Justin
DUI to Divine Intervention
My name is Justin Castro. I am 29 years old, I’m on staff at my church, a little country church here in Reading, and I grew up in a small town north of Redding. My earliest memory is deep darkness, depression, anxiety, and fear. I had a mom who suffered from mental illness, and she would lock me in the garage in the dark. She would threaten to take her own life. She would throw herself out of moving vehicles. Things like that.
My earliest memories are of me feeling depressed and anxious, and I feel like this had an effect on me as a son. Like I felt like I wasn’t good enough. I felt like, yeah, I wasn’t a good son. That I wasn’t living up to the standard of being a good son, and so the Bible says the Lord is close to the brokenhearted, you know, he saves the crushed in spirit, and there were moments where I sensed the Lord.
For the most part, I had begun just early, early, I must have been four, five, six, seven years old, and from that early time, I began feeling depressed, suicidal thoughts. The suicidal thoughts came more as a teenager, around 12 to 13 years old, but there are moments when I grew up going to church. My dad would take me to church. He led me in a sinner’s prayer. He led me in the ways of the Lord to go to church.
I volunteered singing on my worship team as a teenager, but during those times, I still had the hopelessness, the depression, and that began to grow. I knew God was real. I felt that I knew that He was there. I identified with Joseph, you know, Joseph in the Old Testament. He was betrayed by his brothers. They threw him in a pit. I tell people sometimes that’s what depression feels like, it feels like you’re in a pit and you can’t get out, and it’s dark.
I just couldn’t get any healing from the suicidal thoughts all throughout my childhood, my teenage years. I think my mom was a part of that, but also, there’s bullying. I was bullied a little bit, and it wasn’t like I was singled out as a kid, but in elementary school, there was one bully who bullied everyone. It just negatively impacted me.
I do like to say I have walked through forgiveness; I forgave people who’ve hurt me, my bullies, all of that. The thoughts were remaining, and I was still suicidal. The Bible says the Holy Spirit makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.
Deep inside, I just feel that the Holy Spirit was praying for me when I was a child. He was praying for me as a teenager as well as a young adult. These feelings of darkness grew into my 20s, and as early as a young adult, I smoked marijuana, drank alcohol, and was a drunk driver. So I drank, and I drove around. Same with marijuana. I’d smoke weed, and I’d get in my car and drive throughout town, and part of it was being bored, but another part, and I mean the main thing, was covering up the depression and the anxiety.
So my anxiety grew, my depression, and my mental illness became even worse. I started having panic attacks. I was formally clinically diagnosed with panic disorder. I was having several panic attacks every day, and I still held a job, you know, I was 20 to 24, I think, and at work, I would just double over and bend down and be on the ground like trying to keep my breath, I was having a panic attack.
I believe God took away the suicide. I believe the thoughts. I believe God healed me that week. Since then, I've never had any suicidal thoughts or depression, anxiety, or panic attacks.
Adam
Do you remember some of the thoughts that you were having? Was there a repeated pattern or just a feeling that you had?
Justin
Yes, I felt like I was dying. It felt like my brain was telling me that I was going to die, like I was dying that day, like I would suffocate, like there was a bag over my head, and someone was pulling this string and suffocating me. It felt like I couldn’t catch my breath, and it was hard to speak.
There was a three-month period during which I couldn’t speak. So I was just locked away in a room and became completely antisocial, completely isolated. I think the devil wanted me to be isolated. I think we’re designed for community, so the devil can come in and try to take us away from community and church life, things like that.
I know I felt the presence of the Lord. I knew he was with me, but these feelings were so overwhelming. I needed a deliverance. I needed him to save me, and yeah, these feelings grew. I was hospitalized. I stayed in a place. I was like 5150. I think they held me for three days, and after release, the feelings were still there, like nothing helped.
Well, there was some help, like therapy, that helped a little bit, but I needed a spiritual deliverance. I needed something. It was deep. You know, my mom suffered from mental illness in her family. It was in the family line. I just needed a greater healing with the Lord.
Adam
You said 5150. Yeah. What does that mean?
Justin
So, 5150, you are going to hurt yourself. And so the police or the ambulance will come and detain you and make sure you don’t harm yourself and take your own life. Yeah, 5150 is if you’re suicidal and you want to take your own life. But I left that, got away from that, and told people I was okay.
I smoked weed for like an entire year, every day. There were moments I think it helped medically, but overall, it was just a recreational drug. I took to get away from the depression. Yeah, so the suicide was still there, depression and anxiety still there, and I kept drinking. I kept drinking and driving.
I just didn’t care. I kept praying all throughout this, you know, Psalm 39:12 says, “Hear my prayer, Lord. Listen to my cry for help.” So, I’m crying out to you, I cried out to God, and I’m still depressed. I had these memories of being locked away. My mom, as I mentioned earlier, locked me in the garage. There’s still to this day a hole in the wall at my old house, and that’s from her kicking the wall. She would hit her head on the walls, and in all these memories, it was bad.
Adam
She would lock you in the garage because she was punishing you or because she just couldn’t handle what she was doing?
Justin
My mom locked me in the garage out of punishment; that was her version of punishment.
Adam
That must have been terrifying.
Justin
It was scary. I mean, I was so young I was in a car seat. So, I don’t know what age you are, still in the car seat, but I was young enough to remember that, and I would ask her, you know, please don’t do this. Don’t do that again. She would say, “Well, only if you’re good or only if you’re not good, then that’s where you go”.
Adam
Do you think that affected your view of God? Does that have any bearing on your relationship with the Lord?
Justin
With the Lord, it almost pushed me closer to the Lord to call out to him and pray to him. I began reading my Bible on my own as an elementary school student. I just began devouring the word, but these experiences made me wary of people, and it affected my relationship with them.
I became angry and depressed. I was a liar all throughout school. I just didn’t care. I’d lie to my peers to adults. I’d steal from my school, teachers’ stuff off their desks. I became rebellious to authority. At the same time, just again, I was devouring the word.
I had a double life that carried on into adulthood, where I behaved a certain way, I read my Bible, went to church, but the way I treated people was from a place of anger, frustration, and depression. Those feelings definitely grew into my 20s.
Adam
Are there some similarities between the way you were handling people and the way your mom handled people?
Justin
There were some I remember. I had a friend, and I just felt like this frustrating feeling, this anger, and we were on a street, and I walked in front of a car, I walked in front of traffic. That’s something my mom would have done. Nothing happened; they slammed on their brakes, but that kind of behavior definitely reminded me of my mom.
That is something she would do, and I hated that; it caused an extreme self-hatred in me. Like I hated that feeling, and I always avoided anything that was like my mom or my home life, anything that reminded me of my house. I tried to avoid those things that added to the depression and the panic attacks.
Getting away from my history, my past, and how I was mistreated and how I mistreated others, so that definitely added to the chaos and the anger in my soul, and it had a terrible, terrible impact on my soul, where I doubted my salvation. I doubted my faith in God.
Like, who am I? I didn’t know who I was anymore. It was weird. I still believed I was born again, but I didn’t feel it. I didn’t feel God’s presence. I didn’t feel secure. I began to sense that suicide was my only way out. I definitely wanted to plan a suicide. I wanted to plan to end my life.
Adam
Was your dad…You said he led you on a sort of salvation journey, and he was somewhat helpful. How was he guiding you? How much time were you able to get with him? Was he absent?
Justin
Yeah, my dad led me to the Lord. He was there. He had a full-time job as a teacher. So he was always really busy growing up. I did tell him about my mom. I did try to tell him, you know, things were bad, but I think he’s just very loving. He knew what she had been through. My mom had been through a past that was hard on her. He went the way of understanding where she was coming from and how her past affected her.
I understood that, but we did have a good conversation. My dad, we did understand, you know, he and I had an understanding that he was like her caregiver. I mean, to this day, she needs someone there. He’s there all the time helping her. Taking her to appointments, I grew up in hospitals. She had seizures. She had all these health problems.
I appreciate my dad, you know, for always being there for her, and this day they’re still together. They’re still married, so I definitely look up to my dad; he’s a godly man, he’s awesome.
Adam
Awesome. Back to your story, sorry, I kind of sidetracked you there. You’re a young adult, you’re working, you’re having panic attacks. You’re self-medicating. It’s pretty dark.
Justin
Yeah, it’s, and it’s getting worse. The darkness grew, the panic attacks got worse, and I just wanted to end my life. I did not want to feel these feelings anymore, so at work one day, I took a bunch of pills. I drove to the gas station, drank a lot of alcohol, and you’re not supposed to mix the pills with alcohol, you know, and I knew you could definitely not live from it, so I drove to the gas station, drank a bunch of alcohol and the pills, and started driving, and my goal was to wrap my car around a tree. My goal was not to make it home that night.
By the grace of God, I lived, and I was arrested for a DUI and put in jail, and God saved my life. I was wondering if I should have died that night, but I lived. The next few days, I noticed, oh, I don’t have depressive thoughts. The depression is gone, like the suicide is gone. I believe God took away the suicide. I believe God healed me that week.
Since then, I’ve never had any suicidal thoughts or depression, anxiety, or panic attacks. I still have bad days, but that darkness was gone.
Adam
How old were you when this happened?
Justin
I was 27.
Adam
Okay. So walk me through, you’re driving around, and were you conscious when you got pulled over? Were you afraid? Give me some more insight into what that evening was like.
Justin
Yeah, that night I completely blacked out. So I have no recollection. No memory of driving, being arrested, or being in that jail. Apparently, after I was arrested, I walked home, and it was pouring down rain. So I’m in and out of there.
I remember kind of walking, but I don’t even know how I got back to my apartment. You know, I woke up, and I was at my apartment. So they released me, there were some phone calls, I think family members called, I think my dad bailed me out. He was there for me then, too.
Adam
So you walked home by yourself?
Justin
Yeah, I walked out of jail. I don’t remember how, but I got home.
Adam
You don’t remember praying, calling out to the Lord, you don’t remember anything? You just woke up, and you felt different in the morning.
Justin
Yeah, I woke up, and I felt it was like being born again, again, and delivered. I don’t believe I was demonic or demon-possessed, but to me, that’s the closest I can say to match the feeling is that God delivered me.
Like the man in the graveyard who was possessed. It was like Jesus came and completely set me free that week.
Adam
That’s amazing. When did it start to click? You have a DUI. That’s expensive, and it’s on your record. That’s a weighty thing. You just tried; you were trying to kill yourself. So you have the weight of this incident, but on the other hand, you have these feelings of…What was it? How would you describe the feeling? Joy? Were you feeling peace? What were you feeling? Yeah, you are the opposite of what maybe you should be feeling.
Justin
I didn’t care that I had the DUI or the charges. I had to go to DUI class. I was happy. I was happy going to DUI class; the Lord gave me joy. He gave me peace. All those things, joy, peace. I went back to church. In the church service in those early days after being saved, I would go to church, and during worship, the Lord opened my eyes. I’d look over at my pastor, and it looked like a glass cage was covering him.
I saw the Holy Spirit, and it was like this power was coming off of him. I
would feel the wind physically when worship began, like the wind was blowing. The Spirit was washing away all of the darkness, and it was gone, but it was like God showing me what he did like His Holy Spirit delivered me. It was awesome. God completely set me free.
Now. I lead worship at my church when I can. I teach Bible studies.
My goal is to do missions.
Adam
So, how old are you now? This happened at 27.
Justin
I’m now 29, and I’m turning 30 in July.
Adam
All right. That’s a big one, 30. Still young. That is amazing, man. I’m happy for you, and I see that you’re reaching out and trying to share your story wherever you can now. Where did the impetus for that come from?
Justin
Yeah, I met a friend, he’s a missionary in Haiti. Not in person, we talked to each other over the phone, and we have a similar story of experiencing hard times. He’s an evangelist, so he’ll go and share on the radio. He speaks at churches. I’m just trying to kind of model after what he does. What I want to do is missions.
I’m trying to model my walk after his, so that’s when I reached out to the 700 Club. I’m reaching out to different people and seeing if they’ll share my story, and some people will let me, and others are like no or not right now. It’s okay. Wherever the Lord opens the door, I’ll walk through it, and
the Lord will do the rest. He does the saving, you know, and I am just trying to listen and do what he wants me to do.
Adam
That’s awesome. If there’s a hope for sharing your story. What would it be? Why do you share it? What do you hope will happen by sharing your story?
Justin
The Bible says the free gift of God is eternal life. So I hope people come to Christ through my story. I hope they surrender to the Lord. If they are already Christians, I hope they get encouraged in their walk with God, because God wants to do a new thing.
Joel 2:25 says, “I’ll restore to you the years the locusts have eaten.” He wants to restore what the enemy came to destroy. God wants to restore in amazing ways; He wants to do a new thing in each person’s life. I hope people see that and hear that from the Lord when they listen to my story.
Adam
That’s awesome. I am grateful that you reached out. I’m grateful for your courage. I know it’s not always easy, especially when you first get started, to share your story. It’s very vulnerable and can be intimidating. I’m proud of you and thankful for you for sharing the good word and the good news, and I pray God’s blessing over your life.
Justin
Thanks, Adam, thank you. You’re welcome. All right
