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Pastor Goodman's Christian Testimony

The Christian Testimony of Francis D

Celebration of Life Ministries
365 Frances Lane, #107
Lansing, Kansas 66043
Phone: 913.240.8872

 

The Christian Testimony of Francis D. Goodman Jr.

A. What I was like before being BORN AGAIN.

I do not plan to dwell on my pre-Christian life. Before I came to know Jesus Christ, I was attending various Unitarian/Universalist churches and involved with the New Age Movement. Was taught by my religious teachers that man created the concept of god. I was a confessed Atheist and hated anything concerning Jesus Christ.

One of my former Unitarian Universalist religious teachers a Dr. Bragg who pastured the All Souls Unitarian Church in Kansas City, Missouri was a signer of the Humanist Manifesto I. Another of my former Unitarian Universalist religious teachers, Paul Beattie, who pastured the All Souls Unitarian Church in Indianapolis, Indiana, was a signer of the Humanist Manifesto II.

At the age of 12 years old my father began my first subscription to Playboy Magazine and at the age of 14 years he added Penthouse Magazine to the list. I was a seemingly quiet young man who was slowly developing into a womanizer and adulator.

When I graduated high school at the age of 19, I joined the United States Marine Corps. Shortly after arriving at my first duty station (MCAS El Toro) to begin duties as a Military Policeman I met and married my first wife, Virginia Ann (Crawford) Nelson. She went by the name Gennie.

I met Gennie at a serviceman's organization in Santa Anna, California. She was married, but separated from her husband for about six years. After a couple dates I asked her to marry me. Her answer was yes. So I moved in with her and when her divorce was final on October 1, 1976, we got married on October 10, 1976. And our Daughter Teresa Ann (Goodman) Santana was born in December 1976. Gennie found out she was pregnant about a month after I moved in with her.

In June 1977, I was promoted to corporal and was transferred accompanied by my wife and daughter to the Subic Bay Naval Base. I was a member of Marine Barracks, "A" Company, and assigned to the Provost Marshal's Office. The Provost Marshal assigned me to the Armed Forces Police, Starboard Section, where I worked out in the local Philippine community, in the city of Olongapo. Olongapo has earned the nickname "Sin" city by the U.S. Navy personnel.

It was here that I accelerated my womanizing and was deeply involved in numerous one-night stands, adultery. Even after being caught by my wife Gennie and promising not to do that any more, I still kept up the womanizing and adultery until the day I met Jesus Christ. While in the Philippines, Gennie and I had another child a girl we named, Katherine Fay Goodman, born in July 1978.

It was at the Subic Bay Naval Base where I began to watch the 700 Club with Pat Robinson.

The next stop in my military career was Camp Pendleton, California and then I finally completed my full six-year tour in the Marines. Once getting back home I began to look for a job with a local police department. The El Reno, Oklahoma, Police Department, hired me to work for them as a Police Officer. Even here I had numerous affairs and cheated on my wife Gennie on a regular basis. My son Brian was born in February 1983.

One night I was debating in my mind to leave my wife for another woman, I was so distressed that I pulled into the cemetery and prayed for the first time. I said, "God, I do not know if you exist or not. I do not know what to do? Do I leave Gennie or stay?" Funny thing happened, except for one chance meeting, I never saw the other woman again.

B. How I became BORN AGAIN.

A few months after the affair ended, I was watching the 700 Club with Pat Robinson one afternoon in April, shortly after Easter 1984, I did not usually watch the religious programming part of the 700 Club. But, this day I did and was shocked into the ultimate reality that Jesus Christ is who he said he was.

This day on the 700 Club, one of the hosts was interviewing a painter who has painted a picture of Jesus Christ under the power of the Holy Spirit. When they turned the painting around I fell to the floor and wept. I wept because I had seen that figure before in a photograph while stationed at Camp Pendleton, California.

During a flood at the Camp Pendleton Marine Base, I was assigned as a member of the Traffic Division to assist in directing traffic around an area of Vandergrift Blvd where it crosses Isadora Flats, near the air field. Two sergeants approached asking me if they can take some pictures. After getting permission for them to enter the area, I escorted then as they took pictures. A week later, these same two sergeants came to the Traffic Division's office wanting to know who the person was in the photograph, since he was not there when they took the pictures. My hair stood up as I looked at the pictures and even had a tear in my eye, but I did not recognize the person as the Lord Jesus Christ.

When these two events came together, the painting on the 700 Club and the photograph at Camp Pendleton, realizing the person on both the painting and the photograph was the Lord Jesus Christ, I fell to my knees and cried. I cried off and on for two weeks after realizing the lie I was living and the lies I was taught about Jesus Christ.

C. What my life has been like after being BORN AGAIN.

After I gave my live and my heart to Jesus Christ, my live was not the same. Praying came easy to me. I walked four miles a day and prayed as I walked. I did not know of the events that would further change my life. Through a series of events the Lord uprooted Gennie and I from Oklahoma and took us to Colorado Springs, Colorado.

It was here in Colorado Springs that I began to grow spiritually. I was water baptized in December 1985 and baptized in the Holy Spirit with evidence of speaking in tongues a week later.

I began to attend the Fountain Valley Chapter of the Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship International. I was elected chapter secretary for one year. About one month after being elected chapter secretary, about January 24, 1986, my wife Gennie packed herself and the kids when I was at work as a Security Officer and went to California. Left in the middle of the night like a thief.

I could have understood this if she had left before I became a Christian. I gave her many a reason to leave before meeting Jesus Christ, but none after meeting Jesus Christ.

When I returned home and discovered my family missing I was heart broken sad and lonely. I began a fast, a fast where I told the Lord, "I did not care if I died, I wanted an answer, what to do now?" About 9 days later while I was at work, I was reading my Bible. Out of James the 5th chapter, I say these words, "Pray again!" I began to pray. When I looked up Jesus Christ was standing there in the room with me. As he disappeared he put these words into my heart: "Believe what I have done. Believe what I am doing. Believe what I am going to do. Believe what I wrote in my book the Bible. With that my fast ended.

The only contact with the children was by telephone, they were forbidden by Gennie to let me have an address or phone number. I received a phone call about every three or four months apart. During one of the calls, Gennie told me point blank of three ways to get her back, the last one being to give up Jesus. After hearing this, I told her, "You are not worth it," and hung up the phone.

About a month after being selected to fill a position on the Deacon board of the church I was attending, I received divorce papers. While in Colorado Springs four great men of God helped to shape me: My pastor, Elery J. Mayo, Ted Haggard pastor of New Life Church, Bishop Clifford Walton and Virgil Porter.

About a month after being licensed as a minister by Full Gospel Churches International, Gennie stopped all communications with the children. The Lord was telling me these two years that Gennie and I would never come together again, spite my prayers. The Lord was telling me of another wife to be revealed and her name is Maria Mae Kabristante from the Philippines. We have three children, April Mae, Anecita Moraya, and Daniel Roy.

Since writing this in 1998, Mae divorced me in August 2002. The Lord has blessed me with yet another wife, Sandra Gozo snd another daughter (step-daugher) Jameela in April 2010. Sandra is a school teacher from the Philippines.

Through it all Jesus Christ has been the best friend I ever had, the best helper, and the best everything. Some of the things the Holy Spirit has taught me has been breath taking and some of the teachings the Church is not ready to accept. Most of the Christian people and ministers, I have met still do hot know Jesus Christ and who he is, they only know lots of things about him. I am not saying this to condemn anyone but to spark spiritual growth.

I have has some very wonderful experiences with the Lord Jesus Christ and the salvation he has given me. I would not trade Jesus Christ for all the gold, silver, diamonds or money in the world.

I am setting up another page to expand on my testimony make a record of some of the dreams, events that have happened, and the prophecies that I have received from the Holy Spirit.

 

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Email: frankgoodmanjr@yahoo.com