My name is Rizswan.

I’m 34 years old.

And what I’m about to tell you happened on August 23rd, 2019.

I was born a Saudi prince, third in line to inherit millions, raised an absolute devotion to Islam.

That night, my own family set me on fire for reading a Bible.

I should have died, but Jesus Christ had other plans for my life.

Ask yourself right now, what would you risk everything for? I lived in a palace with 200 rooms, had my own private mosque, and servants who anticipated my every need.

The marble floors were imported from Italy, the chandeliers from France, and my bedroom alone was larger than most people’s entire homes.

Every morning I would wake up to the sound of the call to prayer echoing through golden speakers installed throughout our estate.

My father had spared no expense in creating what he called our family’s spiritual sanctuary.

By age 12, I had memorized the entire Quran in Arabic.

My father called me his spiritual heir, the son who would carry on our family’s religious legacy.

I can still remember the pride in his eyes when I would recite verses flawlessly before visiting religious leaders.

They would nod approvingly and tell him that Allah had blessed him with a gifted son.

My mother would dress me in white robes embroidered with gold thread and I felt like I was performing for the most important audience in the world.

I performed Hajj to Mecca four times, led prayers for our extended family gatherings and was studying under the kingdom’s most respected Islamic scholars to become a religious leader myself.

Each pilgrimage felt more elaborate than the last.

We traveled in private jets, stayed in luxury accommodations that overlooked the Cabba, and had personal security, ensuring our safety among the millions of other pilgrims.

I thought this was what true devotion looked like.

I thought the comfort and ease were signs of Allah’s favor upon our family.

But beneath all the golden glory, I felt spiritually empty.

It was like I was performing for an audience that wasn’t there.

During the quiet moments between prayers, when the palace fell silent and the servants retreated to their quarters, I would sit in my private mosque and wonder why my heart felt so cold.

The beautiful Arabic prayers I recited felt like empty words bouncing off the ornate ceiling.

I was speaking, but no one seemed to be listening.

My daily routine was structured to the minute.

500 a.

m.

prayers in my private mosque, followed by breakfast served on gold plates while I reviewed verses from the Quran.

At 7, my private Islamic tutor would arrive to continue my religious education.

We would discuss theology, Islamic law, and my future responsibilities as a religious leader in our family.

By 10, I would join my father for business meetings, learning about our oil investments and charitable foundations.

Lunch was always a formal affair, often with visiting dignitaries or religious authorities.

My father would parade me before these important guests like I was some kind of trophy.

This is my son who will carry on our family’s religious legacy.

He would announce proudly.

The visitors would ask me to recite specific Quranic verses or share my thoughts on various Islamic teachings.

I performed perfectly every time, giving them exactly what they wanted to hear.

But inside, I felt like an actor playing a role I didn’t understand.

My mother took special pride in my religious devotion.

She would personally select my prayer robes, ensuring they were always pristine and appropriate for whatever religious ceremony or family gathering we attended.

She would tell her friends about my memorization of the Quran, my dedication to prayer, and my future as a religious scholar.

She saw my spiritual life as a reflection of her own success as a mother.

When she looked at me, she saw perfection.

My younger sister looked at me like I was some kind of saint.

She would often ask me questions about faith, about prayer, about how to be a better Muslim.

I would give her the answers I had been taught, the responses that sounded wise and spiritual.

But even as the words left my mouth, I wondered if I believed them myself.

She trusted me completely, believing that her big brother had some special connection to God that she hoped to achieve someday.

Everyone thought I had everything.

And by worldly standards, I did.

I had more money than I could spend in several lifetimes, respect from the most powerful people in the kingdom, and a future that seemed guaranteed.

I was being groomed for positions of influence in both business and religious circles.

My opinions would shape policy.

My words would influence thousands of people, and my wealth would fund charitable works across the Muslim world.

The questions started small.

Why did my prayers feel like I was talking to the ceiling? During our elaborate family prayer times, I would watch my father and uncle prostrating themselves, seemingly lost in spiritual communion with Allah.

Their faces showed peace, devotion, even joy.

But when I bowed my head to the prayer rug, I felt nothing but the cold marble beneath my knees.

My words echoed in my head, but never seemed to travel beyond my own thoughts.

During Ramadan fasting, I found myself going through the motions, but feeling spiritually hungry in a way that food could never satisfy.

The sunrise to sunset fast was supposed to purify my soul and bring me closer to Allah.

But as the days passed, I realized I was fasting from food while starving for something I couldn’t name.

The breaking of the fast each evening was a celebration in our palace with elaborate meals and family gatherings.

Yet I felt more empty at the end of Ramadan than I had at the beginning.

I started noticing contradictions between what we taught and how we lived.

We spoke about caring for the poor while living in unimaginable luxury.

We preached about humility while demanding the finest of everything.

We taught about spiritual devotion while measuring our success by material wealth.

These contradictions bothered me in ways I couldn’t articulate to anyone, especially my father.

Have you ever felt like you’re living someone else’s version of faith? Have you ever gone through the motions of religious practice while your heart remained completely untouched? I was the perfect Muslim son on the outside, but inside I was desperate for something real, something that could fill the growing emptiness in my soul.

In March 2019, I accompanied my father on a business trip to London.

This wasn’t unusual for me.

I had been traveling with him to international meetings since I turned 18, learning the ins and outs of our family’s oil investments and diplomatic relationships.

London was familiar territory for us with its luxury hotels, high-end restaurants, and boardrooms where millions of dollars changed hands with a handshake.

What I didn’t expect was that this particular trip would shatter everything I thought I knew about faith.

The meetings were typical.

Oil prices, investment portfolios, partnerships with British petroleum companies.

My father conducted business with the precision of a surgeon.

every word calculated, every decision strategic.

I sat beside him in these meetings, absorbing the lessons of power and influence.

But on the second evening, we attended a formal dinner at the Dorchester Hotel, one of those elaborate affairs, where business deals are disguised as social gatherings.

At this dinner, I was seated next to a British businessman who owned several companies across the Middle East.

He wasn’t like the others at our table.

While everyone else discussed oil prices, market fluctuations, and political developments, this man seemed genuinely interested in me as a person, not just as a Saudi prince with connections.

His name was Richard, and he had kind eyes that seemed to see right through the polished exterior I presented to the world.

About halfway through the dinner, while the others were engaged in heated debate about OPEC policies, Richard leaned over and asked me quietly, “Prince, do you ever wonder if there’s more to God than what you’ve been taught?” The question hit me like a physical blow.

No one had ever did ask me such a thing.

In Saudi Arabia, questioning religious teachings wasn’t just discouraged, it was dangerous.

But something about the way he asked it with genuine curiosity rather than judgment made me pause instead of offering the standard defensive response I had been trained to give.

His question haunted me for the rest of the evening.

I found myself distracted during the remaining conversations, barely participating in discussions about trade agreements and diplomatic relations.

My mind kept returning to his words.

More to God than what you’ve been taught.

What could he possibly mean? I had been taught by the most respected Islamic scholars in the kingdom.

My religious education was impeccable, my knowledge of Islamic theology extensive.

Yet his simple question had exposed something I had been trying to ignore for years.

Over the next three days, Richard and I met for coffee at small cafes away from my father’s watchful eyes.

I told my father I was exploring London’s business district, networking with potential partners, which wasn’t entirely untrue.

But these weren’t business meetings in any traditional sense.

They were conversations that reached into the deepest parts of my soul, places I had kept carefully guarded my entire life.

Richard didn’t try to convert me or argue about religion.

He wasn’t pushy or aggressive like some of the Christian missionaries I had heard about in Saudi Arabia.

Instead, he simply shared his own story of finding peace through Jesus Christ.

He told me about his childhood in a nominally Christian family, his years of spiritual emptiness despite material success and his eventual encounter with what he called the living Christ.

When he spoke about Jesus, his entire countenance changed.

His face lit up in a way I had never seen.

When people talked about religion, he said, “Jesus isn’t a religion prince.

He’s a relationship, a person who loves you personally.

This concept was completely foreign to me.

In Islam, Allah was distant, unknowable, to be feared and obeyed, but never approached as a friend.

The idea of a personal relationship with God seemed almost blasphemous.

Yet, as Richard described his prayers as conversations, his faith as a friendship, and his spiritual life as an ongoing dialogue with someone who actually listened and responded, I felt something stirring in my heart that I had never experienced before.

I asked him questions I had never been able to voice before.

What does it feel like to pray and know someone is listening? How do you distinguish between your own thoughts and God’s voice? Why do you seem so peaceful when you talk about your faith? Richard answered each question with patience, never making me feel foolish for asking.

He shared verses from the Bible, not as religious ammunition, but as personal testimonies of what God had done in his life.

On our last day in London, as we prepared to return to Saudi Arabia, Richard pressed a small package into my hands.

“This changed my life,” he said quietly.

Maybe it will speak to you, too.

Inside was an Arabic Bible, beautifully bound in soft leather.

I stared at it in shock.

Possessing a Bible in Saudi Arabia wasn’t just illegal.

It could result in imprisonment, public flogging, or worse.

For someone in my position, from a prominent religious family, being caught with a Bible would be seen as the ultimate betrayal.

I should have thrown it away immediately.

Every instinct, every survival mechanism I possessed told me to get rid of this dangerous object before anyone discovered it.

But something about Richard’s words, about the peace I had seen in his eyes made me hesitate.

I thought about all those empty prayers in my private mosque, all those moments of spiritual hunger that no amount of religious ritual could satisfy.

I smuggled it back to Riyad, hidden inside my laptop bag.

My heart raced every time we went through security checkpoints.

The weight of that small book felt enormous, like I was carrying a bomb that could destroy everything I had ever known.

During the flight, I couldn’t concentrate on anything else.

I kept thinking about what Richard had said about Jesus being a person, not just a distant deity to be feared.

For 4 months, I read that Bible every night after 2:00 a.

m.

when the palace was completely silent.

I would wait until I was certain everyone was asleep, then lock my bedroom door and pull the book from its hiding place under my mattress.

I started in Matthew reading about this Jesus who touched lepers, fed the hungry, and spoke with an authority unlike any religious leader I had ever encountered.

The Jesus I discovered in those pages wasn’t the distorted version I had been taught about in Islam.

In Islamic teaching, Jesus was merely a prophet subordinate to Muhammad.

Certainly not the son of God.

But as I read his actual words, witnessed his compassion, and learned about his claims to divinity, I realized I had been presented with a caricature, not the real person.

I found myself praying to Jesus in secret, asking, “Are you real? Are you really who you claim to be?” These weren’t the formal ritualistic prayers I had been taught.

They were desperate conversations with someone I hoped might actually be listening.

Sometimes I would feel a presence in my room during these prayer times, a warmth and peace that I had never experienced during my Islamic prayers.

Have you ever had a moment when everything you thought you knew was challenged? Have you ever discovered that the foundation of your entire world view might be built on incomplete information? For months, I lived in this tension between the faith I had been raised in and the faith I was discovering.

I knew I was walking a dangerous path, but I also knew I couldn’t ignore what I was learning about Jesus Christ.

August 23rd, 2019.

started like any other day in our palace.

I woke before dawn for faja prayers as I had done every morning for as long as I could remember.

The marble floors were cool beneath my feet as I made my way to my private mosque.

The call to prayer echoed through the golden speakers and I went through the familiar motions of washing, facing Mecca, and reciting the verses I had memorized as a child.

But my heart wasn’t in those prayers anymore.

My mind was filled with the words I had been reading from the Bible for months.

The teachings of Jesus that had begun to transform my understanding of who God really was.

After morning prayers, I joined my father for breakfast in the main dining hall.

He was reviewing financial documents while eating dates and drinking Turkish coffee from our finest china.

We discussed business matters, upcoming meetings with government officials, and my responsibilities for the week ahead.

Everything seemed perfectly normal.

My mother asked about my plans for the day, and my sister mentioned she needed to borrow a pen for her university studies.

It was the kind of ordinary family interaction that I would look back on as the last peaceful moment of my old life.

Following breakfast, I attended a series of business meetings with my father and uncle.

We were finalizing details for a new charitable foundation that would build mosques throughout Southeast Asia.

I participated in these discussions with the same enthusiasm I had always shown for our family’s religious and business endeavors.

No one suspected that beneath my dutiful exterior, I was wrestling with questions that could destroy everything.

our family stood for.

The afternoon passed quietly.

I spent time in the palace library, officially studying Islamic theology, but secretly thinking about the differences between what I was supposed to believe and what I had discovered in the pages of that hidden Bible.

The contrast was stark and troubling.

The more I learned about Jesus, the more I realized how different his message was from what I had been taught about him in Islamic education.

Evening prayers came and went without incident.

I stood beside my father in our family mosque reciting the familiar Arabic verses while my thoughts were elsewhere.

After prayers, we gathered for dinner.

Another formal affair with extended family members and a few visiting religious scholars.

The conversation centered around upcoming religious festivals and our family’s role in various Islamic charitable organizations.

I contributed to these discussions naturally, giving no indication of the spiritual revolution taking place inside my heart.

After dinner, I excused myself and went to my room, telling everyone I needed to prepare for meetings the next day.

This was my normal routine, and no one thought anything unusual about it.

I had done this hundreds of times over the past four months, waiting for the palace to settle into silence before retrieving my Bible for another night of secret reading and prayer.

My sister came to my room around 1000 p.

m.

to borrow a pen for her university assignments.

I was in my private bathroom at the time completing my evening ablions.

She called out that she was taking a pen from my desk and would return it in the morning.

I thought nothing of this interaction.

She had borrowed pens, books, and other items from my room countless times throughout our lives.

What I didn’t know was that in reaching for a pen in my desk drawer, she had accidentally knocked over a stack of papers, and when she bent down to collect them, she discovered the edge of something hidden beneath my mattress.

Curiosity got the better of her.

She lifted the corner of the mattress and found the Arabic Bible that had been my secret companion for 4 months.

I can only imagine the shock she must have felt.

Finding a Bible in the bedroom of her devout Muslim brother, the family’s spiritual heir, must have been like discovering a bomb.

She later told me that her hands were shaking as she opened it and saw the name Jesus written throughout the pages.

She ran straight to my father with tears streaming down her face.

I learned later that she was terrified for my safety, convinced that I had been deceived by some evil influence.

In her mind, she was saving me from eternal damnation by exposing this terrible secret.

She had no way of knowing that she was actually setting in motion the events that would cost me everything I had ever known, but ultimately lead me to the truth I had been searching for my entire life.

When I returned from evening prayers around 11 p.

m.

, my father, uncle, and two religious adviserss were waiting in my chambers.

The atmosphere in the room was electric with tension.

I knew immediately that something catastrophic had happened.

My father stood in the center of the room holding my Bible like it was a poisonous snake, his face contorted with a mixture of rage, disappointment, and what I can only describe as betrayal.

My father held the Bible up and demanded, “Explain this blasphemy in my house.

” His voice was controlled, but filled with an intensity that made my blood run cold.

I had prepared for this moment for months, rehearsing in my mind what I would say if my secret was ever discovered.

But facing his rage, seeing the disappointment in his eyes, and realizing that my entire life was about to change forever, I found myself speechless.

My uncle spat on the marble floor, something I had never seen him do in our pristine palace.

This is what happens when we let Western influence corrupt our children, he said with disgust.

He began pacing around the room like a caged animal, his anger building with each step.

The two religious advisers stood silently, their presence lending weight and authority to what was clearly going to be a formal proceeding rather than a family discussion.

One of the religious advisers finally spoke, his voice carrying the authority of someone who had spent decades interpreting Islamic law.

This is apostasy, he declared solemnly.

He has brought shame upon the entire family lineage.

The penalty for apostasy in our culture was well known to everyone in that room.

We weren’t just discussing a family disagreement.

This was a matter of religious law, family honor, and potentially life and death.

My father’s voice was ice cold when he finally spoke again.

“You have two choices,” he said, never taking his eyes off my face.

“Burn this book publicly.

Denounce Christianity before witnesses and beg Allah’s forgiveness for your temporary insanity, or you are no longer my son.

” The ultimatum was clear and final.

There would be no negotiation, no middle ground, no time to think it over.

At that moment, my mother arrived, having been summoned by one of the servants.

When she saw the Bible in my father’s hands and realized what was happening, she began weeping uncontrollably.

She fell to her knees beside me, begging me to just obey, to forget about this Jesus nonsense, to think about my family and my future.

Her tears broke my heart more than my father’s anger.

I had never seen her so distraught.

My sister stood in the corner of the room, confused and terrified at what she had unleashed.

She kept looking between me and our father, realizing that her discovery had triggered something far more serious than she had anticipated.

I could see the guilt and fear in her eyes as she began to understand the consequences of her actions.

For 34 years, I had never disobeyed my father in any significant way.

I had been the perfect son, the beautiful heir, the spiritual leader he had groomed me to become.

But something inside me had fundamentally changed during those months of reading about Jesus.

I had discovered a truth that was bigger than family loyalty, more important than personal safety, and worth any sacrifice.

I looked at that Bible in my father’s hands, thought about everything I had learned about Jesus Christ, and said quietly but firmly, “I cannot burn what has given me the peace I’ve searched for my whole life.

” The room went deadly silent.

You could hear the air conditioning humming, the distant sound of traffic outside our walls, even our own breathing.

Everyone stared at me in disbelief.

My father’s face turned red with rage as the full implications of my words sank in.

Then you choose this foreign god over your family, your inheritance, your very life,” he said through clenched teeth.

I felt my legs trembling, but my voice remained steady as I whispered.

“If following Jesus means losing everything else, then yes, Father, that’s my choice.

” What would you have done in that moment? Would you have stood firm in your newfound faith? Or would you have given in to preserve your family relationships and comfortable life? I can tell you that making that choice was the hardest thing I had ever done, but also the most important decision of my entire existence.

The moment I declared my choice to follow Jesus, the atmosphere in my bedroom shifted from tense confrontation to something far more sinister.

My uncle’s face contorted with a rage I had never seen before, and he grabbed the Bible from my father’s hands with such violence that several pages tore loose.

Without hesitation, he stroed to my marble fireplace and threw the book into the flames.

I watched helplessly as the pages began to curl and blacken, the Arabic words that had brought me such peace over the past four months disappearing into smoke and ash.

As the Bible burned, my father looked at me with eyes that had turned completely cold.

“If you love this book so much,” he said slowly, deliberately, “you should join it.

” Those words sent a chill through my entire body because I realized this wasn’t anger speaking anymore.

This was calculated judgment.

My uncle stepped away from the fireplace and I noticed for the first time that he was holding a red plastic container that smelled strongly of gasoline.

Before I could fully process what was happening, my uncle produced this container from behind my dresser as if it had been placed there in preparation.

The realization hit me like a physical blow.

This wasn’t a spontaneous reaction to discovering my secret.

They had known about the Bible before tonight.

They had been planning this confrontation and they had come prepared for the worst possible outcome.

The gasoline had been ready and waiting.

One of the religious advisers began chanting verses from the Quran about cleansing blasphemy with fire.

His voice rose and fell in the rhythmic cadence I had heard at public executions, turning my bedroom into an impromptu courtroom where sentence had already been passed.

The other religious adviser nodded solemnly at each verse, adding his authority to what was clearly meant to be a religious judgment rather than family discipline.

My mother’s screams pierced through the chanting when she realized what they intended to do.

She threw herself between me and my uncle, begging them to stop, to think about what they were doing.

But two palace guards entered the room at that moment, and I understood that their presence hadn’t been coincidental either.

They had been waiting outside my door, ready to intervene if needed.

They gently but firmly restrained my mother, pulling her away from me while she sobbed and pleaded for my life.

My uncle began pouring gasoline over my traditional white robes while the religious advisers continued their chanting.

The smell was overwhelming and terrifying.

I had smelled gasoline countless times at gas stations and around vehicles, but having it soaked into your clothing while people prepare to set you on fire creates a terror that I cannot adequately describe.

Every breath I took filled my lungs with those toxic fumes, and I could feel the liquid seeping through my robes to my skin underneath.

The gasoline was cold against my body, but I knew that sensation would be replaced by unimaginable heat within moments.

I looked around the room at the faces of my family members and realized that I was completely alone.

Even my sister, who had discovered the Bible, was now crying and begging them to stop.

But she was powerless to intervene.

I was surrounded by people who had loved me my entire life and they were about to kill me for choosing Jesus Christ.

My father stepped closer to me, his face a mask of righteous anger.

Let your Jesus save you now, he said mockingly, and then pushed me toward the fireplace.

I stumbled forward, my gasoline soaked robes brushing against the marble hearth where my Bible was still burning.

The heat from the flames was intense on my face and I knew that within seconds I would be consumed by fire.

My clothes ignited instantly.

One moment I was standing near the fireplace and the next moment I was engulfed in flames.

The pain was unlike anything I had ever experienced or could have imagined.

Every nerve ending in my body screamed in agony as the fire spread across my robes and began eating through to my skin.

I could feel my hair singing, my skin burning, and I could smell my own flesh cooking.

The sound was horrible, too.

A crackling, hissing noise as the flames consumed everything they touched.

I collapsed to the floor, my entire body consumed by fire.

The pain was so intense that my vision began to blur and my thoughts became fragmented.

Through the agony, I was dimly aware of everyone stepping back, watching me burn.

No one moved to help me.

No one threw water or tried to smother the flames.

They stood there watching what they believed was righteous judgment being carried out.

But in that moment of absolute desperation, with my body being destroyed by fire and my consciousness fading, I managed to cry out with everything I had left.

Jesus, I screamed through the flames.

If you’re real, if you truly love me, save me now.

I wasn’t bargaining or trying to make a deal with God.

I wasn’t promising to be better or do more religious works.

I was a dying man calling out to the only hope I had left, the Jesus I had come to believe in through months of secret Bible reading.

The prayer came from the deepest part of my soul beyond conscious thought or theological consideration.

It was the cry of a human being facing death and calling out to the one person who had promised to save those who called on his name.

I felt my consciousness fading as the fire spread across my body, and I expected those words to be my last.

Then something impossible happened that defies every law of nature I understand.

A wind came from absolutely nowhere.

We were indoors in my sealed bedroom with no windows open and no air conditioning system that could generate such a force.

It was like a hurricane materialized inside my room.

But this wind had a supernatural quality that touched only the flames consuming my body.

The wind didn’t affect anything else in the room.

Papers didn’t blow around.

Curtains didn’t flutter, and no one’s hair or clothing moved.

But every flame on my body was extinguished instantly, not gradually, not slowly, but in one supernatural moment, as if someone had turned off a switch.

One second I was burning alive and the next second every fire was completely gone.

But more than the wind, the room filled with what I can only describe as a presence.

It wasn’t visible, but it was more real than anything I had ever experienced.

This presence was loving, powerful, and unmistakably divine.

It felt like being embraced by someone infinitely strong, yet infinitely gentle.

For a moment, the pain disappeared entirely, and I felt a peace that surpassed anything I had ever known.

I lay on the floor, smoke still rising from my clothes, but somehow I was alive, with only minor burns on my hands and face.

My hair was singed, and my robes were charred, but my skin was largely intact.

According to every law of physics and medicine, I should have been dead or at least horribly burned over most of my body.

Instead, I was conscious, breathing, and experiencing the most profound sense of God’s presence I had ever felt.

Everyone in the room stood frozen in absolute shock.

My father’s mouth hung open, his face pale with disbelief.

My uncle had fallen to his knees, staring at me like he had witnessed something that challenged everything he thought he knew about reality.

The religious advisers stood speechless, their chanting forgotten as they tried to process what they had just seen.

One of them finally stammered, “This is not possible.

He should be dead.

” The other nodded numbly, unable to form coherent words.

My mother had stopped crying and was staring at me with a mixture of relief and confusion.

Even the palace guards looked shaken, having witnessed something that contradicted their understanding of how the world worked.

I knew in that moment that Jesus Christ was real and he had just saved my life in front of my entire family.

The Jesus I had been reading about in secret.

The Jesus I had been praying to in the darkness of my room had intervened in the most dramatic and undeniable way possible.

He had reached into our palace, into that room filled with hatred and religious fury, and demonstrated his power over fire, over death, and over every force that had tried to destroy me.

Have you ever witnessed something that defied every law of nature you understand? Have you ever experienced a miracle so profound that it changed not just your circumstances but your entire understanding of reality? I can tell you that lying on that marble floor surrounded by the smell of smoke and gasoline, I knew with absolute certainty that I had encountered the living God.

Instead of recognizing what had clearly been divine intervention, my father’s response to the miracle only deepened his rage.

Within minutes of watching me survive what should have been certain death, he began rationalizing what he had witnessed.

“This was dark magic,” he declared to the room.

“This was demonic deception designed to lead our family astray.

” He refused to acknowledge that the god I had chosen to follow had just demonstrated his power in the most undeniable way possible.

The religious advisers quickly rallied to support my father’s interpretation.

They began quoting verses about false signs and wonders, about how Satan could perform miracles to deceive the faithful.

In their minds, the fact that I had survived the fire was not evidence of Jesus Christ’s divinity, but proof that I had been corrupted by evil forces.

They convinced themselves that acknowledging God’s intervention would mean accepting the validity of my faith, something they were absolutely unwilling to do.

Within 6 hours, palace doctors arrived to examine me at my father’s insistence.

They spent over an hour documenting my injuries, taking photographs, and running tests.

Their conclusion was medically baffling.

According to their assessment, I should have suffered thirdderee burns over at least 60% of my body.

The amount of gasoline used and the duration of the fire should have resulted in either death or permanent disfigurement.

Instead, I had minor burns on my hands and face that would heal within weeks without scarring.

The lead doctor, a man who had served our family for over 20 years, privately told my father that he could not explain my condition medically.

He had treated burn victims throughout his career and had never seen anything like this.

A person simply cannot survive that type of fire exposure with such minimal damage.

But rather than consider supernatural intervention, my father chose to interpret the medical mystery as further evidence of dark spiritual forces at work.

My father’s decision was swift and final.

By dawn, less than 12 hours after the fire, he summoned me to his private study and delivered his verdict.

You are dead to this family, he announced with the same cold formality he used in business negotiations.

Your name will be removed from all legal documents, all family records, and all inheritance papers.

As far as this family is concerned, you died in that fire last night.

The practical implications of his decision hit me immediately.

My passport was confiscated, my bank accounts frozen, and my access to all family resources terminated.

The servants were instructed to treat me as a stranger.

My personal belongings were packed into two small suitcases, everything else remaining behind as property of the family I was no longer part of.

I was given 24 hours to leave Saudi Arabia forever with the understanding that any attempt to return would result in my arrest and execution for apostasy.

My mother’s goodbye was the most heartbreaking moment of my entire ordeal.

She came to my room in the early morning hours, bringing me some cash she had hidden from her personal jewelry fund.

She couldn’t speak without crying, but she managed to tell me that she would always love me, even though she could never see me again.

She begged me to reconsider, to renounce this Jesus, and return to the family.

But we both knew that door had been permanently closed.

My sister refused to see me before I left.

The guilt of discovering the Bible had overwhelmed her, and she blamed herself for everything that had happened.

She sent a message through one of the servants saying that she hoped I would find my way back to Islam someday, but she couldn’t bear to say goodbye.

I understood her reaction, but it added another layer of loss to everything else I was leaving behind.

Several loyal palace staff members secretly helped me escape to Jordan.

They risked their own positions and safety to ensure I reached the border without being arrested by religious police.

One of our drivers, a man who had worked for our family for 15 years, drove me to a private airfield where arrangements had been made for my departure.

He told me quietly that he had witnessed miracles before and believed that God had saved me for a reason.

My first night in Ammon, Jordan, was the loneliest of my entire life.

I found myself in a refugee shelter surrounded by people fleeing war, persecution, and poverty.

For the first time in my existence, I understood what it meant to have absolutely nothing.

No family, no money beyond the few hundred dollars my mother had given me, no connections, no prospects, and no identity beyond being a former Saudi prince who had lost everything for following Jesus Christ.

The refugee shelter was a concrete building with dozens of small rooms, each housing multiple families or individuals who had nowhere else to go.

The bathroom facilities were shared, the food was basic, and the noise level was constant as children cried, adults argued, and everyone struggled to create some semblance of privacy in overcrowded conditions.

I had never experienced anything like it, having lived my entire life in luxury and comfort.

But despite the harsh conditions, I felt something I had never experienced before in my palace.

I felt spiritually free.

For the first time in my life, I could pray openly to Jesus Christ.

I could read the Bible without fear of discovery.

I could explore my faith without pretending to be someone I wasn’t.

The physical discomfort and emotional pain of losing everything were overwhelming, but the spiritual liberation was profound.

I spent the next 6 months in various refugee facilities and cheap hotels throughout Ammon trying to process what had happened to me and figured out what to do with the rest of my life.

Some days I questioned whether I had made the right choice.

The cost of following Jesus had been higher than I had ever imagined.

Other days, I would remember the miracle of surviving the fire and know with absolute certainty that I was exactly where God wanted me to be.

During this period, I discovered a small Arabic-speaking Christian church in downtown Ammon.

The pastor was a former Muslim from Iraq who had fled religious persecution in his own country after converting to Christianity.

He understood my situation in ways that others couldn’t, having walked a similar path himself.

He didn’t pressure me to make any immediate decisions about baptism or church membership, but he patiently answered the hundreds of questions I had about following Jesus Christ.

This pastor became my spiritual father during those crucial months.

He helped me understand that what I had experienced wasn’t just a dramatic rescue from physical fire, but a rescue from spiritual death.

He explained that the same Jesus who had saved me from burning alive had also saved me from eternal separation from God.

The miracle I had witnessed was just the beginning of what God wanted to do in my life.

I devoured every Christian book I could find in Arabic, attended multiple church services each week, and spent hours in prayer and Bible study.

The hunger for spiritual truth that had driven me to secretly read the Bible in my palace bedroom had been unleashed completely without the fear of discovery or family pressure.

I could pursue my relationship with Jesus Christ with total freedom.

For three months, I wrestled with the decision of whether to be baptized and formally declare my faith publicly.

I understood that taking this step would make my conversion official and permanent.

There would be no going back, no possibility of reconciliation with my family, no hope of ever returning to my former life.

But I also understood that Jesus Christ had literally saved my life and offered me something my wealth and status had never provided.

Genuine peace, purpose, and eternal security.

The internal struggle was intense because committing fully to Jesus meant accepting that I would never see my mother or sister again.

It meant spending the rest of my life as an exile, cut off from my culture, my language community, and everything familiar.

But it also meant embracing the truth I had discovered about who God really is and what he offers to those who follow him.

What would you be willing to give up to gain everything that truly matters? Would you trade temporary comfort and security for eternal life and genuine peace? These were the questions I faced every day as I sat in that refugee community surrounded by others who had also lost everything but who had found hope in the most unlikely circumstances.

On November 15th, 2019, exactly 3 months after the fire that should have killed me, I made the most important decision of my life.

I chose to be baptized and publicly declared Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior.

The ceremony took place in the Jordan River, the same waters where Jesus himself had been baptized 2,000 years earlier.

Standing waist deep in that historic river, surrounded by a small congregation of Arab Christians, who had become my new family, I felt the weight of my old identity finally lifting from my shoulders.

As the pastor lowered me beneath the surface of the water, I felt like the old Prince Rswan was dying and a completely new creation was emerging.

The water was surprisingly cold.

But as I went under, I experienced the same supernatural peace I had felt the night Jesus saved me from the fire.

When I came up gasping for air, water streaming down my face, I knew beyond any doubt that I was no longer just a former Saudi prince trying to figure out his faith.

I was a son of the King of Kings with an inheritance that could never be taken away by any earthly authority.

The peace I had been searching for my entire life through Islamic prayers, religious rituals, and spiritual disciplines finally filled the emptiness in my soul completely.

It wasn’t a temporary emotional high or a psychological response to trauma.

It was the deep lasting peace that comes from knowing you are exactly where God wants you to be, doing exactly what he has called you to do.

For the first time in my existence, I felt spiritually whole and complete.

After my baptism, several Christian organizations reached out to help me establish a new life.

Word had spread through refugee and missionary networks about the Saudi prince who had been set on fire for his faith and miraculously survived.

Within weeks, I was connected with an international ministry that specialized in helping Muslim converts who faced persecution for following Jesus Christ.

They offered me not just financial support, but a genuine purpose and calling.

Today, I work full-time with this ministry, traveling throughout the Middle East, North Africa, and refugee communities around the world.

My primary responsibility is sharing my testimony with Muslims who are questioning their faith or who have secretly begun following Jesus but are afraid of the consequences.

Every week I meet people who are facing the exact same choice I faced in my bedroom that August night.

Jesus or family, faith or fortune, truth or comfort.

My work takes me to refugee camps where I counsel Syrian, Iraqi, and Afghan families who have lost everything to war and persecution.

Many of these refugees include secret Christians who converted from Islam and had to flee their home countries.

I share my story with them, showing them the scars on my hands from the fire and explaining how God can use even the most traumatic experiences for his purposes.

When they see that a Saudi prince was willing to lose everything for Jesus, it gives them hope that their own sacrifices have meaning.

I also speak at underground house churches throughout the region, places where converted Muslims gather secretly to worship Jesus Christ.

These meetings are dangerous for everyone involved.

In many countries, converting from Islam to Christianity is punishable by death, and helping Muslim converts is considered treason against both religion and state.

But these brave believers risk everything to gather together, study the Bible, and encourage each other in their faith.

The transformation in my life has been complete and permanent.

I lost my family, my country, my fortune, my title, and my old identity.

But what I gained is infinitely more valuable.

I have a personal relationship with the living God, the assurance of eternal life, genuine peace that surpasses understanding, and a purpose that gives meaning to every day.

I wouldn’t trade my current life for all the palaces in Saudi Arabia.

Every morning when I wake up in my simple apartment in Aman, I look at the small scars on my hands and remember what Jesus did for me that night.

Those marks aren’t just reminders of trauma or loss.

They’re daily evidence of God’s power, love, and faithfulness.

They remind me that the God I serve is not distant or unknowable, but personally involved in the lives of his children.

When I was burning alive, he heard my prayer and responded with a miracle that defied every law of nature.

My ministry has expanded beyond just counseling individual converts.

I now work with legal organizations that help persecuted Christians navigate immigration processes and asylum claims.

Many Muslim converts face years of legal battles to find safe countries where they can practice their faith openly.

I use my education and background to help them prepare their cases, document their persecution, and find legal representation.

It’s deeply satisfying to use the privileges of my former life to serve people who have made the same costly choice I made.

The hardest part of my new life isn’t the financial struggle or the physical danger of my work.

It’s the permanent separation from my family.

I haven’t spoken to my mother or sister since the day I left Saudi Arabia.

I don’t know if my mother is healthy, if my sister has married, or even if they think about me.

Through various networks, I’ve learned that my father tells people I died in a tragic accident, which is perhaps easier for him than admitting his son chose Christianity over Islam.

Sometimes I dream about my family, especially my mother.

In these dreams, she understands why I made my choice and welcomes me back with tears of joy.

But I always wake up to the reality that those reconciliation dreams will never come true in this life.

The cost of following Jesus has been everything I held dear in my previous existence.

Yet, I can honestly say that every sacrifice has been worth it for the relationship I now have with God.

I want you to ask yourself the same question that businessmen in London asked me years ago.

Is there more to God than what you’ve been taught? Have you ever experienced the personal intimate relationship with your creator that he desires to have with you? Jesus Christ isn’t just a historical figure or a religious teacher.

He’s the son of God who died for your sins and rose again to offer you eternal life.

If he can save a Saudi prince from fire and transform his entire existence, he can do the same for you.

The question isn’t whether Jesus is real or whether he has the power to save you.

He proved both of those things in my bedroom on August 23rd, 2019.

The question is whether you’re willing to surrender your life to him, regardless of what it might cost you.

Are you willing to trade everything temporary for everything eternal? The choice I made cost me my earthly family, but it gained me a heavenly father.

It cost me material wealth, but it gained me spiritual riches.

It cost me worldly status, but it gained me the identity of being God’s child.

Most importantly, it cost me a religion of empty rituals, but it gained me a relationship with the living Christ, who loves me personally and eternally.

Let me pray for anyone listening who wants to know this Jesus I’m telling you about.

He’s waiting for you right now just as he was waiting for me in that palace.

He’s ready to save you, transform you, and give you a purpose that will last for eternity.

This is my testimony.

This is my truth.

This is what Jesus Christ will do for anyone who calls on his name with a sincere