MONEY CAN'T BUY YOU LOVE
(The Alice Cruz Story)
 

By: Alice Cruz

I would like to share with you how I came into this world, and to a family where I was never allowed to talk about my problems, for fear of being beaten. Children should be seen and not heard, was a family motto of ours.  My stepfather, and other relatives began molesting me from a young age. I wet my bed, to keep them out of it, only to experience my mothers beatings the next day, for wetting the bed. She didn't know how to help me, so she thought she could scare me by hitting me so I would stop wetting my bed. We lived a life of pretending, not facing the truth. We didn't talk about problems, and by the time I became an adult, I had a hard time expressing myself. I was like a volcano of emotions, trying not to erupt. I became fat as a way of protecting myself. My Mom closed her eyes to the problems to meet her own needs, and getting drunk on food became another avoidance tactic.  My mother was spiritually asleep and drunk on food, and that became my way of life too. 

I made up my mind to not be dependent on anyone, but myself. I became independent, rebellious, and lost myself in my world of pretending and fantasy which caused me to feel extremely lonely.  I avoided the truth to meet my own needs, I didn't let the Lord in, or anyone else in, but my heart was crying out to know the God of my salvation.

I married a man just like my stepfather, a child molester. Like my mother, I pretended it wasn't true. I thought he was my prince, my knight in shining armor. He had many good qualities, which caused me to close my eyes to his alcoholism, and sexual hang-ups. We made $160,000.00 a year between the two of us, and he bought me all the candy and toys I wanted. He let me go to Disney Land (my favorite place), to feed my life of fantasy. I stayed drunk on food. I escaped reality thru TV and bought movies all the time. I bought toys and had the biggest TEDDY BEAR collection any had ever seen. My life consisted of going to church, but I surrounded myself with all my idols, and (FALSE COMFORTERS).

My husband and I didn't talk to each other, or really even know each other, he did his thing and I did mine.  He served his idols and I served mine, but I went to church. We each had our own separate livingroom, so we didn't interfere with the other's TV viewing. He bought me diamonds, and took me to Israel three times (so I could get holy)! 2 Thes. 2:10 says, "they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved, FOR THIS REASON God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie. That all who did not believe in the truth, but preferred unrighteousness MIGHT BE DAMNED." I was living a DAMNED life, because I wouldn't face the truth.  I was preferring unrighteousness, over really knowing the joy of my salvation, and my Savior, Jesus Christ.  The HOLY spirit was not my comforter, and I was tormented by many unholy spirits that were captivating me in a prison of fear.

I thought it would hurt too much to face the truth about things.  I didn't have faith that Jesus would love and forgive me if I was really honest.  I didn't know HE HAD THE POWER TO SAVE ME, if I would just FACE THE CANCER IN MY SOUL! Just the opposite was true!  He was waiting patiently for me to come to the death of my own ways. 

I was dying in my fat, shopping my life away with all my major credit cards.  I had been going to church for ten years in my beautiful car, BUT I WAS DYING INSIDE!  I was trying to "pay" for my sins, by handing over money, but my soul wasn't being washed and cleansed, because of my dishonesty.  I would rather try and PAY for my sin, than FACE MY SIN, and look to Jesus to give me a heart of flesh for my heart of stone .........

I had a friend named Linda, who was finding the truth that was setting her free. She introduced me to a man, with an Apostolic calling on his life....He and his precious wife, began showing me who Jesus Christ really is! They helped me face many things, I HAD BEEN RUNNING FROM ALL MY LIFE.  I realized I couldn't buy the gift of forgiveness with all my money and credit cards.  Jesus wasn't like all the friendships I had that I was paying for.  I
realized He couldn't be bought.  I had to come....."just as I am," and though my sins were red as crimson, He could make me white as snow.

I began facing the brokenness, pain and hurt from my past. I had to receive God's people and His family, so I could be fathered, mothered, sistered, and brothered all over again, and it was healing to my soul.  As I let the "real" me out, and quit trying to buy friends with money, and let them get to know the real me, I began to experience healing in Jesus Christ. In dealing with the problems in my heart, and learning how to talk about them, through being with other's that are open, my fat began coming off! I look like a different woman!  My friends tell me I'm half the woman I used to be!!!!

I'm no longer looking for my KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR to come and take me away, because I'm getting to know the TRUE PRINCE OF PEACE AND LORD OF LORDS. The lover and healer of my soul Jesus Christ is becoming real to me because I have received HIS BODY here on the earth! Having open, accountable relationships with His people has absolutely changed my life, FOREVER!!........ "yet He setteth the poor on high from affliction, and maketh him families like a flock!" (Psalm 107:41)

It's been several years since I've written this testimony.  And a lot has happened since then.  God has shown me how I didn't see my body, as His temple. I have destroyed it by my addictive, destructive ways, and I needed to take responsibility for my own actions.  I didn't want to face myself in who I had become. My body wasn't lying to me....it was shouting what I was reaping through what I had been sowing for so many years. Thinking I was so righteous in my Christianity.  I was a hypocrite, liar, and deceiver.  Thank God for His mercy and grace.  I never had a middle name so one of my sister's in the Lord started calling me ALICE GRACE.  So that's what my new name is Alice Grace Cruz.  I was like that woman in Ezek. 16, ...I found thee and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live... 

The reason I went to the Holy Land three times was to get holy, only to become more rebellious and hating men for not loving me right. I was lost in the Kingdom of getting my own needs met, not serving My King.  I didn't love men's souls either, I was looking to consume them upon my lust and damning them for looking at me that way.  I was certainly not a princess and wearing the right apparel for her prince.  God put me in a house where I was told the truth in love.  People spoke to me for the sake of my soul, not for how it was affecting them personally.  I knew in my heart that if the Lord would come, I would be found a foolish virgin with no oil in my lamp.  I was like a cup clean on the outside but dirty in the inside, no clean water in my cup. I loved to do sacrifices.....but OBEDIENCE......NOT ME!!! 

I had to ask myself, am I "meet"  for the masters use, where was my treasure really, and  would  I take the mark of the beast when it came right down to it for food? My God was my belly and my mind was set on earthly things, and I had to face my sin for what it was and cry out to God, to save me from myself and my destructive ways. That was quite an awakening for me.  Was I good for the masters use?  NO!  Where was my treasure, because that's where my heart really is!  MONEY, that's where my heart was. I was building a house on the sand, looking for unrighteous mammon.....money to save me.  And the last question is: would I have taken the mark?  YES, for survival.  I was in a church that said to me God is prospering you because your soooo spiritual. They were stroking me in my sin, telling me words that tickled my ears, but I really needed to hear words of conviction to save me from the enemies of my soul.  I loved the lie and I had to get sick of What a Big fat lie I was.  And growing fatter and fatter wasn't a life that was proclaiming freedom in Jesus. I was paying people to lie to me, while I lied to myself; I wanted the praise of men, and I was willing to dish out praise to men and I had finally gotten sick of it!

I thank the LORD for what he has done for me, I'm so happy that I have chosen the narrow way.  Don't get me wrong, its not because its been an easier softer way. It's harder initially, but it's much easier in the end, and the rewards are eternal. My flesh didn't want to lose it's life, but my spirit did.  My Spirit won out.  I saw that denying the flesh is a blessing, not a curse!

My family had a hard time with me letting go of this good job.  They thought I had lost my mind.  They thought I joined a "cult."  They never said anything to me at the time, but later I found out their thinking.  My only brother stopped talking to me up until December 4, 2000.  And the reason didn't matter now, but I remembering praying for our relationship to mend and for his salvation to my Lord Jesus Christ.  The same Jesus Christ that delivered me from my depths of pity, self-indulgence and hopelessness.  It doesn't matter if you get drunk on food, booze, strife, or workaholism.  When you're drunk, you're asleep spiritually, right where the devil wants you.  That's how I lived with my husband, and the chains of addiction and destruction were very familiar to my brother and everyone in my family.  We were all overcome by one lust or another.  If it wasn't money, sex, or power, it was food.  

On Dec. 3, 2000 I went to California to surprise my mother for her retirement party. After her party my family surprised me by having a party for me with my family whom I hadn't seen in ten years.  They were surprised when they saw in me, (half the woman they had known in the past), but twice the woman spiritually. That's when one of my sister's thought it was her fault that I left the family.  Because she had told me that my ex-husband had molested her before I left, she thought this had removed me from my family.  I had written and shared what the Lord has done for me, but when you live in the dark and want to stay in the dark, you have a hard time comprehending the light.  I told her when I left, I decided that the curse of the family was going to stop with me.  I was getting answers to the lies the family was afraid to expose.

I found out then that my brother was in a rehab and was very ill. He had his life overcome, by the devil stealing, killing and destroying him through alcohol and drugs. He didn't turn to Jesus to get free from the family curse, but little did I know He was crying out to God deep in his soul.  I surprised him by going to see him in the rehab clinic. I had to find out why he didn't want to talk to me, and why he never answered my letters.  Only to find out that he didn't want to expose my ex-husband to me for fear of hurting me.  He didn't want to expose my husband's drug pushing habits and the secret life of lust he was leading when I wasn't around.  The word that comes to me "You shall know the truth and the Truth shall make you free."  If the Son makes "you shall be free in deed."

I only saw clearer, what bondage that I came out of and I had more sorrow because my family doesn't see it yet, what Jesus really wants to free them from.  I had an awesome time together with my brother after ten years.  His name is Steve and he was open to hear the testimony of Jesus in my life and was rejoicing with me; the time flew so fast.  He said to me that he had accepted the Lord about a couple of weeks ago. Because he had REALLY RECEIVED JESUS', He was receiving me for the first time in years.  He could tell how the Lord
had renewed my youth, what the canker worm had stolen.  He was happy to see I wasn't bound and running from my problems, by sticking my head in the sand of gluttony.

It didn't hit me what he said until I came back home from the trip.  I doubted what he said about being saved because I had prayed for him for soooo long and it seemed too good to be true. Does the Lord really answer my prayers.....I wonder how much of a difference it makes for us to pray for our unsaved family?  He had been sent ministering spirits from the throne room of God and I could hardly believe it!  I got a call from my aunt, one morning about a month late, that my brother had liver cancer.  All I wanted to know without a shadow or doubt was that my brother would know the peace of God which passes all understanding and that I would see him later, in Heaven with Jesus.  I would call him every chance I could; he assured me that he knew my Savior also.  My brother went to be with my Lord ten days later.

My mother has come to visit me on a few occasions.  Her heart cries out for freedom when she's here, and she's thrilled with what she sees Jesus has done for me, but she doesn't understand it like I pray she would someday. My deepest heart's desire is to see all my family saved from the bondage of their addictions. I received a letter from my mother, stating that she told my brother she called Alice's family (my family of fellow believer's), her family!  My brother said "they're my family too!"  I am so thankful today for hearing the voice "Come follow me."  WIDE is the way to destruction and narrow is the way to LIFE.  Choose life or death, the blessing or the curse.  You know what I see now?  It's much harder to choose the curse, and choosing life can make a big difference to others one day!  Money can't buy you love.  Food, sex, money, and hell are all things that are NEVER ENOUGH.  When you have the peace of God in your soul, and you make the Lord your Shepherd, You don't have be destroyed by wantonness!  The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.  He has made me to lie down in green pastures, and has led me beside the still waters.  He has restored my soul. What He's done for me, He can do for you because He is no respecter of person's. 

Thank you and God bless you for taking the time to read my testimony.  I pray that it has helped encourage you in some way.  If you would like to talk with me about anything I've shared, please don't hesitate to contact me.  

Alice Grace

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