My Testimony

Donald Bush

At a young age, before I was five, my mother started telling me about our amazing God who created everything.  She gradually brought in Jesus, the Son of God, who performed miracles.  I remember being awe struck when my mom told me Jesus walked on water and made the blind see again.  I grew up aware that God was working in my life unseen. I was also aware of something else; evil was working against it…perhaps demons.  At 9 years of age a devout Jehovah Witness mother of a friend pointed out to me (and anyone who would listen) the ways that Satan was trying to get me—TV, games, Ouija board, and rock music.  She put the fear of evil in me.  But not the fear of God, at least not yet.  I accepted Christ at 15 while attending a very cool teen worship group at my Presbyterian Church.  At 16, I met a Mormon Latter Day Saints girl and she got me going to temple and I did some missionary work.  So, at 18 I got baptized in the Mormon church and the deacons laid hands on me to receive the Holy Spirit.  My Mormon friend and her parents, especially her mother and grandmother, were so happy with me for getting baptized.  I felt like it was no big deal.  My father asked me if I believed “this stuff” and I was shocked to learn that he did not which explained why all the Christmas ornament boxes said x-mas on them.  I did not get very active in the Mormon Church and I did not get along with my stepmother so she decided that I should leave when I was 18.

Being that I was 18 and my Mormon friend was 16, it became necessary to part with her after two years.  She went off to Brigham Young and I went to hell in a handbasket.  Since I no longer had her father’s blessing, I no longer had my carpenter’s apprentice job with his company, and it took what seems like forever to get a job.

I became depressed and started drinking.  The Mormon Church was not the answer, but I knew I needed God’s help. While I do not remember praying for His help, He gave me a job. Then one day while on break, I went down the street looking for a place to eat and met my first wife.  We never attended church together.  She was agoraphobic and did not like crowds or public places much, but I did read the bible out loud to her.   She was 17 years older than me and when I turned 20, I got married.  She had a nine-year-old boy who was a real good kid.  Since I was still a bit kid at heart and I took good care of my childhood toys, I gave a lot of cool stuff to him.

My wife had four miscarriages.  She said the fetus would not attach to the womb, so we stopped. We tried a surrogate, but as it turns out she aborted twice so that was the end of that.

My wife developed cancer at the age of 49 and died the day before her 50^th birthday.  Her mother was there from Minnesota.  It took only 9 months for the cancer to kill her, and it started from a lost filling.  I was 33 at the time and it took a while to get over the devastation. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away.

Being single again one of my friends who was a dialysis nurse “hooked” me up with one of his patients.  She accompanied me to Las Vegas for the nurse’s wedding which did not last a year.  As it turned out, my girlfriend had lupus and if she did not get a kidney transplant, she would die.  Having just buried my wife I could not easily take another chance at a dying spouse.  I told her and her grandma who liked me a lot that I was sorry. They understood and agreed that it was for the best for my sake anyway.