1. India White’s testimony: 

From my knees on the floor in despair, to my hands raised praising God in the air, I’ve experienced a difference."

"As a sophomore at the University of Florida, I was fed up with the partying, boyfriends and other efforts of affection. Accustomed to rejection, I did whatever I could to get accepted. None of my options worked. That’s when I got desperate. I cried out to God, “Okay Jesus, if You don’t rescue me, I will take my life.” That’s when the door opened for a difference to take place in my life. The next week in class, a guy invited me to a Pentecostal church. As I attended more and more, I got baptized in Jesus name, and I hungered for more of God. That’s when I finally sought God in my room for the Holy Ghost, with utterance in tongues, and the Lord filled me with His Spirit. Praise Jesus! After that, I felt different, and had to tell my friends.

After that beautiful supernatural experience that I received in January 2005, I was determined to make a difference in the world that I live in. I was obsessed with telling others about the Lord. I would tell the person sitting next to me on a school bus, to emailing 20,000 students about Jesus and bible study offers at the University. Already, I have seen over five friends of mine receive the gift of the Holy Ghost and most with baptism in Jesus name, along with healings and deliverances at our campus services!

Ever since that experience, I have experienced a love and a joy unspeakable. I am privileged to know Jesus, the Almighty God, and I have grown into an intimate relationship with Him, as He continues to love on me and my loved ones." – India

2. Jakara Anacleto's testimony:

 God has shown me time and time again that He is in control over my life. As a child I was hungry to know about God, and I would ask my mom why we never went to church. I started seeking on my own, and tried a few different churches trying to do what I knew God wanted me to do. Eventually, a friend of mine invited me to a Pentecostal church. I loved that when I went to that church, I could feel God's presence, and not just read about Him. Eventually I was filled with the Holy Ghost, which not only gave me an awesome experience with God, but power to get through my life. After a while, my parents stopped me from going to church for years, but I was finally able to get back into it during my senior year of high school. During this time I grew closer to God and He built me up for the ministry He had for me to later do. After I finally turned 18, I was able to get baptized.

When I came to UF I didn't know anyone here, since I was an out-of-state student. I found out about the Difference Campus Ministry, and started to get involved. This allowed me to get to know people who also were seeking after God, and to get to know people. I started going Bible studies and other events they had. Eventually, I became more involved, and even got elected as the president. Through this I was able to be a part of an organization that would not only help me get closer to God, but also help others and allow me to share with others what God has done. It has been awesome to see what God is doing.

3. Kaleena Thompson's Testimony:

I got the Holy Ghost at my home church, The Pentecostals of Apopka, when I was almost 15. I got baptized in the NAME OF JESUS three years earlier. And I had been praying to receive His Spirit since. Then one night my Pastor preached on "opening the door." He said God is knocking, we just need to open the door. After the message I went to the altar and prayed in that 3rd year for the Holy Ghost and finally received IT with the evidence of speaking in tongues!! Thank you Jesus..

4. Kia Ellis's testimony:

 I've had the wonderful advantage of being raised in church. Since I can remember I've always been in church, but just because you go to church physically doesn't mean anything to your spiritual walk!

At church I was one way, but on Mondays-Saturdays I was a complete different person. I was ashamed of who I was, but I didn't know what else to do or how to stop my two-way life. No one knew my double-life (I made sure I was discreet). I remember walking in the mall and as always there are "church people" walking in the mall in their modest clothing. As quickly I can run, I went to the first clothing store to "change my clothes." I took off my jewelry and I tried to hide the nail polish on my nails. It was awful! I did this each time I was out in the mall and my eye caught a "church person."
It wasn't until I decided for myself that I was tired of living the way I was. I was sick of hiding and "acting" like someone I wasn't. It was 1997 and I remember praying to God that I wanted to receive the Holy Ghost and get baptized this year. By this time, Kira (my sister) had already received the wonderful experience of speaking in tongues and been baptized in the precious name of Jesus. My parents would urge me to seek God so I could feel that immense love of God, but I was scared.

My church youth group in Jacksonville went to Variety (today's version of Fusion). I was only expecting to hear some good messages and meet new people....God had something esle in mind! I forgot the name of the guest speaker, but he challenged me to change for God. It's not about saying you're a Christian, but actually acting like one. Since that message I have never walked back from holiness standards. I gave up a lot to receive a closer relationship with my Savior. In October of that same year I received the baptism of the holy ghost and the following month I was baptized.

Looking back, I can tell Godhad his hands on my life. He has taught me how to trust in Him despite any situation I face and to praise Him while goint through it. He is my help in times of trouble...I know my Redeemer liveth! He is sooo good to me...I just can't tell it all. I love Him for his never-ending mercy, grace, and love towards me and my family. My desire is to be more like Him and to share my story with as many people I can!

5. Latoya Campbell's testimony:

I was baptized at the age of 10 and was infilled with the Holy Ghost about a month later. I was raised in the church. When I came to college, I decided that I needed to know the Lord for myself because I realized that my salvation is my choice. All in all, we were all sinners at some point. I don't have any stories about drugs and alcohol, but I do know that The Lord has saved me from an endless amount of emotional scars. I went from being a quiet insecure young girl to being a bold and confident yet still quiet young lady. God is good.

6.Joshua Tojuola's Testimony:

I have no greater testimony other than the fact that I received the Holy Ghost on May 6th 1993 when I was only at the tender age of 7 and it was the greatest feeling in the world. And I count it all part of Gods perfect plan in my life. A young boy born in Nigeria that moved to the US while growing up I could have easily fallen into the wrong crowds at school due to peer pressure done some things I shouldn't have all just to fit, but thanks be God there was a Pentecostal church already referenced to my parents where we went and my second of service ever in a church in the US I received the gift of the Holy Ghost and ever since then my life has never been the same. I give all the glory and honor to God for keeping me thus this far with my family through the good and the bad and I know He hasn't brought this far to leave me.

7.Jeffrey Wright's testimony:

Christianity has always played an integral part in my life, but it's not just knowing God and His Word, but it's about your walk with Him. To me Christianity is not a religion with rituals and elaborate doctrines, but it's a relationship, and the crucial element to the faith is your walk with God and how closely you relate to Him. I grew up Catholic, and I remember as a small boy thinking that there must be more to God than rituals and silent reverence. Eventually, my family became Protestant and we moved through various denominations settling in various churches of differing denominations. In the fourth grade, I received the Holy Spirit in an Assemblies of God church, which advocated the use of speaking in tongues and often had public speakings and interpretations, but it was not an integral part of the church. My mother received the baptism of the Holy Spirit as a teenager, never having heard it preached or spoken. Not knowing what it was and not having it explained to her, she did not utiilize it and she eventually lost it only to receive it again later in her life with me. I have found myself in many non-Pentecostal churches that strongly advocate the active use of speaking in tongues, but I personally found myself drawn to UPC for it's firm and unwaivering weight it places on this gift. In the university, there are many temptations that surround each student. While my friends and I are strong social conservatives, I lacked the religious companionship when I arrived in Gainesville. Pentecostals of Gainesville and the Difference Campus Ministry have become a large stepping stone in my walk with God, providing a strong, passionate fellowship environment that has strengthened me and supported me. I am so very thankful for their presence in my life and their unwaivering fire-filled devotion for God

9. Marie Valery's Testimony

"You think you know…..but you have no idea"

Hello my full name is Marie Christnie (not Christine) Valery and I am from, Naples Florida. I was born December 29th 1985 from Haitian immigrants, Marie Desrosiers and Meretea Valery. And this is my testimony.

 "Sometimes life seems to unwind like an enormous brown ball of sting. Every morning you roll out of bed, pick up the string where you dropped it the night before and off you go. Today seems pretty much the same as yesterday. One more day, one more length of string and that ball just keeps unwinding. But some days aren't like that at all. They don't unwind like string, they land like a brick. One thing happens, and everything changes. It could be a phone call, an accident, a death or something someone says." (Bruce Wilkinson).

In my case, it was the absence of my father. For the five years that I knew him, I was "daddy's little girl." I love how he would wrap his arms around me, I felt loved and safe from harm. As my aunts and uncles would say……  "You are the spitting image of your father." But like the say goes, anyone can be a daddy but it takes a real man to be a father. You see, most of his time was spent blowing away paycheck after paycheck versus taking care of his family(my mother, little sister and I).This generational curse of absent fathers has never ended. My grandmother's daddy did it to her, my mothers to her and know to me. After enduring this immoral behavior for 5years or so my mother finally found strength in the name called "Jesus" and moved out of the situation.

This was a very stressful time for my mother. She already felt like a Haitian immigrant in a strange man's land, so raising two girls on her own would just be another challenge. Do you know what it's like watching your mother coming home from working two laborious jobs each day? With sweat running down her flushed face, tears rolling down her cheeks, aching bones, sore muscles and swollen feet, my mother would work from 6am-12pm and 2pm-11pm in a hotel and nursing home. In the meanwhile I would help her by taking care of little sister. Soon after, many financial hardships, living arrangements, transportation failure, interrogating friends and back-stabbing family members my mother finally met my step-dad. I think I was about 10 years old when he came in our family and has been there ever since. He was very helpful in the fact that he loved my mother and helped raise my sister and I. And that was a blessing.

Now even though my mother was happy, that didn't include me. All my life I had felt incomplete and robbed of "true fatherly love". I was not satisfied and I was angry. Angry that he never tried to come back, angry that he never called and most of all that I looked just like him. "Your father is a liar and a cheat, don't grow up to be like him," people would say.   As a child I felt secluded and wanted someone to come and wrap me in their arms around me. And then one day there was a nock at my door. I was about 10 years old and I opened the door. It was some Haitian lady who claimed that her daughter (Matania) told her knew my little sister (Yoldine) through pre-school; gave her this address and she wanted to now if they could play together sometime. And of course my mother had to get to know this stranger and her family first. Her name was Martha and she had one little boy named Pierre and two girls Andrine and Matania. Later these strangers would become part of our extended family. Sometime in the process Martha's kids would invite us to their Pentecostal church. Even though my mother preferred us attending her Haitian Nazarene church, she also didn't mind us visiting another.
So, one Sunday morning, I got up and got ready for church. The excitement of visiting a new church filled my soul. At around 9:30am Martha picked Yoldine and I. After driving for 30 minutes or so we pulled up to the big church and parked to a sign that read Faith Apostolic Church. We got out of the car and Martha's son told me to follow him to Sunday school class. That day our lesson, not by mistake, was about receiving the gift of the "Holy Ghost."  All the little kids became excited when they were asked to quote Acts2:38. I thought what a promising gift, but that must be some grown up stuff. Well, week after week, every Sunday for 2 years, I would attend "Faith Apostolic Church." Before I knew it, I would be 12 years old and that was great because now I could be a member of youth. Being in the youth meant that for partial of our time was spent in the sanctuary. And boy was there a sight to see. I saw it all, people jumping out of their seats, people babbling crazy words, men & women weeping. What was going on? I thought this was some foolish stuff and I felt uneasy. How long did that last? To make a long story short……it was my third month in the youth when I received the Holy Ghost, but I didn't get baptized later. My mother though it was best for me to wait until I full grasped the responsibility that goes along with "being saved." Even though that drove me crazy, I still obeyed her and just believed that God would make a way. September 1, 2002, I finally got mother's permission at the age of 16. Thank you Jesus!

Five years later, I am 20 years old and still serving the lord. Let me tell you it hasn't been easy with the constant plaguing of peer pressures and the temptations of the flesh but it has been a privilege to take on the name of Jesus. I am adopted in the body of Christ. That void is gone, because it has turned into love for my "spiritual father," Jesus. Yes, I've fallen, made many mistakes but he has been with me every roll of string and moved every ton of brick. I am a new creature! And there is nothing that can change that, neither my past nor my failures. Hallelujah, In Jesus Name!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!