The Power of Hope

Stories May 4, 2021

I lost my son in a car accident on new-year’s day, January 1st, 2018.  From that day on, my life deteriorated and I was in a serious state of depression.  As my condition got worse, I lost the ability to walk and to sleep normally.  I was taken to a hospital for medical attention where I was admitted.

Many people from different denominations such as Jehovah Witness, Manna, and even Seventh-day Adventists visited and prayed with me. However, my condition continued to deteriorate under the care of the medical doctors and clergy visits.

Because I wasn’t making any improvement, I had to be discharged from the hospital since it didn’t make any sense for me to occupy space in the hospital and receive medication without any improvement. My daughters took me home where they nursed me for fifteen days. I couldn’t walk, talk or eat. I was completely withdrawn.   

After the initial fifteen days, I began to feel better. What a blessing. At the end of eight days I went to a recording studio to record a message. Little did I know that this visit would mark a turning point in my life.

While at the studio I conversed with the owner of the studio who happened to be a Seventh Day Adventist. I related my entire ordeal to him, when I finished, he asked me if I attended any church, to which I responded no. He went on to tell me about a book he bought at church, of which he had read just a few chapters. He told me that the book addresses my situation and if I read it faithfully I could find some relief. The book was entitled “The Power of Hope.”

The moment I got home; I was captivated by the book. The more I turned the pages the better I became. I can testify that the book became my personal doctor and everything in my entire existence. In fact, from the time I fell sick, the longest I had slept was just a wink, about two minutes or so. The day I started reading the book and completed the first chapter, a miracle happened. The book fell on my chest and for the first time I dozed off to sleep that evening until five the next morning.  Since that morning, I have not needed a sleeping or pain numbing medication to manage my condition. Surprisingly, the more I read the book the greater my recovery was. By the time I finished the book, I could walk, talk, and sleep with ease. I got stronger by the day.

I felt a strong urge to attend church in response to the question that had been asked by the man who had given me the book. One Saturday, I embarked on a search for the church which the owner of the book attended. Upon finding it, the leadership reluctantly gave a stranger an opportunity to share her story. This was not at the church where the person who had shared the book with me attended.  My testimony had such an impact on the members. They realized that a book could be such an effective evangelistic tool, that it had brought a person to church. By the time I left home to look for the church, I had already made up my mind to join the church of the book that healed me and changed my life forever. In a nutshell, this book was sent to tell me that it is time to repent and follow Jesus all the way. I am prepared to do so. Reading this book was a one stop solution for my life.

My Appeal to every living person out there and church members is that brothers and sisters please read this book because it is in this book that I found God and in Him I have found a life of happiness. I have started attending Saturday services and I feel like a new person, I never had a Bible in my life, now I want the church to explain everything to me about the Bible.

Dionia lives in Felha Fede, on the island of Sao Tome, which is an attached field of the Southern Africa-Indian Ocean Division