Jonas experienced conversion and became a leader in his church. Worship services were exciting, with a focus on miracles, speaking in tongues and rock music, but something was missing. Soon, he would come across a different kind of spiritual experience.

<p>Jonas experienced conversion and became a leader in his church. Worship services were exciting, with a focus on miracles, speaking in tongues and rock music, but something was missing. Soon, he would come across a different kind of spiritual experience.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Adverum Productions

Christopher Laubscher

Journeys Season 1

Should Christians Have Ecstatic Experiences?: Christopher’s Journey

Dan Millares

Searching for the Meaning of Life: Dan’s Journey

Cacyne Hernehult

Searching for True Love: Cacyne’s Journey

Maj Oblak

Can Faith Be Rational?: Maj’s Journey

Miikael Volkonski

I Would Never Become a Christian: Miikael’s Journey

Jan Haugg

Finding Hope for the Environment: Jan’s Journey

Conrad Whitaker

Beyond Rituals and Crucifixes: Conrad’s Journey

Samuel Jacobsen

Escape From New Age and the Paranormal: Samuel’s Journey

Grace Rose

Finding Peace at Last: A Miraculous Journey

Jonas Nygard

Hungry for More: Jonas’ Journey

Albert Jurgens

Learning to Trust the Bible: Albert’s Journey

Chris Berger

Existential U-turn: Chris’s Journey


My youth leader and his friend started to pray for me and they spoke in tongues, but nothing really happened to me. Then I came to discover the truth of the Bible in a much more meaningful way. That was a turning point in my journey. My name is Jonas Nygård. I'm a Swedish-speaking Finn and I grew up in a non-Christian family.

And from my dad's side, a long way back, they were pirates. And both my grandfather and my father were seamen. And I grew up in a city called Vaasa on the western coast of Finland. That can be a pretty dark place, especially in wintertime, when the sun doesn't stay up for that many hours. I have a younger brother and my mother stayed home a lot when we were small.

And when I was about 3 years old, my mom was really depressed and everything around her was dark. But 1 day when she woke up, it was bright as as light in the middle of the room and she actually thought it was Jesus himself standing there. She had read in an article that one's life can change from 1 day unto another. She found out that this article was written by her next door neighbor who was a Baptist pastor. And she visited him, and she started to attend the Baptist church, which was close to us.

And she even took me there a few times. My mom didn't know much from the Bible then, but she used to say that Jesus lives in our hearts. And that thought stuck with me. What did your mother say when you were a child? What did you do when you were a teenager?

And she used to pray with me and my brother before going to sleep. And my dad was against my mother becoming a Christian, but we prayed for him also. When I was a teenager, my mom took me to a large Pentecostal church because they had a lot of young people there. And during a worship service I really felt God's presence and I believed, even though I didn't know much about him. I did continue to go to Friday youth meetings and I was very shy then so I sneaked in in in the back you know when the lights were dimmed down and then I sneaked out.

A youth leader invited me to a life group where it was supposed to be all about reading the Bible and praying for each other and we did read maybe 1 verse and then we did pray for each other, but then we didn't talk about everything else. And at home I started to read the Bible, but I didn't understand much. I felt like the Ethiopian in the book of Acts who said, how can I understand unless someone guides me? When I was 10 years old, I got my first guitar and I took private lessons. And at some point I started to play in the worship team in the Pentecostal church on stage.

And it was a lot about music. So especially on Friday evenings, we could play for an hour and we could repeat a song maybe for 10 minutes or as long as we wanted to. I have always liked hard rock and metal music. The music that we played in church was way softer, but it was still inspired from rock music. I enjoyed playing on stage.

I became quite good at it because our worship team got invited to play for different events and I played a lot and I really enjoyed it. In the beginning I was shy, but I learned how to overcome my shyness. After playing we went out to pubs. In the beginning that was a no-no, but we went to a leaders conference where they taught us how to evangelize. And they said that you have to reach people where they are.

So we were allowed to go to pubs and clubs, smoking, drinking, swearing, because it was for a good cause. We wanted to reach people. In the church there was a lot of focus on feelings, miracles, speaking in tongues, the Holy Spirit and sometimes it could get very noisy and people could fall back and roll on the floor. I taught to myself that if I invite people here, my friends, they will think it's a madhouse. We were taught in the church that the sign that you have been baptized with the Holy Spirit is that you speak in tongues.

And these were not real foreign tongues, but it was some kind of babbling. But I wanted to speak in tongues since I was part of a church, but I said I'm not gonna fake it. The youth leader invited me to his home and he and his friend laid their hands on me and started to pray for me and they spoke in tongues. But nothing really happened to me. And it felt like forever and they just kept going on.

And my youth leader said just open your mouth and it will come. So I made up some words. I started working and first I worked as an electrician and as a truck driver and as a photographer and I sold floors and eventually I ended up cleaning ventilation systems. I was 26 at that time and my workmates and I went out eating lunch at restaurants. In my town we have a strong restaurant culture and my workmate invited me to come to this restaurant called Vegana.

And At that time I was a big meat eater and drinker, but I said, okay, let's go. At first I thought this is just salad, not much substance. My body was in shock, but I said to myself that this has to be good and I slowly started to enjoy it. At the table at the restaurant I found a flyer about a depression course And there I learned that a plant-based diet is really good for you. And I set my mind on actually starting to eat like that.

And the restaurant was a really nice place hanging out. And I did invite my mom and a couple of friends. After the course I did attend a course about the book of Daniel and the book of Revelation presented by a guy called Jonathan Carlson. And I thought to myself, wow, these people really know their Bible. It felt like we haven't even read the same book.

I started to talk to Jonathan and a pastor that was connected to the restaurant. And I felt that I could really talk to these people about the Bible. In my previous church it felt like the pastor took it personally when I had a question. And unfortunately many young people left the church because they didn't get their questions answered. But here with Jonathan it felt like the harder the question was the happier he became.

And I had so many questions. And every time I had a question, Jonathan just said, let's go to this text. Just like that. So Jonathan and I went to my mom's place and the 3 of us had Bible studies and we studied many different topics. And my fist slowly went from being up here to down here and I became like a sponge.

I had been to many churches searching for the truth and I went to the Lutheran church and I found out that it was alcoholic wine they served during the communion. And I thought to myself that can be right. So I thought that I was at the right place in the Pentecostal church because we had the Holy Spirit and we spoke in tongues. And now I met Jonathan and I thought to myself these are intelligent Christians that follow what they believe and get their teachings from the Bible. And I asked him what kind of Christians are you and he said we are Seventh-day Adventists.

And I said, okay. I had never heard about Seventh-day Adventists and I thought to myself that the way they do church is probably boring, But I could see it was biblical and I found out that this was real food to satisfy my soul. I had been baptized and confirmed in the Lutheran Church and then in the Pentecostal Church. But now I was finding biblical truth like never before. It took me a long time to decide but finally in 2019 I got baptized.

But even before that I was an Adventist in my heart. The teaching about health from the bible was new to me and amazing. At that time I did workout a lot at the gym. And I thought that you have to get the protein from meat. And I thought that if I go vegetarian I can do as much.

So I did an experiment like Daniel in the Bible. And what do you think? I broke all my records at the gym and Not only that, my mind became clearer and that actually sealed the deal. I started to give up meat and became a vegetarian. I came across a book that is called the Minister of Healing by L.N.G.

White which talks about the link between faith and health, and how it is one's religious duty to take care of both your mental and physical health. And at Vegana, I learned the importance of how to prevent disease, not just curing disease. So I thought since health is so important and I want to do something good in this world, why not get educated? And at that point my brother did study to become an electrical engineer. But I hadn't had so good grades in school.

But I felt I could at least give it a try. So I applied for the public health nurse program. And by God's grace 4 years later I graduated as a public health nurse. In 2021, I came to Sweden to attend a three-month long Bible school. And I have learned so much, especially about giving Bible studies.

And I found out that there are so many people who want to study the Bible and they really hunger for spiritual food but they don't know where to get it. Looking back I can see how God has guided me step by step first in believing him and then I thought that the sign of true faith was speaking in tongues. And even though I was a leader in my church, I was hungry for spiritual food. And God has really opened my mind to understand the Bible on a whole new level. I learned that emotions have their place in the Christian life, but that our experience with God should be based on the Word of God.

When we do that we will want to live our life according to the will of God. And when I read the Bible in a new light, I learned how to get down on my knees every morning and humble myself before God. I gained a closer relationship with Him, and my passion today is to share with others the amazing truth from the Bible that I have learned. My story can be illustrated by a Bible text which says, The path of the just is like the shining sun that shines ever brighter unto the perfect day you

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Series

Journeys Season 1

Hungry for More: Jonas’ Journey

Description

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

Other Teachings in Series

Should Christians Have Ecstatic Experiences?: Christopher’s Journey

14m

Searching for the Meaning of Life: Dan’s Journey

14m

Searching for True Love: Cacyne’s Journey

14m

Can Faith Be Rational?: Maj’s Journey

14m

I Would Never Become a Christian: Miikael’s Journey

14m

Finding Hope for the Environment: Jan’s Journey

14m

Beyond Rituals and Crucifixes: Conrad’s Journey

14m

Escape From New Age and the Paranormal: Samuel’s Journey

14m

Finding Peace at Last: A Miraculous Journey

14m

Hungry for More: Jonas’ Journey

14m

Learning to Trust the Bible: Albert’s Journey

14m

Existential U-turn: Chris’s Journey

14m

Sound Doctrine