My Testimony: From Darkness to the Marvelous Light

If there is one thing a true Pentecostal loves, it is the testimony. It is often the gateway into ministry. In fact, beyond evangelizing through stories based on real events, I have seen many people’s lives transformed by hearing someone else’s experience. I count myself among them.

I do not like talking about myself, yet I felt a very strong urge to write my testimony and my journey, from conversion to the present moment in which I write this text, in the early hours of a Friday morning. I promise to be as concise as possible, especially since my memory may fail on some specific detail from certain periods of my life.

I will begin with childhood. I was always a very introverted, quiet, and shy child. This led me to observe the people around me closely and to read the environment with an extremely sharp sensitivity. I can say that nothing was ever lacking: clothing, good food, good schools, and so on. Nevertheless, I did not have a satisfying experience during that phase of life.

Up until the age of seven, I lived in several different houses. I believe this negatively impacted my emotional stability. On top of that, I grew up in a dysfunctional home, where I witnessed many fights between my parents, and ugly ones at that. I remember one day when my mother put all my father’s belongings out of the house.

Setting the family side of things aside for a moment, I will talk about my introduction to music. At age five, I already loved pretending to be a drummer. I would break the wooden chairs in the house and tear up the sofa. Until I had the brilliant idea of improvising a drum kit using the percussion instruments my father kept at home. Every weekend, the family would gather for a barbecue, and there was always some traditional samba to “liven up” the party.

Always very curious and creative, I kept looking for new ways to put together a drum kit closer to a professional one. Until, at the age of nine, I was given a professional drum kit. I could barely reach the pedals, both the bass drum and the hi-hat. Going back a little in time, my brother Roney, my cousin Igor, my uncle Raphael and I used to play at being a band, doing covers of Mamonas Assassinas.

It was also around this time that I met a neighbor who introduced me to some vinyl records (yes, I am from that era!) that changed my life completely. I remember the first records I ever heard: “Kill ‘Em All” by Metallica and “No Prayer for the Dying” by Iron Maiden. Along with those two records, he lent me a VHS tape containing the final part of Guns N’ Roses‘ “Live in Tokyo” show, and a Nirvana documentary called “Live! Tonight! Sold Out!”.

From that day on, my life was never the same. We continued our band game, taking it more and more seriously. Until one fine day, a last-minute opportunity came up to play at a restaurant open to the public. The drum kit I had been given was still wrapped as a Christmas present. I was given permission to use it that day, and from then on, the game never stopped.

Around that same time, I took up surfing under the influence of my great uncle Waltinho (Mocotó, to those close to him). I remember how we would gather to wake up at 5 in the morning every day to catch the best waves. It was in mid-1997 that we met Diego Volpato, our neighbor. He joined the band, giving it an upgrade. We started playing more frequently, including at night. Our first show, however, was at an event organized by the surfers of Guriri, at a place called Praiano. It took place on an afternoon and there were several bands on the line-up.

The band grew to enormous proportions in the city and was named ReadStones. There were some lineup changes over time, until it settled down to just me, Roney, and Diego. We played original songs and covers of bands such as The Offspring, Pennywise, Raimundos, Charlie Brown Jr., among others.

To summarize the testimony, I went through several other bands after that. However, a defining moment in my life was when I met a friend named Paulo Ricardo. By that point, I was already living in Guriri. I also met Romário and Carlyle, who were from São Mateus. I was eleven years old at the time. We put together a Christian punk rock and hardcore band called Open a Smile.

I had never attended an evangelical church before, until, at the invitation of my friend Paulo Ricardo, I began going to Batista Sião, which was located (I believe it still is) next to the Old Church in São Mateus. In truth, I went so I could play the drums. I knew nothing about the Bible (not that I know much today), but I did not understand what was happening in that environment beyond playing. I took turns on the drums with a brother who was three times my size but had an even bigger heart. He was nicknamed Dudu.

Nonetheless, I fell into The Dark Side of the Moon (those who know, know). At age 12, we had the “brilliant idea” to form a black metal band. We would spend weeks in a house playing basketball, eating pizza and ice cream, and watching Hermes e Renato. Besides that, we recorded original songs and covers of bands like Immortal, Emperor, Dark Funeral, Dimmu Borgir, Marduk and Mayhem. The list goes on!

After that phase, I met a young man named Olavo Lima, nicknamed Xaxá. We put together a power metal band in the same vein: covers and originals. We played covers of bands like Helloween, Gamma Ray, Blind Guardian, Hammerfall, and so on. We rented a house for him and the guitarist, known as Cacau, to live in and used it as a rehearsal space.

A few years later, I was in a band that deeply marked my life and shaped my personality. It was called Limbo. We recorded an EP in Vitória at the time and played in various places, including a competition festival in Piúma. The lyrical themes were complex and reflective, though also quite pessimistic. I believe this was due to the influence of existentialist philosophy, which served as our source of inspiration. My worldview grew darker and darker, and eventually I would live out everything we sang about.

Finally, to wrap up the subject of music, let me go back to where it all began. At the age of fifteen, I would see my brother always surrounded by friends. By then, he was already playing reggae, while I lived isolated, watching a VHS that contained the full Oficina G3 concert, based on the CD “O Tempo,” and the Dream Theater show “Live Scenes from New York.” I also had a Dream Theater VHS titled “5 Years in a LIVEtime.”

Faced with this, I was exhausted from living that solitary life and wanted to be accepted by the reggae crowd. I grew up with a strong reggae influence from my father. I carry with me the memories of times when he would drive and I sat in the back seat listening to Edson Gomes, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Steel Pulse. He had some vinyl records that also left a deep mark on me, like “Catch a Fire” by Bob Marley and “Mystic Man” by Peter Tosh.

As was to be expected, all of my brother’s friends who listened to reggae and surfed used Cannabis sativa. I decided to try it, and from that moment on, I never stopped. I used it every day! We even put together a reggae band called Dedamarelo. And it did not stop there. My personality is such that when I take an interest in something, I throw myself into it completely until my strength runs out. By sixteen, I had already tried cocaine. I got hooked immediately!

I hit rock bottom when I encountered crack shortly after. But going back a little in the story, I went through several psychiatric clinic admissions due to some psychotic episodes. The first admission was to a clinic called Travessia, where there were schizophrenic patients everywhere. It was like a scene from a horror film! Around that time, I started smoking cigarettes. I would stub them out on my arm and light one after another.

I was diagnosed with schizophrenia. At the second clinic, psychiatrist Dr. Paulo Cesar Aragão diagnosed me with bipolar disorder and several other conditions, but not schizophrenia. I lived through very difficult moments, in which I had to receive a sedative injection on several occasions, after being strapped into a straitjacket. I would sleep for two straight days and wake up having soiled myself. Heavy stuff! I went through that clinic about two or three times.

Returning to the subject of crack, there was a phase when I was nothing but skin and bones. My lunch was an apple, if I was lucky. I traded everything I had in the house for drugs. I had a wardrobe full of original jerseys from teams and international squads. Gone, all of it! When my own things ran out, I went through my brother’s. This created chaos at home. I even stripped copper wire in the streets because I had no money for anything. Until one day, as I was stealing a gold piece of jewelry from my mother to try to trade it for drugs, at the moment I was about to board the bus from São Mateus to Guriri, I broke down crying, went back home, and asked my parents for help.

My father worked offshore for Petrobras, but he took a provisional leave of absence to watch over me and help. He reached out to a clinic in São Bernardo do Campo, in São Paulo, called Bezerra de Menezes. We scheduled my admission. He flew me there, left me at the clinic, and returned to Espírito Santo. There was, however, a problem: they placed me in the wrong ward, in the psychiatric unit. I lived through one of the worst nights of my life. It was a closed cell, with only a barred door, full of howling schizophrenic patients. A total nightmare!

The following day, after causing a great deal of trouble, I was taken to the correct ward. Treatment began there. The setting was beautiful on the outside and terrifying on the inside. The clinic’s structure was cozy and charming, but the situation I found myself in at that moment was one of novelty, not the kind of novelty that sparks philosophical wonder, but rather a novelty surrounded by uncertainty, fragility, and withdrawal.

There were people from all over the country, and from abroad as well. The treatment was focused primarily on the psychological side, with plenty of group therapy and physical and recreational activities. It was also accompanied by medication. Each person was allowed a set number of packs of cigarettes per month. Since I lived far away, someone was put in charge of managing that for me.

I met people of all kinds and social classes, from ex-convicts to doctors. I befriended a doctor who was admitted due to his morphine addiction. According to him, he only worked while under the influence, including performing surgeries. I also got close to a professional powerlifter. In fact, there was a rather unpleasant episode involving him. One day I said I wanted to escape and was going to do something foolish. He immediately reported it to the clinic staff, who isolated me from the rest of the group and placed me in a special ward. I was given a sedative injection and slept for approximately two straight days.

Without further ado, after 40 days I was discharged. My father came to pick me up at the clinic and we returned to Espírito Santo. From that point on, I had to cut some ties, rebuild my circle of friendships, and even end a relationship I was in at the time. I stayed clean for a good while, though I kept smoking cigarettes. I began attending an alternative church where members gathered at the pastor’s home. Around that time, I went back to playing power metal, but this time it was gospel.

Between coming and going, I had several relapses. I went to live alone in Vitória again. At that point in life, a woman I had met at the clinic (whose father had been admitted) came from São Paulo to live with me in Espírito Santo. However, with my constant relapses and nights out on the streets, the relationship fell apart. I have always led a disordered life when it comes to relationships. This caused many traumas and deep wounds that drove me back to drugs at the time. It was a self-destructive vicious cycle. An atomic bomb!

Moving forward, there was a period when I was living in Jardim da Penha and was addicted to cocaine and alcohol. The addiction was so severe that I stopped going out and stopped talking. I went months without saying a single word; sometimes I would only say what was strictly necessary. Faced with this, I decided to ask my parents for help, as I could see the situation was far too critical. As a side note: during this period I read the biography of Kurt Cobain, titled “Heavier than Heaven.” It affected me so badly that on a Friday I took several medications along with drugs and only woke up on Monday. I nearly departed this world for Gehenna (hell).

My parents came to get me and I went to live in Guriri. For months, I lived locked in the house, drinking Heineken, smoking cigarettes, and buried in a room at the computer. Those were difficult times. I remember I only smoked Marlboro Red and Lucky Strike Red. I barely spoke and lived in isolation. Sometimes I played at the homes of acquaintances and at parties that took place in Guriri. There was one in particular where I mixed a large number of Benflogin pills with cocaine and alcohol. The result was catastrophic! I asked to be admitted again.

I must have been around 23 or 24 years old. After completing treatment, I returned home. Shortly afterward, I decided to move back to Vitória. Since the age of 17, I had been living away from home and my parents. Again, I stayed clean for a while and then relapsed. During that period I was quite lost. I used everything I could get, except heroin, since I could never find it. However, I did try morphine. Besides that, I regularly used LSD, ecstasy, MD; in short, everything!

Not satisfied with my life here, I decided to try my luck abroad. I planned for nearly a year and went to London. Arriving there, at Heathrow airport, during the interview I got nervous and answered part of it in Spanish. I remember the attendant saying to me: Stay here! And that was that. Two men came, searched my bags, and sent me up to a department within the airport. At the time, I was somewhat long-haired, wearing a black Black Flag hoodie and a massive headphones hanging around my neck. In short, I went up and sat in a room with a translator from Portugal and the British interviewer. He would ask the question while looking into my eyes, the translator would interpret it into Portuguese, I would answer in Portuguese, he would translate into English, and so it went for some time.

The moral of the story: I got an X stamped in my passport, had to take a bunch of photos like a prisoner, and they took my fingerprints. I was refused entry into London! I only got to see the airport, which, incidentally, reminded me of episodes of Mr. Bean. I had to wait for the next return flight in a holding area full of people from all over the world who had been stopped, all speaking different languages at the same time. It was almost like Pentecost! Jokes aside, I faced another 12-hour flight back, full of bitterness in my heart.

When I set foot back in Brazil, I did not want to talk to anyone. And the worst part: I had plenty of British pounds to start sinking with. I exchanged the pounds for reais and lived for a good while with headphones on, not talking to anyone and using a lot of drugs. During that time, I had even stopped playing. After a long period of that decline, a friend of mine who had played with me in adolescence asked me to come back and play in a System of a Down cover band. I accepted the invitation, even though I was not a fan of the band’s sound.

After that opportunity, others followed and I was back to playing at venues. I traveled quite a bit to play in nearby cities, even while being in a cover band. The debauchery during that period increased considerably. I practically changed girlfriends every week. Even so, I lived in intense depression, an inexplicable existential emptiness. Until on one of those occasions I met a woman who would become the mother of my son. We moved in together and, not long after, she became pregnant with Antônio. That event helped me quit cocaine for good!

During that period, I passed the entrance exam for FAMES (the Espírito Santo School of Music), in the Popular Music program. I soon joined the main band, traveling to play at the Bossa and Jazz Festival in Santa Teresa. Yes, I played bossa nova and samba jazz! I was not at my best in those styles, but I went through them. Alongside that, many opportunities to play at night venues began appearing. It was during this period that I lost my relationship, and my son went to live far from me.

My life went into total decline, where I lived in a vicious cycle of drugs, women, and nightlife. The gigs dried up. Sin increased. The wrong friendships crept in. I remember living in Jardim Camburi, walking the streets at dawn with a phone hidden under my shirt, playing Sonny Rollins, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, among so many others. Anyone who has walked the streets of Jardim Camburi, in the infamous “laminha” area, knows the risk involved!

I found myself, once again, with no way out. No job, no band, no money, nothing but bad company and bad habits. I decided I needed an escape plan. I asked my parents for help to move abroad, but this time to Lisbon. An acquaintance of mine was there and encouraged me to go and play. He played with Lion Jump, a well-known reggae band here in Espírito Santo. I got the help I needed and made my plans within a short timeframe. I went without hesitating!

At last, I set foot on Portuguese soil! The environment was not welcoming at all. I do not know if it was because of my tattoos or because I look American, but I faced a great deal of prejudice and rejection from the Portuguese at the beginning. I arrived at the hostel, put my things away, and headed to a square called Adamastor. When I got there I was so shocked that my first reaction was to go back to Brazil the very next day. And mind you, I was pretty wild at the time! People were using everything, out in the open. People from all over the world in one place. Just remembering it gives me vertigo!

I had the opportunity to meet the great Kal Robson! Kal, besides being a pastor, is also an exceptional musician! I had the privilege of playing with him on countless occasions. He would pick me up by car in Benfica, drums and all. He would talk to me about Jesus the whole way from Benfica to the gig. The result: I was extremely nervous! At that time I was a practitioner of a Japanese Buddhist tradition known as Nichiren Daishonin. I studied it quite thoroughly, recited the mantra, had my own “sacred” space and everything!

The peak moment in Lisbon came when our reggae band, Plantada, was invited to be part of the lineup at Portugal’s biggest reggae festival: the Musa Festival. It no longer exists, by the way. This was in 2018. It was a three-day festival featuring names from international reggae. On that day, which was the first day of the festival, we played on the same stage where Alpha Blondy performed. We were the first or second band, if my memory serves me right. I had the privilege of speaking with him in my then A1-level English and getting a photo with him. After all, I used to listen to one of his CDs as a teenager, which belonged to my brother: “Live at Paris Zénith & Paris Bercy.” It was a dream come true!

However, in the moment I was behind the drum kit, in that enormous arena that seemed to have no end, an insight came to me: “Is this what you dreamed of your whole life? Is this what you fought for all this time?” It was a wake-up call, and back home, the emptiness only grew. To make a long story short, I left Buddhism and went back to living a lifestyle worse than before. Once again I found myself in the same cycle I had been in back in Brazil: drugs, nightlife, and women. I was deeply depressed!

I started having very unpleasant intrusive thoughts and was no longer playing music. I remember it as if it were today: it was November, winter in Lisbon. A biting cold, the city at a standstill. It was a Sunday evening. I made my dinner, completely without hope for the future. I went into the room of the house I shared with four other people, opened YouTube to watch something while I ate, and a video by Pastor Cláudio Duarte appeared. I decided to give it a chance; after all, I had no other way out. One caveat: I despised Christians! I watched that video and it made me laugh on the very day I had thought of giving up for good. The subject was pornography, something I was also struggling greatly with at the time. Right after, I decided to watch his testimony. It moved me in a way I cannot explain.

And that was that! Dinner finished, video finished, life goes on. I went to sleep. The next day, a Monday, I woke up different, with a spirit and a will to live. My lens was no longer the same. Even so, I opened the wardrobe, took the jar of skunk I had fully packed (expensive, by the way) and tried to use it. I could not do it anymore. I grabbed the jar, threw it in the toilet, and flushed it. I never used anything again! I continued drinking a little wine, but I no longer felt comfortable with that either. There was a genuine conversion!

I decided to spend Christmas and New Year in Brazil, to visit my son and my parents. Setting foot in São Paulo, I could see that things had truly changed. I began to notice things I had not noticed before, especially within my family. True to my holy restlessness, I decided at the last minute to return to Lisbon in January. Back in the Portuguese capital, I tried to keep playing, but I could not stay in that environment. I would stay isolated, reading the Bible on my phone. So I decided to give up music. I started working as a transport assistant. I could see that the cost of living was not sustainable without music, and I decided to move to Leiria.

I joined a church of Brazilians there, but soon, seeing many things that were wrong, I sought out the Portuguese Assembleia de Deus. I was welcomed very warmly. I even had the opportunity to counsel a Portuguese couple. This same couple drove me to the airport to return to Brazil for good, when all doors had closed. I saw it as a sign that my time there was up. After all, I also wanted to be close to my son. I worked at a ceramics company, where I met a Brazilian who took me to the CBB (Congregação Cristã no Brasil) in Leiria. It was through him that I received my first Bible, from an acquaintance of his.

In short, I was determined to return to Brazil. I went back, and the real war began! I could not find peace at home. I went to live in Guriri, at my parents’ house. I went through a zealous phase of burning books, giving away band t-shirts, and destroying things. I would fast in the middle of the night and come across old personal files. Many significant experiences. However, every time I tried to leave my parents’ home, something would go wrong and I would have to return. I had nothing left, not even anywhere to go. Until one day I put some books and a few pieces of clothing in my backpack and decided to break away from my family.

In the middle of all this, I tried to rekindle the relationship with the mother of my son. Without success! She took me to a Baptist missionary base in Maruípe. At that time, I met my namesake Roger Rocha, who referred me to his father’s church. It was the Assembleia de Deus Hebrom, which was located in the Brisamar neighborhood in Vila Velha at the time. I remember the night I spoke with Pastor Vanderlei Rocha in his office; it was a Tuesday. I had nowhere to go and was about to sleep on the street. He decided to take me in, and that night I slept in a room that was still under renovation at the church. On Wednesday morning, there was already a prayer meeting. After that, I was taken to a house where four or five other people were staying.

I spent a few weeks there, and Pastor Vanderlei rented a small studio apartment for me behind the church. It was a single room with nothing in it. Just an old stove and an old refrigerator. Later, a brother donated a piece of furniture and a mattress that sat on the floor. There I lived through the most difficult experiences of my life. No job, no money, no playing music, a new creature. I went through an enormous existential crisis because of my tattoos, along with the fact that I had grown used to life in Europe. It was an arduous process to readjust to Brazilian reality. Not long after, I completed the baptism course and was baptized by Pastor Vanderlei Rocha himself.

The battle of a life of faith had begun!

Still in the studio apartment, I met a sister who helped me in prayer, gave me books, a Bible, and even a phone, since I had gone without one. We grew close, as there was no one left in my circle of friendship. Everyone had vanished: the famous desert season! Then the pandemic arrived, and I was very thin and weakened. A psychiatrist advised me to be admitted to a clinic in Fundão, the Green House, to gain weight and be protected. He also told me that if I caught COVID-19 in that condition, there was a serious risk I might not survive.

Well, I stayed there for about two months. After leaving, I spent some time in Guriri, at my parents’ house. I gained quite a bit of weight and was able to return to Vitória. During that period, I lived in an apartment in Jardim da Penha. Attending Hebrom while living in Vitória was very far off route. I had a conversation with the pastor in which I arrived at the following solution: I’ll try to move to São Paulo, and if it doesn’t work out, I’ll come back here! I stayed in Vitória without a fixed church. During that time, I visited several churches: Baptist, Church’s, Bola de Neve…

I was cold in my faith. I had not strayed, but I was completely unfruitful. I attended services only occasionally. I even joined a church for a period, but I witnessed things so bizarre that, if I mentioned them here, they would scandalize even unbelievers. Anyway, once again: it was a Sunday! I was completely without hope, playing Counter-Strike in the afternoon, and I decided to go back to my roots. I searched for an Assembleia de Deus on Google and went alone. During the sermon, I felt the witness that I should leave where I was and return to Hebrom. The next day I called Pastor Vanderlei and explained what had happened. He agreed and helped me make the move from Jardim da Penha to Vila Velha.

This time it was better: the apartment was in Coqueiral de Itaparica. I became a member of Hebrom again and many things began to happen. I will summarize the story. I started dating the woman from my studio apartment days, and two years later we got married. By then, the church had moved to a different neighborhood. I went to live near it, in Jardim Colorado. Days after the honeymoon, I was let go from my job. Newly married and unemployed! Total desperation! I enrolled in one course, then another, and nothing worked out. Until the Spirit began directing me toward Theology.

Like every beginner in academic theological studies, I became unbearable! That contributed greatly to the breakdown of my marriage. At the turn of 2024, my marriage fell apart. I was caught off guard! In the end, I had to change everything: my routine, the church, the apartment, the neighborhood. I found myself starting from zero again. The year 2025 was a very difficult one, in which I had the most profound reflections on life. In fact, one way of working through the grief of the divorce was to immerse myself in art, literature, and philosophy. I even share here a poem I wrote during that period:

How long has it been since this desert claimed us.
Dizziness, subtlety, the bitterness of so much dust.
Suddenly the ground shifted, once fertile, now stone.
Wherever I look, what I see are reflections, pure idleness.
I have tried to flee this place, I have tried not to exist.
I made poetry in calamity, I was the poet of atrocity.
My blood changed color, and the cold settled in.
Against the wind, I scatter, no longer knowing what I want.
My mind came undone, my life lost its flavor.
Night is day, day is haste, I no longer know what interests me.
Everything that once satisfied me, today I want and tomorrow it means nothing.
Without meaning, right or wrong, my cry is that You remain by my side.
I deceived myself into feeling no pain, I pretended to know what love is.
Storm, tidal wave, being faithful brought me to divorce.
I have grown weary, but I did not give up; I have stopped, but I chose to press on.
This is a hard idleness, this burden, and every day it grows heavier.

To summarize the whole affair, I went through another church, faced several internal struggles, and so on. It was also during this period that I had the idea of creating a blog, posting my Theology Faculty exam papers. That is why the writing style there is more technical.

In broad strokes, brothers and sisters, this is a summary of a summary of my life story. Jesus pulled me out of the ash heap, out of the mud, and is rebuilding me according to His image and likeness. It has not been easy! It has been nearly 8 years that I have been in the intense process of living by a standard of life I was never raised to follow, always living at the very edge of my limits. But in all things, the good hand of the Lord has sustained me. My hope is that you, who are reading this text, may find the Way to eternal life, which is Jesus! He alone is the truth that sets free, the healing of the soul, the peace that surpasses all understanding. And He chose to love us, in spite of ourselves!

May God bless you abundantly!