The first smile
Sasha Tsuterov was a member of the Communist Party for years and worked for the KGB. As he spies on a Christian missionary family, he begins to wonder if there may not be a god after all. Even my parents were members of the Communist Party. They never talked about God or the Bible. Even so, when I was five, my grandmother suddenly insisted that I should be baptized. All this happened secretly, miles away from Moscow, in a small, rundown chapel. Although I was still very young at the time, this event triggered a yearning for God in me. But because in the seventy years of communism in Russia all traces of Christianity had been wiped out, nobody nourished my incipient faith and so he eventually fell asleep again.
My life as a KGB agent
Years later, I also joined the Communist Party and secured a position with the KGB. I married my gorgeous wife Natasha and we got a lovely daughter, Julia. I had a great circle of friends, a glorious future ahead of me, and had really achieved everything that I had dreamed of as a young man. Julia became friends with an American girl whose grandfather was a missionary in Moscow. A little later, my wife started giving Russian lessons to this family. As a KGB agent and head of the family, I felt obliged to observe these foreigners. After all, they had a lot to do with my family and were Americans. But the more I shadowed them, the more fascinated I was about them. The humanitarian aid that her church provided was extraordinary. And they too were so different from all the people I knew. I was really attracted by their joie de vivre, their friendliness and their joy in God. And I noticed that her generosity was related to her Christian faith. That impressed me.
Is there perhaps God?
I began to wonder if this was really all about atheism. And after a few reflections, I came to the conclusion: If no one can prove God’s existence, no one can – for fairness – confidently deny it. My atheistic beliefs, so strong so far, softened slowly. And one day something unbelievable happened. I had accompanied the American family to a church service. And while everyone was praying around me, I had a vision myself! I saw God standing on a mountain and I felt that I was like a clay pot. God poured pure, liquid gold into this vessel – into me! And with that image, it was as if the scales were falling from my eyes. Suddenly, deep in my heart, I realized that I no longer needed proof of God’s existence. I suddenly realized very clearly that God and Jesus are real. Today I know that God filled me with His Holy Spirit at this moment, who gave me revelation.
“You’re smiling!”
When I got home that night, my wife opened the door for me and asked in amazement, “What’s the matter with you?” I wanted to know how she meant it when she said, “You’re smiling! And I’ve never seen you smile before. “That’s when I first realized what had happened. I had always been a very serious man, but God had filled me with joy. And that was even outwardly! I confessed to her that I had become a Christian. Then she fell into my arms and told me that she, too, had been believing in Jesus for some time, but had never dared to tell me, the KGB agent!
Radical Steps
Little later, I was baptized and confessed publicly to Jesus Christ. I knew that I had to give up my work at the KGB. I wanted to study theology now, but in my country I did not have the opportunity, it was forbidden. And so I left my homeland and studied in the USA. Since then a lot of time has passed and also in Russia a lot has changed. Today I work as a director and professor of a Bible school in Moscow. A new generation of Russians has grown up to live their faith freely and to study the Bible officially. My lifelong dream as a young man fades against what I am allowed to do today. The fact that today I can pass on the word of God in Russia, the hope and joy that I have found in Jesus, is a miracle to me.
Would you like to get to know this Jesus?
Source (german language): Jesus.ch