I came back from Vietnam in October 1968 and ended up in Houston, Texas some months later, where my family had relocated during my hitch in the Marine Corps. For four torturous years I bounced from one job to another while I tried to drink all the booze, and do all the drugs, in the state of Texas. I won't get into the gory details, for this testemony isn't about the crisis that I came home to, but the solution that found me on a rainy afternoon in 1972.

I had burned all my bridges by that time (1972); Lost my job, wrecked my 5th car, had my furniture reposessed...and had faced the ultimate humiliation of asking my folks for a place to live. Even that refuge was tenuous, for I was arrested a short time later and my Mom and little sister had to go downtown to bail me out of jail. That, in itself, was a traumatic thing for them to bear, for my family were not very familiar with the local hoosegow. My Dad called me into his room when we came home and told me that, excpet for my Mom's unswerving loyalty to me, he would be kicking me out of the family. I had, even then, a deep love for my family, and my Father's grim words took from me the one thing of value that remained in my life. That moment was the low point, the bottom of the barrel for me.

I remember going to my darkened room right after our talk, and sitting on the edge of the bed for hours. I was confused and afraid. My soul was convulsing with a pain more awesome than I can describe. Finally,I looked down at my hands in the darkness, watched them shake a moment, then lifted my eyes heavenward and screamed, silently, within myelf; "God! If You're up there, please help me! I can't do this anymore!"

I had reached the barren place of utter hopelessness, and without realizing it, had turned to the One Source that could help. Ofcourse, in His infinite wisdom, He had stripped me of all my worldly possessions, all the distractions of an empty life, in order that I might do just that, call upon His grace in the moment of my greatest need. He brought me the answer two days later. An old friend was starting a new business, and he offered me a job. It wasn't the kind of work I normally would have been interested in, direct selling, but I was desperate to restore some measure of normalcy to my shattered life.

One of my first appointments was with, as Gary described him, "A religious guy...say somethin' about God", he advised me. Well, as it turned out, the "guy" invited me to lunch after our meeting, and it was he that did all the talking, and God happened to be the subject. When I walked out of that restaurant I had made the greatest decision a human being can make, I had accepted Jesus Christ as my savior. Little did I realize then that one simple choice, no more than a second in duration, would have such an enormous impact on my life.

From that moment, my life became a potitive force. Not a spectacular, overnight transformation, but a day by day advance that has brought me to this very hour.

I quoted a partial verse in a prominent place on this page; "The word of God is alive and powerful...", because it best captures the reality of what happened to me, or I should say, the cause of what happened to me. No mere words can do justice to this divine power which has penetrated time and reached into the souls of men to fashion a "new man", a person remade upon the ashes of the old. This irresistable force has given me a life of blessing and happiness beyond anything I could have imagined.

Of those that may happen upon this site, I know one will be in that same dark void that I was in that night, and they will read far more into these words than the casual visitor. If, per chance, that tortured soul is led here, then all my meticulous work will have been worth it. In this way, I will be priviledged to be the instrument of my Lord in delivering another lost soul, as I was, into His marvelous light.

The purpose of this site is to publish and make available the doctrines I have learned and applied over this span of 28 years. Since that day in 1972 I have been a student of one man, Robert Thieme, the Pastor of Berachah Church in Houston. This site is dedicated to him for his 50 years of devoted service to The Lord, and the countless blessings that have come of his ministry.

Richard O'Leary