Free from addiction.
Read by Zoe Cochran.
God blesses, those who patiently and Jua testing and temptation.
Afterward, they will receive the crown of life that God has
promised to those who love him.
James chapter one, verse 12.
For 19 years, she'd been trying to give up her addiction to smoking on her own.
Conrad you relo was out canvassing when he came across a woman in her
late fifties with a European accent.
He asked her what her cultural background was when he learned that she was Polish,
he was able to converse with her.
The woman said her name was Jada and that God had healed her from
hepatitis B several years earlier.
She read the Bible and seemed to be a God-fearing woman.
However, I noticed that she had stubbed out a cigarette
just before we began speaking.
And that concerned me said, Conrad.
Got impressed me to ask her outright, why she smoked?
19 years ago, a friend kept tempting me to try smoking Yasha admitted.
I finally gave in, had my first cigarette and the rest is history.
All these years, I've been pleading with God to help me get rid of this
terrible vice, but I can't give it up.
Conrad then shared with her the story of the paralytic who waited
by the pool for 38 years until he encountered Jesus Who asked him if he
would like to be made well, The man could have, let doubt fill his heart.
He told Yasha, but his faith helped him through.
He believed in the words of Jesus and put them into action.
Later that evening, Yasha lit a cigarette and contemplated what
Conrad had shared with her earlier.
Suddenly the penny dropped for 19 years.
She'd been trying to give up her addiction to smoking on her own.
She hadn't truly believed that Jesus could help her break this habit.
Jesus take these filthy things out of my life and you deal with them.
She prayed.
Please give me the willpower.
I need.
From that moment onwards, she gained the victory.
She had so desperately been seeking and suffered no withdrawal symptoms.
Her son tried to offer her cigarettes and she was able to resist.
God sent you there to my house so that I could have this victory.
Yasha told Conrad.
Since then she has been introduced to several Polish Adventists and,
uh, started taking Bible studies.
We praise the Lord for his power to overcome.
Zoe Cochrane: This year literature ministries celebrates 175 years.
This mum's devotional readings come from stories of faith edited by Vani Chu and
produced by the literature ministries department of the seventh day Adventist
church in the south Pacific division.
Jarrod Stackelroth: To find out more about this month's heritage celebrations,
visit heritage dot Adventist church.
Dot com.