Yulia was raised by well-educated Buddhist parents in Russia. By local standards, they were making it. But when her father died suddenly, her mother slid into a spiral of alcoholism, and abuse. When Yulia was 21, her mother – in a fit of drunken rage – told her to leave. Her mother’s last hateful words were, “Just leave. I don’t even care. And if you die, I won’t even cry.”

Yulia stood alone in her bedroom with a piece of rope. She fashioned a crude noose, hanging it from a rafter in the room. She stacked a small side table on top of her dresser and climbed up placing the noose around her neck. As Yulia balanced on top of the table, with voices in her head telling her how useless she was, suddenly, her mother walked into her room. Racked with guilt and sadness, her mother screamed, “We cannot have life without you. Let’s go back home and start afresh!”

A few days later, a local Christian man came to the house to visit her. “Yulia, do you know there is a God?” he asked. “He is Jesus Christ who loves you and gave His life for you.” Yulia says his words pierced her heart. A week later, Yulia had “an amazing dream” in which Jesus appeared to her saying, “Believe in me and pray, Yulia, and I will save you.” A month went by and the Christian friend invited Yulia to a local fellowship where God touched her heart deeply once more. On one of those evenings Yulia fell to her knees, prayed a prayer of repentance, and was born anew in Jesus Christ.

Since she began to follow Jesus, she admits she still has some problems – but she no longer faces them alone. She has her Lord and Saviour by her side – and He has blessed her with a nursing job, a marriage, and a child. What a life she would have missed if she had given in to her plan, rather than God’s!

Source: Joel News International; SEND International

BIBLE STUDY: Psalm 40:1-2

PRAISE: God that Jesus rescued Yulia from the deepest pit and has given her a whole new life.