My name is Belek and I live in Kyrgyzstan. This is my story.
Kyrgyzstan was part of the Soviet Union until the fall of the Berlin Wall, which had a big impact on my upbringing. I grew up in a society without much freedom. Freedom of thought, freedom of belief and freedom of speech were not words I knew. Instead, I experienced my whole life as a prison. Despite the ideas of socialism and community, I found myself feeling completely alone.
At school I felt alone. Kindness was a sign of weakness and so we all fought in the schoolyard to prove our worth. At home, I felt alone. When I was little, my parents divorced and they had left me with my grandparents, where I grew up.
When I was 14 years old, the Berlin Wall fell. For the first time, I saw that there were other ways to live life than the one I had known until then. Previously, atheism had been widespread and Christianity was not allowed. But after the fall of the wall, both Christian and Muslim missionaries poured into Kyrgyzstan, preaching an alternative way of believing and living.
Read also: Lilia got a safe base at Egehuset
Overriding anger
I heard about Jesus for the first time, but I could not accept the message that was preached. I was blinded and ruled by anger at all that life had offered me. The anger was all-consuming. I was angry that my parents had failed me. Those who were supposed to protect me and look after me had abandoned me. They had abandoned me to loneliness and darkness. I was angry at school, where I had never really thrived. I felt all alone in a battle against the world. A battle I could not win. The anger was destructive and devastating to me and it steered me into crime. I stole and I was in trouble with the police. My only goal was to make a quick buck and I didn't care what the cost was.
I had spent years building a hard shell. Yet something started to happen inside me. I saw the consequences of my lifestyle and felt how hard and destructive it was to live my life that way. I clearly remember one day when it became clear to me. I was 21 years old and I was on my way to a place where I could no longer find my footing. There I remembered the God that the missionaries had told me about. I stopped and prayed: "God, if you exist, change my life". I couldn't stand my life anymore, but I didn't know how to change it.
"It was a landmark day for my life"
Shortly after, I had to meet with the mafia. I had been offered a job and was meeting with them to close the deal. On the way there, I passed a group of my childhood friends. They were standing outside a church building and invited me to a youth conference that had just been held. But I moved on. I wanted the job. When I got there, there was no one there. I was alone and the Mafia never showed up. Instead, I chose to go back to the church and for the next four days I attended the youth conference. It was a pivotal day in my life. On a whim and a canceled job interview, my life changed. God showed me the path that I could not find on my own. He led me to the church. He planted the idea in my head and he saved me.
At the youth conference, I saw people with warm and happy eyes. These people were so different from the ones I had met in school. All my life I had met cold eyes. But these people had been touched by God's love and they wanted to share it with me. At the conference, there was no struggle for survival or to prove yourself. Here I got free food and was greeted with kindness.
I wondered at the care that these people showed. Why were they showing me all this love that I had in no way earned? I did not understand it.
But I knew that I was living a life that was destructive to me and to others. I was hurting others in exchange for quick profit. But the life I had lived didn't have to define me. "God can forgive and wash away your sins," I was told. That message touched me. Despite everything, God wanted to forgive me. God wanted to fellowship with me! He wanted to take away my loneliness.
I was therefore faced with a choice, and I knew that God wanted me to follow him. But by choosing God, I had to leave everything I had known until then. "I don't know the future, but I know it will be with you," was my conclusion. I could feel it from the inside. That God was my truth and my savior and that I had to have him in my life. God changed me. I didn't want to live a life with access to easy money. I wanted to be a good citizen and complete an education.
In the time that followed, I experienced an unquenchable thirst for God's word. Every day I walked 10 kilometers to church to be in community with other Christians. I quickly found a job at a construction company and earned my own honest money for the first time in my life. It was an incredible feeling!
"God had to change me so that today I can help change the lives of others."
Throughout my life, I have experienced that God has changed me and guided me. It's not always easy to follow God and profess to be a Christian in Kyrgyzstan, but I know that God is the truth. Some Christians choose to move to countries with greater freedom of belief because Christianity is increasingly perceived as a threat as Islam gains more influence throughout our society. Some Christians therefore feel discriminated against. But I feel called by God to serve my people and share the Gospel with them. I know that God had to change me first so that today I can help change the lives of others.
Today you can I use my experience from my old life to help young girls at Egehuset. Egehuset is a youth center for young girls, who are too old to be in an orphanage and are at risk of ending up on the streets and in prostitution. At the youth home, they are given shelter, food and security while they get an education.
At this home, like my childhood friends at the youth conference, I can show them God's love, feed them and tell them God's word. I get to tell them about the freedom they can have in Jesus. They get to know that there is a God who loves them and wants to be with them. I hope it can give them a youth with less darkness and anger than the one I had. These girls come from orphanages, but they have a parent who loves them, and I hope they see that here at Egehuset.
Belek is the project manager for the Oak House in Kyrgyzstan. The Oak House is a shelter for teenage girls who are at risk of ending up on the streets. Danish European Mission donors support local Christians like Belek and the other staff and volunteers who run the home and help the vulnerable girls to have a good adolescence and an education so they can build a life for themselves. At the same time, they share the gospel with the girls.
