From Cults, to Abortions, to Grand Larceny, to Encountering God 😳

I ended up getting a job in New York from a Rolex boutique that is right in the middle of Times Square but then what ends up happening is while I'm working at this job I'm not doing as well as I was in sales in Atlanta and then this this thing comes over me of desperation of I have to make a sale I have to make a sale at this Boutique there were two guys that came into the store and they approached me about doing a scheme for credit card fraud then I get a job as

an executive assistant for a biomedical Ad Agency until I get a call from the lady who was previously my lawyer and she said you have to turn yourself into the New York Police Department your previous company is pressing charges against you for third degree grand larceny and this bright white light comes in just like permeates the entire cell and it's this vision and I just like follow my face and I see the feet of Jesus standing before me both of my parents were divorce since I was two um since Dylan with the divorce with both

of my parents Um that caused a very big strain in the relationship between my parents um I grew up with an older brother and we live with our mother full time but my father was always in my life um always but um ever since my parents got divorced it caused strain um between them two and so it would cause strain as well between our relationship between our two parents oftentimes being put in positions to where we would have to choose between which parent um which being in circumstances where my father would show up to pick

us up and my mom would not let us go with him I'm just due to just domestic issues that they had between one another but I grew up with two very loving loving parents especially to me and my brother um but it became very interesting because as I started to grow my mother's side of the family um they would go to church um like on Easter Christmas uh regular holidays but we did not observe Jesus at all like really that way in our home but on my father's side of the family we would go down

to Columbus Georgia and my grandmother would teach this like home kind of Church thing but I did not know at the time that it was a cult which is what it ended up being so um we would go down there every single weekend and we would basically be in this environment with majority of my family and we would be being taught things about Jesus but it really was not the Bible and so just to go into the back story of that my grandmother actually grew up um going to church when she got older she had

four Sons including my dad and they were attending a church regularly my grandmother had some form of Revelation that she felt that she received I'm not sure if it was from an angel or something weird and she thought that she was going to go to the pastor the preacher and let him know that she deserved to be in a position in the church and she wanted to teach this Doctrine and she actually ended up being removed from the church so when she started this home kind of church at her house it was from a place

of bitterness and she started to teach us a lot of things against the church so at a very young age we were taught to not attend church we were taught that Christians were Hypocrites we were taught even not to go to the doctor and there was This this environment where we would come and sit and we would sing songs and we would be hearing about the Bible but we would actually just be worshiping my grandmother once I got to a certain age I was being put in this position to choose between the two and with

choosing between the two um out just like it was when I was growing up and my parents were like pulling us which one which pair you're going to choose we were chosen we were basically put to choose between which religion whether to go with my mom or to go with my dad and this is a key thing in My Testimony because um I grew up very financially successful so my father was very financially successful my mother was also financially successful not to the extent of my father so just like majority of us who don't know

Jesus we attribute God to financial success so I ended up choosing my dad's side of the family and going with that side because I assumed it to be correct because we were prospering so much financially but this caused a lot of Rifts just in my life um pre-jesus I grew up feeling very self-righteous when people would try to come to talk to me about God I didn't need to hear anything that there's that they said um I knew what was best for me if you would try to evangelize to me you believe what's right for

you I believe what's right for me and we were actually indoctrinated into these beliefs in the cold it was also very um traumatic because we anytime there would be a conflict or let's just say we didn't wake up one time to clean up my grandmother's house or we didn't wake up in time to do certain things or there was a behavioral situation we would be sat in front of the entire church and just berated just by family um and that caused a lot of um issues with me never even understanding what Grace was um it

was very much so if you did this you deserve this and you deserve what happens to you after it and there was no form of there is Grace um and it would be so much manipulation um it you would be questioned and questioned and then when you would answer the question that wasn't good enough and it was also like they made you to believe that if you disagree with them you disagree with god um also if I cried if I showed emotion I had a demon in me and I had the devil in me and

I didn't want to change and It was very uh psychologically just damaging they also made me um think that it wasn't good to go in career fields of law or career fields of being a doc in a doctor or medicine because they taught us against those things and so yes I just grew up with a very traumatic uh childhood now Melissa as you're growing up did you realize you were like different from other people who maybe were going to church just on Sundays or did you have any sort of idea like that you were actually

an occult so we would have Whispers from other family members when we would go for like family reunions I would notice that anytime we would speak to if I had any other friends or any other um close friends of the family especially on my mom's side they would just be so perplexed about what we were being taught um and we were very much so being taught about God and obeying God but no one obeyed God on my dad's side of the family so I grew up seeing my father dating multiple women um going out to

the club living all types of of a life you know and it was never an emphasis on that needs to be something we repent for but we need to have radical obedience to my dad Or my grandmother and whatever they say but not anything in our life um needs to like shift and change so I would notice when I would go around people that that would just be very alarming for them and most people would say say to me that this was a cult this isn't right what are you being taught I would get that

a lot but because we were financially successful I didn't see a need for anything else that they were telling me um that I needed I felt that I had everything and we were even being taught from a book that my grandmother wrote so it was a lot of just weird uh just twisting of scripture but as children we don't know and then occult you're raised with like your your cousins and your family and you do have moments to where you're having a good time like you're going on little trips throughout the summer and you know

you're having a good time and hanging out and so there are happy moments and you don't really recognize as a child just what to the extreme what you were being indoctrinated into so Melissa I know it was a long time before you had your encounter with Jesus can you take us through your life even after the cold what was that like For you what were some other things that you found yourself involved in before you encountered Christ absolutely so I would say even though the cult experience was traumatic as a child I still had a

father who was very present in my life I still had a mother who was really present in my life so to my understanding even though a lot of things were manipulation they were always present for me so I never felt the absence of like a mother or the absence of a father and I even grow up grew up like being in all these different sports and activities and I would notice just different things about my personal I was very outgoing made friends very quickly very easily where things started to become or hit a hit for

me with I would say would be high school so high school would be a very traumatic time where I actually would start to have very serious behavioral issues that were starting to take place in me so I would notice that I would be very angry I would notice that I would be very depressed I would notice that I would be kind of sort of a bully because I did have a loving mother but my mom because of bitterness from the divorce between My father and my and my mother they would teach me a lot of

really harmful things so they would basically teach me like that well especially For My Father's Side to never get married um to never be in relationships with people because they're just going to hurt you um they're just going to the second that you tell them what you believe they're going to try to change you a lot of fear-based tactics then on my mother's side there was a lot of Anger from the rejection of the divorce and so with that that would be a lot of misplaced anger that she would take out on me and my

brother and in Middle School my brother went to go live with my father but I was stuck with my mom in high school and my mother was very very very volatile um with how she would speak to me um everything would be screaming yelling and argument and so what would happen when I got to high school is when you can't defend yourself at home you would start wanting to try to defend yourself at school to your peers and so I started to become a bully Not only was I self-righteous and believed I had everything I

knew everything but I was also very much so a bully because I Wasn't gonna I was going to defend myself I wasn't going to let anybody talk to me crazy and because I had gone through this cult environment to where anytime you would do something wrong it would sit and just berate you and in that moment I would feel just completely just not protected in those specific moments anytime I would be in any form of conflict I would just try to protect myself and so this really hit ahead between me and my mother I ended

up getting into a lot of fights when I I was in high school and just being suspended having to go through anger management and I ended up getting into a very big argument with my mom and that's when she physically um hit me and when that happened I ended up saying well I'm gonna move with my dad because I was also pretty manipulative as a child when you go through it when you're in a divorce household you can basically like put parents against one another if you want to get your way you know so with

that I ended up moving my junior year in high school I ended up moving um to my dad's house but then this now created extreme bitterness for my mom because she here she is she's now lost two kids And so this once very close relationship with my mom turned extremely volatile so she tried to get me kicked out of the high school this is when she totally just would cut me off and this is when I started to feel extreme rejection to where I've had the closest relationship with my parents and now she's treating me

as if I'm like an enemy so this pushed me even further into this cult kind of stuff that I was into with my dad because now my mother is actively fighting against me and then it goes to my mom's not calling me on on my birthday or on holidays or and it just put such deep seated hurt in me of just abandonment that I'm a child like you know um and that started to cause like a lot of pain and so um it would manifest itself in a lot of relationships that I would have with

friendships and um when I would even feel that someone is like drawn away from me or you know I would just like fight back or do all these things to just like protect myself and so this would be my high school years um just really feeling a lot of pain from not having my mother in my life or not feeling reconciliation and this would start a trend with both of my parents of any Time something would happen in our relationship they would just cut me off and just would not talk to me now I'm headed

off to college and when I get off to college this is a time to really um start to try to explore what you're into what you believe because when I grew up in this environment where I was constantly being indoctrinated and told what to believe and so freshman year of college my grandmother who was over the cult passes away this causes a friendly frenzy in the family and as a matter of fact majority of the people who were in that cult died horrible deaths so my grandmother her stomach just protruded all the way out which

is fluid they didn't believe in doctors so they didn't take her to the doctor so she just died traumatically in the bed just with sickness and as before she died she was seeing demons in the room it was actually very horrible but they would not take her to the doctor my dad's two other older brothers died from um drugs and then there were other people in the cult that died from a truck falling on them to a garage coming and and cutting their neck off a lot of trauma happened to some of the children Um

because they didn't want to take one of the kids to the doctor that was recently born so they ended up having mental health issues a lot of the younger girls ended up being abused sexually and then there were other people who would just die from cancer honestly majority of every person that was in that cult um died a majority of every last one of them um except for a handful of a few people who ended up getting away so when that happened freshman year when she passed away that caused a frenzy in our family because

she was the head that was like leading everybody into this thing and now with no other direction my dad had idolized my grandmother so much that it caused even more bitterness in him because of listening to my grandmother this is what led him to divorcing my mom this is what led him to divorce in many other uh not divorcing many other people but this is what led him from separating from other women who would be in his life and there was such a stronghold and such a manipulation controlling that relationship that when she passed away

it caused my dad to just go Into extreme extreme unhappiness and bitterness so now I'm in college and I'm trying to figure out what I want to do my mother was in a sorority um when she pled when she went to college because both of my parents went to college so so I grew up in a very educated home as well but I now start to pursue a sorority and I start to try to pursue my identity so now my identity is in oh I'm going to be freshman class president oh I'm popular on campus

everybody wants me to be a part of their their group and now I want to pursue this sorority and so I end up getting in this sorority and we end up going through horrible uh rituals and these are rituals that I also did to other people uh whether it would be slapping beating eating dog food paddling every sort of demeaning thing that you can imagine we went through as opposed to kneeling down before altars taking Oaths to our final judgment this false god you know on on the shield on the crest like no Melissa did

you have any idea that what you were doing was unto false gods or anything like that or was this just normal like did you have any of these concerns that you have now It was totally normal because my mother was in a sorority my aunt was in a sorority my brother was in a fraternity my grandfather on my mother's side was a Mason Shriner so this thing was introduced in my family I was groomed I was as a baby wearing future of the sorority um future t-shirts you know like that I would be this so

I was groomed into this every last one of my mother's friends were a part of the sorority so I knew I actually picked the college based upon them having that sorority um so I just knew that this was something I wanted to do but the deceitful thing about sororities and fraternities because they are secret societies is that on the surface on the surface you see that they do community service you see that they're college educated women you see that the founders were a part of like a woman's suffrage March you see all these wonderful things

but you do not know until you get in and you're chosen what you're going to do and the deception when you get into a sorority is they don't give you a manual so you know what you're about to do that evening you walk in blindly to every last one of the rituals or the classes that you're going to do and that's when You see that you're doing witchcraft but it's not you don't know that and I was very blind I never had a relationship with Jesus did not step foot in the church so I was

doubly blind on any of this being demonic as a matter of fact I wasn't even going to go to one of the rituals because they do the rituals in a church and because I didn't believe in church I wasn't even going to go to that this is how deceived I was and so you look at these things that you're going through like it's making you tough it's making you strong there's nothing you know and they're building you up and but they also are killing a lot of individuality and they're indoctrinating you into the sorority so

it's like I go from one cult to another one not only did those things happen to me while crossing over into the story I also did it to other people that are brought over in the sorority even worse there is something that really shifted and changed once I crossed over into the sorority and this is what leads me down a path of a lot of sexual immorality so Melissa tell me a little bit about that you know you're in the sorority you begin to see some of these things popping Up what are some of the

things that you found yourself really struggling with yes so if I was self-righteous before the second that I became in that sorority I was extremely self-righteous um we're taught to have pride in the sorority we are taught to that we're popular we now have women that are like following around us that just want to be a part of the sorority so you're bullying them you're hazing them um you have this superiority complex this um this complex that you are in some way shape or form like a god you know like you they want what you

have and so now you're going to manipulate them and use them and make them run errands for you and make them do all these things so something really shifted in my bully personality if I wasn't a bully before I became even more of a mean girl of belief afterwards but I now started to manipulate young girl us the same way that this thing happened to me when I was younger and manipulated them to make it seem like they were doing this for a good cause this was honor this was respect and meanwhile I was doing

nothing but taking advantage of them also something happened to me uh in regards to Sexual immorality the second that I took that Covenant unto the false god which was Minerva by the way that that's the false God that's over the sorority that we would wear it over our Crest we would even say songs that all my peace my love my happiness I give it to the sorority everything was about worship to this sorority and so afterwards um I ended up being in different relationships but the relationships would always end because I was indoctrinated that I

don't ever want to get married and on top of that I never want to have kids so this led me down a path of extreme sexual immorality where I was literally sleeping with a lot of people I didn't care I was very numb and this also led me to my senior year in college to get pregnant and then I ended up getting pregnant and this was by a guy at the time who I was talking to but we weren't in a relationship and I was like there's no way that I could have this child because

I was indoctrinated that my body my choice and why would I bring a child into this situation where I'm not even with the dead and I'm not going to be a single single mom in just total selfishness and so I ended up having an abortion And I remember I never forget the day that I drove to the clinic literally as I was driving to the clinic before pulling in I saw a Christian standing outside with signs and saying please don't go in there and begging and pleading not to go in there but I my my

will my human will was I was going to have this abortion there was no way that I was going to bring a kid into this because my ego my my image that that meant more to me than anything and I just remember sitting on the table before about to have the abortion and they show you the sonogram of the the baby and still making a decision it was like God was trying to give me Grace and I still made the decision to to kill the child and I remember sitting in my feet are in the

stirrups and they did this thing called a Twilight sedation uh back in the day because this was around uh 2009 and I did this thing called the Twilight sedation and that means you're half sleeping half awake and I felt the um I felt the entire procedure then afterwards after they just like suck the child out they put you in this room and it's called a recovery room and it's just a bunch of women and everybody is just depressed And something changed in me after that too I just became so cold so cold something changed in

my spirit something happened to me something left me that day that I did that and um my life just went on this spiral after that and the yeah so Melissa I know that you had an intense encounter with Christ but it happened at a point of your life that you were never expecting it to can you kind of take us into what kind of led up to Jesus um kind of Shifting everything that you had gone through before yes absolutely so now I graduate from college I've made this decision um now I get very heavily

into my career which was luxury retail but by the way as I started to get into my career about four years later I end up meeting up with the same exact guy and I ended up getting pregnant again and I end up having abortion again but at this point I was so cold-hearted and as a matter of fact my father drove me to the abortion clinic and at this time I'm 25 I have every means to take care of the child nothing more than just selfishness and then my father told me that he he had

had an abortion with a young lady when he was in college and so he understood and he took Me and it was such a normalized thing but after I did it once it became very easy to do it again I was just very cold-hearted um and then I started to shift my ambitions into career so I ended up getting into luxury retail and I ended up doing very well very similar to my father who was in sales and I end up succeeding I was working at one of the top luxury retail um stores here in

Atlanta I was selling Rolex and all the top brands and and and I was selling um diamonds and rings and um for like the first year that I'm working there I ended up being a a million dollar writer for the company and I'm excelling and I'm around celebrities and I'm around football players and I'm around basketball players and I now start to get immersed into this Atlanta lifestyle of just strip clubs and parties and going to taking last minute trips and going to Miami and I would meet different clients there drug dealers different all types

of people that I would meet and I would go into this fast lifestyle of just like image of just um I'm I'm going with people's husbands on trips um now I'm just so arrogant and I'm so cold-hearted that I could care less I would Be selling a diamond ring to a man one day who had a wife and the next day I'm going on a trip with them and I was very cold-hearted in regards to those things I was very dog eat dog in my Pursuits of wanting to reach the top of the field that

I was in and so I just became arrogant um I felt that I had no need of God I actually felt like God was blessing me but yes I would all throughout the week I would be I would go to the strip club with different clients and I have very well-known celebrity clients at the time what happens is that I started to become very greedy and so this wasn't enough for me after I reached the top of my field in Atlanta there's a thought that comes in my mind and I'm like well I want to

move to New York because then I could work for Rolex in the top of these companies like that they're all the headquarters are in New York and at the time I ended up meeting um a guy who I ended up getting into a relationship with who lived in New York I started to pursue this career in New York because he's there have a cousin who lives there and then I could work at this top of the top company and be in New York and making lots and lots of money At the top of my field

because I had been working in this career for about seven years at this point and so I end up immediately getting a job this was December of 2014. I ended up getting a job in New York from a Rolex boutique that is right in the middle of Times Square and I was like wow this is God you know we always attribute God I do believe that the Lord had something to do with my move up there because this is when I encountered Jesus was in New York I also think that he separated me um from

a lot of the manipulation I was in still with my family because I don't believe I would have been able to encounter God because I was so submitted just to my dad and whatever he believed in in very fearful to go against whatever he was saying so I end up moving up to New York and this is where my life changes drastically is when I moved to New York the moment that I moved to New York I end up moving in with a few girls who were a part of my sorority and um one of

the girls ended up not really liking one of my close family members and so from that point forward I started to deal with roommate rejection and they started to like push me out of the apartment and So the second I get up there I'm dealing with that I'm also dating a guy but why while dating him I'm on Tinder I'm on apps I'm just so self-righteous so arrogant always felt that I could do better than this person and just treating the people around me like crap like complete crap and um so I would be you

know talking to other men and um still up there trying to live the same lifestyle of going out partying every weekend all while having this job but then what ends up happening is while I'm working at this job I'm not doing as well as I was in sales in Atlanta I'm actually tanking and then this this thing comes over me of desperation of I have to make a sale I have to make a sale and at the time I considered myself very ethical in what I would do in my I would never steal or do

anything like that but desperation came over me when I moved to New York um I'm feeling I'm not succeeding I'm not making clients as quickly and on top of that I'm just greedy greedy for more greedy for men have extremely diff extremely extremely strong lust issue and I just wanted more and more and more and so when I was at this Boutique there Were two guys that came into the store and the enemy had planted a seed because I had also met them in Atlanta but they lived in New York and so they came into

the store and they approached me about doing a scheme for credit card fraud not a scheme around the city but in the store and so with how I worked in New York you don't have to really check anybody's ID um in regard when they would come into the store to make a purchase so because I was so desperate for a sale I remember the night before agreeing to doing this I remember sitting and knowing that this was wrong and knowing not to do it and feeling of extreme unctioning in my spirit to not do it

and I remember even praying and asking God to protect me while I was gonna go in and do it which made no sense at all so I go into the store the guys meet me there they pick out two watches that they wanted and we go into this back room now a part of the story that is is a big deal is there was an off-duty police officer that would work at the store to do security and he was a detective that would work for the New York police department and we would talk he would

talk to me about my dad Because at that time my dad also started to have a lot of health issues um he started to deal with cancer heart failure a lot of things that my dad was dealing with back home and so I would talk to the author this police officer and share with him but he knew when the guys walked into the store that something wasn't right I took the guys back to a private room and while taking them back to a private room I started to try to do the sale knowing that they

were giving me fake credit cards knowing this and I was just greedy for a sale and then on top of that after the sale was complete and the guys walked out they even gifted me a watch which was I was I felt so guilty I went and like sold it and I was like and tried to get rid of it just to cover up the sin that I had done shortly after that I ended up having to go and get my wisdom teeth pulled out so I was away from the store for a few days

I noticed that when I came back to the store that things were really off my manager was acting weird everybody around me was acting weird they had some of the people from like the headquarters that were there and I just didn't know what was going on about 30 minutes After I clocked in for my shift the police pulled up to the store and dragged me out of the store in handcuffs and then once they dragged me out of the store in handcuffs I was just in shock and I just they took me down to the

police station and that same off-duty detective started questioning me and this is when he made me write a statement and he was asking me what was the motive for doing it and I was just shocked I was just shocked that number one I had gotten caught I had never in my life been in any form of legal trouble or never in my life been in this type of situation he said that we're only taking your statement for now but if we hear that you're involved in this any any bit further we you will be hearing

for us from us so they released me from the police station after giving a statement after that I had an older cousin who lived in New York I reached out to her just for a lawyer because I just didn't know what to do with my life or what was going on and then after that she and it like gave me the contacts for a lady that she knew that was a lawyer and then I started to work with her to figure out what was going on and at that point they were Not pressing charges against

me I had just lost my job and I just needed to write a statement so then I started to try to rebuild my life in New York at that time I started to work for Saks Fifth Avenue after working in Saks Fifth Avenue I then end up getting a very good job at Cartier literally the Cartier Boutique that was right in right in Fifth Avenue as well you know and so I'm like well finally my life is just you know feeling back out again everything is going great like I would never make that mistake again

in my life and all these things are behind me and I also want to mention that when I went and got my wisdom teeth pulled out and did that whole thing they gave me an entire bottle of hydrocodine so I just wanted to mark that for this story because it is important as I move on and share the rest of the testimony once I got that job at Cartier this had to be about six months or so after everything had happened I was also living a very promiscuous lifestyle I had broken up with the guy

who I was with in New York and I was just dating whoever for having sex with whoever engaging in whatever anything in regards to sexual immorality um just Really trying to cope with so much loneliness emptiness depression that I felt and with working in retail you're working on the weekends so it's not like you can go back and visit your family in Atlanta so I was just up there and I just felt so much depression I just felt very low so I ended up getting this job at Cartier after getting this job at Cartier I

was working there for maybe two weeks I get a call from the HR department that they are terminating me and that I need to leave the premises immediately and basically they had heard what happened when I was at the other store and so when this happened um it was actually at the same time that I had a friend coming to visit me in New York I was so distraught I just could not believe that this thing was following me everywhere and I went home and um that is when I tried to take my life I

tried to take like a bottle of those pills because I felt that I had no identity outside of my career I had no identity outside of money and I felt that my reputation was ruined and I felt that I was a failure I didn't know what was going to happen to me and if that friend was not there and didn't find me I'm not sure what that Would have looked like for my life but after that certain scenario happened I ended up wanting to move back to Atlanta because I just felt like this thing would

be following me forever I moved back down to Atlanta I was in Atlanta for maybe two months and I was trying to get a job in Atlanta I could not get a job anywhere I looked everything was blocked but I kept getting calls again for jobs in New York so I said I'm going to switch careers I'm going to move to being an executive assistant and I moved back up to New York and it's like who would move back up to New York with all these things that just happened little did I know that that

was the Lord um that was actually having me move back up to New York and um then I get a job as an executive assistant for a biomedical Ad Agency and I end up getting hired with them permanently which was such a miracle in New York because you do so much temp work and um they very rarely hire you for the permanent things and so they ended up hiring me and I was not on that job for a week until I get a call from the lady who was previously my lawyer and she said Melissa

you have to turn yourself in on Thursday I think She had caught contacted me on like a Monday and she said you have to turn yourself into the New York police department on Thursday your previous company is pressing charges against you for third degree grand larceny I felt like my life was shattered I felt like my life was over I felt hopeless I felt defeated I felt like I'm about to go to jail and I've never done anything in my life to get in this level of trouble what are people going going to say what

what is my family going to say how in the world will I ever get a job moving forward this thing has followed me everywhere that I've gone and I just felt utterly utterly hopeless when I got home I ended up calling my father first and when I contacted my dad my dad basically said to me on the phone that this is what you deserve this is what you've got yourself into I'm not coming to help you do not call me do not call anybody from the family if they're saying that you did this you did

this and he hung up in my face and uh that caused a lot of pain to me because my father really was like my hero he had never just not been there for me even though we went through the things that we went through that cult he had Always been there like for everything and now I'm feeling alone I'm feeling what am I about to do and then at this time I still had the estranged relationship with my mom we weren't talking very often but I ended up calling my mom my mom ends up um

saying to me she was actually out of the country at the time and I ended up letting her know what was going on and she ends up like calming me down she says that she's gonna give me a call tomorrow she's going to figure out what to do that whole night I'm just tormented by thoughts the devil was just telling me to take my life again I'm just totally utterly worthless just wanting to commit suicide again and then my mom my mother my aunt at the time calls me and my aunt starts to like pray

for me and this is my aunt on my mother's side and she starts to just pray for me and she just starts to just tell me to just hold on hold on hold on just hold on my mother actually ends up calling me the next day and she says that the Lord had given her this dream and this vision and she's getting on the first flight to come up here and the Lord spoke to her audibly and said that she needed to Go up to New York immediately to be with me because I'm going to

be doing Mighty things for his kingdom and at this time I knew nothing about God I just didn't know anything about Jesus um was this comforting to you having people pray for you people telling you like the lord gave them a vision or did this help you at all no I I didn't understand any of it because I it's not like I grew up in the church I only grew up in knowing the Jesus that I had created that was okay with my sin I was okay with my lifestyle that was here to financially help

me but not I never grew up knowing what Grace was you know so I didn't understand at the time all I could still think about is I'm about to go to jail you know and the prayers are great but I'm about to go to jail and I'm by myself in New York uh what am I supposed to do so I didn't understand how much those prayers were helping me but they were preserving me because I didn't take my life um but I I was overcome with very tormented thoughts um but when my mom said that

the Lord said that she needed to come up there immediately and that God was going to be doing I was going to Be doing Mighty things for the kingdom of God I was so blind you got like I did not understand what that meant what does that mean like I don't even know what does it mean what is the kingdom of God like I don't even know what that means so I was really blind but I was more so comforting that my mom was coming up um because I did have an idolatry for family at

the time so I was just yeah so Melissa take us into that that Thursday morning you know you know you have to turn yourself in you know you have literally no other option at this point what happens Wednesday when before we get to Thursday my mother made it up on made it up to New York on Wednesday the whole day that my mom was headed up to me my mother I mean my aunt stayed on the phone to just talk to me I did not realize how precious that was until after the fact and so

my mother ends up making it uh to New York and she starts to talk to me about uh Jesus and this was really interesting because my mother was not a extremely uh Born Again believer but she started to talk to me about Jesus and she started to talk to me about how much he loves me and she started to talk to me about Grace but at the time Because I grew up in that cult I wasn't without accountability because we were taught to have accountability so I truly never went to God like I didn't deserve

this why are they doing this to me it was actually the other way where I was like I do deserve this I do I deserve everything that happens to me I didn't think that Jesus would want to talk to me because why would he want to talk to me why would he want to help me I've done all these things against him why would he listen to me why would he help me I just did not understand anything in regards to Grace and she starts to talk to me about Grace and she starts to talk

to me that instantly Jesus loves me and I couldn't see how anyone could love me for for the things that I've done I was just so used to whether it was my parents family friends just cutting me off very similar to what my dad did who would love me the second I'll make a mistake like I'm worthless that is what I felt so she starts talking to me about God and there's something that shifted in me where I just said well I just I believe and if he wants to help me I should I believe

that he's with me and something shifted in me I don't something Shifted in me and so the morning that I woke up to go to turn myself in it was very early I remember the Lord uh telling my mom to dress nicely to turn myself in and I didn't understand it at the time and uh I ended up dressing really nicely and we ended up getting on the train and I hear the voice from the Lord that says listen to worship music and I was like well what do I listen to I've never heard worship

music a day in my life I've never I don't know gospel artists I don't know anything what do I listen to and I just turn on Spotify and the first song that comes comes on is great as your mercy credit your mercy for me and it was a revelation that wow God like is having mercy on me and there's this amount this was the first time that I ever felt the Holy Spirit like I just I didn't know at the time that's what was happening to me but I had a supernatural piece that just made

no sense because I'm headed to go turn myself in and I was an alarmist in the world just a panicker anytime thing what happened things would happen and there was a piece that was over me a supernatural piece and I feel the presence of the Holy Spirit This is when there was like faith that started to happen where I just chose to believe that the Lord was with me and I don't know how it had to have been the gift of faith because I do not know how I believed that Jesus was just there and

so I get to the police station and at this time my mother had gotten a different lawyer for me because the other lawyer never showed up the lawyer meets us at the police department and the first person that I see at the police department is the off-duty police officer the detective and he's there to book me in so the way that this procedure works is that you go you surrender you they book you in and then you wait in the jail cell for your bill hearing you have to go appear before the judge and the

judge lets you know if you are going to have Bill and so this was what was happening to me that morning when I saw the detective I just knew something which is different with me because I didn't feel angry I didn't feel upset because what you guys don't know is that um he actually really fabricated the statement that I gave to him and he actually said that the motive behind me colluding with those guys Um was that my father was sick and I needed money to send to my dad and he created a story that

actually wasn't true I was definitely guilty of what happened but he he basically testified an entirely different statement and that is why they brought charges and then he also tried to say that I was involved in a an entire Heist an entire ring around New York and that's why my charges were so heavy but I had only met those guys that one time in the store but I wasn't angry when I saw him I I was actually joyful and I actually didn't have fear it was the oddest thing and so from that point forward I

experienced Amazing Grace um and and it just boggles my mind when I think back to this story because I never knew Grace from the moment that they took me in I could tell something was different with the detective once my parents left and they're going to like book me in with handcuffs and to put me in a Cell normally they would put you in general in a general cell where there's all these people that are in the cell with you he takes me and puts me in a single cell that is near his desk I

don't know if you guys have ever seen like uh Police stations in New York and NYPD they're very dark it's like a very slender window at the top um so it was very dark in there but he goes and puts me in a single cell that's just near where his desk is the whole time he's headed to take me to the cell he says would you like something to eat would you like something to drink is there anything that I can get you would you like to to call your mom and I'm like why is

he being so nice to me like I'm not this is really strange you know like I was very nervous but I was like what is happening like he was offering everything and you could tell something was happening in him like something was off with him maybe it was guilt I'm not sure but he takes me and he puts me in the cell and when he puts me in the cell I am sitting in the cell and I start to go through my life and this is when I'm just telling the Lord like I am just

so sorry that I've done this I am just so sorry for what I've done this is how I'm knowing Jesus now I'm get I hear his name I know who to pray for and I'm like I am just sorry that I've embarrassed you that I've done this action to you and while I was doing that Um this is this is the moment that I met that I met the Lord so the cell is dark dark where it's just very dark because it was very early in the morning and this bright white light comes in just

like permeates the entire cell a light that's not like what we see just like overwhelming and it's this vision and I just like follow my face and I see the feet of Jesus just like standing before me I just follow my face and he starts to run my entire life back before me everything secret says things that I didn't even remember that I've done and not only does he do that but he starts to show me when I would leave conflicts and encounters how I heard people he would show them going home into being in

pain and crying for things that I did or I said to them and he would make me feel what they felt in that moment and I say like all the time like when you meet Jesus you meet truth that's why it's not an option to say like oh but or I didn't mean to and I I wasn't like that because he showed me my sin through through his eyes which was the truth so there was no way to like to see anything that I've Done In a Different Light except for that I have sinned against

a holy God and then The vision is so real that it's like you feel like you want to hide under the lowest object that you can from the Lord because you feel like not only what you did you're guilty but whatever happens after that you deserve it the vision was so real that I felt like he was going to like cast me into hell like immediately all these things my body my choice just sexual immorality not to mention like my sexual morality got so bad like I was going to sex clubs like it was so

bad and like he showed me just everything just all the people that I've hurt and it couldn't have been any longer than five minutes in the natural but it was so long in in the spiritual realm and I'm just Balling on the floor in a fetal position just uh turn it off like you just want it to be turned off and he's not speaking to me audibly like he's just like I can't explain it but like he's just like talking I guess like heart to heart but you you just know everything you know everything that

you have ever done in like a split second in the exact moment where I felt like he was going to like banish me to hell he overwhelms me with the love that I've never experienced He overwhelms me with a love that I've never experienced in my life I am married I have experienced Joy I have never experienced this in my entire life and to imagine that I felt so dirty the worst of the worst How Could You Love Someone Like Me how could you love someone like me it just didn't make sense in this love

if he would have turned it up one notch I felt like I would have died like I would have burst I have never experienced this in my life that any person on Earth could ever feel this about me and I just was undone undone like when I hear them say they fell at Jesus feet is dead like I I was undone I have never experienced this in my life and he started telling me uh that he wanted me to repent I didn't know what that word even meant at the time um and then after he

started telling me that he wanted me to repent he started then to prophesy my entire life to me he started to tell me that he was going to use me for Mighty things in his kingdom that I was going to be working with young women and young children and that I would be ministering to them and that I would have a fellowship and that I would just be evangelizing uh to many different people and bringing many souls to his kingdom I did not know what any of that meant and then after he said that to

me he said to me that he would be with me throughout the day and he said to me that I would be released without bill then he just left after he left I was just undone I don't know how the other police officers didn't see me I don't know how they how it was shielded that encounter but after he left was when they started to notice me and noticed that I was crying and noticed that I was just undone but at that point it was also like the glory of the Lord was on me so

I couldn't stop smiling I could not I I just couldn't like I was just full of joy I was so full of joy that when they took me to take my mug shot they had to tell me to stop smiling um it was crazy um but I had never experienced that before just the presence of the holy spirit being in the presence of Jesus it was unbelievable so after that I ended up it was time for them to transport me to the courthouse where I was going to have to go for my court hearing for

Bill at this time that all through the Police officer was only supposed to work a half day because this by the way you guys was a Fourth of July weekend it was a Fourth of July weekend in 2015. many people were off and it was a Thursday so they were leaving to go out of town so there was another police officer that came and said Hey listen I know that you need to go and be with your family I can just take her to the courthouse and the off-duty police officer was like no I'm going

to take her like it was something in him that he just could not leave from me and like he was just so kind I don't know what was happening in his art um he was so kind to me that when it when they went to go put me into the police car they put an extra set of handcuffs on me so my arms could be loose in the back the level of Grace that I was receiving it just made zero sense and so even on the police car ride the the other guy his partner is

like I can literally just do it like we do this all the time I'm like and he's like I'm not leaving her I'm not leaving her side and so um then the police officer says to me hey I do I believe that you're probably not going to have to have Bill and I was like oh my gosh that's what Jesus just said to me that's unbelievable um but I think what was happening in the police officer's mind is that they are the ones that like testify but they're the prosecutor is the one in charge of

like what they charge you with so I don't think he thought that I was going to get charged as High um because when I got to the courthouse they actually let me know that um they had up my charges to second degree grand larceny and second degree grand larceny is theft over a hundred thousand dollars um it is a felony it is a minimum jail time of 10 years um and so it is a very big charge so um maybe he knew that at the time I didn't know that because I was just in the

car I only knew it was third degree and I don't even know what that fully meant honestly so we get to the courthouse and when we get to the courthouse that's when I see my mom and my lawyer again and we're sitting in the hallway we we haven't gone in the courtroom yet so there's seats in the hallway the detective let me sit with my mom and let me even talk with her which is like not customary they normally will let you talk to your lawyer but like not Any family so my mom is sitting

there and I'm like Mom I met Jesus I met Jesus like he appeared to me I met Jesus and I'm telling the lawyer I'm like I met Jesus and Jesus told me that I'm going to be released without having to pay bill and I met him and and this and my lawyer looks over to me and he goes uh yeah no that's not possible because they upped your charges to second degree grand larceny you're going to have to pay bill um and I looked over there at him and I'm like but I met Jesus and

I was just like a child like I've met God I met God while we were at the courtroom there were so many Supernatural things that started to happen happened there was a brawl that broke out which was crazy between rival gang members and while we were sitting in the hallway there was a man that was like playing with his son that was sitting at the end of the hallway to to the left of me and all the way at the right of me there was a woman that was sitting there and they were sitting there

the whole time and they were just looking forward and then the woman in the suit came by me and she said I just want you to know that you're beautiful and then she went back to go and sit they never Met anybody no one came to meet them but when the bra broke out in the hallway from like the rival gangs or something that was happening the two looked down at the people and when they looked down at the people who were fighting they started screaming almost like screaming that you hear in a Deliverance they

started screaming and they just ran off the floor and after that happened they just the two people just looked forward I know that now to be that they were Angels but at the time I didn't know what was going on also when I was before they called us into the courtroom I was sitting in a seat and I saw this vision of Jesus walking down the hallway in a purple robe and he had a stack of like papers in his arm and there was an angel that was next to him and I only saw the

back of him still to I don't I've never seen Dolores face but I only saw that back and the robe was a long robe and he walked down the hallway and he walked into the courtroom that I was going into because there were multiple courtrooms on that Hall and he walked in there and I was just like oh my goodness and he had like a stack of papers and so we end up going into the courtroom And by the time we got into the courtroom this was close to lunchtime because I had to turn myself

in around eight so this is close to lunch time there was and so the enemy was causing a lot of delay a lot of delay and by the way when I got into the a courtroom a lot of people had to go before me every single person that went before me got locked up we couldn't have had the meanest judge that you could ever imagine this judge was so mean and every single person that appeared before him was even was either getting the hardest sentence getting locked up and I had to sit there and watch

every person go before me and also to watch my lawyers say your mom needs to figure out the bill stuff and at the time my dad didn't want to help out with any of the Bell stuff but my mom ended up getting a bails bondsman to come we're standing in the courtroom um and by the time I think that they're going to call me they end up going to recess and I'm like oh my gosh like this thing is just getting dragged out and while it's getting dragged out the enemy is just talking to me

oh my gosh they're going to give you the worst scent like he allowed me to see all this to try To put doubt in me but I just believe what what God said when they go to recess they are normally supposed to take you to the holding cell that's underneath the jail with the rest of the Prisoners the detective takes me to the employee break room and just lets me sit in a chair just handcuffed in the chair the level of Grace that they that was being shown to me was unbelievable and remember I said

that the Lord wanted me to dress up it was amazing because when I went to the jail cell they didn't make me you know change into scrubs and so now we leave from out of the employee break room and we go back into the courtroom and now they call my case to the front when they called my case to the front the prosecutor starts to just Ram in on me me we want to set her bill as sixty thousand dollars with a surety on funds a surety on funds mean they take 72 hours to legitimize

the money that you're putting up for Bill and since it's a fraud case they'll do that right and so that would have meant that I would have been on Rikers Island for an entire week before I was able to ever post bill because this was the Fourth of July weekend so the next business day wouldn't Have been until that Monday because they wouldn't have processed it on Friday and he goes she's a Flight Risk and he just starts going insane about just my character and just like tearing me to shreds and like the second when

he started talking I was literally about to like hang my head and the second that I was about to hang my head I heard the holy spirit said to me you better not and he said look up and I said and I just like looked up and I just helped held my head you know hi then the judge goes to for my lawyer it's my lawyer's turn to speak my lawyer maybe only said one sentence about you know seeking to defend me the judge cuts my lawyer off and he goes does she have any family

here and my mother is just standing there raising her hand and he just immediately looks at my mom and then he looks at me and he hits the gavel and he says she's released no bill wow I fell on my face when I went out of the courtroom my lawyer was crying because he used to be a prosecutor so he's now a defense attorney but he's never seen that before the detective stayed there the whole time in a courtroom and he was just in awe and he was and I when he took Of me I

just fell on my face and I just started to worship Jesus I just started to worship him and that happened on a Thursday I was in church on Sunday and I had never stepped footing the church in my life and something broke off me when I walked into that church on that Sunday the Lord showed me just a vision of the courtroom and he showed me that that's what he did for me on the cross that I was guilty with so many sins that I had no way to pay them I had no way but

he took the price and he defended me and he set me free and he allowed me to go with Grace thank you not just from that point forward I just gave my life to the Lord there was a lot that I didn't know within the first year of me walking with Jesus because the church that I went to was just a random church that I found so it wasn't solid uh doctrinally but I wanted to get baptized I wanted to share about Jesus I didn't fully understand repentance because no one like taught it to me

and at the time I didn't have the end feeling of the holy spirit for things to change but I thought that being a devoted Christian was going to church every single Sunday and volunteering On everything I just and the Lord really corrected me along the way so in 2018 was when I became born again and that's when I the I heard of repentance and I fell on my face and I fully repented for everything that the Holy Spirit showed me and uh that's when I received it and filling up the Holy Spirit and ever since

then everything that Jesus has prophesied to me I'm doing now I have a wonderful Fellowship group here in Atlanta um we have baptized so many women uh so many men um we are focused on creating disciples and leading people to Jesus and this has been my life where now I do full-time Ministry and this has been my life serving Jesus that is my testimony amen Melissa who is Jesus to you Jesus to me is Amazing Grace Jesus Is Amazing Grace how sweet the sound that saved a Wretch like Me I once was lost but now

I'm foul was blind but now I see he is the way he is the truth he is the life and I am just honored to serve him as a daughter now Melissa do you have any advice or encouragement for the people who may be watching that are finding themselves In that really low place like you were at and don't really know where to turn and don't feel like they have any other options yes um he truly leaves the 99 for the one he will never leave you ignorant if you are truly searching for truth and

I internally was truly searching for truth I did not know at the time that him separating me from my father and moving me to New York and having me with no influences with him pursuing me and so the advice that I would have is today is the day of salvation I don't know what would have happened if I didn't heed to God in that moment when he showed me myself if I didn't choose to believe him um if after that day he showed me Grace if I didn't choose to yield to him I don't know

what would have happened so I would just say please like if the Lord is knocking on your heart if you are empty you're looking at a person that had everything in the world you're looking at somebody who had money who had men who had relationships who had everything that I've ever set out to have and I still was empty and I'm here to tell you that you cannot find love and sex you can't find love and money you can't Find peace in anything in the world it is only Jesus surrender to him please surrender to

him it's not worth being ignorant in religion it's not worth being ignorant in Cults hearken to his voice really when he calls you just humble yourself and submit to him amen no Melissa can you pray for the people watching who may have gone through some of the same things that you have gone through yes heavenly father I just thank you so much for today I thank you for everybody that is watching this testimony I pray that if it has touched your heart I pray that you really go and seek Jesus on your floor and seek

to have a relationship with him to seek to have an encounter with him I pray that you're open to receiving his love and that you're open to receiving what he has to say about who he has said that you are I hope that you receive the grace on what the Lord has done for you in your life what he has done with dying on the cross I pray ahead your protection around every single person that is reading this or watching this I pray that the gift of repentance falls down and that we may see our

sin through Jesus's eyes and not through our Eyes I pray that the Holy Spirit comes right now and touches every single person that is watching this testimony and that no matter if you are have extreme testimony or no matter if you were someone who grew up not having anything to the person who has everything Jesus is for all he is for the rich man he is for the poor man and I pray that we all will come to know that love that Jesus has for us in the Salvation And so I pray this over every

single person that is watching this video please Harden not your heart today is the day of salvation and I just pray this in Jesus name amen