God Transforms Drug-Abusing 'Goth' Into AG Pastor - Page 2 of 2

“My grandmother saw me and knew something was wrong,” Hodges recalls. “She asked me if it was OK if she took me to church, for the pastor to pray for me. I don’t remember, but apparently I told her it was OK.”

For Hodges, the battleground had moved from the physical and emotional addiction and fully into the spiritual realm. He explained that when God “cleaned house” during his conversion it was real, the emptiness was filled with Christ. But when he chose to turn his back on God and embrace the drug culture again, it was as if the demonic forces in his life—a life that had been filled with the occult—returned seven times (as the Bible indicates will happen) more powerfully.

“When I got to Nampa First Assembly, I trashed the pastor’s office—I just went off,” Hodges says. “Pastor Barry Osteen (former Southern Idaho assistant district superintendent) and Pastor Jim Stevens (former Southern Idaho district treasurer) were there. They started to pray over me and demons began to manifest themselves. One moment I would be begging them to help me, the next it was a demonic voice, screaming in torment, fighting.”

As the prayers continued, Pastor Osteen phoned Chaplain Rigenhagen, as Jordan was uncontrollable.

“Immediately when I walked in, Hodges sat down,” Rigenhagen recalls. “I walked over to him and began to plead the blood of Jesus. I could tell what was going on with Jordan was extremely demonic.”

Rigenhagen says they continued to pray for at least another half hour before Hodges suddenly dropped to his knees and they prayed the sinner’s prayer together.

“He was still quite intoxicated due to the meth,” Rigenhagen says, “but now he was determined to go out and find a police officer and turn himself in for an outstanding warrant. He’s a big guy, so there’s no way we could have stopped him, even if we wanted to. I followed him in my car and that’s exactly what he did.”

On the advice of Chaplain Rigenhagen, Pastor Monty Sears of Christian Faith Center (AG) visited Hodges in jail. After visiting with Hodges, Sears believed God was telling him that Hodges was to somehow play a key role in reaching the community of Nampa for Christ.

There was potential in the young man, and once Hodges was released from jail several months later, Sears offered him a job in the church, providing an opportunity for ongoing biblical training and mentoring by godly men. Hodges’ life continued to evolve and grow in Christ as he walked down his “hallway.” He admits it wasn’t easy, as temptation was really never more than an encounter or phone call away.

“What many in today’s church don’t understand is that a lot of kids don’t experience instantaneous transformation and freedom from the baggage they’re carrying,” Hodges explains. “They are going to have setbacks, they’re going to disappear for weeks or even months at a time, but they need a church family who’s willing to continue to believe in them, call them, encourage them.” He says people in the “hallway” need someone to come alongside of them and patiently and lovingly walk with them until they can stand on their own.

Hodges’ soon-to-be wife, Amanda, was also deep into the drug culture buying from and selling with Hodges. She says that through the help of godly men who stood by Hodges even when he messed up, his life has been transformed.

Now, a little more than five years after his conversion, Jordan and Amanda are drug-free and happily married. Both have become credentialed Assemblies of God ministers and are lead pastors in a new extension of Christian Faith Center that has grown to more than 250 members, many of the members in the midst of making their way down their own lonely hallways.

“A big part of the hallway is that people are caught between ‘belonging,'” Jordan explains. “They’re no longer a part of the drug culture, but they don’t feel like they’re in anyway connected with the whole ‘Christian’ thing, so they feel like the don’t belong anywhere. Christians also have preconceived ideas of what a new Christian should look like, but guess what, they may not look right, smell right, act right—because they’re not—but God wants us to embrace them anyway.”

And what God told Pastor Sears about Hodges being key to reaching the community for Christ has come to pass.

“God has us ministering in the very part of Nampa that Amanda and I used to sell drugs in,” Hodges says. “Many of the people we used to deal drugs to are now Christians and attending our church.”

He says that whatever the issues people are dealing with, whether meth addicts, homosexuals, prostitutes, whatever, he understands the power of acceptance.

“You have to understand, no matter how steeped in sin we are, God still loves us and He is still with us at every step. It’s not like you can ever really ‘get away’ from God,” Hodges says.

Hodges also underscores the vital importance of seeing God’s potential in people who are in pain, sticking with people for the long ride, as the length of the hallway can vary from person to person, and demonstrating unconditional love, where the mess and pain is hated, but the person is loved.

“We want people to know they’re okay to be here. We have a culture of acceptance in that we love you, wherever you’re at,” Hodges says. “We don’t embrace the lifestyle; we embrace the person.”

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