Broken and ready to give up on life, Victor encountered Christ in the storm and found hope in the darkness.
Victor’s Testimony (20 years old)
What was your life like before knowing Christ?
Before knowing Christ… my life was disordered. I didn’t know what my purpose was. I was lost, doing the things that the world thought was right, but I was in darkness. I was lost and felt empty.
How did you come to know Christ personally?
God gave me a sign. He broke me and made me weak, bringing me to a point of surrender. I knew I had a hard heart. I had hardened myself, it thought in order to make me strong. But God touched me in an even stronger way. I felt that He was calling me, saying, “Surrender. Your life is not pleasing to me.”
Then He broke me, and I came to know Him in the middle of a great trial, in the middle of the storm. And I reached the point of no longer wanting to live, of wanting to kill myself because of the desperation.
But little by little, He touched my heart, and Natalie spoke to me about Christ. Because of that I’m forever thankful for her. It was hard at first, but I’m thankful now because I know that I’m saved. It wasn’t easy at the beginning, but now I feel that peace.
How did your family or community react when you decided to follow Jesus? / How have you suffered for Christ?
Even though my parents weren’t Christians, they gave me that freedom to go because they knew the situation I was in, what I was going through.
They were desperate because they knew that I didn’t want to keep living. I already had the plan to kill myself and they didn’t know what to do with me. But when I received Christ, they took it well because they saw how I changed.
And the only thing I needed, or what God knew I needed, was Him.
Now, my grandparents, my uncles, it was different. When they found out, they rejected us because they felt betrayed. They said we no longer belonged to them, that we were from another world. But that’s the truth. We are not of this world.
Yes, we’re in this world, but this world doesn’t belong to us. We’re just here for a short time and then we’re gone.
How have you suffered for Christ?
When all the people around me found out that I accepted Christ, they thought that I was different from them. They knew that I no longer did the things that they did. The things I used to do with them before knowing Christ.
So that was a big conflict. Because my friends, my family, they all rejected me and I also had to make the hard decision to separate myself from them. They would criticize me. And I used to think, “If being a Christian means suffering like this, isn’t it bad to be a Christian?”
But despite all the problems, I’ve stayed firm. Because I know that all the glory belongs to Christ. Because I understood that He saved me.
So I have no reason, no excuse, to walk away from Him. Just to remain firm and keep seeking Him.
That’s the price we have to pay for Christ, because He already paid everything. So we have to make the decision to keep following the path, because He suffered for us.
What we go through is small, it’s nothing compared to what Christ went through. So yes, I’ve suffered, but that’s not a reason to stop.
How did your life begin to change when you started following Christ? / How have you seen God working in your life?
It all started when I understood or at least, when I began to understand. It started to change my way of thinking, my way of living. But this was also a challenge because I was fighting with sin. I’m still fighting with sin.
That’s one of the hardest battles that one faces, especially when you’re immature, just starting in the life that Christ wants for us. It’s a challenge because I come to a point where, when I fail in something small, I feel so guilty and I feel like I’ve lost my salvation. But I know it’s not like that. Because I know that Christ loves me and I know what He wants for me.
So, understanding that helps me not fall easily into temptation.
What people or experiences have encouraged or supported you in your walk with Christ?
The main ones who have helped me are the leaders at Bible Study and church. They’ve helped me. They’ve encouraged me not to stay stuck where I am but to keep following Christ, to obey Him.
Also Natalie. She’s one of the main people. My main source from where all that help and encouragement comes.
What is the desire of your heart for how God could use you to extend His Kingdom?
The desire of my heart, well there are two things.
To teach the Bible and to help others, the lost, to draw close to Christ, to know Christ.
Do you have any words of encouragement for other young people?
Some last words… there are many young people in the world who are lost.
So the point is this: if we don’t know Christ, we are lost in the world.
We have to listen, hear that there is hope. They need to hear that there is hope.
If we are in an addiction, or in a problem, or we feel desperate about something that doesn’t let us move forward or have peace, we need to go to Christ.
He is the only solution to all our problems.
Because even though I have lived that, feeling that I would never have peace, God came to give me a sign. Not to transform me overnight into a Christian, but to give me a sign so that I would be transformed through Him.
So we must listen before it’s too late. It’s better to obey now than to suffer and then be transformed, because that’s a hard process.
It’s better to have a problem, because through that problem, we come to Christ. And there we understand why we’re here in this world. Then we’ll see the glory of God in the middle of everything we go through.
