I learned that I’m a sinner fully deserving God’s wrath, which is something I already understood, but I learned about why Jesus came. I learned that sin can only be paid with a sacrifice of blood being shed. I learned that God loves me so much that despite me not caring about Him, the purpose with which He sent His son Jesus was to pay for my sin.
I learned that there had to be a perfect person to not only die, but also sacrifice their own life in order to take the death that I deserved. I learned that by putting my faith in Jesus, He can lead me to everlasting life which is found in Him. He will adopt me into His family, and I can truly become God’s child. Dear Christian rapper, thank you!
That’s not the end of the story. At the same time as I was getting into Christian hip-hop, I was on the track team at school. Running made great impacts on my life, but there were some guys on the team who were not so positive influences. They would talk about a bad activity that they did, saying how great it was.
That summer I decided to try it out. It was a terrible idea. I got trapped chasing a high that always left me feeling low. I would think “Maybe next time I won’t feel bad after doing this,” but that never worked. I was struggling with this harmful addiction and it was taking over my life; at the same time I was listening to all of this good music and reading the bible a lot.
This addiction persisted until the Fall of that year, after I read a book by my favorite rapper, Trip Lee. In his book “The Good Life,” Trip Lee says “The good life is living by faith in a good God” and “The good life is living by faith in God and everything he offers us in Christ.” His message of all the good things that God brings to life, the love, joy, peace, and freedom, made a tremendous impact on my life.
Through reading his book, I came to understand that God could give me the joy that I was looking for in this pleasure that wouldn’t last. I was freed from my addiction and I can say that after reading that book is when I truly started following Jesus.
I hope that my testimony can be a blessing to someone, that you can relate to it and that it can encourage you in a special way.
God bless you.
Fouad Abou-Rizk
