Never Going Back: This is My Story

By Dylan Robinson

Coming from a life of brokenness and abuse, Dylan came to a crossroads in his life and had to choose between going down the path set before him or to accept the hope and love of Jesus Christ. Once he experienced Jesus for the first time, he knew it was what he had always been looking for. Life didn't get easier after accepting Christ, but the purpose and fulfillment that came with living in Christ was a life he never thought was possible.

This book is about how God took a broken kid, born on the wrong side of the tracks, and redeemed him in a way he never thought possible. Dylan now travels all over the country preaching about the Good News that can save their lives as well and also inspire others in their own faith. Dylan chose and continues to choose to keep moving forward and to never go back to his old life, and he believes that God desires everyone to continue to grow in their faith rather than becoming stagnant. What will you choose?

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Nov 29, 2019
• ISBN: 9781543990386

Book preview

©All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Print ISBN: 978-1-54399-037-9

eBook ISBN: 978-1-54399-038-6

NOTE FROM AUTHOR

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

FINAL THOUGHTS

Note From Author

God began to lay it on my heart to write a book telling my story several years ago, but because of the busyness of life and also the lies of Satan discouraging me from writing, I put it off. After finally obeying God’s Spirit and ignoring the lies of the enemy, I’m excited to now be able to share my story with you about the transformation that Jesus made in my life. I’ve mentioned bits and pieces of my story all over the country, but I’ve decided to put it all together and dive deeper in the stories that I’ve shared over the years. My reason for writing this is not to bring glory to my name in any way, but to offer a source of hope and inspiration by telling you about the life-giving power of Jesus. I struggled writing this because I didn’t want people to get the wrong impression of why I chose to write this. I did not write this to explain how hard I had it as a kid, nor was it an attempt to make my family look bad. I love my family very much, regardless of everything that has taken place, and the last thing I would want is to cause more conflict within our relationship and for others to look down upon them. It is my hope that, by writing this, they are inspired to surrender everything to God and know that they, too, can be used by Him in great ways. I pray that each book that is read will be a great encouragement to both the individuals that feel like they are too broken for God to love them and use them, and also the person that feels like there is nothing else they can do to help out the broken people in their lives. I also know that there will be many that can relate to me and share some of the same experiences that I’ve had, and some that I cannot relate with. I’m aware that every person experiences things differently, and there are some things that I’ve never had to go through, so please understand my purpose is to share my own experiences in life. I also pray that as you read this you will be open to what God is laying on your heart, whether that be to help out troubled kids, answer the call to ministry, or try and reconcile with your family. I’m a firm believer that God is always speaking, but we have to learn to listen to His whisper. If this book speaks to you, then please put it in the hands of someone else that you think would benefit from it, because I know that in one moment God can change a person’s life from the inside out, and He will use anyone and everything to bring about that change. 

Thanks for reading!

Introduction

I’ll never forget walking down those hallways as a junior in High School reading the first book I had read ever since I was a little kid. I’m sure it caught people off guard as I walked past them with my head down and my eyes glued to the pages. At that point of my life, everyone knew that I wasn’t a good student, let alone a reader on my own time, but I couldn’t put it down. One of my friends knew about a speaker that was coming into town to preach at a youth rally soon, and he just so happened to have a copy of his book, and God encouraged him to lend it to me to read. The name of the book was If You Only Knew by Chad Varga. The title alone pierced my heart because that was the very phrase that I had often thought to myself when my teachers, administrators, and others would ask me why I was acting the way I was growing up as a kid, which carried over all the way until I got saved my junior year (just a couple of months before reading Chad’s book). They had no idea what was taking place in my life outside those school doors and behind the four walls of my home. As I would often come to school after witnessing terrible things at home the night before, I would eventually blow up in anger or act out disrespectfully to the administration because I was boiling inside from the sounds and images in my head from the previous night. How was I supposed to focus on the subjects in class that day with all of these things going on inside my head? I hated getting into trouble, but it was as though it was inevitable. I’m not suggesting that I had the right to talk and behave the way I did, but I do know now, looking back, that my impulsive reactions (that would eventually lead to almost daily discipline) was the only way I knew how to deal with the pain. I often wondered if there would ever be a change in my life and if there was anyone out there that could help me, but little did I know that there was a God in Heaven watching over me and protecting me the entire time.

By the end of the day, I had completed the entire book, and it was as though I felt something inside me telling me that I would one day be writing my story to help others know that there are truly people out there who love you and want to help you, and, most importantly, that there is a God in Heaven who loves you and adores you. The amazing thing about this story is the fact that I got to personally meet and talk to Chad Varga at my youth pastor’s home after the conference, and I was able to tell him how much I could relate to some of the family aspects of his story. I thanked him for sharing his story because it gave me the hope that maybe one day God could move in my family as He did for his, and that his story gave me the encouragement to one day share mine.

So, this is my story.

Chapter 1

He’s a miracle baby. Those were the first few words the doctors and nurses told my family when I was born. I was born with a defect called Gastroschisis, in which the baby’s intestines are found outside the baby’s body, exiting through a hole beside the belly button. If the medical description wasn’t gross enough, seeing pictures of me as a baby with my intestines on the outside was enough to make me gag! Though more common now, Gastroschisis was something that wasn’t too common in the early 90s, so the doctors weren’t too sure what the outcome would be. This birth defect typically occurs with younger mothers, and my mother was 18 years old when she had me. It wasn’t until recently that I saw pictures and videos of myself shortly after I was born, and honestly speaking, I was overwhelmed by the idea that God’s hand of protection was upon me right from the start. As I looked through some of the pictures and saw the many IVs attached to my body (even to the top of my head), making me look like some type of alien, it dawned on me how close our God is to us even from the start. The first part of the famous verse found in Jeremiah 1:5 says, I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb. Wow: though I have read and recited that verse at least a hundred times since becoming a Christian, it never became so real and personal than right there. Though the doctors and my family members were shocked that I pulled through as well as I did, God knew His protection upon my life was just getting started. Until now, I’ve always hated the scar on my wrist from the IV and also the way my belly button looks, but rather than seeing them as physical imperfections, I now see them as God’s protective mark upon my life.

Right from the start, life was a fight, and that was pretty fitting since fighting was something that I became very accustomed to within my own family. Growing up, my life on the outside seemed perfect to others. My Mom was a young, beautiful woman, and many of my friends and older men were in awe of her; my Dad was one of the most popular men in the state of Missouri at the time because he was a professional boxer that had a couple of fights on ESPN. It was textbook: the young and pretty wife with the dynamic, tough-guy husband. Honestly, I was pretty proud of it early on. Some of my favorite memories as a kid are going to the boxing gym with my Dad as he prepared for his next fight. He would be with his trainer going through their typical pre-fight ritual, and there I would be off in the distance shadowboxing in front of the mirror because my Dad told me to (which I hated). I remember watching and being so proud of my Dad as all of the other local boxers in the gym would watch him workout. Every boxing gym has their main fighters that the trainer works