Flying Leaves
We talk with young adult Christians about the real journey—following Jesus, discerning their vocational calling, and living out their faith in a restless world.
Flying Leaves
Alex Onley
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In this episode of Flying Leaves, Pastor Rick Bergh sits down with Alex to hear the remarkable story of a young man whose life was radically transformed by an encounter with Jesus Christ. From growing up with a shallow faith, to chasing fulfillment in the world, to experiencing God's forgiveness and grace in a life-changing moment, Alex shares how Christ gave him a new purpose. Together they explore repentance, discipleship, Bible study, mission work, baptism, and discerning God's call into ministry, offering hope and encouragement to anyone searching for meaning, wondering about their vocation, or longing to know that God still changes lives today.
Well, welcome everybody to Fly Leaves. Great to have you with us once again for another podcast. As we know, we're discussing young adults and their journey and the Christian faith, how they follow Jesus in the restless world. My name is Rick Berg. I'm your host, and today I'm greatly honored and privileged to have Alex on the podcast. Welcome, Alex. Thank you. Thanks. Good to have you with us. And uh we want to get right into your story. Alex, I know you have so much to share. This is only the first podcast, by the way, with you on here. We're going to have you back in a couple months. That's sweet. Because we always see the progression of God working in our lives over a period of time. I think that's very helpful. But we're trying to get to know these young adults as our listeners are learning to get to know you. Tell us a little bit about you and your face story and how that was once important, maybe, and it kind of went away for a while and it came back, and how God has brought you to this point in your life.
SPEAKER_00Okay, sweet, thank you. Yeah, so I grew up in a Christian household and I grew up around the church, always hearing the name Jesus, and I had a very, very shallow faith. You know, I knew of Jesus, but I didn't know Jesus. I didn't have a personal relationship with Jesus. And so come grade nine or the beginning of high school, when I faced some serious adversity, and when I wasn't always surrounded by my Christian community, and I was surrounded by bad influence, I bad influences, I ended up giving in to temptation and I ended up falling very far away from the Lord with nicotine weed, sleeping around, going to parties and fighting. I tried to find myself in a world that was broken that I could never really find myself in, right? Because true fulfillment comes in God, and I didn't realize that until later. And you know, looking for myself in a broken world left me way more broken than I was when I started. And it ended up being at the end of high school, I graduated and I felt like I had no worth. I felt like I had no purpose. I felt like you know, I wasn't loved. I felt like I contributed nothing truly to this world or this life. And yeah, it was in that point where I hit a a really, really bad point in my life, like truly rock bottom. And you know, one night the I had I had an encounter with the Holy Spirit that changed me, that was the beginning of my faith that night. And basically what happened was I was coming back from a girl's house very late at night and I was trying to fall asleep. It was like 4 a.m. and I couldn't. And I was like, okay, why is this happening? You know, I I don't have problems sleeping. But you know, I've re I was reminded of something my mother said to me when I was like seven years old, and she said, Alex, if you ever can't sleep, God is trying to talk to you. And so, you know, for the first time in my life, I was like, okay, whatever. You know, I have nothing, I have nothing to gain or nothing to lose. Right. Or so I thought, and so I was like, okay. And I and I got down on my knees and I prayed for the first time, and you know, I could barely get the words Lord out before I was just bawling because I was I I felt in that moment the the presence of the Holy Spirit so strongly, and the presence of love and the feelings of forgiveness and and joy just over overcome me. And it was it was that night where I was like, hey, Lord, I have I have live I have lived my way, I'm now going to live your way. You know, that's the that's the one thing that I remember, like just repeating like what I'm sorry, I lived my way. Now I'm gonna live your way.
SPEAKER_01Wow. You know, it just it just a story just tweaked in my mind of the Saul on the road to Damascus. Yeah, you know, how he uh how God came to him and you know the voice of God saying, Saul, so why are you why are you persecuting me? Yeah, you know, and I mean before that he didn't even realize he was doing anything wrong. You know, and uh I'm just intrigued by this whole idea of coming to God, knowing that somehow you have fallen short of the glory of God, that you've sinned. And I think the concept is very difficult for people to grasp on the outside world. You know, no one likes to be called a sinner. Yeah, and yet obviously for you that was important in your experience with God that night. Yeah, yeah. Talk a little bit about that forgiveness factor.
SPEAKER_00So I feel like forgiveness and repentance are two very similar but different things, you know. Forget like repentance and true repentance is being truly sorry, and that can only the forgiveness can only come when you have truly repented.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00And I feel, you know, a lot of people and a lot of Christians, especially like me, because you know, that whole time I called myself a Christian, but you know, I thought I was forgiven, but you know, I only was doing half of repentance. You know, the full definition of repentance is feeling sorry for what you've done and then turning away from it. You know, I was I was feeling sorry sometimes, but I wasn't turning away. And so I feel in order to understand true forgiveness, you have to have true repentance. You know, and I feel like that really it truly comes from a revelation of how truly bad we are, you know, because you know, our we we may we may not seem that bad in the moment, but you know, compare us up to a holy and perfect God, we can we can never compare, you know. And what's something I had to realize was, you know, the gospel isn't about happiness, it's about righteousness before a holy God. Right. And so in order to be seen as righteous, we need to be forgiven. And in order to be forgiven, we need to truly repent.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you know, yeah, that's powerful, that's powerful. So, I mean, you had this experience in your bedroom.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Tell me about the day after.
SPEAKER_00The day after. That was the first time I ever picked up my Bible and read it. Like, just just on my own. I started in John. I had no, I didn't know where else to start, but I was like, okay. Like I was I was so over, like filled with joy. I I was running that whole day on like two hours of sleep because I got up at 6 a.m. because I was like, man, I want to read. Man, I want to pray. Man, I want to do all of this. And I realized that like that night a fire was really like just started in my heart. The um there's a song set a fire, where it goes like set a fire down in my soul that I can't contain and I can't control. I feel like in like that night, a fire was set down in my heart, and that worked its way into me living differently. Right. I was still for a few months, I still struggled with nicotine and weed, but the the the fornication, the sleeping around, the fighting and my bad mouth was like those were come, those were immediate transformations for me. Like the next day it was, it was it was gone. But there were obviously some things I still had to work through. Sure. But as I grew closer to God and as I was trying to learn more about God and hear more about God and to know him more, those those desires that I had, they they slowly fell away.
SPEAKER_01So I mean, I love it. I mean, like God's word, right? Just captures us. And so you became very excited about the word, not only for yourself, yeah, but for others. Tell us about that experience of of wanting others to, I guess, discover a little bit what you had discovered.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. When I like the the transformation that happened in my heart was so drastic that, you know, a lot of the people around me, they were like, Alex, like, what happened? Because I like within within less than a week, we really within two hours, I completely changed. Like, like full 180 transformation. And that joy that I was feeling that was inside my heart that I had never felt before, I realized I was like, wow, hold on, this is possible for more people to feel. Yeah, you know, everyone should should feel this, everyone deserves to feel this. Right. And so it was it was in that moment where I was like, okay, I need to do everything I can to make sure that everybody hears the gospel, everyone hears this good news. Wow, right? And you know, as as you know, that I was I felt moved to start a Bible study. And we ended up like one one Thursday, I was like, okay, me and my buddy Dave were like, okay, bet, let's start, let's start this by let's start a Bible study. And so we ended up inviting everybody we knew. It was on a Thursday evening at 7 p.m. We invited like everybody we knew who would be open to Christianity, and even people who wouldn't be open. We invited everybody, and it ended up being like 45 young adults showed up Thursday night to dive into the scriptures. Yeah, and then and then since then, every Thursday we've been meeting and we've been growing, and now you know we have a consistent group of not just believers but disciples who are advocates for the word, who are witnesses, and who are also building disciples, you know, not just churchgoers, but true followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01So, I mean, we're talking about other young people, yeah, correct?
SPEAKER_00Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_01So, I mean, which is pretty amazing because I think a lot of society tells us that young people are interested in Christianity. They've kind of followed a secular way of life. Yeah, you know, they think might be better. Although there's been some obviously some recent happenings of young people being more interested and are curious about the fate. So were these young people, were some of them like nominal believers or or maybe agnostics or it was all from all kinds of walks of life?
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00That that first Thursday, and even now we had people from uh everywhere from like absolute agnostic does like hates God, hates Jesus to faithful believers. We had the whole like anyone you can imagine, you know, and that thought that you know the young people nowadays aren't interested. I I don't believe that. Right. You know, I truly believe that you know this generation is actually one of the most seeking generations there's been in a while.
SPEAKER_01And yeah, wow, that's amazing. What I love about this is that it's not just getting together, it's like you guys dive into God's word. Yeah. And so what what how does that what does that look like then when you go into God's word? Like you just pick a certain book of the Bible or you oh yeah, yes.
SPEAKER_00We we've been actually since the beginning, we've been walking through Matthew. We're at chapter 21 right now. And every every week what we do is you know, we the doors open at 7. 7:30, we start worship, and by eight, we're diving into the scriptures. You know, whether it's me who we it's either me, Dave, or Jeremiah who's been, or you know, a pastor who's been studying a specific scripture throughout the whole week. And we we go verse by verse and line by line through the scriptures and we really study it, and we really, really, we, we really try to juice it for all all it has, you know, because the scripture we've learned that even in two or three verses, you can you can learn so much, right? And so that's kind of how we how we do it.
SPEAKER_01That's fantastic. You know, I know that I met you a number of months ago, only a couple months later, you God called you to go on a mission trip with the organization. So tell us tell us a little bit about how that, first of all, why you why do you think God called you there to go there? And then maybe just share a couple experiences of why it was important to you as you just returned like last week.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, 100%. You know, I I truly feel that God called me there for a number of things, but one of the main things was figuring out my vocation and where I'm called and you know what I want to do with the rest of my life. And you know, through there there were so many experiences that I had, but you know, a few of them stick out, which one of them we had well first we had three months on learning in a learning phase, which we did we had a bunch of teachers come in and teach us about what they specialized in. And then the last two months we got to go to Albania, England, and the Dominican Republic to do evangelism and to do children's ministries. And I think one of the main experiences that sticks out to me is you know, a time of prayer that we got to have over a little boy, his name was Alejandro. We got to visit their village, and these these people, these gypsy people, they are seen as less than. They're very segregated against and discriminated against in Albania, and they're they're not, they they can't get jobs other than you know, taking out trash and begging on the street. That's what that's what they do. And so we got to go to their village, and it was really heartbreaking to see their living conditions. But there was this little boy Alejandro, and he had a broken leg, and he had a cast over it. And so me and Caleb, my buddy, we we felt called to pray over his leg for healing. And so Caleb put his hand on his shin, his leg, and I put my hand on his shoulder, and we began praying. And Caleb, throughout the prayer, he said he felt a pop. And throughout that prayer as well, I felt like a huge just rush of the Holy Spirit. And we had we had full faith that you know this kid was was healed in that moment. So we tried to get him to stand up, and he he began walking, but his mother pulled him down and was like, No, no, he he needs money because what they do is they use their children to to beg. Right. Yeah. And but also we're figuring out the pieces after, and one of the girls, Liberty, she said that she also during that prayer, she felt the spirit moving and she saw his toes moving as well. And so we we we have true faith that he was he was healed, and so I think that was one of the craziest experiences that I you know had in my time there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that miracles happen, yeah. That healings happened, yeah, 100%. And the power of God's word to do that, as he said. So you you're thinking a little bit about vocation. You said that earlier. Yeah, and you know, I don't want to put you on the spot here, but God seems to be moving you in a little bit of a maybe a direction. You're still I don't try to discern that. Yeah, can you talk a little bit about that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So actually, when I was when I was there, I in like in the lecture phase, so I think this was the third or fourth week, we had a teacher, her name was Rosie. She didn't speak any English, and she only spoke Spanish, but we she taught us about worship and praise. And at the end of the week, we went up to almost a lookout spot over the Mediterranean Sea with a cross on the top. And so we had a worship time up there and a time of prayer. And I was in charge of praying for Canada and India, mostly for Canada though, because I'm I consider myself Canadian. And so I was praying and I was like, Lord, I like like bring revive, you know, bring workers. I pray that there would be a shift in the hearts of your people here in Canada. And, you know, I like the main thing I was praying for, I was praying, Lord, send workers, you know, send send laborers to collect what you have planted, right? And at the end of my time, I sat down and I was just just sitting, waiting, waiting on the Lord to see if he had anything to say to me. And Rosie came up and said something to me in Spanish, and I was like, man, I'm so like I was like, no, habla espanhol. Yeah, right. She called over a translator and she essentially said, like, I have I have a word for you.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And in that moment, she was like, you know, you remind me of Gideon because he was young when he was called and that he had doubts. And she said that, you know, the Lord was going to work through me in this time. And she said that the time of revival was coming, that the Lord was going to use me. And that was kind of crazy to me because week prior, I discovered that you know, I really felt called to ministry and pastoralship. And I was struggling with that for the week because I was like, I don't, I don't know. I don't know if that's me, right? And I was having a lot of doubts.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And the fact that she not only said that, but also confirmed right after when I was like praying, I was like, Lord, you know, send send send workers, you know, send people, build up people for Canada. And he was like, hey, I'm gonna send you. And so that's kind of what you know happened for me, figuring out and discovering my calling and vocation. And so like now, after it's all over, like I realize that you know, I'm I'm called to ministry and pastoralship and church planning, I believe, is further down. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Isn't it cool that how God works? I mean, obviously, his main primarily way of reaching us is through his word, the Bible. But I just love it how sometimes he confirms those things in our heart through people, yeah, you know, and I think we need that. I think God knows that we need to hear from other people, you know, to be affirmed into the ministry. Yeah, you know, like even when you think about the story of of Samuel, you know, and Eli. Yeah, you know, where Samuel's in the temple there and Eli's old, and Samu hears the voice of God and kind of wondering who it is. Yeah, goes to Eli and says, Hey, what's up in here? And yeah, Eli's even kind of confused, right? But then finally, Eli goes, No, listen, this is God, God speaking to you. Yeah, you know, so although the word came to Samuel, Eli needed to confirm that. Yeah, first Samuel, who became, you know, like in his life, right? 100%. You know, so that's really cool. So as you look a little bit about what what excites you? I mean, hold it here. When you came back, you also had a little bit of a a prayer time with God, and he was saying to you, invite people to uh to a gathering. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Tell me about that. How did that how did that happen? So we actually had a like with through the Bible study, we had a a barbecue event when I when I came back instead, and that was actually you know implanted in my head through one of the teachers two months prior. And so we we've been planning this barbecue for like two months now. And recently, I think it was a week or two ago, one of the females who comes to the Bible study, she said she wants to get baptized. And so we baptized her and planned to baptize her at the barbecue. Yeah, and there was about 120 people there. And yeah, and then after McKenna got baptized, we had almost an altar call where where we're like, hey, you know, if you feel called to get baptized, yeah, you'll come talk to us or one of the pastors, yeah, and you know, we we we can make that happen. And there were three more people who have been struggling with, or not necessarily struggling, but considering getting baptized, and they felt truly called in that night, in that moment to get baptized. So we had a total of four people get baptized and 120 people show up last Thursday.
SPEAKER_01It's amazing. I mean, yeah, you're talking about a city of what 38,000 people here, yeah. But to have 120 people gathered for that event, and most of them were younger people. Yeah, yeah. A few of us old parts, but you know, it was mostly young people, right? Yeah, which again reminds us that faith is alive and that people are curious, and and young people are curious about the faith. So thinking about who's listening on today, yeah, and there could be people, you know, who maybe like you were when you're younger, they were brought up in the Christian church, the faith a little bit, but kind of left for a while, and maybe they're wondering if this is worth it to get back into. You know, maybe there's people who are just curious, they never heard the gospel before in their life. Maybe there's atheists out there too. So I'm not gonna believe in that stuff. What would you say to those people who are listening on?
SPEAKER_03To the non-believer, man, I'd say like first do your research, right?
SPEAKER_00The the the evidence that Jesus Christ came, lived, and died is is truly undeniable. Yeah. And I'd say open like open your heart to the truth, because this isn't just a decision that should be made with feeling. Yeah, okay, because this is like the most important decision of your life. And to to the to the believer, man, a verse that's been on my heart is in Revelation 3 in to the to the church of Laotis, I believe. And the part that sticks out and really sits on my heart is when Jesus is saying, like, wake up and strengthen what remains. And that I feel like has been such a heavy verse on on my heart, you know, with this, with this Bible study, with this, you know, revival that's happening. You know, it's it was it was a huge call on my heart, like the Lord saying, Hey, straight, like wake up, you know, strengthen the believers that are here and and work out of work out of what's what what he has for you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so the future, you do not know yet, as we don't know. How do you last question? How do you kind of discern the future? I mean, there's that it seems like there's such a big question for me when I hear young adults talk about kind of I don't know what my purpose is, I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I feel like I'm kind of like a bird in air, kind of fluttering.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01How do you, how would you, how are you gonna discern your next steps? Yeah. This was for a question.
SPEAKER_00A lot of prayer. A lot of prayer, but I think one thing that my leader at the the school I went to, one thing he would always say is God can't steer a stalled car. And so I think right right now my my plan is just to keep moving, yeah, and see where the Lord takes me where He where He steers me.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, because I'm gonna go in that direction. If He doesn't want me to go somewhere, he's gonna He's gonna turn the car.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. That's great advice. I mean, yeah, Jesus the pilot, right? A little bit passenger, just to be a co-worker with him in this wonderful mission that he's given us. Well, Alex, I just want to thank you so much. Uh again, this is kind of introduction to your life a little bit. And a couple months from now, we're gonna bring you back on and we'll see what God is gonna do in the next couple months. Okay. You know, so it's exciting to see, you know, because I think a lot of a lot of us need to see that God is working in our lives. Yeah, right? He's got a plan for us, he's moving us ahead. I'm not saying that there's not quiet times or silent times, but even those are valuable, right? Yeah. So, so uh again, thanks for being on today. I really appreciate it. No worries. So, those who were listening today, thank you for joining us once again. And again, this is Rick Berg, your host from Flying Leaves, and uh God bless, and we'll talk to you soon as we interview another one of our young adults in this restless world following Jesus. Take care, everybody. Bye bye.