Testimonies of Searching and Finding the Truth

I inwardly laughed, because Christians, as far as I knew, were people who believed in something they could not prove. Hence I told my friend to prove to me that God exists and he told me things I was not prepared for. The first thing that surprised me was... 

After being at University, I moved to Glasgow to work at a firm of stockbrokers. I had friends, a good job, a nice flat and a great family. But as life went on, I realised that there was something missing. My interest in the spiritual side of life had brought many questions, but no firm answers. In the end, it boiled down to three main questions... 

From childhood on I was beaten nearly every day - most of the time for no reason. I felt worthless, unloved, unwanted and very lonely. Often I wished I had never been born, or thought about suicide, yet, there was a spark of hope that my life might still turn around one day... 

I must say I never really believed in God, but things changed when I met a fellow student at university, who gave me evidence for the Bible that I was not prepared for...

When I decided to buy “the illegal book” for a quarter of my monthly salary, I met ‘by chance’ some Americans, who gave me a brand new Bible as a present. There was no way I could call it a coincidence! The Americans also told me about having a “personal relationship with God” and this phrase affected me greatly, and I could not get it out of my head… not icons, not “saints”, not even the church – but only Jesus Christ as mediator between man and God.

When I was 19, in the year 1999, I was involved in a car accident in which my girlfriend and my cousin died. At this time, my uncle wrote to me saying I should be happy to be alive and not on my way to hell. I didn't agree... 

The next day I bought myself a Bible with the intention to show her that she wasn't right and if God was real and a loving one He would just let us do what ever we wanted, but as I read the Bible more and more over the next 3 months, I got convinced by the Word and day by day I started to think deeply about my whole life, the sins I committed... 

I grew up in an average home, finished school, and started to study librarianship in 1985. In 1988 my life was about to take another direction. It all started off with some kind of sleeplessness. For some reason I started waking up earlier and earlier. It was as if I had gotten myself into a swirl, and gradually began to see coded messages behind every corner. After a few days I had completely lost touch with reality, started to hallucinate, and found myself on an inner journey.

The same evening, I decided that I need to know if there is a God or not and if He is a God that is “the same yesterday, today and forever,” He would be able to give me a sign to prove He is real. After I had prayed I waited and waited and waited and eventually fell asleep. Nothing happened, so it was clear for me there was no God. However... 

I was raised a Roman Catholic. We went to church most Sundays and kept all the Catholic traditions. I was seeking for God, but at some stage I had to leave in the middle of the church ceremony as everything seemed very hypocritical to me. I could not help it. Although there was not really an alternative to the Catholic Church in the area where I grew up, God had already prepared a way.

It was especially during this period that we searched God’s Word and waited on Him for answers. We became aware that we were missing the “power from on high” spoken of in depth in the Book of Acts...

I had not long started a new job in 1985 when I was first introduced to someone whom I was told was a ‘born again Christian.' I immediately thought she would be some kind of ‘Bible thumping' religious fanatic so I was cautious from the beginning.To my surprise however, she never actually preached to me, nor did she ram the Bible down my throat but she did make an impression on me by... 

After two and a half years of reading the Bible now and then, and studying other material, while also drinking and partying, I saw how the fragments fitted together and formed a picture like a mosaic. I had to make a decision - to follow God according to His Way, or maybe lose the chance of getting saved forever... 

I did not want to hear about that, because it meant that I would have to change my life, but I went on studying my Bible; reading about the miracles, such as when Elijah prayed for rain, or when Daniel survived being thrown into the Lion's den. I missed this power in church, where it was rather boring. 

A series of prayer answers and miracles showed me that Jesus is real and how He wants to change my life.

I did not have any peace or assurance of salvation... I wasn't 100% right with God and knew something was missing. For many years I lived in fear and asked myself the question “what does it take to be saved on Judgement Day?" 

I went to parties and did other teenage things and yet I grew more and more unhappy. I felt that something was awfully wrong in my life. There was a big difference between the things that happened in my own life and in my church and what I read about in the Bible. I felt empty and dirty...

"The following Tuesday I was meant to leave for three weeks to go camping in Bavaria. But what I had heard and seen from those Christians had captured me. I knew they had something which I wanted to have too, and I decided to get baptised. I did not want to leave before receiving from God the same thing as these people had..." 

Although I had many friends, I no longer had the joy and happiness in life that I had before this event. At this stage I was really desperate for something positive in my life... 

While my life was not ‘godly', by the standards of the World it was pretty blameless, although I knew that I could only be ‘saved by faith' alone, not by works. I knew the ‘God' part of my life was missing, my life felt incomplete, even with ‘success' with my career and a busy life. 

I'd like to tell you something exciting about ‘praying in the Spirit', (speaking in tongues), the prayer language that God gives you as a confirmation that you have received the Holy Spirit. There are a number of reasons why God gives you this prayer language, among them are to build up your faith and to encourage you. I faced a tremendous trial in my Christian walk, without going into detail, it brought me to the brink of despair, I was at the end of my tether and my mind went berserk. I then opened the Bible for guidance and specifically prayed that God would speak to me through His Word.

Up until that point I was rather pessimistic, in that I feared the disappointment of something not turning out as imagined. So I stopped anticipating anything positive. But after reading that book my world-view changed completely

I saw all the different religions around and it never occurred to me that one of these might hold all the answers. In fact, I got to the point that if I had been asked whether I believed in God, or whether or not I was a Christian, I wouldn’t have known how to reply because everything was so unclear and uncertain. Furthermore, even when I did call myself a Christian, I didn’t read a Bible or spend my time with God...

I had a sheltered life; not only was I brought up protestant, but have always believed that God existed. Nevertheless, I had to fight with a lot of anxiety and restlessness inside me for inexplicable reasons. I always found the spiritual world to be interesting, leading me to watch several TV shows that revolved around demonic powers. From an early age, I had infrequent terrible nightmares causing me to be incapable of sleeping through the night. This resulted in concentration problems...

Turned his back on the life of a 'Rock and Roll' musician for eternal life..

My mother smoked during pregnancy and I was born with a metabolic disorder called ADS. When I went to school I always had problems concentrating on the lessons. Although I always tried my best, it took me three times as long as the other kids to do my homework and it was always very frustrating...

I was brought up on a sheep farm at the bottom of the South Island of New Zealand, and for as long as I can remember, I have always known there was a God. My parents are very sincere believers, and it was rare for a Sunday to go past without finding Mum and Dad with all us kids in church. I guess it was this upbringing that gave me a firm belief in God and the infallibility of His Word. Although I read the Bible fairly often, due to a series of different events, I became aware that my knowledge of God and what the Bible said was pretty limited...

Tormented by fear of death I found the reason for life where I never expected it.

One morning, when we were having breakfast, I felt like I wanted to cry. Then I realised that I had totally forgotten to take my medicine. I talked to a doctor about the shadows of the past, and about all the medical stuff and what it does to you. I finally realised that I just had to accept God as my healer as the scripture says...