Losing and Finding My Faith Again: Jeff Dalton’s Story of Healing and Hope

Hello everyone, welcome to Telling My Story, the podcast where we share real-life stories, personal journeys, career experiences, challenges, growth, and the lessons that can inspire others. I'm your host, Henry Chuetelu. Today, we are having a deep personal conversation about faith, pain, rejection, mental health, healing, and what it means to be completely honest about our struggles. My guest today is Jeff Dalton, an author, poet, and a speaker who is passionate about helping people develop a real personal and unfiltered relationship with Jesus. Jeff's story includes church hurts, rejection, depression, mental health struggles, losing his faith, and eventually finding his way back to Jesus. His message is powerful. True faith isn't about pretending to be perfect. It's about being completely real with Jesus in the middle of our mess and pain. Jeff, welcome to Telling My Story. It's a pleasure to have you here with us today. Hey, thank you. It's good to be here. I appreciate it. All right, Jeff, take us back to high school. You were struggling with depression and self-esteem when you had an encounter with Jesus. What happened that day? Well, when I

entered my freshman year of high school, all of my childhood friends moved away. So I was completely alone, didn't know anyone. And I felt worthless. I felt unlovable. I didn't feel valuable. I had suicidal thoughts and I was depressed. And then my sophomore year of high school, a couple of friends of mine took me to a Christian comedian concert. And he was really funny. I liked him. And then at the end, I know he talked about Jesus. I don't remember what he said, but you know, I've seen enough articles where I know what's said. And then he goes, and then he asked for everyone to bow their heads and let the Holy Spirit move. And that's the only time I've heard someone say that, you know, throughout my 38 years of walking with Jesus. And so I bowed my head, and then I felt like something was picking me up from my seat. And so I walked to the center of the aisle, and I started walking forward. And my head was hung low because I have no self-esteem. I had no confidence at all. But every step I took going forward, my head began to rise because low self-esteem, the feeling of worthlessness just rolled off my back. And I started feeling valuable. And I started feeling loved. And I started feeling confident. And I just knew that Jesus loved me and how much he loves me. And so I went up front and I accepted him into my life. I know I said that I trusted him, what he did on the cross, to save me from my sins rather than my own good works, which can't save me. And I accepted him to be Lord of my life. And then I went home and I went upstairs to my room and I prayed to Jesus personally. And I said, I want to follow you no matter what. If it's cruel or uncruel, if it's the right thing to do or the wrong thing to do, I will follow you. And then a few months afterwards, I wrote my first poem called My Love, which is about accepting Jesus into my life and all that entailed. And that's actually in my book, Expressions of the Heart, Poems and Devotionals.

Well, that's really very insightful. So how did accepting