You Might Be Right, but You Aint’ Right with the Word of God!

By Dimitri Yanuli

We believers are to be ambassadors of Christ, representing Him in whatsoever we eat, drink, and do to the glory of the Father, regardless of denomination or worldly, flesh-dominated traditions man has contrived. God the Father has not only paid the price for our salvation through the innocent shed blood of His Son Jesus Christ of Nazareth, but He has also given us the power and authority for each of us to accomplish our destiny and receive complete restoration through the baptism of the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. This path is outlined only in the written word of the living God in the Bible, from the written account of Moses in Genesis to the Revelation of the Apostle John on the isle of Patmos in Revelation. Your newly saved temple is protected by your restored and rehabilitated soul walls, and they alone determine your eternal rewardsnot your salvation, but your rewards. Let us now travel together through this life journey as we examine our soul walls for restoration, deliverance, and spiritual healing that only the Bible explains.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Dec 21, 2012
• ISBN: 9781449773786

Dimitri Yanuli

Dimitri Yanuli’s qualifications to write this book are twofold: he is saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost, and he is too afraid of God to proclaim anything not written in His Word. Dimitri has come close to death three times, and his brush with death has only increased his desire to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ. He is currently disabled from the diagnosis of MS. He lives with his wife, Lena, in Medina, Ohio. Together they have three sons, Christopher, Anthony and Matthew.

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You Might Be Right,

but You Ain’t Right

with the Word of God!

Dimitri Yanuli

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Copyright © 2012 Dimitri Yanuli

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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ISBN: 978-1-4497-7379-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4497-7380-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4497-7378-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012920969

WestBow Press rev. date: 12/19/2012

Contents

Chapter 1 God’s Call

Chapter 2 Resolution: Change Me, Lord

Chapter 3 Take Your Denominational Blinders Off

Chapter 4 The Age of Conscience

Chapter 5 The Apple of God’s Eye

Chapter 6 Connect the Dots

Chapter 7 Trust in Jesus Alone

Chapter 8 Either the Bible Is True or It’s Not

Chapter 9 Was Jesus Lying?

Chapter 10 The Daily Battles We Face

Chapter 11 Our Spirit’s Protection

Chapter 12 Look Who Jesus Loves

Chapter 13 The Third Person of the Trinity

Chapter 14 Reboot your Brain

Chapter 15 Close the Ports to Our Hard Drives

Chapter 16 Our Eternal Rewards

Chapter 17 The Power of God

Chapter 18 Were You There Charlie?

Chapter 19 Evil Spirits Torment Believers Too

Chapter 20 Receive the Holy Spirit

Chapter 21 Fruit of Love

Chapter 22 The Fruit of Joy

Chapter 23 The Fruit of Peace

Chapter 24 The Fruit of Longsuffering

Chapter 25 The Fruit of Gentleness

Chapter 26 The Fruit of Goodness

Chapter 27 The Fruit of Faith

Chapter 28 The Fruit of Meekness

Chapter 29 The Fruit of Temperance

Chapter 30 Be Battle Tested

Revelation Given 7/1/2010

Bibliography

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. (Ephesians 6:12)

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans10:9–10)

But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. (Acts 1:8)

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. (John 1:1–5)

And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him. (Luke 12:4-5)

Chapter 1

God’s Call

The premise of this book is to help give you an understanding of the process that mankind has had to go through in order to reconnect and have intimacy with the God of creation again after the fall of Adam. The Judeo-Christian Bible is the only account that tries to completely answer and explain creation from the beginning of time to the end of mankind here on earth. It alone explains his eternal destination that is based on this life’s actions, done while we are alive and assessed at our death. With its account of the creation of the universe and all the life on this earth to all the calamities and consequences of evil actions done by people in this life, only the Bible answers completely the questions of mankind’s purpose and his eternal destination after death.

I will venture to show and prove to the best of my ability, with clarity from the written Word of God, that it is God’s desire to call man—all of mankind—into fellowship with Him again on the same level they had in the garden of Eden. I will try to show that every scientific discovery made only validates and proves God’s existence and that the destination and purpose for man is explained in His Word alone. From the God of Adam at creation to the keeping of a pure bloodline for the Messiah to be born to heal and save a corrupt humanity—only in the Judeo-Christian biblical Scriptures are all the failures and victories of mankind recorded in detail. Only in the Jewish Torah and the complete Christian Bible do we see the purpose, failures, and restoration of mankind given continuously as examples for us to grow spiritually and achieve our fullest eternal potential. It alone tells us that you must believe in the only Creator, Jehovah God, who designed all that we see, taste, hear, touch, and smell, and that the consequences of our thoughts and actions are dealt with only at the cross of Christ. The Bible alone sets parameters that will determine our destination for eternity, and it alone warns us of potential losses in that eternity. The God of the Torah is the same God who sent His only begotten Son Jesus Christ as Messiah to Hebrew’s and believing Gentiles as their perfect Redeemer so that all who believe in Him can be saved for eternity. The complete Bible alone explains that Jesus Christ of Nazareth is the Messiah and has fulfilled every requirement of the Old Testament as High Priest, perfect sacrifice, and King of Kings. It alone tells us of man’s fall and that Jesus currently is seated at the right hand of the Father, interceding for us as our advocate and mediator in our times of need. Jesus is seated because His work is done and completed. There is nothing else needed for you or me to do to receive salvation other than to believe that Jesus is the great I AM spoken of to Abraham in Genesis17:1 and to Moses in Exodus 3:14

Thus my dilemma. As I read the Scriptures, I read sections that didn’t seem to apply to my rigid Greek Orthodox denominational upbringing. So much of what I was reading had to do with the Jews, and even more than that, Jesus said He didn’t even come for us Gentiles (see Matthew 10:5 and Mark 5:19). What I read didn’t line up with my traditional understanding of who God and Jesus were in relationship to me individually or to the church as I understood it. What about the Virgin Mary the mother of Jesus, the dead saints, the book of James, and the books of Acts and Hebrews? Who were they talking about, and how can they help us now? Who were these books in Scripture written by, and why the confusion and rejection of the Jewish people who wrote them? The Word says that you must verbally confess that Jesus is Lord to be saved but doesn’t say anything about where to attend a specific church or follow the specific doctrines of a particular denomination. It just says to believe with all your being—spirit, soul, and body. We will differentiate and explain their individual attributes and significance in our eternal quest throughout this book.

As I searched the Bible for the definitive salvation Scriptures, I studied the obvious one we all know: John 3:16, spoken by Jesus.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

The next most authoritative Scripture was written by the apostle Paul in Romans 10:9–10 for you to personally confess Jesus:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

You don’t have to do anything more than believe that Jesus is the only way to God the Father, that He is the Messiah, and that God raised Jesus from the dead for you to enter His presence. Throughout the Pauline Epistles, Paul emphasizes that after a person confesses Jesus as Lord and Savior of their life, they are a new creation. He says that old things have passed away, and all things have become brand-new.

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation. (2 Corinthians 5:17–18)

Once born again, your spirit is renewed and is as perfect as it will ever be for all eternity. You are clean and forgiven.

Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:22–23)

We need to be cleaned and that can only be done through the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ the Messiah, our kinsman Redeemer on the cross. The process begins for rebuilding the walls of your soul that protect your spirit, and in the context of this revelation, each person is constantly building or destroying the walls of their soul in their daily walk. The purpose of rebuilding those soul walls is to then rehang the gates that access and lead to your believing spirit to protect it from attacks of the Enemy. Let me explain.

My pastor had asked me to teach a class on a book written by the leader of our denomination: Rebuilding the Real You By Jack Hayford. It is based on the book of Nehemiah in the Old Testament, and it speaks of his desire to rebuild the walls and rehang the gates surrounding the newly rebuilt temple in Jerusalem. The walls were necessary for protecting the temple. We had many great discussions on the difficulties, opposition, and process of rebuilding the walls and rehanging the gates to protect the new temple in Jerusalem. Similarly, as you grow in the Lord after your salvation experience, your newly rebuilt temple needs to be protected by your soul walls, regardless if they’re damaged or not through this life. Because of the Holy Spirit being in you and communing with your soul and spirit at salvation, we need to rebuild and fortify our soul’s walls to protect our newly born again spirit temple.

As we continue on in this book, I will explain all the obstacles and hindrances that arose with Nehemiah as he rebuilt the temple walls, and I will discuss the similarities to the obstacles I faced because of my desire for knowledge through salvation. Jesus is the foundation, the cornerstone of our faith, and everything we believe in after salvation is then based on this rebuilding of the walls and gates to our soul, protecting our born-again spirits. All you have to do is believe in Jesus and begin to change your mind (repent) from your learned life (habits) that are detrimental to our eternal position and rewards in the kingdom.

I will venture to explain what is necessary to receive after believing in this priceless gift of eternal life we have been given through Jesus Christ. In my personal quest to find God and be where I am today—saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost—I had to go through a whole transformation and reprogramming process of my mind and soul. The obstacles and ridicule I had encountered were very similar to those outlined in the book of Nehemiah as he was determined to rebuild the walls around the temple in Jerusalem. The striking similarities in the newly born-again believer’s struggles with the acquisition of resources for rebuilding protective barrier walls is the heart and core of this book. It completely opened my eyes to all of my damaged walls and emotional strongholds I had built to protect my spirit temple with my damaged soul. This transformation has taken twenty-five-plus years since a (feta cheese) salesman brought me to the Lord at my mom’s deli store in 1986. That’s when the process began for me, and it continues to this day.

As I acquire resources of knowledge and wisdom from the Word of God, it removes the strongholds of racism and prejudice and refills the voids with the Godly fruit of the Spirit. I am a project in progress, continually learning and continually growing in the Lord. Scars and battle wounds are all part of the process in the pulling down of strongholds and the mending of broken walls which are all part of the restoration process. The Holy Spirit revealed this to me, and I realized that most of the soul wounds protecting my spirit were self-inflicted. This became more and more apparent to me the more I read about Jesus and His Father, Jehovah God. Many of these soul wounds I didn’t even know I had.

I realized that I was responding to everyone around me with crude, snide comments that were really protective barbs repelling others to protect my wounded soul. These reactions had become so second nature with me that my family and friends expected them as my normal behavior. As my ugly, vulgar personality took over, this condescending ridiculing humor became second Nature to me and I found myself making jokes about everything. Many of the jokes and comments were really just a way for me to be accepted, and over the years, the jokes became filthier and the comments more hurtful to the people I really cared about. Not only was I struggling with what the Word called coarse jesting, but my spirit ached from the contradictions as I read Scriptures. Jesus was alone in His actions, and His teachings were diametrically opposed to the natural fleshly desires of the common man or woman. I’m in good company, because the apostle Paul tells us in his epistles that he battled his flesh as well.

For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. (Romans 7:19–20)

Wow! In learning that this earthly battle was experienced by all men, I began to understand that I was in a process that was entirely up to me to continue or to stop. I could delay it or completely stop this process on the road to physical and spiritual destruction, or I could choose my soul’s restoration through Jesus with the help of the Holy Spirit. It was my decision and mine alone, just as yours is your choice alone. Contrary to the philosophers and gurus of antiquity, God has given us free will, and with it, we choose our eternal destination. I chose Jesus, I chose to study and show myself approved by rightly dividing the Word of Truth. I choose to teach, I choose to learn, I choose to obey Him, and I choose to write this book because His Word says He wants no one to perish but all to come to the knowledge of Jesus Christ. I choose to teach what I believe coincides with the Word of God: that science validates Scripture in the Old and New Testaments. I choose to preach and teach the good news of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ of Nazareth in humility and grace to the Hebrews and the Gentiles alike. Finally, I choose to teach on the weapons of our warfare available to all believers with the baptism of the Holy Spirit today!

Remember, you can be right about astronomy, archeology, physics, and all the other sciences of time and space, but you ain’t right about your rejection of the Bible. You can be right about biblical religious rules and traditions, but you ain’t right in the ways you treat other people because of the color of their skin, their social economic status, or people’s scientific conclusions deduced from undeniable facts. So it is my contention as I write this book that the combinations of all these scientific proofs and reasons for personal maladies are outlined only in the biblical Judeo-Christian Scriptures for all of mankind’s edification and instruction for eternity. They are not mutually exclusive to each other but validation of a creator God and His endless love for every single soul who has ever lived or shall ever be conceived and born before Jesus’ return.

Chapter 2

Resolution: Change Me, Lord

There were three hurdles I had to accept and pass over in order to return to the position of intimacy and fellowship with God the Father that I know He desires from us all. That’s what I wanted, and I wanted to have what Adam had before his fall in Genesis 2:25–3:10. The three hurdles in my life that I needed to overcome were my notions of ethnic and racial superiority and the deep-seated anti-Semitism that was taught to me from childhood—none of which I could keep and reach my goal of serving the Lord Jesus Christ (a Jew). We will discuss in detail the purpose and reasons for the undefiled Hebrew lineage of Jesus through the Hebrew girl Mary, the significance of His virgin birth, and the legal priestly order of His stepfather, Joseph, all the way back to Abraham. Matt. 1-17 KJV.

These truths of Jesus’ sinless humanity are paramount for the complete eradication of humanity’s sin nature so as to never return again unless we legally invite it in. This is what the rest of this book is about. That every believer is not destined to suffer in torment, but through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross and the baptism of the Holy Spirit, God has provided all the tools necessary for the believer’s life here on earth and for eternity.

Scripture also promises us that Jesus will split the eastern sky; will then raise the dead in Christ first; then as the Word says, we will all be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord and be with Him for a thousand years as fellow heirs, kings, and priests in the New Jerusalem of His kingdom. I want to be ready, and I knew I couldn’t be ready with all the hate, prejudice, and anger in my heart. I had to take my ethnically racist and anti-Semitic blinders off and read Scripture without these prejudices for the first time.

But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:13–18, emphasis added)

The arpaxo, or snatching away of the believers, to be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the sky, was revealed first to us as a shadow of this arpoxo in the Old Testament with Enoch being translated in Genesis 5:24 and again with Elijah being taken in a whirlwind and chariot of fire in 2 Kings 2:11.

Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him. (Genesis 5:24)

And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. (2 Kings 2:11)

Many believe that these two men are the two witnesses of the book of Revelation 11:3–12 because they were both translated and did not die natural deaths as the rest of humanity does. This is what the apostle Luke spoke of in Luke 21:36.

Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man. (emphasis added)

You have to understand that the things I’m telling you have nothing to do with your salvation. What they refer to is His promise to all believers that we will not experience the wrath of God, but because of our faith, we’ll be translated (escape) through the rapture. When I think this will occur will be discussed in later chapters in detail. But suffice it to say that, without a doubt, once you receive Jesus and confess Him as Lord and Savior with your mouth and believe in your heart He is risen, you’ll escape the wrath coming upon this earth:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shall be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10:9–10, emphasis added)

You can pray this with me and be sure of your eternity. Repeat this now regardless of orthodox Christian denomination:

Father God, I repent for my sins, Lord. I’m sorry, and I’m willing to change the way I think and live. I believe You raised Jesus from the dead, and I am now ready to trust my whole life under the lordship of Your Son, Jesus the Christ. By faith, I receive Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. Amen.

Halleluiah!

This salvation through Jesus is the first hurdle and is the only mandatory one of the three to know you’re a sinner in need of redemption. But with this first hurdle I had to climb, I realized it was the most difficult one for me to believe and accept, because Romans 10:9–10 is a non-ethnic, nondenominational prayer, and denominational religion has nothing to do with it. To believe in my heart that God raised Jesus from the dead and then confess Him as Lord and Savior of my life was no big deal. This was easy since I believed that I was already a Christian, even if only a nominal one at the time. So confessing with my mouth was easy, but believing in my heart … that was a different story. Nothing I had done in my life up to that point differentiated me from the rest of the nonbelieving world. The way I lived, spoke, and thought contradicted everything I read that Jesus expected of a believer in the risen Christ.

The more I read the New Testament, the more I realized that it was an extension of the Old Testament, and I then could begin to see how far from Jesus I really was. Without the Old Testament, the New Testament made no sense to me and it seemed incomplete. I read that God is not a respecter of persons and wants none to perish but all to come to the knowledge of Jesus Christ. When I read in the Bible what Jesus would say on judgment day to professing believers, fear of not making it to heaven ran through my mind, and for the first time, I realized that everything I took for granted wasn’t going to save me.

But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity. (Luke 13:27)

I knew Jesus, so worker of iniquity was not me—right? How could that be? My thoughts ran through my life: I’m a Christian; I go to church on Easter and Christmas. I’ve donated to the Greek Church for the festivals. I never killed anyone, I should be okay … I am okay … I think I’m okay. There are a lot worse people than me. I’m really a good person. I really love people and I’m really a good person! God wouldn’t punish me, would He?

In my mind, I was trying to justify my life’s actions, my prejudices, and my hates. The more I read the Bible, the more I was convicted of my prejudice, bigotry, and intolerance of non-Greeks and nonwhites; this was my second major hurdle to cross. I needed to work on my walls and gates even though I didn’t know it at the time. I just knew that I fell really short of what I was reading on how I should be as a believer in the risen Christ. Then I was confronted with the third hurdle: all the histories of the writers, their lives, their deaths, and their commitment to die for the Word were written by Jews. How they copied the words that Moses received from God exactly. How when even one mistake was made, the whole book was not kosher and was discarded. Every jot and every tittle had to be perfect. Then I had to acknowledge that Jesus was a Jew, and the apostles were all Jews. Every last one of them was Jewish. They wrote about the Jews. The history in the Bible was about the Jews. Prophecy was for the Jews.

Wait a minute. I hated the Jews; I even beat up a kid once because he was a Jew. The only people I hated more than the Jews were the queers and black people. I’m not proud of that, but I even used to go out with my cousin, looking for gays to beat up. In the army, this black queer kid beat the snot out of me for my prejudice toward blacks and gays. He kind of convinced me to change my opinion about them a little, but in my heart, I hated them all and I was still prejudiced, still racist, and still an anti-Semite. I never knew any Jews, queers, or black people, but I just knew I hated them all. Never really knew why; I just knew I did. They were my enemies. I was better, smarter, whiter, and of course, I was a Greek, so I justified my actions and opinions. If I saw any person of color—or even worse yet, a white girl with a black man in a store or restaurant—I would snicker and prejudge her as being a whore in my mind. I never really would say anything, but my heart was darkened with false accusations and the preconceived ideas of superiority over them was there. She was a white-trash whore. Or if the person she was with was what I deemed as beneath my class of people, they were white-trash hillbillies too.

This was the mind-set I had before my dad died when I was eleven years old, and it had stayed with me until I got saved at twenty-six and began reading the Bible. I had learned most of this from hearing my dad, family, and neighbors talk about the race wars in the sixties. The lady across the street from us had married a black policeman after her first husband died from cancer, and they of course became the topic of many neighborhood discussions. My father’s ugly racial comments planted the seeds of racism and prejudice in my heart. Never mind that this lady was left alone with four kids to care for and that her second husband loved her. She was white and he was black—end of discussion. This was a time when many of the stereotypes of the sixties were running rampant, and tolerance of interracial marriages did not really exist (not in my family). Hearing them ridicule her and the other families in the neighborhood helped shape my racism and prejudices that I carried with me until I prayed the day my white niece married a black man. I prayed, and I distinctly remember the Holy Spirit telling me that they were doing the right thing by getting married and that I was wrong to snub them by not going to the wedding.

The second hurdle of racism was tied in with my sense of ethnic superiority that was intertwined with anger, forming hatred and intolerance of anyone different than white Greeks. There was a family that lived down the street from us that helped instill that racist Greek superiority complex even further. The fact that they had twelve kids—I think they were from West Virginia—also helped form my opinions. I remember my mom and dad calling them filthy hillbillies for years; you would think I grew up with Archie Bunker. Their house was only two houses away, and it really stunk; they were always dirty and nasty. Not only did the house stink from the cats and dogs defecating inside and out, but there was garbage everywhere. There weren’t even screens on any of the house windows, which only added to the ridicule. It was my mission in life to beat up the oldest boy and his friends whenever possible.

No wonder when I grew older I had so many issues that had to be dealt with, especially in the false sense of superiority I had. In a way it seems cruel, but as I look back at every issue, every one of them was absolutely necessary for me to identify and remove to grow spiritually. I needed to understand from experience the shame and ridicule I contributed by inflicting this cruelty toward others, but the realization of the root planted was what was necessary.

The pain, shame, and remorse for the things I had done as a child and later as a young adult were brought to light the more I read Scripture. I am very ashamed and very sorry for how I acted and thought and the way I made fun of people. I couldn’t even go to my twenty-year high school reunion because of my shame on how I treated some girls in high school. As a born-again believer, we’re to be ambassadors for Jesus, and as a new creation in Christ, I could see that I was a miserable failure.

I now know that I was a very hypocritical, angry, and a very bitter man. How could I not be? It only makes sense since when I was a boy, I was filled with so much fear, hate, and anger about who I thought I was and who I thought everyone else was. It has taken Jesus twenty-six years to change me into the man I am today, and I thank God that what the Devil has designed for my destruction, God has transformed into victory. Had not a born-again Greek olive–and–feta cheese salesman come into my mother’s deli and witnessed to me the good news of Jesus Christ and then taken me to a church youth meeting, I would not be where I am today. Because of my asking Jesus into my life, I am convinced that I would never have met the pretty youth group leader who later became my wife. She was yelling at the youth to get their act together because they only had a couple of weeks left until the Christmas play. I remember thinking how mean she was—good-looking, but mean.

The process had begun with my willingness to freely choose Jesus. As I look back, there really was no way I could have had such a heart transformation without Jesus. Only Jesus could have taken this wicked and hateful man that I had become and remold him even with all the scars, scrapes, and bruises into a man willing to admit failure and change the hates into the love of Jesus Christ. I was a hateful and angry man who still doesn’t understand how or why anyone could or would fall in love with me—especially since I never even told my future wife that I loved her until after we were married. Go figure.

Have you ever seen the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding? It’s a pretty accurate depiction of my Greek family life growing up, once you get past the phony introductions and family-acceptance parts of the movie, which is another story. You know how the church is set up on the wedding day with the bride’s family on one side and the groom’s on the other? Well, mine looked a little different. My future wife Lena’s side was full of family and friends; my side was completely empty except for my mom’s best friend, Christine, and Uncle Peter who married an American girl and probably had sympathy for my situation. They were the only people on my side of the church (which seated about five hundred people). Because of my Greek Orthodox mutiny to my family, they disowned me for marrying an Italian-Polish-Jewish girl. Hmmm! Not only were they upset that their firstborn son wasn’t marrying a Greek girl, but they were also upset for my going to another church. I even lost my job at my mom’s deli store as well.

Not only did I get disowned by my family, but my soon-to-be mother-in-law stood at the entrance of the church on our wedding day, holding the keys to her car and telling my future wife she could still leave if she wanted to. She said, It’s not too late to leave! No kidding! We had no money, my new wife was in debt, I didn’t have a job, and we didn’t even have a real honeymoon. We couldn’t even keep the diamond wedding ring I bought her, because we needed the money to turn the electricity back on at our house. Good thing my poker buddy owned the jewelry store where I bought the ring from, and he gave me the deposit money back when we returned it. The only good thing was that my sister and I had made an agreement that whoever got married first would get the house that our mother bought for us to live together in while we both worked in the family store.

A couple of months after Lena and I got married, my mother sent my sister to Greece for vacation, all because some American boy showed an interest in her and my mom didn’t want what happened to me to happen to her daughter. It’s been twenty-five years since she went there. She now has a husband and four kids, and she’s only been back to visit twice. That’s okay. She’s happy and I’m very happy for her. I was a young man full of hate, anger, fear, prejudice, and ugly stinking thinking until I was twenty-six years old and I received Jesus as my Lord and Savior and He showed me grace.

The process began in November of 1986 and is still going on today. I learned the hard way that all those learned attitudes just don’t disappear when you get saved. The first two hurdles of ethnicity and racism kind of led me to automatically fall into the next obstacle of anti-Semitism. This third hurdle for me to get over was to accept the Jewish people as necessary to reestablish a relationship with God. God had to separate a people from the rest of the corrupted bloodline of the now-pagan world. God had to find a group of people undefiled by generational and national curses and to set up a people that revered Him (Jehovah God) as their one and only true God. God needed to find a righteous and mindfully conscious people that would adhere to His commands and His future rules of family lineage, marriage, food, cleanliness, and the priesthood, and only the pre-Jewish Hebrew people led by Abram were willing to meet these criteria. This was necessary to have a royal, legal bloodline as well as a holy priesthood to usher in the Messiah. It was not only required that the Messiah be of the lineage of King David, but He had to also be a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. Hebrews 4:14-16

The God I believed in was inherently different from the God of Israel. Sure I believed in God, but I didn’t know Him as Israel’s God too. I knew He was the same God, but because of Jesus, He was different. Somehow