My name is Prince Abdullah.

I’m 24 years old.

And on March 15th, 2018, my life changed forever.

That was the night I was supposed to marry my own sister in a forced Islamic ceremony instead.

Jesus Christ saved my soul and shattered every chain that bound me.

But here’s what most people don’t know about that night.

It wasn’t just a miracle.

It was the result of three specific things.

I did at 2:30 in the morning that opened heaven itself.

I stand before you today as a former member of the Saudi royal family speaking from exile because what happened in those desperate moments can happen for anyone trapped by impossible circumstances.

Ask yourself this question.

What would you sacrifice to escape a fate worse than death? And more importantly, what would you do if you discovered that your most desperate prayer could become your greatest breakthrough? Because that’s exactly what happened to me.

I was born in Riyad in 1996 into a world that most people can only imagine.

Golden marble floors stretched endlessly through our palace.

Servants attended to my every need before I even knew I had needs.

My father, Prince Khaled, commanded respect from world leaders and controlled oil revenues that could fund entire countries to the outside world.

I lived in paradise.

But let me tell you something that will change how you see your own family struggles.

Luxury became my prison and wealth became the bars that kept me trapped.

Because here, as what I learned, it does matter if your parents control oil money or just your college fund.

It doesn’t matter if you live in a palace or a small apartment.

When the people who should love you most become your prison guards, the pain feels exactly the same.

From our earliest memories, Amamira and I created our own universe within those walls, playing games in empty ballrooms and racing through corridors that seemed to stretch forever.

While other children played in neighborhoods and attended schools, we lived behind walls that were 20 ft high and guarded by men with automatic weapons.

Private tutors came to us.

The world never came to us.

Amira arrived 2 years after me in 1998.

From our earliest memories, we were inseparable companions in that vast echoing palace.

We had no friends outside the family, no classmates, no normal childhood experiences.

Father was a strict adherent to Wahhabi Islam, the most conservative interpretation of the faith.

Every morning at dawn, his voice would boom through the palace speakers, calling us to fasure prayer.

The sound would echo through marble hallways and wake every person in the compound.

I learned to recite Quranic verses before I could properly read Arabic.

By age seven, I was performing all five daily prayers without question.

The ritual became as automatic as breathing.

But even as a child, something felt hollow about the repetitive motions and memorized words.

I would kneel on my prayer rug, facing Mecca, going through the motions, but my heart felt empty.

To the outside world, I lived in paradise.

Golden marble floors stretched endlessly through our palace.

Servants attended to my every need before I even knew I had needs.

My father, Prince Khaled, commanded respect from world leaders and controlled oil revenues that could fund entire countries.

But luxury became my prison, and wealth became the bars that kept me trapped.

The same walls that protected us from the outside world also prevented us from ever experiencing real freedom.

We were prisoners in a golden cage, and we didn’t even know it.

Our religious training went far beyond normal Islamic education.

father hired private clerics who taught us about family honor, bloodline purity, and the absolute authority of the patriarch.

These men would arrive in black robes, carrying themselves with an heir of divine authority.

They spoke about women as possessions to be protected and controlled.

They taught that a woman’s highest purpose was serving her husband and producing sons.

They preached that questioning family decisions was questioning Allah himself.

Every lesson emphasized submission, obedience, and the sacred duty of preserving our royal bloodline.

I memorized these teachings perfectly, sitting cross-legged on cushions in our private study room, reciting verses until my throat was dry.

But they left my heart feeling empty and confused.

The god they described seemed cruel and controlling.

Nothing like the loving creator I sometimes sensed during quiet moments.

The strange conversations started when I was around 10 years old.

Father would meet with his brothers in his private office and their voices would carry through the ventilation system into my room.

I would lie in bed straining to understand their hushed discussions.

They spoke about keeping bloodlines strong and maintaining family purity.

They discussed arrangements and traditions that I didn’t understand.

Sometimes they mentioned a mirror and me in the same breath, speaking our names with a reverence that made my skin crawl.

Children are reaching the right age.

I heard one uncle say, “The bloodline must remain pure for the next generation.

” Their words were coated in language that made no sense to my young mind, but deep in my stomach.

Something twisted with unease.

mother was a ghost in our palace.

She moved silently through the halls, beautiful but always sad.

Like a flower that had been cut from its roots.

I often caught her crying in her private sitting room, staring out windows at gardens, she was forbidden to walk through alone.

Her tears would fall onto silk cushions while she watched birds fly freely outside.

When I asked why she cried, she would quickly wipe her tears with trembling hands and tell me they were tears of joy for Allah’s blessings.

But even as a child, I knew the difference between happy tears and the tears of a caged bird.

The servants whispered when they thought we couldn’t hear them.

They spoke in Arabic dialects from their home countries, thinking we wouldn’t understand their conversations.

But I was a curious child, and I learned to pick up fragments of their worried discussions.

They called us the chosen ones, and spoke about the arrangement with pity in their voices.

Their expressions would change when they looked at a mirror and me playing together.

Instead of the joy adults usually showed when watching children, their faces held a sadness that I couldn’t comprehend.

Those poor children, I heard our housekeeper whisper to the cook one afternoon.

They have no idea what’s being planned for them when they looked at a mirror and me playing together, building castles with our blocks.

Their expressions held a sadness that pierced straight through my innocent heart.

During my teenage years, father granted me limited internet access for educational purposes.

That small window to the outside world changed everything.

I discovered that normal families didn’t live like ours.

brothers and sisters in other royal families, married outside their immediate bloodlines.

They attended universities with other students.

They had friends who weren’t servants or tutors.

They lived in the same world we did, but somehow their lives looked completely different.

They smiled in photos with people their own age, traveled to different countries, experienced life beyond palace walls.

I began noticing how we were kept separate from our extended royal cousins.

During rare family gatherings, other princes our age would arrive with friends or even girlfriends.

They would laugh and tell stories about their adventures.

Amira and I always arrived together and left together like a matched set asterisk asterisk.

The adults would watch us with knowing expressions that made my skin crawl.

Their eyes would follow us wherever we went, studying our interactions with an intensity that felt suffocating.

It was like being specimens in a laboratory.

By age 16, Amamira’s natural cheerfulness began fading into anxiety and depression.

The sister who used to dance through our ballrooms now moved like she was carrying invisible chains.

She stopped laughing at my jokes and spent hours staring silently out her bedroom window.

When I asked what was wrong, she would just shake her head and say she had strange feelings about our future.

Something bad is coming, Abdullah.

she would whisper.

She had nightmares that she couldn’t explain and panic attacks that seemed to come from nowhere.

I tried to comfort her, but deep down I felt the same creeping dread.

Whatever our family was planning for us, whatever arrangement the servants whispered about, it was getting closer.

And as I watched my sister fade away like a flower dying in darkness, I began to understand that our childhood was ending.

That growing sense of doom pushed me deeper into questioning everything I had been taught.

The Islamic teachings about women and marriage started disturbing me deeply.

The clerics spoke about wives as property and described marriage as a transaction between men.

They taught that a woman’s highest purpose was serving her husband and producing sons.

When they looked at a mirror during these lessons, something in their expressions made me want to protect her from their words.

But there was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide from the suffocating weight of tradition that was slowly crushing my spirit.

That feeling of being trapped by the very people supposed to protect me started growing around age 18.

I performed all the Islamic rituals perfectly, but my heart felt increasingly distant from Allah.

The prayers became mechanical recitations.

The Quranic verses felt like chains around my mind rather than sources of comfort.

I was desperately searching for something real in a world that felt completely artificial.

The guards wore expensive robes and spoke about honor, but I could sense they were planning something that filled me with growing dread.

Something was coming, something that would shatter the last pieces of innocence I had left.

I had no idea that January 15th would be the day everything became horrifyingly clear.

January 15th, 2017 changed everything.

I remember the date because it was the day my childhood officially died.

The day my worst fears became my living nightmare.

Father summoned me to his private office after Maghra prayer.

The evening call to worship that usually brought our family together for dinner.

But tonight would be different.

Tonight the secret that had been growing in the shadows for years would finally be revealed.

Instead of joining the others, I walked down that long marble corridor toward his heavy wooden doors.

My footsteps echoing in the silence like funeral drums.

Each step felt heavier than the last, as if I was walking toward my own execution.

His office was a monument to power and tradition.

Persian carpets worth millions covered the floor, each thread woven with the blood and sweat of generations.

Gold-framed portraits of Saudi kings lined the walls, their eyes seeming to watch my every movement, judging me, weighing my worthiness.

The massive desk where he conducted business with oil ministers and foreign diplomats dominated the room like a throne.

Behind it sat my father, like a judge, preparing to deliver a verdict.

His traditional white th was immaculate, his beard perfectly groomed, his eyes cold and calculating as winter wind.

Abdullah, he said without any warmth in his voice.

The name that should have carried love carried only duty.

You are 21 years old now.

It is time for you to fulfill your destiny and honor your family.

I stood before him like a soldier awaiting orders.

My hands clasped behind my back in the respectful posture he had demanded since childhood.

My heart was racing, but I forced my breathing to remain steady.

Whatever was coming, I would face it with dignity.

I expected him to announce my engagement to some distant royal cousin or wealthy merchant’s daughter.

Arranged marriages were normal in our world, a business transaction disguised as love.

I had mentally prepared myself for that possibility.

Perhaps Princess Norah from the al-Rashid family or one of the oil minister’s daughters I had met at formal gatherings.

You will marry Amira in 18 months,” he said.

The words hit me like a physical blow to the stomach, stealing all the air from my lungs.

I actually laughed out loud because my brain refused to process what he had said.

It was so impossible, so completely insane that laughter seemed like the only rational response.

Surely, this was some kind of test, some cruel joke to measure my loyalty.

Father, I don’t understand.

Did you say Amira? My sister Amira.

My voice sounded strange in my own ears, like it was coming from someone else’s throat.

His expression didn’t change.

There was no hint of emotion, no acknowledgement of how devastating his words were.

Yes, your sister.

This marriage will preserve our bloodline and ensure that our family’s wealth remains concentrated within our direct lineage.

He spoke about my sister like she was livestock being bred for superior genetics, like she was a prize mayor and I was the stallion chosen to continue the bloodline.

The casual cruelty in his voice made my stomach turn.

It is a tradition that goes back generations in the purest royal families.

Your greatgrandfather married his halfsister.

Their union produced the strongest leaders in our family history.

You should be honored to continue this sacred tradition.

The room started spinning around me.

I gripped the back of the leather chair in front of his desk to keep from falling to the floor.

My legs felt like they were made of water, unable to support the weight of this revelation.

Father, you cannot be serious.

She is my sister.

This is against Islamic law.

This is against nature itself.

The words tumbled out of my mouth in desperation, hoping to find some crack in his resolve, some hint of the father who had once loved me.

Do not lecture me about Islamic law.

Boy, his voice turned dangerous like a blade being unshathed in the darkness.

I have consulted with the most respected clerics in exceptional circumstances to preserve royal bloodlines.

Such arrangements are permissible.

The prophet himself married within his family to strengthen tribal alliances.

I felt like I was drowning in a nightmare that had no end.

The man I had respected and obeyed my entire life was revealing himself to be a monster wearing my father s face.

The religion I had practiced faithfully for 14 years was being twisted to justify something that made my soul scream in horror.

But this was only the beginning.

What came next would break whatever was left of my spirit.

What came next was even more devastating than the revelation itself.

The decision is made, he said with the finality of a death sentence.

You will marry Amamira on March 15th, 2018.

The ceremony will be private, conducted by our family clerics.

You will produce sons to continue our pure lineage.

This is your duty as my heir and as a faithful Muslim.

March 15th.

The date burned itself into my mind like a brand.

Less than 14 months away.

14 months until my life would end and something unnatural would begin.

I stumbled out of his office in complete shock.

My world crashing down around me like a building in an earthquake.

The palace hallways that had been my entire world suddenly felt like the corridors of a tomb.

Every marble pillar, every golden decoration, every priceless artifact now seemed like grave markers in a cemetery of my dreams.

Every servant, every guard, every family member I passed seemed to be part of a conspiracy that had been growing around me for 21 years.

Their polite smiles now looked sinister.

Their respectful boughs felt like mockery.

How long had they known? How long had they been watching me grow up, knowing what I was being prepared for? The cook who had made my favorite meals.

Did she know? The guard who had taught me to play chess.

Was he in on it? The tutor who had praised my intelligence.

Had he been preparing me for this moment all along? asterisk.

I was not a son or a prince.

I was a breeding animal being prepared for a task that horrified every fiber of my being.

The golden chains around my wrists had always been there.

I was just now feeling their weight for the first time.

Finding a mirror that night was the hardest thing I had ever done.

My feet felt like lead as I walked toward her sitting room, each step taking an eternity.

She was curled up on her favorite cushions, reading a romance novel about normal people who fell in love and married by choice.

The irony was so cruel it made my heart ache.

When I told her what father had announced, she didn’t laugh like I had.

She just stared at me with growing horror.

the color draining from her beautiful face until she looked like a ghost haunting her own life.

The book slipped from her trembling fingers and fell to the floor with a soft thud that sounded like thunder in the silence.

“Knew it,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.

“Deep down, I always knew.

The way the adults looked at us.

The way we were never allowed to form relationships outside the family.

The way they kept us so isolated.

The way they talked about us like we were precious treasures that needed to be preserved.

Asterisk asterisk.

Then she broke down completely, sobbing with a desperation that broke my heart into a million pieces.

Her whole body shook with the force of her tears.

We held each other and cried that night.

But not as future husband and wife.

We cried as brother and sister facing the destruction of everything pure and good in our relationship.

She kept repeating through her sobs.

We’re not children anymore.

Abdullah were sacrifices were sacrifices on the altar of family tradition.

Her words echoed in my mind like a curse that would never be broken.

The next months became psychological torture designed to break our spirits completely.

father began involving me in wedding preparations like I was an eager groom instead of a condemned prisoner walking toward his execution.

He would call me to his office and show me architectural plans for the private ceremony hall being constructed in our compound.

He discussed honeymoon arrangements to a secluded palace in the desert where no one would hear us scream.

He spoke about the genetic advantages our children would have because of their concentrated royal blood as if we were prize horses being bred for racing.

Sleep became impossible.

I would lie in bed staring at the ceiling.

My mind racing through escape scenarios that all seemed hopeless.

Run away.

Where could a Saudi prince hide? Fight back against what army of tradition and law.

Kill myself.

That would only leave Amir to face this alone.

The palace walls that had protected me as a child now felt like prison walls built to keep me trapped forever.

The guards who had kept threats out were now keeping me in.

Every exit was watched.

Every movement monitored.

I lost 30 lb because food tasted like ash in my mouth.

Every meal felt like my last meal before an execution.

Amamira’s depression deepened every day until she became a walking shadow of her former self.

Drifting through the palace like a ghost, preparing for her own funeral.

In my desperation, I turned to the only place I had left, my prayers.

But even Allah seemed to have abandoned me in my darkest hour.

The physical torture was nothing compared to the spiritual crisis that followed.

Isk asterisk December 2017 brought the darkest spiritual crisis of my life.

I had performed Islamic prayers faithfully for 14 years prostrating myself toward Mecca five times each day without fail.

But suddenly the words felt like stones in my mouth, heavy and lifeless.

When I knelt on my prayer rug during FJR prayer at dawn, instead of finding the peace I had been taught to expect, I found myself crying out in desperation to a god who seemed increasingly distant and silent.

The palace was still and quiet during those early morning hours, but my heart was screaming with anguish.

Asterisk asterisk if Allah truly loves me.

I whispered into the silk fibers of my prayer rug.

Why would he demand this abomination from me? The questions that had been growing in my mind for months became impossible to ignore.

Everything I had been taught about God s love and mercy seemed like lies designed to keep me obedient and compliant.

The Islamic teachings about family honor and submission to parental authority felt like chains around my soul.

I had memorized verses about obeying your parents, about trusting Allah’s plan even when you couldn’t understand it.

But how could this be Allah’s plan? How could a loving God demand something so twisted and unnatural? My Islamic prayers transformed from worship into desperate bargaining sessions with a God who seemed to have abandoned me to my fate.

Please Allah, show me another way.

I would plead during my midnight prayers.

Tears soaking into the carpet beneath my knees.

Give father a different vision.

Send him a dream that changes his mind.

Let me serve you in some other manner that doesn’t destroy my sister and me.

But the ceiling of my room remained silent.

The ornate golden patterns seemed to mock my desperation.

March 15th kept approaching like an unstoppable train heading toward a cliff and I was tied to the tracks with no hope of rescue during Maghra prayer as the sun set over the desert and painted the sky blood red like a warning.

I would prostrate myself and feel nothing but emptiness where Allah’s presence should have been.

The God I had served faithfully since childhood had become a stranger.

Or perhaps I was finally seeing his true nature.

Cold, demanding, merciless, did you create me only to destroy me? I whispered into the gathering darkness.

But there was no answer.

Only the sound of my own broken breathing and the distant call of desert winds against the palace walls like the voices of the dam calling my name.

It was in this state of complete spiritual bankruptcy that I would stumble upon something that would change everything.

When Allah’s silence became unbearable, I decided to find my own answers.

The breaking point came on a sleepless night in January 2018.

I was researching Islamic marriage laws on my computer, desperately searching for some religious precedent that might free me from this nightmare.

My eyes burnt from staring at the screen for hours, reading through scholarly debates and legal interpretations.

I typed Islamic law sibling marriage forbidden into the search engine, hoping against hope to find scholarly opinions that father might be forced to respect.

Instead, one of the search results took me to a Christian website that was discussing biblical views on family relationships.

I should have closed that browser window immediately.

In Saudi Arabia, accessing Christian content could be considered apostasy, punishable by death.

My heart started racing as I stared at the forbidden page, knowing that this single click could cost me my life.

But something about the header stopped me cold.

It said, “Jesus loves you unconditionally.

Not Jesus demands your obedience or Jesus requires your sacrifice or Jesus will punish you if you fail.

” Just simple unconditional love.

I had never heard God described that way in 21 years of Islamic teaching.

love without conditions, without fear, without the constant threat of punishment hanging over your head.

I spent the next hour reading testimonies from people who claimed Jesus had rescued them from impossible situations.

Their stories were nothing like the formal ritualistic language I was accustomed to in Islamic texts.

These people wrote about Jesus as if he was their friend, their protector, their loving father who actually cared about their happiness and well-being.

It was like seeing color after a lifetime of black and white, like hearing music after a lifetime of silence, like feeling warmth after a lifetime of cold.

One testimony was from a woman who had escaped an arranged marriage that would have destroyed her.

She wrote about praying to Jesus and finding a way out that seemed impossible.

Another was from a man whose family had disowned him for his faith.

He described a prayer where he surrendered everything to Jesus, his family, his inheritance, his very life, and how that surrender had led to a supernatural breakthrough.

Be real, I whispered to my empty room.

For the first time in months, a tiny spark of hope flickered in the darkness of my despair.

Could there really be a God who loved without conditions? Could there be a way out of this nightmare? That tiny spark was about to become a flame that would consume everything I thought I knew about God.

Hope is a dangerous thing for a desperate man.

Once it takes root, it demands to be fed.

The next night, I downloaded a Bible app under a fake name, my hands trembling as I typed in false information.

If anyone discovered this on my phone, it would mean certain death.

But I was already dying inside.

What was one more risk? I began reading the Gospel of Matthew and Jesus swwords jumped off the screen with a power that Quranic verses had never held for me.

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.

I was definitely weary.

I was definitely burdened.

Could this Jesus really offer rest to someone in my impossible situation? Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart.

Gentle and humble.

These were not qualities I associated with the demanding fearinducing Allah of my upbringing.

This Jesus spoke like someone who understood pain, who had experienced suffering himself.

I became obsessed with the stories of Jesus defending women and children from religious leaders who wanted to use them for their own purposes.

When the Pharisees brought him the woman caught in adultery, he protected her instead of condemning her.

When people tried to prevent children from approaching him, he welcomed them with open arms.

This Jesus seemed to oppose exactly the kind of religious manipulation that was destroying my life.

He fought against traditions that hurt people.

He stood up to religious authorities who used God’s name to justify cruelty.

He protected the vulnerable from those who would exploit them.

Reading the gospels late at night under my covers.

Using my phone’s dimst setting to avoid detection became my secret refuge from the nightmare my life had become.

Jesus’s words about setting captives free resonated in my soul like nothing ever had before.

Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind to set the oppressed free.

I was definitely oppressed.

I was definitely a prisoner.

I was definitely in need of freedom.

But the internal war was brutal.

21 years of Islamic indoctrination fought against every page I read.

The voice of my father, my clerics, my entire culture, screamed that I was committing the ultimate betrayal by even considering Christianity.

There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet echoed in my mind like a warning siren.

The penalty for apostasy in Saudi Arabia was death and I was dancing on the edge of treason against everything I had been taught to revere.

Yet something deeper than fear was stirring in my heart.

When I read Jesus’s words, I felt a presence that was completely different from anything I had experienced during Islamic prayer.

Instead of fear and obligation, I sensed warmth, acceptance, and genuine love.

It was as if someone was actually listening to my thoughts and caring about my pain.

February 2018 became a month of secret spiritual exploration.

I started praying to Jesus tentatively, afraid that Allah might strike me down for approaching a different God.

But instead of judgment, I felt something I had never experienced in my Islamic prayers.

Peace.

I began to understand that prayer wasn’t just about reciting memorized verses.

It could be a conversation, a desperate plea, a complete surrender of everything you couldn’t control.

The testimonies I had read spoke of three things that seemed to unlock God’s power.

Complete surrender, specific honesty about your situation and staying open to unexpected answers.

As March 15th approached like a death sentence, I realized I would need more than just reading about Jesus.

I would need to experience his power for myself.

But I had no idea that my desperate prayer in the early morning hours would change not just my situation, but my entire understanding of who God really was.

But reading about God’s love and experiencing his power are two very different things.

Asterisk asterisk February 2018 became a battlefield inside my soul.

Every night I would read Jesus’s words and feel hope rising in my chest like dawn breaking over the desert.

But every morning I would wake up to the same nightmare.

March 15th, circled on my calendar in red ink, counting down like a bomb.

The internal war was more vicious than any physical torture could have been.

On one side stood 21 years of Islamic indoctrination.

The voice of my father, the teachings of clerics who had shaped my mind since childhood.

They scream that I was committing the ultimate betrayal by even considering Christianity.

There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet echoed in my mind like a warning siren every time I opened the Bible app.

The penalty for apostasy in Saudi Arabia was death not just legal death but eternal damnation according to everything I had been taught to believe.

Risk on the other side whispered this Jesus who spoke of love without conditions, of freedom for prisoners, of hope for the hopeless.

But could I trust these whispers against the thunderous roar of tradition that had controlled my life? The clerics had warned us about Christian deception.

They will tell you sweet lies, they had said.

They will promise you freedom while leading you to hell.

Every verse I read, every prayer I whispered to Jesus felt like stepping closer to an eternal cliff.

But what was eternal damnation compared to the living hell I was already trapped in? What was the threat of future punishment compared to the certain destruction awaiting me in 30 days? I started testing this Jesus in small ways.

Instead of my ritual Islamic prayers, I would whisper desperate please to him in the darkness of my room.

If you’re real, show me a sign.

If you love me like your book says, “Give me strength.

” If you can set prisoners free, then prove it.

asterisk.

Sometimes I felt something, a warmth, a presence, a peace that had nothing to do with my circumstances.

But was it real, or was I just desperately imagining what I needed to feel? The battle raged every moment of every day.

Tradition and terror on one side, hope and love on the other.

But as March 15th drew closer, I realized that hoping wasn’t enough.

Reading wasn’t enough.

If I wanted to escape this nightmare, I would need to surrender everything to this Jesus and trust him with my very life.

That moment of complete surrender was coming sooner than I knew.

March 14th, 2018 was supposed to be my last night as a single man.

Instead, it became my last night as a Muslim.

The palace buzzed with final wedding preparations that felt more like funeral arrangements to me.

Servants hung white silk drapes throughout the ceremonial hall, their movements efficient and practiced as if they had done this many times before.

The family clerics arrived to perform the Islamic na ceremony that would legally bind me to my own sister.

Flowers were arranged in patterns that spelled out our names in Arabic calligraphy.

Everything was beautiful and everything was wrong.

The irony was suffocating.

They were decorating the tomb of my soul with exquisite care.

I couldn’t eat the elaborate dinner father had ordered from the finest restaurant in Riyad.

The lamb tasted like cardboard in my mouth, each bite requiring tremendous effort to swallow.

The saffron rice felt like sand grinding between my teeth.

My stomach had closed itself off, refusing to accept nourishment for tomorrow’s abomination.

Drisk Amira sat across from me at the formal dining table, her face pale as winter snow, her hands shaking so badly she couldn’t hold her water glass steady.

We exchanged glances that communicated volumes of shared horror, but neither of us spoke.

What words could possibly capture the nightmare we were about to enter? Father presided over the meal like a king celebrating a great victory.

He spoke about family honor, about the strength our union would bring to the royal bloodline, about the grandchildren who would carry on our pure heritage.

Every word felt like another nail in our coffins.

After dinner, I retreated to my room and tried to sleep, but rest was impossible.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw images of tomorrow’s ceremony.

Father leading a mirror to me like a lamb to slaughter.

the cleric reading Quranic verses about marriage.

While my soul screamed in protest, Amamira sed tears as she was forced to speak vows that would destroy everything pure about our relationship as siblings.

The nightmare played on repeat in my mind until I felt like I was losing my sanity.

I paced my room like a caged animal wearing a path in the Persian carpet.

The marble floors that had once seemed luxurious now felt like prison stones beneath my bare feet.

Through my window, I could see the lights of Riad stretching to the horizon.

Millions of people living normal lives, sleeping peacefully in their beds.

While I prepared for an act that would haunt me forever at midnight, the palace had fallen completely silent.

Even the guards had settled into their nighttime routines.

Amir s muffled crying drifted through the walls from her adjacent room.

The sound of a broken heart that matched my own.

I could hear her moving restlessly, probably experiencing the same sleepless torment that was consuming me.

Tomorrow would destroy both of us, and there seemed to be absolutely nothing either of us could do to stop it.

Every escape plan I had considered seemed hopeless.

Run away.

Father’s connections reached across the globe.

fight back against what army of tradition, law, and religious authority? I was drowning in despair, suffocating under the weight of tradition and family honor, and religious obligation.

The God I had been praying to for weeks seemed as distant as the stars outside my window.

By 2:00 a.

m.

, I had reached the absolute end of my rope.

This was it.

The moment when everything I had read about Jesus would either prove real or prove to be just another beautiful lie.

I was about to discover if desperate prayer could really unlock the supernatural.

What happened next changed everything I thought I knew about God.

Prayer and the supernatural asterisk asterisk.

At 2:30 in the morning, I fell to my knees in complete desperation.

But instead of facing toward Mecca, as I had been trained since childhood, I looked up toward the ceiling and cried out to Jesus with every fiber of my being.

Discuses, if you’re real, if you truly love me, like your book says, “Save us.

” The words came from a place deeper than my mind, deeper than my training, deeper than my fear.

I surrender everything to you.

I don’t know how to pray to you properly, but I’m begging you to help us.

I poured out 21 years of pain and confusion in that prayer.

I told Jesus about the emptiness I had felt during Islamic worship, about the questions that had tormented me for months, about my growing certainty that the God who created love would never demand its destruction.

I wept as I confessed my secret reading of the Bible and my growing belief that Jesus was the true king I had been searching for my entire life.

I’ll give up everything, I whispered through my tears.

My family, my inheritance, my very life.

Just please don’t let this happen to Amira and me.

Then I prayed the three things that the testimonies had taught me.

Complete surrender, specific honesty about my impossible situation and staying open to whatever answer might come.

The room began to change.

Around 2:30 a.

m.

, a warm light started filling the space, but it wasn’t coming from my lamps or from the moonlight streaming through the windows.

It seemed to emanate from everywhere at once, gentle and golden, and completely supernatural.

The temperature shifted from the cool desert night to something that felt like a perfect spring morning.

The very air seemed to shimmer with a presence that made my heart race with recognition rather than fear.

Then Jesus appeared not as the distant prophet Esau that Islamic teaching had described, but as the living savior I had been reading about in the Gospels.

His presence filled the room with love so powerful that I understood immediately why people throughout history had been willing to die for him.

His eyes held all the compassion I had been desperately seeking.

All the understanding I had never found in Islamic prayer.

All the acceptance my soul had been craving.

Looking at him was like looking at love itself, he said.

And his voice was like water to a man dying of thirst.

I have not created you for this bondage.

You were made for freedom, made to love and be loved in the way I designed from the beginning.

I wanted to speak, but words seemed inadequate in his presence.

He continued, I have come to set the captives free, and you are my captive now.

The chains that your family has placed on you have no power over my love for you.

The overwhelming sensation was one of coming home after being lost for 21 years.

Every Islamic prayer I had ever recited.

Every verse I had ever memorized.

Every ritual I had ever performed had been searching for this moment of connection with the true God.

Jesus was not demanding my submission through fear and obligation.

He was offering me relationship through love and sacrifice.

This was not the cold, distant Allah of my upbringing, but the loving father my heart had always longed for.

What about tomorrow? I managed to whisper.

How can I escape something that has been planned for so long? Trust me completely, Jesus replied.

I will provide a way where there seems to be no way.

I will give you courage where you have only known fear.

I will turn this night of despair into the first day of your real life.

The vision continued for what felt like hours, but probably lasted only minutes.

Jesus showed me that true worship was not about ritual and tradition, but about relationship and love.

He revealed that my growing revulsion toward the forced marriage was actually his spirit within me.

Recognizing the perversion of his design for families, he promised that following him would cost me everything I had known, but would give me everything I truly needed.

When the vision ended, I was still kneeling on my bedroom floor.

But everything had changed.

asterisk asterisk The supernatural peace that filled my heart was stronger than 21 years of fear and conditioning.

I knew with absolute certainty that I belonged to Jesus Christ now that I was born again in that moment.

That the old Abdullah who had lived in bondage to Islamic law was dead and buried.

I stood up from that prayer as a completely different person ready to face whatever consequences came from choosing Jesus over family tradition.

Ready to trust the God who had just revealed himself as my true father and king.

March 15th, 2018 arrived with all the pageantry of a royal celebration and all the dread of an execution day.

But I was no longer the same person who had gone to sleep the night before.

I woke at dawn not to perform the Islamic FJR prayer as I had for 14 years, but to kneel beside my bed and talk to Jesus like he was sitting right there with me.

The supernatural peace from the night before remained with me like armor, protecting my heart from the fear that should have been consuming me, I whispered.

Today I choose you over everything else.

Give me the courage to do what’s right, no matter the cost.

As I prayed, I could hear the palace coming alive around me.

Servants preparing the ceremonial hall.

Cooks preparing the wedding feast.

guards receiving special security instructions for the private ceremony.

Everyone was playing their part in a tradition that I was about to shatter completely.

But instead of terror, I felt a calm certainty that had nothing to do with my circumstances and everything to do with the presence of Christ within me.

At 10:00 a.

m.

, Father summoned me to his office for what he called final preparations.

I walked down that familiar marble corridor with Jesus-given courage flowing through my veins, knowing that this conversation would change everything forever.

The same man sat behind the same massive desk wearing his most formal white though reviewing documents with our family lawyer, marriage contracts, financial arrangements, plans for the honeymoon suite that had been prepared in our desert palace, all the legal machinery of a union that would never happen.

But he was no longer the all powerful father figure who had controlled my life.

In the light of my encounter with Jesus, he looked smaller, more desperate, clinging to traditions that were crumbling beneath the weight of their own cruelty.

Kabula, he said without looking up from his papers.

The ceremony begins at 2 p.

m.

The clerics are here.

The contracts are ready.

Your bride is being prepared.

Are you ready to fulfill your destiny and honor your family? I stood before him.

one final time as his son, drawing strength from the memory of Jesus’s presence the night before.

The words came from a place deeper than fear, deeper than tradition, deeper than the 21 years of conditioning that had shaped my obedience.

I said with a steadiness that surprised even me, “I will not marry a mirror.

I cannot and will not participate in this ceremony,” his head snapped up from the documents, his eyes flashing with immediate anger.

The mask of paternal authority slipped, revealing the tyrant beneath.

“What did you say?” said, “I will not marry my sister.

What you are asking me to do is against God’s design for families.

It is wrong and I will not be part of it.

” The words came out with a conviction I had never possessed before my encounter with Christ.

Father’s face turned red with rage.

He stood up so violently that his chair rolled backward into the wall behind him.

21 years of absolute obedience had not prepared him for this moment of resistance.

You ungrateful, disobedient boy, do you think you can humiliate me on the day of the ceremony? Do you think you can destroy months of preparation because of some childish rebellion? Is not rebellion, father.

This is obedience to the true God who created families for love, not for the kind of arrangement you have planned.

I had never spoken to him with such boldness in my entire life.

But Jesus’s strength was flowing through me like electricity.

The confrontation that followed would determine whether I live or died.

Whether I would walk in freedom or remain a prisoner forever.

You will marry Amir today or you will be dead by tomorrow.

Father threatened his voice becoming dangerously quiet.

I will not allow you to bring shame on our family name.

I will not permit you to mock our traditions.

Would rather die than dishonor God and destroy my sister through this abomination.

I replied, and I meant every word.

Death seemed preferable to participating in something that would violate everything Jesus had shown me about love and family.

Father stared at me in complete shock.

In 21 years, I had never refused a direct command from him.

I had been the perfect obedient son, following every instruction without question.

Seeing me stand firm against his ultimate demand left him speechless for several moments.

Have lost your mind, he finally said, his voice shaking with rage.

Some devil has possessed you, filled your head with western ideas about love and choice.

We are not Westerners.

We are Saudi royalty and we follow Saudi traditions.

Go.

No devil has possessed me.

Father, for the first time in my life, I see clearly what you’re calling tradition, I call evil.

What you’re calling honor, I call shame.

What you’re calling obedience to Allah.

I call rebellion against the true God.

His hand moved to his phone.

And I knew he was seconds away from calling the guards to drag me to the ceremony hall.

But then, as if orchestrated by divine intervention, his phone rang with an emergency tone that cut through our confrontation like a sword.

The expression on his face changed from rage to alarm as he listened to the caller.

A political crisis was unfolding in Riad.

Key oil ministers were threatening to resign over a policy dispute that could destabilize the entire government.

International contracts worth billions of dollars were in jeopardy.

His immediate presence was required in the capital to prevent an economic disaster that would affect not just our family but the entire kingdom.

For a man who lived for power and control, this was a crisis that demanded his personal attention.

This conversation is not over, he told me coldly after ending the call.

The wedding is postponed for 48 hours while I handle this crisis.

But when I return, you will marry your sister or you will face consequences worse than death.

As father rushed out of the office to arrange his emergency travel, I realized that Jesus had orchestrated circumstances that I couldn’t have planned or predicted.

The political crisis that seemed like a disaster for my family was actually God providing an unexpected window of escape.

But I had less than 48 hours to get away before father returned with renewed determination to force the marriage.

The countdown had begun, and my only hope was to trust completely in the God who had just demonstrated his power to move mountains and governments when his children cried out to him.

God’s timing is never accidental, but sometimes his methods surprise even the most desperate believer.

Within an hour of father’s departure for Riad, the entire atmosphere of the palace changed.

The frantic wedding preparations came to a grinding halt.

Servants who had been hanging decorations stood around in confusion, unsure whether to continue or stop.

The clerics who had arrived to perform the ceremony gathered in hushed groups, whispering about the sudden delay.

Amira found me in the garden where I had gone to think and pray.

Her face still carried the weight of yesterday’s terror.

But there was something else there now, a flicker of hope she was afraid to fully embrace.

It true? she asked, her voice barely audible.

The servants are saying the wedding is postponed.

They’re saying father had to leave for an emergency.

But Amamira, this isn’t just a delay.

This is our chance.

Something happened last night when I prayed, really prayed, not just recited, memorized words.

And I believe this crisis is part of the answer.

She stared at me with confusion.

What do you mean? You sound different, Abdullah.

You look different.

Ski finally found a way to pray that actually works.

I was completely honest about our impossible situation.

I surrendered everything I couldn’t control and I stayed open to whatever answer might come.

And look what happened.

Father gets called away at the exact moment we needed breathing room.

She looked at me like I had lost my mind.

But she had seen the change in me.

The brother who had been consumed with despair and terror was now speaking with a calm certainty that had nothing to do with our circumstances.

Are you talking about? How can you be so sure this means anything? Best.

Yesterday I was ready to die rather than marry you.

Today I have hope that we’ll both be free.

That’s not human optimism.

Amir, that’s what happens when you pray to someone who actually answers.

as if to confirm my words.

My phone buzzed with a text message from an unknown number.

My hands trembled as I read the words that would change everything.

Sometimes prayers get answered through the most unexpected messengers.

Sometimes the answer to desperate prayer comes disguised as a stranger’s text message.

asterisk asterisk The message was simple but electrifying.

Prince Abdullah, I represent people who want to help you find freedom.

If you are serious about leaving your current situation, meet me at the coffee shop in the Al-Rashid Mall at 3:00 p.

m.

today, come alone, look for the man reading a newspaper in English.

” My hands shook as I read the message again and again.

How did this person know about my situation? How had they gotten my private phone number? More importantly, how did they know I needed help exactly when I needed it most? Were they government agents testing my loyalty? foreign spies trying to recruit me or had my prayer last night somehow reached the right people.

The timing was too perfect to be coincidence.

I showed the message to Amamira and her face went white with fear.

Abdullah, this could be a trap.

Father could have arranged this to test whether you would try to escape.

If you go and it’s his people, you’ll be dead before sunset.

She was right to be terrified.

In our world, escape attempts by royal family members were treated as treason.

But as I held that phone, I remembered the peace I had felt during my prayer.

That supernatural calm when I had surrendered everything asterisk aimeira yesterday.

I would have agreed with you yesterday.

I would have been too terrified to take this risk.

But I prayed differently last night.

I was completely honest about how impossible our situation was.

I let go of trying to control the outcome and I stayed open to answers I couldn’t imagine.

This happened the very next day.

Either that’s the most incredible coincidence in history or someone heard my prayer and is already working to answer it.

She stared at me in shock.

You really believe this message is connected to your prayer.

What do we have to lose? If I don’t go, well be married in 48 hours.

If this is a trap, at least I’ll die knowing I tried to save us both.

But if this is real, if this is how prayers get answered in the real world, dot dot dot single quotes.

I pulled her into a tight embrace.

Pray for me, sister.

However you know how, pray that this is our miracle, walking toward us.

As I prepared to leave for what might be my final act as a free man, I realized that sometimes faith looks like walking toward danger because it’s the only path to freedom.

Some goodbyes are endings.

Others are the beginning of everything you’ve hoped for.

Before leaving for the coffee shop, I knew I had to have a final conversation with Amira.

If this was a trap, if I didn’t return, she needed to know that someone loved her enough to die trying to save her.

I found her in her room, sitting by the window where she had spent so many hours staring out at a world she was forbidden to join.

She looked so small and fragile, like a bird with clipped wings, who had forgotten she was meant to fly.

“If something happens to me today,” I began, but she cut me off immediately.

“Done, T.

Talk like that.

Don’t you dare talk like that.

Tears started flowing down her cheeks.

I can’t lose you to Abdullah.

You’re the only person in this prison who has ever truly loved me.

I knelt beside her chair and took her hands in mine.

Amira, listen to me.

Nothing father has planned for us has anything to do with love.

Love protects.

It doesn’t destroy.

Love builds up.

It doesn’t tear down.

What we have as brother and sister is pure and beautiful.

and I will die before I let him corrupt it.

What if they catch you? What if this is all a setup? I’ll face whatever comes knowing that I tried.

But Amira, I need you to understand something.

Last night, I discovered that prayer isn’t just about memorizing verses and going through motions.

Real prayer is when you’re completely honest about your situation.

When you surrender control of things you can’t change, and when you stay open to answers you never expected.

prayed that way for the first time in my life and look what happened.

Father gets called away.

Mysterious people offer help and for the first time in months I have hope instead of terror.

I pulled out a piece of paper and quickly wrote down everything.

I could remember not just about accessing forbidden websites but about the way I had prayed.

If something happens to me, if they take me away, try praying like this.

Be completely honest about how trapped you feel.

Stop trying to control the outcome and stay open to help coming from unexpected places.

She stared at the paper like it was dangerous.

Abdullah just possessing this could get me killed.

Scan staying here will definitely kill your soul.

Amira, promise me something.

If I don’t come back, if father forces you into another arrangement, remember that you’re precious beyond measure.

You deserve better than being someone’s property.

We held each other and cried.

Not the desperate tears of last night, but tears mixed with something we hadn’t felt in months.

Hope going to come back for you.

I promised.

I don’t know how.

I don’t know when, but I will find a way to get you out of here, too.

You’re not alone, Amira, and neither am I not anymore.

As I walked toward what might be freedom or death, I carried with me the memory of my sister’s face, not the broken, hopeless expression she had worn for months, but something I hadn’t seen in years, the beginning of hope.

Sometimes angels look like ordinary middle-aged men reading newspapers.

The Al- Rashid Mall was crowded with afternoon shoppers, families enjoying coffee, teenagers escaping the desert heat.

I moved through the crowds with my heart hammering against my ribs, hyper aare of every face, every movement, every potential threat.

There he was, a middle-aged man with kind eyes and weathered hands, reading an English newspaper as promised.

He looked so ordinary, so unremarkable that I almost walked past him.

This couldn’t be my rescuer.

He looked more like a university professor than someone who could outwit the Saudi royal family.

But as I approached his table, he looked up and spoke my name quietly.

Prince Abdullah.

I nodded, unable to speak.

He gestured to the empty chair across from him.

Please sit.

My name is David.

I work with people who help believers escape religious persecution.

We’ve been watching your situation for some time.

Asterisko, I managed to whisper.

How do you know about my situation? Asteriscu DB.

surprised how many people in your palace are believers or at least sympathetic to those who are suffering.

Word gets out, but more importantly, we’ve been praying.

And sometimes God answers prayer through networks of people who care.

He slid a passport across the table.

My photograph, but a different name, a different nationality.

David Kim, South Korean businessman.

Your exit visa was approved this morning.

Interesting timing.

Considering your father’s sudden departure, don’t you think? I stared at the document in shock.

This is impossible.

Exit visas take weeks to process.

Background checks.

Family approval.

Government clearance.

Asterisk Prince Abdullah.

The way you prayed last night.

Completely honest about your impossible situation.

Surrendering control.

Staying open to unexpected answers.

That’s exactly how we pray for people in your position.

And that’s exactly how these operations work.

God moves through ordinary people doing extraordinary things.

My breath caught in my throat.

You know how I prayed.

Elements, honesty, surrender, openness.

They’re not just prayer principles.

They’re how God works through rescue networks like ours.

When someone prays that way, when they’re truly ready to trust completely, doors start opening that shouldn’t open.

The weight of the decision hit me like a physical blow.

Leave everything, my family, my heritage, my identity as a Saudi prince.

Never see my country again.

Never speak Arabic publicly.

Never acknowledge my royal blood about Amira.

I can’t leave her behind.

David’s expression grew sad but determined one at a time.

We can’t save everyone at once, but we can save those who are ready to be saved.

Your sister will have her chance, but today is your day.

The question is, are you ready to step into the freedom you prayed for? As I held that fake passport, I realized that this was exactly what staying open to unexpected answers looked like.

This ordinary looking man with kind eyes was God’s response to my desperate prayer.

This fake passport was the door I had asked him to open.

“Am ready,” I whispered.

And for the first time in my life, I truly was.

Freedom often begins with the most terrifying step you’ve ever taken.

David’s network moved with precision.

But as we prepared for the border crossing, doubt began creeping into my mind like poison.

What if this was all an elaborate trap? What if David was working for father? What if this passport was fake in the wrong way designed to get me arrested at the border? Astrosker father will discover you’re missing sometime tonight.

David explained as we drove toward the outskirts of Riad.

By tomorrow morning, every airport, every border checkpoint, every police station in the kingdom will have your photograph.

We have maybe 8 hours before the manhunt begins.

8 hours.

That’s all that stood between me and either freedom or a death sentence for treason.

My hands would unstopped the produce truck that would smuggle me across the border.

The plan was simple, but absolutely terrifying.

I would lie beneath crates of oranges while praying for protection every mile of the journey into Jordan.

If the border guards decided to inspect the cargo, if a single piece of fruit shifted wrong, if my breathing was too loud, I would be discovered.

Dot.

As I climbed into the back of that truck and felt the weight of oranges being stacked above me, the full terror of my situation hit me.

I was literally betting my life on a prayer I had whispered 12 hours ago.

Was I insane? Was this faith or just elaborate suicide? The physical escape was the easy part.

The emotional weight of leaving everything behind was almost unbearable.

As we drove through the streets of Riad for what I knew would be the last time, I could see glimpses of my entire life through the gaps between fruit crates, 21 years of luxury, privilege, and royal identity were about to vanish as if they had never existed.

The billions in inheritance, the palace that had been my entire world, the servants who had attended my every need, all of it abandoned in a single night.

But the hardest part was leaving Amir behind.

With every mile we traveled, I felt like I was betraying her.

How could I save myself and leave her in that nightmare? What kind of brother was I? asterisk asterisks ll have her chance, David had said.

But when how from my position as a refugee with no name, no money, and no legal existence, how could I ever help anyone? As we approached the Jordanian border at 3:00 a.

m.

while father was still dealing with his political crisis and had no idea his son was escaping, I closed my eyes and whispered the prayer that was becoming my lifeline.

Being completely honest, I’m terrified this won’t work.

I’m surrendering my life, my family, my future to you, and I’m staying open to whatever happens next, even if it’s not what I expected.

The border guards never looked twice at the truck full of oranges.

The fake passport worked perfectly.

And as we crossed into Jordan, I realized I was no longer Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.

I was simply Abdullah, a man who had learned to pray in a way that moved mountains and governments and changed everything.

Freedom, I discovered, is both a gift and a challenge you’re never fully prepared for.

I arrived in Ammon, Jordan on March 17th, 2018.

Exhausted, traumatized, and completely overwhelmed by culture shock.

David S.

contacts connected me with a small Christian community that specialized in helping former Muslims who had converted to Christianity.

These people became my lifeline in a world I didn’t understand.

Pastor Michael, a gentle Jordanian man who spoke fluent Arabic, became my first real friend in this new world.

His church was nothing like the grand mosques I had known.

Just a simple building filled with people who welcomed me like family, despite knowing nothing about my royal background.

The first few weeks were the hardest of my life.

I had never worked a day in my life, never handled money, never lived without servants attending my needs.

Learning to cook, clean, shop for groceries, and manage basic adult responsibilities was humbling and sometimes embarrassing.

But what struck me most was how these people prayed.

They did unjust recite memorized verses.

They talked to God like he was sitting right there with them.

They were completely honest about their struggles.

They surrendered their worries to him and they stayed open to answers that came in unexpected ways.

Is how you prayed that night in your room, isn’t it? Pastor Michael asked me during one of our conversations.

Complete honesty, total surrender, openness to God’s surprises.

That’s not just crisis prayer, Abdullah.

That’s how relationship with God works every day.

I was amazed to discover that my desperate prayer hadn’t just been a one-time miracle.

It was actually the foundation of daily Christian life.

Ongoing conversation with a God who genuinely cared about every detail of my existence.

Within a month, my English had improved enough for me to begin sharing my testimony with international Christian organizations.

My story spread through networks of believers who worked with persecuted Christians in Muslim countries.

But I wasn’t sharing it as Prince Abdullah anymore.

I was just Abdullah, a man who had learned that prayer is more powerful than palaces, that freedom is more valuable than gold, and that God specializes in making ways where there seemed to be no ways.

God provided for every need through the generosity of my new Christian brothers and sisters who treated this former prince like their own son.

They didn’t care about my royal blood or my lost inheritance.

They cared about the fact that Jesus had rescued me.

And they wanted to help me grow in this new life.

But the hardest part wasn’t learning to live without luxury.

The hardest part was learning to live with the guilt of leaving Amir behind.

Every night I would pray the same prayer.

Complete honesty about my heartbreak, surrendering her situation to God’s control and staying open to however he might rescue her.

Little did I know that God was already working on that answer to there are moments in life when you get to participate in something much bigger than yourself.

On April 8th, 2018, I made the most important public declaration of my life.

Standing waist deep in the Jordan River, the same waters where Jesus himself had been baptized, I proclaimed before God and witnesses that I was choosing to follow Christ for the rest of my days.

Pastor Michael lowered me completely under the muddy water, and I felt the weight of 21 years of Islamic bondage washing away from my soul.

Going under that water, I buried Prince Abdullah, the Muslim, the obedient son, who had lived in fear and performed empty rituals, rising up, gasping for breath in the bright Jordanian sunshine.

I was Abdullah, the son of the living God, born again into a freedom I had never known existed.

The baptism was witnessed by 12 other former Muslims who had made similar journeys from Islam to Christianity.

Their tears of joy mixed with mine as I emerged from the river completely transformed.

These were unjust strangers watching a religious ceremony.

They were family members celebrating a brother who had found his way home.

But what made this moment even more special was what I understood about prayer.

Now, the same three principles that had saved my life in Saudi Arabia.

Honesty, surrender, and openness were exactly what baptism represented.

Going under the water was being completely honest about my old life.

It was broken.

It was bondage.

It was leading to death.

Staying under the water was surrender.

Letting go of control.

Trusting God completely with my future.

Coming up out of the water was staying open to new life, new identity, new purposes I couldn’t even imagine yet.

See, Pastor Michael said as we stood dripping wet in the river.

The prayer that saved you from that forced marriage was just the beginning.

This is how you’ll live every day now, honest with God about your struggles, surrendered to his will, open to his surprises.

Learning to live as a Christian was like learning to walk again after a lifetime of crawling.

Everything was different.

Instead of five daily prayers facing Mecca, I could talk to Jesus anytime, anywhere, in any language.

Instead of fearing God’s wrath for minor infractions, I experienced his love even when I made mistakes.

Instead of trying to earn salvation through good works and ritual purity, I rested in the knowledge that Jesus had already paid the price for my freedom.

Prayer wasn’t about performance anymore.

It was about relationship.

Pastor Michael connected me with an intensive Bible study program designed for new converts from Islamic backgrounds.

For 6 months, I studied scripture eight hours a day, hungry to understand everything about this God who had rescued me from the darkest night of my life.

The Bible came alive in ways that the Quran never had.

Each page revealed more about God’s character and his heart for broken people like me.

But most importantly, I was learning that the desperate prayer method I had discovered wasn’t just for emergencies.

It was for everything.

Every decision, every worry, every hope, every relationship, all of it could be approached with the same honesty, surrender, and openness that had saved my life.

I was becoming a man who knew how to pray prayers that actually work.

Sometimes the greatest victories happen in secret, in places where no one else can see.

The message from a mirror that changed everything arrived on a quiet Tuesday morning in December 2020.

I was preparing for a video call with a refugee from Iran when my encrypted phone buzzed with a notification that made my hands shake.

Kabula, I did it.

I prayed the way you taught me.

I was completely honest with Jesus about feeling like I was dying inside.

I surrendered my future to him, even if that means staying here forever.

And I stayed open to whatever he wanted to do.

Something happened.

I can’t describe it exactly, but I felt this peace that had nothing to do with my circumstances.

For the first time since you left, I don’t feel alone.

I don’t feel abandoned.

I know someone is watching over me.

Someone who actually cares has given up on forcing another marriage arrangement.

The scandal of your escape made him more cautious about family attention.

I’m still trapped physically, but spiritually, I’m more free than I’ve ever been.

The same God who rescued you is sustaining me here, teaching others how to pray like this.

Keep showing them that God makes ways where there seem to be no ways.

I’m living proof that your prayer method works even when the circumstances don’t change immediately.

I wept as I read her words.

My sister had found the same Jesus who had saved me, discovered the same prayer method that had unlocked my prison and experienced the same supernatural peace that had sustained me through the darkest nights.

She was still in Saudi Arabia, still under father’s control, still living behind those 20ft walls, but she was no longer a prisoner in her heart.

The light I had found in that 2:30 a.

m.

prayer was now shining in her darkness.

To this is how God’s kingdom spreads, not through armies or politics, but through desperate people learning to pray prayers that actually work.

Then teaching others to do the same.

The most profound changes happen not when your circumstances improve, but when your identity transforms.

By early 2020, I was working full-time with a religious freedom organization, counseling other Muslim refugees who were questioning Islam and considering Christianity.

My royal background actually became useful in these conversations, not because it impressed people, but because I could relate to losing everything for faith.

I understood the fear of apostasy laws because I had faced those same terrors.

I understood the weight of family rejection because I had lived through it.

I understood the difficulty of learning to pray differently because I had made that same journey.

But what made me most effective was unto my dramatic escape story.

It was what I had learned about prayer that actually works.

When someone sat across from me trembling with fear about their impossible situation, I could teach them exactly what had saved my life.

God exactly how trapped you feel.

I would say don’t try to make it sound spiritual or proper.

Just be completely honest about how scared you are, how hopeless everything seems.

Surrender the outcome.

Stop trying to figure out how God should fix it.

Stop demanding specific solutions.

Just say, “God, I give this situation to you completely.

” Then stay open.

The answer might come through a text message from a stranger.

It might come through a political crisis that gives you breathing room.

It might come through ordinary people doing extraordinary things.

But if you’re honest, surrendered, and open, God will make a way.

I had counseledled dozens of believers facing family rejection for their faith.

And I watched this prayer method work over and over again.

Not always dramatically like my escape, but consistently.

God seemed to specialize in opening doors that should stay locked.

The most amazing development came in late 2019 when I received a secret message through encrypted channels.

My heart stopped when I saw who it was from.

Amira, she had been following my journey through contacts who remained sympathetic to our situation.

Her message was brief but life-changing.

Brother, I have been reading the same book you were reading before you left.

I think I understand now why you had to go.

Pray for me.

I love you.

My sister was discovering Jesus on her own.

Asking the same questions that had led me out of Islam and into the arms of Christ.

Through carefully arranged communications, I was able to guide her toward Christian resources and pray with her as she began her own spiritual journey.

I taught her the same prayer method that had saved me.

Be completely honest with Jesus about how trapped you feel.

Surrender the outcome.

Stop trying to control how or when he rescues you and stay open to answers that might come in ways you never expected.

She remained in Saudi Arabia for now, but she was no longer trapped in despair because she had found hope in the same savior who had rescued me.

The prayer method was working for her too.

Not yet with physical escape, but with spiritual freedom that no palace prison could contain.

By November 2020, I was engaged to Sarah, a beautiful Christian woman I met through my church in Ammon.

She knew my entire story and loved me not because of my royal blood or my dramatic testimony, but because she saw Jesus reflected in my life.

Our relationship was everything that God designed marriage to be, voluntary, loving, built on mutual respect and shared faith in Christ.

It was the complete opposite of the nightmare father had planned where he had designed bondage.

God had provided freedom where he had planned perversion.

God had given purity.

I live in an undisclosed location for security reasons.

But I wake up every morning with joy that I never experienced in the palace.

I am poor in worldly terms, supporting myself through ministry donations and part-time work.

But I am rich beyond measure in the love of Christ.

The golden prison of my childhood had been replaced by the glorious freedom of life in Jesus.

And every day I teach others the simple but powerful truth.

Prayer that combines honesty, surrender, and openness can unlock doors that seem permanently sealed.

Disk, if Jesus could save a Saudi prince from the darkest family tradition, he can save anyone from anything.

Isk today I live quietly in Jordan with Sarah serving refugees and teaching the prayer method that saved my life.

We’re planning our wedding for next spring.

A real wedding based on love and choice.

Everything God designed marriage to be.

Asterisk asterisk our home is simple.

Our resources are limited but our joy is overflowing.

Every morning I wake up grateful for a freedom I once thought was impossible.

Every evening I pray for others who are facing their own impossible situations.

No cultural bondage is too strong for Christ to break.

No religious system is too entrenched for God to overcome.

No family pressure is too intense for the Lord to handle.

I am living proof that when you pray with complete honesty, total surrender, and openness to unexpected answers, God specializes in the impossible.

The three steps that broke my chains honesty about your situation.

Surrender of the outcome.

Openness to God’s surprises.

They work whether you’re facing execution or family rejection.

Whether you’re trapped in a palace or a small apartment, whether your prison is made of gold or just tradition, Sarah and I spend our evenings counseling others through video calls, teaching them what I learned that desperate night in March 2018.

The same prayer principles that moved governments and opened borders continue to work in ordinary lives facing extraordinary challenges.

But my story isn’t finished.

Amira is still waiting for her physical freedom.

Thousands of others are trapped in situations they think are hopeless.

And maybe you’re one of them.

Maybe you’re watching this because your family situation feels impossible.

Maybe you’re facing pressures that seem too big to overcome.

Maybe you’ve tried everything and nothing has worked.

If that’s you, then you’re exactly where I was at 2:30 in the morning on March 15th, 2018.

And I have something to tell you.

The prayer that saved my life at 2:30 in the morning can work for you tonight.

Let me tell you exactly what I prayed in that desperate moment, word for word.

So you can pray the same way when your situation feels impossible.

I was completely honest.

Not spiritual, not polite, not proper, just brutally honest.

Jesus, if you’re real, save us.

I don’t know how to pray to you properly, but I’m begging you to help us.

I told him exactly how trapped I felt, how terrified I was, how hopeless everything seemed.

Second, I surrendered everything.

I’ll give up everything.

My family, my inheritance, my very life.

I stopped trying to control how God should fix my situation.

I stopped demanding specific solutions.

I just said, “I give this completely to you.

” Third, I stayed open to whatever answer might come.

I didn’t expect a supernatural encounter.

I didn’t expect a political crisis.

I didn’t expect a stranger with a fake passport.

But I told God I was ready for his surprises.

Honesty, surrender, openness.

Three simple steps that unlocked the supernatural and changed everything.

Now, let me ask you the question that could change your life.

What is Jesus asking you to surrender to him tonight? Maybe it’s a family situation that feels impossible to change.

Maybe it’s parents who will never accept your faith.

Maybe it’s feeling like God has forgotten about you while he saves everyone else.

Maybe it’s the fear that you’re trapped forever with no way out.

Here s what I learned in that palace prison.

The very thing you think is too big for God to handle is exactly what he wants to handle.

The situation that feels most hopeless is often where he does his greatest work.

Your prison might not be made of 20ft walls and armed guards.

It might be made of family expectations, financial pressure, or religious traditions that suffocate your soul.

But the same God who moved a government to save me can move whatever mountain is blocking your freedom.

Right now, before you watch another video, before you get distracted by life, I want you to try something.

Find a quiet place and pray these three steps.

Be completely honest with Jesus about your situation.

Tell him exactly how you feel, how trapped you are, how scared you’ve been.

Don’t clean it up.

Don’t make it sound spiritual.

Just be real.

Then surrender the outcome to him.

Stop trying to figure out how he should fix it.

Stop demanding it happen your way or in your timing.

Just say, “Jesus, I give this completely to you.

” Finally, stay open to answers you can’t imagine.

They might come through unexpected people, surprising circumstances, or doors opening that shouldn’t open, but be ready for God’s surprises.

If a desperate Saudi prince facing execution could find freedom through this simple prayer, what could God do for you? Drop a comment below and tell me what you’re surrendering to Jesus tonight.

I read every comment and I’ll be praying for you using the same method that saved my life.

And if this story has given you hope, share it with someone who needs to know that no situation is too impossible for God.

Because somewhere out there, someone else is having their 2:30 a.

m.

moment, and they need to know that prayer really can move mountains.

The same Jesus who appeared in my room is waiting to meet you in yours.

The same God who makes ways where there seem to be no ways is listening for your honest, surrendered, open prayer.

What are you waiting for?