HUMANS OF SURRENDER
Africa

“Sometimes, they would force me to go a church close to my home. At school, we had exams. I prayed a little prayer and asked God to help me pass. I said, “If I pass, I will always go to church.” I passed and said, “Oh God, why has this happened to me?” I started going to church. I heard the pastor preaching about having a relationship with Jesus. He said, “Be alone and try to talk with Him. Open your heart to Him.” I went home, closed the door to my bedroom, and started pr

“I asked myself, ‘Why did God let that little thing live?’ I was born preterm at 28 weeks. My mother was 19, and she gave birth on the way to the hospital. The car broke down, and my grandmother said, ‘Let’s not cut the umbilical cord. Let’s wrap this child in a blanket.’ I got to the hospital, and I was blue. I went into the incubator. I grew up in a Christian home. I received Christ as my Lord and Savior when I was in boarding school. When I accepted Christ, I went back to

I was born on a little farm in Iowa. I was raised in a good Christian home. When I was about 20, I wanted to get away from all the rules of the Christian life. I got married, and for 23 years, I was away from the Lord. The marriage started deteriorating, and we ended up getting a divorce. The first words out of my new wife’s mouth were, “I want to go to church. I want to go to the church where your mom and dad go.” I thought, “Oh no, back to the rules and regulations.” I di

“The Red Army came in and broke the people’s will, forcing communism on them. They called it “The Hard Boot.” I was born in Hungary in 1956. Many fled the country. One of them was my uncle, my mom’s brother. My mom was pregnant with me, so they could not go with him. He ended up in the United States later. There was a Baptist pastor who started to visit us. He was from a town that was about a half-hour drive away. One night, he met with my parents and talked with them about t

"I somehow managed my off-the-rails life and my responsibilities at the same time, which is quite a dangerous combination of things to do. I tried marijuana for the first time at age 13 or 14. I was drunk for the first time at age 11 and became sexually involved. I started smoking cigarettes when I was 10. I was 15 when I had my first encounter with God. I was baptized by the Holy Spirit and radically changed. I remember going back to the boarding school and people who saw me

"Anxiety has been a big part of my story. There were a lot of questions that I wrestled with. I looked at my sins and problems that were going on in my heart. I remember staying up late at night, knowing that God had forgiven me, but struggling with the tension of knowing how dark my heart was. My parents were both missionaries on a Navajo Reservation and led me to the Lord. They talked to me about God's grace and encouraged me. This provided a place where I could dive d

"My dad is not my blood father, but he is the one who took up the mantle when I was six years old. When he got together with my mom, he wasn't with the Lord. It's weird how what the enemy thought would work against me is exactly why I'm still with the Lord today. I was raised knowing Jesus my whole life. I think I've always had, dare I say, the gift of faith—just knowing who Jesus was and knowing that He was there the whole time. I think I have a great understanding that we

“Church was part of my life, my whole life. I grew up in a Christian home and came to Christ at an early age. It’s fairly easy to be a Christian when you're in a Christian home and always going to church. It wasn't until college that I said, ‘You know, I need to really make this my own. Am I doing this because this is what Mom, Dad, Grandma, and Grandpa taught me, or is this my own?’ It just dawned on me: I'm not thirteen anymore, I have to make my own decision. It was someti

“It was in my brokenness that I got to see the best of God. I thought the great were going to come help me out. I thought the ones with titles were going to speak for me. But it was the lowly who represented me. They fed me. The one who didn’t have food in her house made sure I was fed. It was the homeless who kept me company at my lowest. I can reach others through the pain. God turns that pain into something beautiful for His name’s sake. I was born into a family that serve

“All those years, I was wrong. I did believe, but I don't think I believed more than the demons. That's not good. I had the Bible on the side of my bed and a cross hanging from my mirror. I would have said I was a Christian, but you are not a Christian until you're born again. Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a s