At a young age, Zac Vachikhan found himself hanging around bad influences as a result of
unresolved issues concerning his father. I grew up without a my dad he left when I was pretty
young and you know throughout my life I've always wondered why like why he left and I
always had this feeling that it was my fault you know, so I started getting into the wrong crowd,
I just had that didn't care mentality. As his insecurities took over and depression set in,
Zac looked to drugs for the answer. I started smoking weed at the age of 11 11 or 12 all the way
to about last year that's 11 years and on top of that you know I was always partying and trying to
fill this void just try to just flush out reality and so I was always partying every weekend,
getting drunk and then I was introduced to pills. You know that really was my escape you know,
I was high almost every day almost off of anything really any narcotic I could find- xanax,
adderall you know I just had to have something. Still void of peace, Zac turned to his family's
religion of Buddhism and even went as far as becoming a monk. I became a monk you know
trying to find inner peace, trying to you know overcome these things and I only felt like I was
going more down because I couldn't even live up to that expectation like I just couldn't do it,
I couldn't succeed at anything I did and so that was really discouraging and it brought
me deeper into depression. Living as a Buddhist monk seemed to leave Zach worse off than before,
life had become too heavy for Zach to carry any longer. Then one night, I just you know thought to
myself like I'm just dead weight, so my mom hides her gun in her room I'm not gonna say where but,
I went and grabbed it you know and ran downstairs and locked my door, turn up the music and tried
to pull the trigger but it just jammed you know, I figured it was a sign somehow. Zac had planned
to commit suicide once more but was caught by a friend who had stopped him in the act. I was gonna
hang myself but he, he snuck through my window and found me and then you know took the rope from me,
just you know stayed with me that night and made sure I didn't do anything and I just poured out to
him- like man I don't know why I can't do anything right in my life, why I am the way I am.
After some convincing, his friend had talked him into coming to youth service that next day. The
presence here was amazing. It was really good but it was weird to me to see how much people
care like I wonder I was wondering where all this you know excitement and love and stuff
was coming from. Why these people worship this God so much because I'm over here going through
what I'm going through and I just didn't believe in a God. The word spoken that night had reached
Zac in a way that nothing else had. I was being touched. I felt really really convicted
but in a good way, like it reevaluated in my life and I went home I cried I didn't
make it to like 20 minutes of the service but I went home and I cried and something
sparked in me that I somehow found a Bible in a Buddhist home, it was kind of ironic and then
I read through Psalms and proverbs in one sitting and I just got curious, like what does this mean,
like why do I feel the way I feel? That following Sunday Zac was back in church and gave his life
to Christ. I felt this you know this push to come up on the altar call so, I gave my life.
Things have been great you know, set free from drugs I never went back I actually found a big
packet of pills and I called my my girlfriend and told her that I just didn't want to do it anymore.
So I flushed them and then God has taken me through so much now. Me and my girlfriend
were living a sinful life and we decided to separate you know, try to focus on God and
now we're getting married and we're both serving in the church and it's
it's amazing to be in an environment where people care and to feel the presence of God,
to know what true love and true peace is. My name is Zac Vachikhan and this is my testimony.