My brother and sister had to go and take all the guns

from the house and hide the them, just to keep me safe,

because I was at a really serious stage.

I planned on how I was going to do it.

NARRATOR: Brooke Gardner was only 11

when persistent feelings of hopelessness

put her on the verge of suicide.

Her parents took her to a psychiatrist who

prescribed medication, but it did

little to alleviate her despair.

Really just numbed me.

I didn't have any thoughts or really feelings anymore.

Kind of just walked around like a zombie.

And after a year, she's searched for other ways

to cope with her depression.

BROOKE GARDNER: I had started looking online

about spells and about Wicca and when

and bought some spell books.

I started doing these spells in my room.

I was burning lots of sage and, you know,

I thought they were positive spells,

and they were going to help my depression.

I thought that by controlling the environment,

that I could control my feelings.

NARRATOR: Performing the spells also gave her a sense of power.

BROOKE GARDNER: I just wanted to connect

to something more powerful.

You want to be bigger and better than a lot of the people

around you.

Everyone better stay away from me, or you're going to get it.

NARRATOR: But one night, Brooke discovered

the magic she thought was helping

her had invited an unexpected presence into her life.

BROOKE GARDNER: I was sleeping, and beside me

was this dark figure.

And it was, like, touching the bed, right beside me.

I don't know what it was doing, or why it had one of its hands

on me.

And I woke up, and I still felt something with its hand on me.

At that moment, I couldn't even scream or make a noise.

I was so scared that whatever this was was still in the room.

After a while, it went away.

NARRATOR: Despite her fear, Brooke

continued practicing witchcraft, and her condition only

got worse.

BROOKE GARDNER: I didn't feel more powerful.

Actually, really more so I felt powerless.

And I felt like a failure.

It didn't make me feel any better than what I was.

Just got me deeper and deeper into depression.

NARRATOR: Brooke lived with a debilitating depression

for three years, going on and off various medications.

Then, when she was 14, she woke up one morning

to find something had changed.

I told the doctor, I said, listen,

I don't know what happened, I don't know how it happened,

but I no longer have depression.

And never experience that state of depression

or that oppression again.

It was gone.

NARRATOR: But what remained was her need

to have meaning and control in her life.

And while she kept casting spells,

she also started reading her father's dusty King James

Bible, hoping she might find some answers there.

I read in the book of Leviticus how

God's not pleased with people who

practice witchcraft and practice that kind of thing.

So that's what really gripped me,

really believing all my life that it

was OK to do those things.

So after that I took all my books,

everything that I had that had to do with it,

and I threw them all in the trash

and just turned away from all of those things.

NARRATOR: A short time later, she was watching television

and discovered a program she had never seen before.

It was "The 700 Club."

I'd hear some of the testimonies of miracles

and healings, and it just kind of opened my eyes

to this whole other place of what I really

desired and wanted inside.

And so after watching it several, several times,

I would pray with Pat on the TV and ask

Christ to come into my life.

NARRATOR: Brooke called the CBN Prayer Line to confess Jesus

as her Savior.

It was something I'd never experienced in my life.

For once in my life, all the sin that I had in my heart,

all the stuff that I've ever done was forgiven.

It was just a complete, complete change.

I would look at a flower and be like, wow,

I can't believe God created this flower.

I felt a complete release and just

a huge weight taken off of me.

And I knew that I was right with God.

NARRATOR: She found a church and started attending.

Soon, her family started going with her, and one by one

gave their lives to Christ.

BROOKE GARDNER: That was just an amazing, amazing experience

to see your parents for the first time just

have a joy that I've never seen before in them.

And pretty much everybody in my family has received Christ

and is serving Him today.

And I really am a product of the ministry that 700 Club does

on a daily basis.

NARRATOR: Brooke realizes now that God's hand was on her,

even when she didn't know Him.

I looked back at those times where God

was in those little moments.

When I woke up that morning and didn't have depression anymore,

I knew that that was God healing me, and healing my mind,

and healing that oppression that was on me at that time.

NARRATOR: Brooke attended Bible College,

and today runs a music cafe that ministers

to children and youth.

She has the peace of mind she always longed for

and a hope that never fades.

BROOKE GARDNER: He died so that you can have forgiveness,

you can have restoration with Him, and a relationship.

There's no greater choice or decision

that I've ever made in my life than to accept Him

into my life as my Savior.