going from job to job and from relationship to relationship... all of which failed. That is when a friend of mine took me to the Open Door Mission in Rochester, New York where I enrolled in thier Bible Based Christian Life 12-step recovery program. There the Lord performed a miricle in my life. He accomplished in an instant what I could not do for myself in 20 years. He totally delivered me from drugs and alcohol. And all I had to do was to turn my addictions over to Him and ask Him to remove them from me! Through the kind care and guidance of the staff of the Open Door Mission and my home church, Bethel Christian Fellowship , I returned to my walk with the Lord, this time without any of the urges and cravings for the drugs and alcohol that I experienced when I tried to quit them under my own power. I have since moved to the Southern Tier of New York and I had found a new home church, Obi Community Church. However, An industrial accident has left me disabled and my "home church" is now has to be any number of churches and/or sermons availabe at OnePlace.com since it is very difficult for me to physically get out to attend church... especially in the Western New York winters!

  

The Lord has done many miracles in my life... the violence and anger of my previous life was replaced with love and a genuine carring for my fellow human beings. He led me to my wife, a fine Christian woman named Kathleen who not only played the piano, organ and sang for the church for 11 years prior to when I met her, but she also was an addictions coucilor in the Mentally Ill, Chemically Addicted (MICA) Unit of Bradford Regional Medical Center in Bradford, PA! What a coincidence! God is good and He is real! He is there for you if you will just humble yourself and call upon His name. I hope that each of you that read this finds the joy and peace that my Lord Jesus has for you just as I have found them. If you don't know Jesus and would like to, please click on the salvation link below. God Bless!

I also want to send a HUGE "Thank You" to the people at E-Sword for providing a powerful and awesome Electronic Bible totally free of charge! Be sure and visit their site and get your own free Bible software!

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