WHY WE MUST KEEP THE LAW? MY TESTIMONY

     You can't love God and sin. I could not continue sleeping and living with a man that I was not married to while wanting to serve in the church. When I was growing up, my great-grandmother made sure that all the children learned the law to include the ten commandments by heart and the books of the bible. Every child was able to quote the commandments, know its author and verbalize the scripture. The bible explains that if you train children in the way that they should go, even when they are old they would never depart from it. I made sure to follow the law, but never went deeper into understanding the entire law and how I must live until a pastor at a church checked me. 

    When I moved to Atlanta, GA in 2017, I met a man within the same week of me being there. He told the girl that I was with that I would be his wife. I laughed it off mainly because I never considered marriage. Even as a little girl, I never thought about getting married. My experience with men was always sexual. They only fulfilled my sexual needs. I'm sorry to tell all you men that I've slept with that I never liked you like that. I was lusting and looking to fulfill my own desires, which is why I would end the situation between us the moment that you didn't give me what I needed. I never set expectations for myself. I just went with the flow as us millennials say. So for a man to say that I would be his wife was an unexpected feeling that I didn't consider. 

    Prior to me moving to Atlanta, I was having sex and flying back and forth from NYC/Newark, NJ to see a man from my hometown that I've known all my life. I thought we were having fun until I realized that I wanted more. I was ready for a relationship. One day he said to me that he knew that he was supposed to help me do something, but he didn't know what. He proceeded to tell me that my kids need a father. My oldest was 6 at the time and I didn't consider my children needing a man to raise them. Less than a few weeks after him saying this, I came back to Atlanta to visit without him. I wasn't following God like I used to, yet I always believed in him. I heard God clearly say, follow the man. 

    I moved here with my two children, $600 and a rental car. I didn't have a plan. I was here on faith. After I met the man who said that I would be his wife, I saw him a few times and didn't entertain him as he had a girlfriend and I was getting over the disappointment of not being with the guy that I wanted. The guy from my hometown and I would make music. Since I was no longer seeing him, I started going to open mics and meeting singers to help me with my album. I met a girl named Jewel, who's on my album, who asked me one day after seeing how I was moving around Atlanta, if I wanted to get married? I told her no and that I've never considered it. She told me to pray for exactly what I wanted in a man so I took her advice and went home and did that. 

    I started seeing the man who said that he would marry me more since he was my neighbor. I even met his girlfriend and her son of whom I played with. Again, I wasn't checking him out like that yet until one day my mom called him son in law. My mother has never liked anyone for me so for her to like this guy, he had to have good qualities. I started paying attention to him. He would leave for work early in the morning and wouldn't return home until the evenings. He had his own apartment with a roommate and his own car. He had others living with him. He turned out to be exactly what I prayed for and more. He was kind and caring. He even whooped my son one day because my son would terrorize other children in the neighborhood by taking their bikes and just being rough. 

    Over the next few months, we would talk outside and chill. He told me that he broke up with his girlfriend because she acted like a young girl and needed to grow up and that all she focused on was weaves, makeup and lashes and that he liked natural women. I told him that my son's birthday was coming up and that I didn't have money to throw him a party. He offered to take my son and daughter to a children's amusement park to celebrate. This would be our first date. My birthday is 4 days after my son's so he asked me what I wanted and offered to take me out to a restaurant. I told him no thank you and that he could pay my phone bill and I will cook instead. He was all in after that. 

    Come to find out, the guy ended up believing in God even more than I did. After 1 month of being in a relationship, we moved in together to a new place. Shortly after, I decided that I needed to go to church. A church nearby was having a fall festival so the guy, his brother, my children and I all went to the church. We loved it and started attending. While I was there, I started getting the same feeling that I had from all the other churches that I attended over the years. I started seeing how the church wasn't progressing and that people who were like me would visit once and wouldn't return. I know that God called the many and yet the many weren't coming to the church. Not even a few were staying. 

    When I met the pastor and his wife, I introduced the guy that I was living with as my boyfriend. After a few months of attending and serving the church, I told everyone that he was my husband, thinking that the pastor forgot what I told him. I began to know that living with a man and having sex outside of marriage is sin. I became uncomfortable telling the truth about where I was spiritually. One day I called that pastor or he called me, and expressed my distaste for what was happening with the church. I did prophecy and told him that if things didn't change, they would have to leave those grounds. He asked me how I could tell him about his church when I was living with a man that I wasn't married to? I instantly felt regret. I started crying and told the truth. We prayed together and ended the call.

    Shortly after that, I told my boyfriend that I wanted to follow God and do things the right way and that I needed to move out because I couldn't continue to sleep with him since we weren't married. My boyfriend had attended many churches and knew God, but stopped following him as a result of his experience with the men of the church. My boyfriend knew God's law and asked why don't we get married since we are already living like we are? I asked him if he was sure? He said that he was ready. We ended up getting married a few days later at the courthouse.

    We didn't have family around other than my mother and his brother so we didn’t have a traditional wedding, not that we wanted one anyways. We just wanted each other. I went back to the pastor and told him that I got legally married. He ended up losing that church and had to move. I changed my ways. I didn't know about grace. I just knew that I had to do what was right and the man I was with agreed. I now understand why the commandment says do not commit adultery. It implies that a man and a woman should be married and sex outside of marriage is a sin. 

    I rededicated my life to following Jesus Christ on October 31, 2017. I didn't understand the law and its commandments until I realized that I was in sin. In the beginning of our knowledge, we learn what the expectation from God is. As we gain wisdom, we learn to live above the law. It is better to live right than wrong. I knew the law because it was written in my heart. Even though I tried to depart from it, the conviction from being chosen wouldn't allow me to stay in sin. God is the same God from the former as he is in the latter. When you decide to accept Jesus Christ, the law is not erased. It is fulfilled by his spirit that we do greater things above the law because the law measures sin. Instead of weighing the wages of sin, I decided to weigh the wages of righteousness. God's wisdom elevated me to grace once I received understanding.

I am Ashley Sylvestre and welcome to Boxed Closet Talk.