My Testimony: From Islam to Christ

I recently watched a LIVE FREE podcast by Lakepointe Church featuring Dr Frank Turek. When engaging with people of different faiths he emphasised the importance of understanding your audience and the simplest way to do that is by asking either of the following questions:

“If Christianity were true, would you become a Christian?”
or
“If Jesus truly predicted and accomplished His resurrection from the dead to prove He was God, would you follow Him?”

If their answer to either question is no, Dr Turek suggests the issue is not intellectual but a heart problem and I agree. In those cases continuing the conversation often becomes fruitless and all that remains is prayer that the Holy Spirit softens their heart.

But if the answer is yes, even with hesitation, then there is room to explore. For many Muslims that hesitation is normal. Leaving Islam is not treated lightly, it is part of your identity. In some Muslim majority countries apostasy is punishable by death under certain interpretations of sharia law.

As a British born ex Muslim I have never had to fear that level of consequence. Even so my family will be deeply disappointed when they discover I have left Islam and even worse become a Christian.

It still took me over 40 years to understand God not as Allah as I had been taught but as Yahweh, the God revealed through Christ.

So where do I start?

To cut my 40 plus year story short, I was born after 12 years of my parents’ miscarriages — a long awaited daughter my dad named Glory. My early years held both joy and hardship: a traumatic birth for my mum who was extremely petite delivering a 9 pound baby; a serious burn accident as a toddler; and a mother quietly battling what would later be diagnosed as schizophrenia. Even so I grew up a sociable, people loving child with a natural warmth that often surprised those around me.

That changed around the age of 9 when I was sent to live with my aunt and uncle in Bangladesh for around 3 years to learn Arabic and pray properly. That chapter was overshadowed by abuse from my uncle which unfolded over time and left deep scars. I later understood I had been groomed and that I was not the first child he had harmed. I will revisit this in later posts but for now it is enough to say it changed me completely and shaped the trajectory of my life.

My teenage years reflected that hidden pain. I was angry and volatile and often cruel to my mum whom I unfairly blamed until I finally told her the truth. At school I hid behind humour as the loud class clown masking a quiet collapse. Only a few close friends knew what I was carrying.

In my mid to late twenties I married my first husband. We had been living together and cultural pressure pushed us to legitimise the relationship. Some of my family never fully accepted him because he refused to convert to Islam. He was agnostic with a Catholic background so our civil ceremony was a marriage in the eyes of the Government not God. The marriage ended in divorce after a failed IVF round. Yet during that time I found the strength to forgive my uncle and I began to heal. I genuinely wanted to know God although I would later realise it was not Allah drawing me. Despite everything I still hope my ex husband finds Christ one day.

After the divorce I completed my open degree and threw myself into work. I moved further away for a care work venture with my older brother which also failed. When I write it out like this it feels as though my life had been one long string of disappointments — setback after setback yet there was light at the end of the tunnel.

Around 6 months before my 40th birthday everything changed. I met my now husband on a dating app. We were two previously broken people with failed marriages behind us and both far along in our healing. He had a supportive family and a puppy who, if I’m honest, may have chosen me first. I fell in love with his kind respectful nature. At first I wondered if he was putting on an act but after meeting his parents a month later I knew he was genuine.

Soon after I met the rest of his family who were all just as lovely. A conversation after dinner with his sister, a Christian missionary in Nepal, became the moment that set everything in motion. Until then I held a universalist view of God. I believed Muslims and Christians worshipped the same God and her gentle questions stirred something in me. They pushed me to look deeper into Islam in the hope of strengthening my faith.

I had grown up being told Muslims were the continuation of the faith and that Jesus was our prophet yet I realised I knew very little about the Muslim Jesus. As I studied I began to see the cracks and slowly but surely my faith in Islam started to dismantle.

All the while his family introduced me to Christianity with patience and tenderness. We visited their local church from time to time when we went to visit and the Reverend was always warm and welcoming. A year and a half later I was baptised and we married in that same church. It was simple, beautiful and finally a marriage in the eyes of God.

My younger brother was the only member of my family who attended the church wedding and he walked me down the aisle. Although the rest of my family chose not to attend the ceremony they celebrated with us at the reception held at my in laws’ home. I never explicitly told them I was Christian and still haven’t at the time of writing this. I suspect my dad already has an inkling and chooses not to ask knowing I might say yes. Even so our wedding was a truly beautiful day and the photograph that forms the background of this website was taken by our Christian photographer on that very day.

God truly works in mysterious ways. Only a year earlier I had said I would never become a Christian yet here I am. Thank you Lord for being my Shepherd and guiding me onto the right path.

The Moral of My Story

There was purpose in my suffering and it was all part of God the Father’s plan. I was dead in my sins and needed to reach the bottom of the deep before I was ready to take God the Son Jesus’ hand and be lifted out. It is through God the Holy Spirit that my heart is continually being transformed even to this day.

Looking back I can now see how every part of my story was preparing me for the truth. With Christ the world finally makes sense — its beauty, its suffering and everything in between. If you have faced hardship remember this verse:

“Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance and endurance produces character and character produces hope and hope does not put us to shame because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” — Romans 5:3–5 (ESV)

In my upcoming posts I hope to share the slow and difficult process of dismantling Islam including the online resources that helped me through my journey.