"I started smoking a lot of weed. I was worrying a lot of people and told a lot of lies to cover my tracks."
Things started to spiral for Sam as he began to dabble in other drugs with some of his mates.
"After a while" he admits, "all we cared about was how to get money for drugs. We stole, lied - anything."
Meanwhile, Sam's family and his friends at the Jesus Army were praying for him - hard! One day, Sam reached his turning point.
"I'd had this big fall-out with my mates in town - the police had to split us up. Later, I went to the Jesus Army house. A friend - one of the leaders - threw a cushion at me and asked if I wanted to talk.
"We went out into the garden and I told him I'd had enough of the lies and the drugs. But I was scared that God wouldn't want to forgive me. We prayed together and I started crying so much - because I knew I had gone against God.
"At the same time I can't describe how amazingly happy I was to know that I was forgiven. When I went inside to tell people, I couldn't say anything because I was laughing and crying too much all at the same time."
It was Sam's "breakthrough" moment.
"I know I've messed around enough. Now I just want to be all out for God. I've seen just the smallest part of His love - and that's enough to make me realise I have to follow Him through good and bad times for the rest of my life."
[Re-printed in Christian Today with the kind permission of Jesus Army's Streetpaper. To find out more about the work of Jesus Army and Streetpaper, visit www.jesus.org.uk/]
