Selma 20 -
True purpose in life with Jesus
I grew up in a Christian home, and every Sunday I was rather unwillingly dragged along to Sunday school at church. My parents believed in Jesus, but I rarely heard them talk about what God had done in their lives, and I didn’t notice them practicing their faith outside of church. My perception of Christianity was boring, full of rules, and without life. I called myself a Christian mostly out of tradition, and what I actually believed was that all religions in different ways led to the same God. Why Jesus had to die had never sunk in, even after hearing it countless times throughout my childhood.
Most of the time, I felt like I didn’t quite fit in. I was interested in deeper and more complex things, and I often heard from others my age that I was far too “grown up.” And it was true. I must have been no older than eight or nine when I started thinking about my own sexuality, and a few years later I also discovered pornography. For a long period, I felt attracted to both boys and girls, and in general, my self-image was completely distorted. The things I consumed online were garbage, and the friends I did have weren’t a good influence either. I had many thoughts that I had no purpose on earth—and I believed them—and it even went so far that I considered taking my own life.
When I was 11 years old and my dad had just come home from a mission trip in the Middle East, I overheard him telling my mom about what a man he met had prophesied over me. The man had asked whether my dad had a daughter, and when he said yes, the man said: “She will travel to Africa, and she will tell many people about Jesus.” I broke down in my room when I heard this, because those words meant the opposite of the lies I had believed. God actually had a plan for my life, and I wasn’t going to be useless. After this, the suicidal thoughts lifted, but since I still hadn’t understood the gospel, I continued living in sin and without a personal relationship with God. Life was still empty, and I longed for something more.
A year later, my mom, dad, brother, and I went to the local cinema to watch a documentary about what it looks like to be a disciple of Jesus today. The film followed people traveling to different places around the world—praying for the sick who were healed, casting out demons in Jesus’ name, and baptizing those who came to faith in Him. Watching this awakened something new in me. This was the kind of life I was hungry for—meaningful and alive in the power of the Holy Spirit. Why had I never seen this in real life?
A few weeks later it was Easter, and my dad got us to join a seminar weekend in Denmark, where the people from the film were based. There they explained the whole gospel, and for the first time I understood what it truly meant: that I am a sinner and NEED Jesus. For only through Him can we be cleansed and have a place in Heaven after this life. During those days, I witnessed miracles and healings. Experiencing and understanding that all of this was real became powerful proof that God is real, that Jesus lives, and that I had to repent and make a choice to truly follow Him. On Easter Sunday 2018, I was baptized, burying all sin and my old life, and rising into a new life in Christ.
Immediately, I stopped swearing completely, and I decided not to lie anymore. I did not go back to pornography, and I understood that the feelings I had had for the same sex were not from God. God had completely transformed me on the inside and ignited a fire in me to share the gospel. I knew I was loved and saved by Jesus. Being kind to others had previously been difficult—but the love I received on the inside began to flow naturally out of me. This became truly worth sharing, no longer about getting anything out of it for myself. When we returned to everyday life, I got to pray for several of the students at school and friends outside of school, and many of them told me their pain disappeared from their bodies. During a class outside where we talked about what we wanted to become when we grew up, there was only one thing I wanted to be—a disciple of Jesus!
I’m not sharing all of this to show what a cool testimony I have—but because Jesus really can completely transform our lives when we let Him. Many people have been surprised when I’ve told them about my life before I met Jesus, because it is so far from the life I live and the person I am today. But it truly is evidence of how good God is! I no longer live in myself, for Christ lives in me.
All that is really required is a choice to believe that Jesus has died for us—and to follow Him. We must understand that no matter how much good we do in this world, it cannot save us. For all have sinned, and therefore God cannot accept us as we are, because sin separates us from Him. That is why you and I NEED Jesus. What is absolutely certain is that God is good and has already made the best path for us—if we choose to walk on it. Living close to God is still a daily choice, but I do not doubt for a second that He exists and that the Bible is His Word—for what is written there is not just theory; it works in practice!