The Personal Testimony of
“The Magnet Man”
Brother Steve F. Schlechty
I was raised in a
traditional American home just 4 miles outside of Newtown, Ohio.
My Father was a hard working meat
cutter for the restaurant chain Frisches. My Mother was a faithful stay at
home mom. My Mother would take myself and two older sisters to a United
Methodist church every Sunday while my dad would stay at home and tinker
around in the garage and read the Sunday paper that was delivered to the top
of the driveway every day. (My dad most likely got more out of Sunday than I
did.)
At the age of 8 years old while
lying in my bunk bed, I distinctly remember wondering what happens to a
person when they die. The public school taught me about evolution and
creation, trying to reconcile these led to much confusion in my little
tinder mind. I hated school! My Mother had to threaten me with a yardstick
to "get on that bus…"! I remember standing there lying through my teeth that
I had a stomach ache and that I was about to throw up. My whole youth I was
always terribly afraid of the dark, sleeping many nights at the end of my
parents bed on the hardwood floor! To this day I still don't like the dark!
There's something out there you see!
I played little league baseball
and had dreams of playing professionally for the Cincinnati Reds. Two tumors
in my finger and one in my knee quickly put that dream out in left field
where it came from! My Father encouraged me toward a career in drafting
which, for a change, I listened to him. To this day I am ever grateful to my
Dad for that advice. I spent the next 29 years as a Mechanical Engineer – a
job that would provide money for my home and ministry.
At 18 years old I got a job and
left home. Some said I was living the American Dream, but in reality inside
myself I felt void and with no direction in life. My American
nightmare was unfolding right before my eyes. In high school I fell
prey to the wrong friends who used drugs and alcohol. The same happened on
the job. Friends who used drugs and lived wicked lives became my companions
to evil. My heart was so very heavy. I knew there was something very
desperately wrong with me. I could not stop the sins in my life: day to day,
week after week with no peace within. Have you ever felt that way?
In May of 1981 I had enough of
this life. My sins were out of control and consuming my heart and mind. No
peace in my head, no peace in my heart, no peace in my home. My only
conclusion was to take a cowards way out. Blow my brains out! Suicide! Yes,
I went and loaded the gun my Dad had given me when I was just a young boy.
While putting the hair trigger gun to my head, a thought entered my mind
from seemingly nowhere. "Pull that trigger and you are going to burn in Hell
forever"! Needless to say that shook me up. Then a thought entered just as
quickly as the other one and said "Go ahead and pull the trigger you will be
much happier, just do it". The battle went on for what seemed like hours but
really only seconds. (A short time before this day I remember getting a
little red Bible handed to me at a fair. It was very small – about 2"
x 2" square. It was filled with Bible verses about salvation. I read
it cover to cover and set it aside. Little did I know the precious seed of
the Word of God had been planted in my dark cold dirty & desperately
wicked heart.) Well, thank God the Lord gave me enough sense to put
the gun down (I was always afraid of fire and burning too). I began to weep
uncontrollably and pour my heart out to God. I told the Lord how
sorry I was for who I was and who I had become, so wicked and so empty, so
lost and so hopeless! The thought of Jesus dying on the cross for me
entered my mind and heart. While balling my eyes out and emptying my heart
and self out to the Lord, I did the only thing I somehow knew to do and that
was to ask Jesus to save me and forgive me of all that I had done and
become in this life.
That day in 1981 I put all my
trust in the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ to save my
wretched soul from a devil’s burning HELL! Have you ever done that? Shortly
after that moment I all of the sudden had a very strong desire to read the
Bible! I had to get a Bible! But where? Off I went to the
“Christian” book store. I said to the clerk, "Give me the latest and best
Bible you got"! She handed me a brand new New International Version of the
Bible! Needless to say the Lord refused to feed His new born again
child spoiled milk! Glory to God! Then still desiring some pure milk
from the Word of God, I went back to the bookstore and asked for
something a little more alive. She handed me a "Living Bible". Well, I still
was getting the wrong milk! This one was worse than the last one. Funny
thing was that I still had my old KING JAMES BIBLE that the United
Methodist Church gave me at the age of 10. I picked it up and flipped it
opened and started to read it. I seemed to have no problem understanding
this one and it was easy to memorize too. I loved it!!! The truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth!
After a short time I all of a
sudden wanted to go to church! But which church would I go to? A fellow
invited me to a little Baptist church, where I would began to be taught the
Word of God and learn what a Christian life was really all about. I
did every thing they told me to do. I began to attend church 3 times a week.
I got my hair cut and stopped my cussing and drinking. I quit smoking those
funny little cigarettes (Weed). I started going out on Visitation and
passing out Gospel tracts, street preaching and all! I wanted the whole
world to know about the forgiveness of sins that I had found in the Lord
Jesus Christ. To make a long long story short, I wanted to put The
Word of God on my car like some of the brothers in my church had
permanently stuck on their cars! Well, I didn’t want to "Stick" it on my
nice clean shinny car like they did on their old junky cars. After wrestling
with this thought and desire for quite some time, the Lord put a thought in
my heart to "just make a magnetic sign" with the Word of God on it. I
thought, “Wow, what a brilliant idea Lord! God, you are something!”
Yeah, a Magnet, with the Word of God on it! What a GREAT idea!
At that point in my life I would have gone anywhere, done anything, and been
anything, for the Lord Jesus Christ. I felt in my heart I owed Him my
life! All God was asking me to do was to faithfully print the Word
of God on Magnetic material for His honor and Glory!
That was well over 23 years ago.
For the last 23 years (by the grace of God) we have been printing the
blessed pure Words of God found only in the King James Bible
on white magnetic material. In 1985 God also called me, a shy backward
young man to preach the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. So went the
birth of the Magnetic Scripture Sign ministry!
By God's amazing grace He
has protected this ministry from several severe attempts of the Devil to
destroy and stop the printing of the Precious Words of God. God
only knows just how many lost souls have read the Word of God since
the conception of this ministry in 1985. Most lost people do not go to
church. I believe with all that is within me the way to reach this lost
world is to bring them face to face with the Word of God.
The Magnetic Scripture Sign
Ministry does just that!
