I grew up in a Croatian Catholic family. We went to church every Sunday but the services were always in Croation, so I never understood what was being said. I remember one day asking Grandma, “Why do we come to church?” She shooshed me and said, “Stop complaining. God just wants you to come for one hour a week.” I thought, Really? He wants us here at 10:30 on a Sunday? I had many questions back then but never felt like I was getting answers.
My family made me become an altar boy. I’d carry things down the church aisles, help the priest with services and go with him on home visits. I routinely went to confessional, silently suspicious of the two feet peeking out under the curtains. The more I forced myself to follow these rituals I didn’t understand, the emptier and more confused I felt. Religion, the Bible, church—it made less sense with time. I remember asking questions at church and receiving answers that made no sense at all. So, at eight years old I vowed, “I will never again pick up the Bible as long as I live.”
During this period, there were a lot of shows and films about the supernatural—ghosts, paranormal activity, people rising from the dead. The Matrix came out when I was in primary school and it was the first film to plant the idea that there might be more to reality than what we see. Unsurprisingly, my family sent me to a private Catholic high school. Most students were Catholic but I had one friend who came from a family of strong atheists. One day he told me he had decided to become a Buddhist and I thought, Wait, you can just change? Just like I was ethnically Croatian, I thought I was ethnically Catholic. Just as my friend decided to stop identifying as an atheist, I stopped identifying as Catholic. But I kept identifying as spiritual. I knew the truth had to be out there.
the search
The more I explored, the heavier I felt. The evil in the world, the wars that followed 9/11, the darkness, the unanswered questions—it all started to mess with me to the point where I became completely overwhelmed. I’d explored religion but found no compelling answers. I’d explored evolution but saw many holes in it. The idea that we were just sitting on a rock, floating through space by random accident didn’t make sense when I looked out at the world around me.
For a while, I became dependent on alcohol to rest my mind. I’d have a few drinks, put on some music and relax. But the alcohol quickly stopped having any effect and my questions remained just as loud.
when things got weird
Then I started experiencing supernatural events. I’m not sure if it was because I had watched so many films of this nature—or because I denounced God as a young boy—but it sure seemed like something was out to get me.
One morning at around 2:30am, I laid in my bed wide awake. My eyes were open, but suddenly everything around me took on a strange blue hue. I tried to sit up, but my body was locked in place. Next minute, my cupboard doors started opening and a smoky figure appeared saying, “I’ve come to destroy you”. At that time, I truly believed the most powerful, binding force in the universe was love. As I laid there afraid, I tried to dwell on this concept of love, not knowing what else to do. Suddenly, a white light covered me, causing the smoky figure to become enraged. It came up to me and started thrashing around, but it couldn’t break through the white light. Then it disappeared. I remember feeling myself peacefully drift off to sleep while the white light still surrounded me. You would think something like this would keep me wide awake but instantly, I fell into a deep sleep.
This wasn’t my first—or last—supernatural experience. Over the following year, my nights were haunted by spirits, shadow figures, alien-like beings and all sorts of strange things. And they were all the same. They’d approach me softly to start and request access to my heart, but when I would say no, their presence would become aggressive until they’d eventually give up and leave.
From the beginning, I wondered if I had completely lost my mind. I moved house, thinking it may have been cursed, but the same things kept happening. I moved again, this time buying a place of my own, thinking it might help. Things only got worse.
After a few years, I hit a point where I hated everything. I hated work, hated where I was living, hated feeling fatigued. So, I made massive lifestyle changes. I began running, training for marathons and getting up early for bootcamp. I stopped drinking alcohol, caffeine, soft drinks, energy drinks and became fully plant-based—a very big deal for my meat-loving Croatian family.
Everyone around me started seeing the change. I loved how I was feeling. But the dark nights remained. I never told anyone what was happening to me during this time because I didn’t want people thinking I was going crazy. I continued living a normal life throughout the day, going to work, going to CrossFit and meeting up with friends. On the surface I looked fine. I was social, fit and was always joking around with my mates. But underneath I was crumbling.
breaking point
One night, another figure appeared in my room. It was a blue-veiled Mary, who I was used to seeing on church stain-glassed windows and paintings. Again, she came politely, gently and with a soft voice said, “I’m everything you’ve been searching for. Give me your heart.” The more I refused, the more aggressive she became. In utter desperation, I yelled out, “Save me!” I wasn’t necessarily calling to God, but to anyone or anything that could save me from this torment. As soon as these words left my lips, the white light appeared again. Then the Mary figure transformed into a red demon, full of rage. She tried to charge toward me but again, a white light protected me and the figure disappeared. Without hesitating, I got on my knees. The magnificence of this presence was so powerful that it completely awed me. Suddenly, I was no longer afraid. I knew I was safe. I knew I was in the presence of God. With clasped hands I confessed, “You are Jesus Christ. You have made Your presence known.”
I got back into bed and had the most peaceful sleep I’d had in years. The next morning, I woke up to a message from a friend I hadn’t spoken to in a long time. He had sent me a link to a video of a preacher talking about Jesus and in his message said, “Hey, you should watch this”. The video made so much sense, considering everything I’d been experiencing. I knelt by my bed and this time, gave my heart to Jesus.
light in the darkness
Suddenly, all my free time was filled with prayer and seeking for answers about God, Jesus and Christianity. Funnily enough, the one reluctance I had was that I felt really convinced by this plant-based lifestyle, but I had it in my mind that the Christian philosophy taught God created animals to be killed and eaten.
I prayed to God and heard Him say, “Seventh-day Adventists”. I thought, What in the world is that? Months went by and I kept pondering the events that had happened. I prayed a second time, telling God I would like to talk to people about my experiences. Again, I heard Him say, “Speak to My Adventists.”
Eventually, I went for a drive one weekend to try to find an Adventist church. I drove around my suburb for hours. I passed the Anglican church, the Methodist church, the Baptist church. But after failing to find an Adventist church, I gave up.
Months later, it was still nagging at me. While praying I asked, “God, who are these Adventists?” When I had moved into the place I bought, I noticed a building across the road had my name spray-painted across the bricks in big, purple, graffiti. I thought, Great. Someone’s going to think I did that. I looked again at my name as I walked to my car on my way to work and in frustration thought, What is this dumb wall? I walked across the road with my breakfast in one hand and my bag in the other and looked around the building. On the other side was the front entrance of the building with a sign that read “Hungarian Seventh-day Adventist Church”. “Unbelievable,” I said in shock.
going to church
The next Saturday, I went to church, but it was closed. I found a number to call and they told me to go to another Adventist church in Geelong, Victoria. When I walked in, two young guys said hello and gave me my first Bible. For a while, I was on edge, sceptical and looking for an excuse to call it quits altogether. There were days where I would show up, listen to the preacher and think, Once this is finished, I’m out of here. But when I got to the door, someone would stop me and we’d have a conversation that would make me think, Maybe I’m wrong. I still had big questions about Creation, space, DNA, nutrition, dinosaurs—all the things that seemed to contradict Christianity. Over time, God either gave me answers to these questions or peace about their mystery. But I remember getting to the point where I thought, I’ve just had this two-year conversation with God as to why He doesn’t exist. In my search for answers, He graciously joined me in discussions and debates.
This was almost 10 years ago now. Since then, there’s been highs and lows. In the lows, I have often slipped back into treating faith like a performance or trying to be perfect for God. I remember once feeling God ask me to do something and I did the opposite. I thought, That’s it. I’ve lost His love. I was crushed. But even then, He gently reminded me that’s not how it works with Him. As I sat on my couch, I felt this outpouring of wondrous love, filling me up.
I keep on learning how wonderfully amazing, patient and kind God is. Looking back and seeing how He has transformed my life, how He’s walked with me and changed me even after all the times I ignored and doubted Him, I can’t help but get emotional. It’s so beautiful.
