Tag Archives: witness

Alan came to God

*Names changed due to sensitive location.

[Photo by Erika Giraud on Unsplash]

I want to share with you how I came to God. I wasn’t seeking him – he found me. He came to me at the most difficult time in my life. I got to a point when I wanted to take my own life.

It was unexpected. I was walking by my university, I saw this student handing out flyers. I went up to her, and in some way this person seemed to shine. After taking that flyer, I thought for a long time, and finally decided to go to that meeting. That evening the discussion was about truth, and it concluded with the thought, “the truth will set you free.” It just hit me.

“But to us, as staff, Alan seemed very suspect. He asked a lot of questions about who we are. But he also seemed to have a lot of genuine questions about the faith. We wondered if he was a spy, so we chose not to meet with him. We told him he could read the Bible if he wanted to find answers to his questions.

So he did! He downloaded the Bible onto his phone, and googled where best to start reading; he started with John’s gospel. It was his own reading of Scripture that let him to the decision to follow Christ.”

I went to the IFES staff l and said: “I want to know God, to know Jesus, and to grow in him”. God started to change everything in my life. My friends rejected me. When I read the Word of God, it led me to forgive my parents. They were amazed – and started to wonder why.

“We later found out that Alan’s father worked in the religious affairs department of the ‘KGB’ in our country, hence why he seemed so well-connected and inquisitive. Yet his interest was genuine; we started meeting with him for one-to-one Bible study.”

When my parents heard I was going to Bible studies, it was a shock for them. “We don’t need a son like that.” I wondered what to do; my father said “family or God: choose.” I began to gather my belongings.

Then my parents said: “Stay, we’ll drag you out of this”. I didn’t go to church for two weeks, I met with different people, with a Mullah, the took me to the mosque, and through all these contacts I understood that there is something in my heart, that salvation is in me, it was amazing. I started to abide in God’s Word, and I understood how much God loves me. I am thankful to God that there is this ministry through which I came to God.

“During this time we studied 1 Peter with Alan, about holding fast to Jesus in suffering. He said ‘I felt that this has been written just for me’. Alan was a final year student, and he said he didn’t want to do anything else in life except help others find Christ. He’s now joined our IFES movement as an intern, in another city where he can have more freedom from his parents, and his passion is to help others meet Jesus in his Word.”

 

Nina: Professor and Seeker

*Names changed due to sensitive location.

[Photo by Ifrah Akhter on Unsplash]

Nina is a remarkable woman. She is a single mother working several jobs to provide for her family. She is a university professor and a private language teacher for both local children and foreigners who need to learn a local language. Even with such a schedule she has time to think and to dream about what life could be like.

Nina comes from a minority ethnic group in a majority Muslim country in Asia. This ethnic group has very few believers… and she is not yet following Christ herself. But hearing her story it is clear that the God of all creation has been pursuing her…

From South American ‘m-workers’ who befriended her and helped her through some tough times, to the chance invitation to work in a private school founded by Christians — and then the many friendships she has formed, the conversations about faith and the way she experienced a different working atmosphere when surrounded by believers in J.

Mary, an older student and mature believer, prayed often for her, watching and waiting for the opportunities to share the Word with her. Mary’s patience did not mean inaction but active prayer. During this time of waiting and praying, friendship and trust grew. Nina began to tell Mary about her family and her history, starting to share her hopes and dreams. When Nina had a bereavement in her family she talked to Mary about death, which gave an opportunity to share a verse from the Holy Scriptures. But Mary’s great desire was to read from the Bible together with Nina, so that Nina could hear about and meet with God in His Word…

After a while, Nina herself asked Mary if they could read the Bible together. Nina invited Mary, not the other way around — and this started a pattern of meeting outside of lessons and reading the Scriptures together.

Mary led Nina through the Bible, starting at the beginning…and taking her through the big story of Scripture, introducing her to God in these stories and seeing His interactions with people. They traced God’s grace through the Bible and led up to the gospel story.

Mary asked Nina to find the passages, read them aloud and then summarise what they had read together. This way she learnt for herself the big story of God’s love and purpose.

During part of the coronavirus pandemic, they were even connecting every day and reading the gospel together. Nina learned to pray and to read with this good Christian friend. And even though the Bible, she would say, is not yet ‘her’ book, Nina shared these stories that she was hearing and learning with her friends because she was so moved by what she was reading and so convinced that these stories would be of help to her friends…