“I Found Shalom”—Round Two!

We were gonna do one last drug deal . . . it kinda went badly. One of the guys was yelling, “Just kill him now!” and the other one says, “No, we gotta get the rest of the drugs! Let’s just torch the place!” You haven’t felt anything until you’ve felt the cold steel of a sawed-off shotgun against the back of your neck. . . . I’m an unlikely person to believe in Jesus.

That is the beginning of my own story of coming to faith in Jesus; you can listen to the rest on our “I Found Shalom” website. There’s something extraordinary about a good story. Scientists tell us that when we hear a compelling narrative, our brains actually sync with the storyteller’s in a process called “neural coupling”—our heart rates align, our emotions mirror theirs, and we identify with what they feel. Stories speak directly to the heart. That’s why, from ancient campfires to modern screens, humans have always been drawn to testimonies of transformation.

This is exactly why our “I Found Shalom” testimony project has been so powerful.

The Power of “I Found Shalom”

Over the past several years, we have filmed and shared about 100 testimonies of Jewish people who have found their Messiah, Yeshua (Jesus). These five-to-seven-minute videos have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times—and more importantly, they have led Jewish seekers to faith. When someone watches a fellow Jewish person describe their journey to Yeshua, something clicks. They see themselves in that story. They think, “If this could happen to them, maybe it could happen to me.” For example, Shohreh shared with us her story of how she came to faith in Jesus after growing up in a Jewish family in Iran. Here is part of her journey to trusting in Yeshua as the Jewish Messiah:

As a Jewish kid growing up in Iran, I went to a Jewish school. We would go every Monday and Thursday to synagogue. . . . My dad . . . since we observed all the Jewish holidays at home, we’d get into these stories, and especially at Passover he would very passionately tell us about the story of the Passover and how we got saved from Egypt and he would always emphasize that it was God’s hand that brought us out of Egypt.

In 1977 I moved to New York to continue my studies. A year later, the revolution happened in Iran and pretty much upset all of our lives. Things started to . . . fall apart in the country that I was raised in and so much loved. . . . I started to really look at what’s the meaning of life, understand life, understand myself, what’s going on with me. . . . There came a time when both my parents fell ill, especially my mom which I never expected. She was 57 and she was diagnosed with cancer. . . . How do I talk to my mom now, knowing that soon she’s going to be dying, and she’s not ready for it? . . . Do I know if there’s going to be another life after death? . . . 

There was no way I could fix my own problems. So I started to read the Torah and the Tanakh of course, and slowly I felt that God is speaking to me through His book, and this is His book. . . . And I started to see this . . . continuous theme: there was always a sacrifice required for our sins. . . . Putting together all of the stories of the Hebrew Scriptures, and also all the stories I had heard from my dad and grandfather—that one day there’s going to be a Mashiach [Messiah] coming—it suddenly clicked for me that, yeah of course, Yeshua had to come and die for us. . . .

He came to fulfill all of the promises that God had given us, that He would send us a Savior. I needed a mashiach, and He was the Mashiach. . . . only the blood of someone holy like Yeshua could cover all of our sins. I remember when I was a kid . . . if I needed my prayers to be heard I would always go to the rabbi to pray for me . . . We don’t have a direct relationship with God, we cannot have that direct relationship with God, because of our iniquities. Yeshua had to come to die for us so that He would make that relationship whole again between us and God. . . . [Jesus] takes away the anxiety and the anxiousness and He replaces it with His joy and His peace, and to me that’s precious. That cannot be bought with millions of dollars.

A story that changes one heart—like Shohreh’s—can change a family, a community, and a generation. With your support, the “I Found Shalom” project has allowed us to tell stories that lead Jewish people to the greatest story of all: the love of their Messiah.

Ready for Round Two

In such a time as this—when antisemitism is on the rise, and Israelis and the Jewish people are more spiritually open to the gospel than ever before—it is crucial to hear more Jewish voices from a wide variety of perspectives, backgrounds, nationalities, ages, and languages tell their story of how they put their faith in Yeshua as their Messiah.

That is why we plan to produce fifty new testimonies over the coming year, expanding our reach in remarkable ways. We will include at least twenty-five Israelis—young and old, those raised in believing homes who made their faith personal, and those who discovered Yeshua for the first time. We will film Jewish believers from England, Australia, Canada, France, Argentina, Brazil, and beyond, sharing their stories in multiple languages. These new testimonies will diversify the stories, ensuring that this new phase of our “I Found Shalom” project will speak to the hearts of Jewish people worldwide, no matter where they are from, how old they are, or what kind of life they have lived.

A Resource to Meet People Where They Are

We are meeting people wherever they are; these testimonies will reach Jewish people on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok. We are creating beautiful storybooks for those who prefer to read. Audio versions will be available for those who want to listen while commuting, exercising, or simply going about their day. We will use these testimonies in our summer outreach campaigns in New York City, San Francisco, London, and Hungary—where thousands of Israeli tourists visit each year. Here is just one testimony of how our volunteers were able to use “I Found Shalom” to share the good news of Yeshua on one of our outreach campaigns:

I handed an “I Found Shalom” tract [that has a link to our “I Found Shalom” video testimonies] to a 30-year-old Israeli man who said, “I am looking for shalom.” I said, “I have found shalom . . .” We were able to share our testimonies and also how God loved us enough to sacrifice His only Son, Yeshua, the spotless Lamb once and for all, for our sins.

It is hard to get Jewish people to attend a large evangelistic event. But with “I Found Shalom”, we can bring the event to them—to their phones, their homes, and their daily routines. Hundreds of Christians have already used these testimonies as tools to share the gospel with Jewish friends and neighbors.