My mom said that I was almost born on a train. My parents were living in Mexico City when they decided that I was to be born on the border, but I tried to come out to this world a month before I was supposed to, so my mother rushed to take the train from the capital of Mexico all the way to El Paso, Texas. Ever since, I think my life´s been somewhat like a rapid train going faster than 100 mph.
During my childhood years, my parents, my sister, and I lived and moved to different cities because of my dad´s job. I think it was when I completed 4th grade in elementary school when we moved to Mexicali, Baja California. It was there where someone invited my mom to a ladies house group meeting and she had an encounter with God and she started going to an evangelical church. My mom insisted that I enroll in the elementary school which was recently opened by the church we were attending, and even though they were not accepting any more students, she managed to get us into the principal´s office after insisting quite much. My mom had said that I found grace in the lady Principal, given that after interviewing me, she called the Pastor of the church and asked him to make an exception and accept me to enroll, and despite his objection, she ended up convincing him.
It was in that extremely hot place, Mexicali (border with Calexico, California) where I started to hear about Jesus. One of my best friends at school was the son of the youth group pastor and worship leader. This friend of mine and his brother were very musically talented and I enjoyed being around drums and guitars. My mother was a professional singer and most of her family were musicians, so I had been surrounded by music since I was a baby.
My mom took us to church every Sunday and I liked it since I got to hang around with my school buddies. I finished elementary school, and by middle school I started making my own decisions in regards to God and accepted Jesus as my savior. I remember during a church service, we were singing worship songs when something happened. I was perceiving a voice that I couldn´t understand. They lined us up, all the middle school students, shoulder by shoulder. A lot of my friends were close to me, standing in the row. I remember the pastor of the church praying and laying hands on the foreheads of each young student, one by one, starting at the left end while I was in the middle. Most had their eyes closed, others were praying, others singing, but I, well, I was having a conflict in my mind. I saw that one by one were falling back or collapsing to the ground after the pastor prayed and laid his hand over their heads. I was feeling something powerful, like if someone was talking into my heart, but I kept asking myself whether it was my imagination and everybody was letting themselves fall down on purpose and kept asking myself if I was going to fall back just because all the others were doing it. I closed my eyes as I heard the voice of the pastor as he was approaching the part of the row where I was standing. I decided to stiffen-up my posture and simply refused to fall. I recall opening my eyes and watching all the others fall back like they were unconscious. I stood still and didn´t want to move.
Well, after that, I had my first encounters with cigarettes, alcohol, and with the world of rock music. I should mention that my parents always loved me and gave me everything I needed, nevertheless, my life was a high speed train which took a sudden change of rails into a different direction when my parents split up and my mother took me and my sister and moved to El Paso, Texas.
It was in El Paso where music became the purpose in my life. I finished junior high and while in high school, it didn´t take long for me to start playing in rock bands at parties, local bars and coffee shops. I was rocking the clubs and partying until the sun came up. Even though by this time, my dad and mom were back together at home and I kept going to school and even had excellent grades, I was investing all my energy in the rock bands I was playing in. When I graduated from high school, I enrolled in college as a music major. It was them when my train changed rails into a dark and obscure tunnel.
During my college years, I saw myself immersed in an abyss created by my urge to make it in the music business, drugs, and the whole rock n´roll scene. I spent years in the never-ending party, playing in all the clubs in Juárez, Mexico, despite hearing a voice calling me to have my eyes look up and see that there was someone watching, I would hide and listen to music instead, and spent days and nights playing videogames. My life was about music and heavy partying, and there was no room for anything else. My dreams of signing up with a record label and make it in the business were coming true. My dream of performing in a famous club in Mexico City called “Rockotitlan,” where many of the most famous rock bands from Mexico started their careers, came true. I traveled to many places and experimented with all the pleasures money could buy, but the more I wanted to fill my heart with all of those things, the more miserable I felt in my wickedness. Having it all, I had nothing. Everything was about me and for me only, so, nobody could tell me what to do, not even my mom, who throughout all these years, kept talking to me about God and spent nights on her knees praying for me. My world was on a train that did not stop, and I committed terrible sins and horrible mistakes that hurt me and others. Later I met the most beautiful girl. We decided to form a family and had two lovely daughters. I thought having a wife and two daughters, getting a 9-to-5 job was a good formula to find stability and joy in my heart, but I was still headed to the end of the tracks.
It was in March of the year 2008 when the train finally stopped. It was about 15 years since I had felt the presence of God when the pastor was praying for the middle school youth, 15 years in which my mom prayed day and night for the son that had gotten lost. It was 15 years of wrecking my life, doing my own will and living without any fear of God. My life was shredded to pieces, my marriage was being destroyed and my daughters suffering from all of that. In that afternoon of the year 2008, my wife and daughters, by the might of God, fell asleep very early and would not wake up. I was in the living room of our house when I clearly heard God´s voice calling me: “Jesus Balderrama…What are you doing?” When I heard His voice I fell to my knees and onto the floor. I was completely shocked to hear the voice of Him from whom I had been hiding all of these years. I spent hours that night watching my life as if God had made a movie out of it. He showed me the many times He had saved my life just when I was about to die. He showed me images of the sins I had commited. I cried in awful agony as I felt for the first time in my life, shamed and hideous for the horrible things I had done against God. I kept crying as I definitely knew that God had always been watching me. As the Lord showed me my sins, I kept asking Him again and again if He would forgive me for each of those sins, and His answer was “Yes, I already have.” every time.
After several hours in the presence of the Lord, I got into the shower to get ready for work since it was almost morning. I had been there since 8 pm the night before and my wife and daughters never woke up! I went to work and the first thing I noticed was that I hadn´t smoked a single cigarette that morning (I had been a heavy smoker since high school, so I couldn´t believe that I wasn´t smoking). I even went to the store to buy a pack and tried lighting one up. I confirmed that I did not have the usual urge to smoke. The previous night, God had freed me from all my addictions. I never again took drugs, got drunk or smoked. I didn’t know at the time that my wife and my two daughters had been attending church for about a month, so next Sunday I was already introducing myself to one of the pastors of the congregation while telling him that God had called me to serve Him.
After having that encounter with Lord Jesus, my life has been moving in a supernatural way. God runs my life now. He did not only restore what was destroyed, but edified a life that I simply had never experimented before. God healed my kidneys, which had not worked properly since high school, having suffered the terrible joint pain from chronic gout for 15 years. My wife, who clinically could not have any more children, became pregnant and gave birth to a beautiful baby boy by the might and love of God. God listened to my mother’s prayers for some 15 years, and He spoke to me in a way I couldn’t refuse. As I write testimony, I can still hear His voice echoing inside my heart.
As time had passed by, I asked God why I had to go through such a long time and so many terrible things when, after all, He was going to speak me and let me know that He is real. I think God didn´t have to answer me, but He did. He told me: “I was ready to give you something, but you didn´t want to receive.” It was then when I remembered for the first time since it happened, when in back in Mexicali, my heart hardened, when even though I had felt the presence of God, I did not want to surrender to His Presence and receive what He had for me. I have lived to serve the true and almighty God ever since.
God is always faithful and His mercies endure forever. He grabbed me out of the claws of hell and had mercy on me. He has put light where there was darkness. He has put health where there was sickness. He has put love where there was rancor. He has made me free, free to get to know Him, free to serve Him. Now I am in His hands to serve and honor Him.
God has given me the privilege to serve Him in worship music and teaching ministries. Each day ever since has been a new and awesome adventure. I haven’t stopped being amazed with God’s power, wisdom, patience, and love.
God loves me so much, that even though I have been an awful sinner, He sent His only begotten Son Jesus to cruelly die on a cross despite not having ever sinned in the 33 years he lived as a man. Lord Jesus paid the price I deserve for my wickedness. He paid the prize for me, and now He owns me. Now that I understand that He died for me, without deserving it, I am willing to live and die for Him. My own life has no value to me compared to Him.
God put a burden in my heart to testify to all my fellow musicians, friends, and all the people that I shared my life with all of these years in the music lifestyle when I was away from Him.
Maybe you identify yourself a little with my story, maybe not. Nonetheless, the bible says that we have all sinned against God, and for that, we have been set aside from His presence. If you have ever stolen, if you have lied, even if it´s a little white lie, if you have ever had sexual thoughts with someone who is not your spouse, hetero or homosexual, are addicted to porn, if you have envied someone, if you ever disobeyed your parents even once, if you have killed. If you have worshiped something or someone other than God, be it videogames or music…If you have done these, you have sinned against God, who is Holy. You have broken the law of God who created you. Only if you repent in your heart and ask Jesus to cleanse you of all your sins with His precious blood, only then you are a Child of God and you will know that you have been saved and you will spend the rest of eternity by His side. If you are not willing to do this, then you will be judged according to your sin and spend eternity in hell. There is no other option, there is no purgatory, there is no reincarnation, and there is no other way. If you have read until this point, I urge you, don´t harden your heart. Look for a private place and call on to Him. Ask Him is He is real. Get close to Him, repent of all your sins and give your life to your creator.
My name is Jessie Balderrama. I live in El Paso, Texas /Juárez, Mex. I am a missionary for Yeshua-JesusChrist serving Him in the borderland. Feel free to contact me if you wish to do so. ♥
