I was born in Nairobi, Kenya into a Gujarati Hindu family but we moved to Leicester when I was a child. Growing up, our faith was perhaps more traditional and cultural than fully committed. We would go to the temple for special occasions and religious festivals and we had a shrine at home. As a child, my brother and I even often went to the children’s events at a local Catholic church, but we didn’t encounter the Jesus I met decades later.

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My journey of true ‘spiritual seeking’ only really began when my teenage son became very ill. He had been horribly bullied at school and ended up getting involved with the wrong crowd – who sadly got him into smoking a lot of cannabis. This made some acute ongoing mental health issues and constant migraines he had suffered with for a while, much worse.

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It was deeply troubling for us to see him so distressed, and it was this that ignited the search for deeper spiritual peace, healing and liberation. Of course, we started with Hinduism because that was all we knew. We tried various Hindu denominations and groups with different spiritual leaders, gurus and different practices. We did so many different Pujas at a myriad of temples. We even went on an expensive Yatra pilgrimage to India to visit all the key spiritual sites and plead with the gods. I thought there must be answers somewhere in Hinduism because I always assumed it was ‘the religion of Indians’ – the place to go to for spiritual guidance and help.

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The trouble was, there are endless options in Hinduism and they all try and persuade you that they have the true answers. We went to so many spiritual places and people. And each time they all wanted – and took – a lot of money from us. This left our bank balance, and our hearts, increasingly empty – with no results at all. In fact, things got worse rather than better.

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Eventually, I even looked outside of traditional Hinduism. By then we were willing to try anything. So we went to a Mosque, a Psychic, mediums and a Reiki healing practitioner. But nothing improved the situation. By this time I was utterly worn out, not having a clue how to move forward. We had nowhere else to turn. There were no options left.

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Until one day, a friend at my work whom I had confided in asked, seeing as I had tried everything else, why I hadn’t tried Christianity too? In that moment it struck me that I hadn’t even really considered it. I guess I had always just assumed that Christianity was a religion for white British people. However, I did know a lady at work who went to church, and she agreed to go with me one Sunday morning, so I could see what it was like.

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When I got to Life Church, it really shocked me how different it was to how I imagined church to be. Whilst in church I felt a lot of peace. From that first Sunday, I just knew that this was what I needed and had been searching for. I realised pretty quickly that my search had ended and I didn’t need anything else. I soon gave my life to Jesus and, a couple of weeks later, was baptised in water. Shortly after that, I was prayed for and received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and started speaking in the supernatural prayer and worship language called ‘tongues’, that is described in the New Testament. It brought an even deeper way to pray and commune with God, without my mind and thoughts getting in the way.

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Everything didn’t dramatically change in an instant in our lives. Change is a process of being stripped back and having your mind renewed to God’s way of thinking. But change comes more naturally over time in Christianity as we rest in Jesus’ unconditional love and grace and by immersing yourself in Bible Truths. I can honestly say that things have improved so much in my family’s life over the past decade and my son is much better than he was. I’m so thankful that we now have a loving family around us in our church. In our church we have people from all sorts of ethnic and cultural backgrounds, yet we are one big family who care, support and look after one another. We know we are loved by others at church unconditionally and don’t have to keep trying to win each other’s approval all the time.

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For so many years I was searching for answers. I worked so very, very hard to earn and find the Truth that I so desperately needed. Then, one day, God drew me towards Himself, and I found the Truth in Jesus Christ. And I can say for sure – once you have found Him, you just know that it’s the Truth. You know, deep inside, that you no longer need to look anywhere else. You get to enjoy this beautiful lifelong journey of seeing more and more of His Truth being revealed and unfolded within you day by day – all because of His never-ending, unconditional love and grace. It doesn’t mean that everything in life will be perfect. But it does mean that you always live knowing that you will spend eternity with Him.