Scary Television News

To Sabbath School teachers: This story is for Sabbath, November 29.

Watching television news scared 10-year-old Andrielle.

Every evening, Dad turned on the TV to watch the news at their home in Brazil. Every evening, Andrielle and her 13-year-old brother, Alef, joined him.

But many bad things were happening in the news. It seemed like every evening, television news showed storms, earthquakes, and other natural disasters. It seemed like every evening, television news showed stealing, killing, and other evil things.

It was scary watching the news. Andrielle saw so many bad things on television that she decided that the world must be ending soon.

Andrielle had heard about the end of the world in church. Every Sunday, her older sister, Shirley, took her and Alef to a different church. Andrielle heard at the churches that when the world ended, Jesus would come and take His children to heaven.

More than anything, she wanted to go to heaven and live with Jesus.

But the preachers never spoke about how people could go to heaven and live with Jesus. They never opened their Bibles and read Bible verses about how to prepare for Jesus’ coming.

Andrielle hoped to find out by reading the Bible for herself. She found a small New Testament Bible at home and read it every night before going to sleep.

The little girl read the books of Matthew and Revelation. They were very interesting. But she didn’t understand much of what she read. She still didn’t know how to prepare to go to heaven.

One evening, after watching yet another scary news program on television, she spoke with her brother, Alef.

“We need to pray to Jesus to show us the true church that will prepare us to go to heaven,” she said.

Alef liked the idea, and he closed his eyes for the prayer.

“Send us to the real church,” Andrielle prayed. “We want to prepare for Your return. We really, really want to go to heaven.”

Andrielle felt better after the prayer. She knew that Jesus would somehow help her to prepare to go to heaven and meet Him.

Two years passed.

Andrielle and her big sister Shirley moved from living with their dad to living with her mom and stepdad.

Alef stayed with Dad.

One Saturday morning, Shirley said abruptly, “Andrielle, let’s go to church.”

Andrielle was surprised. She had never been to church on Saturday. It felt unusual to go on a Saturday, but she went because she was used to visiting churches with Shirley.

People warmly welcomed Andrielle and Shirley at the Seventh-day Adventist church. Andrielle felt comfortable. She liked how people opened Bibles and read from them. She felt at home.

She and her sister returned the next week, and the next.

Then Andrielle started studying the Bible with two women from church. Her mom and stepdad joined her for the Bible studies.

As they read, Andrielle saw that the Bible explained how to prepare to go to heaven and live with Jesus.

She read in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (NKJV).

All she needed to do to go to heaven was believe in Jesus.

At that moment, Andrielle realized that God had answered her prayer from two years earlier. She had found the answer to her biggest question in the Bible.

Today, Andrielle is a 27-year-old nurse preparing to be a missionary in the Philippines.

She wants to tell people everywhere that the world is ending soon and that they can prepare to go to heaven by believing in Jesus.

“I’m so happy and grateful to God for answering my prayer even though it was the voice of a little child,” she said. “I’m so grateful to Him for guiding me to the church of God.”

Pray that many people in Brazil will prepare for Jesus’ coming with the help of this quarter’s Thirteenth Sabbath Offering, also known as the Quarterly Mission Project Offering. Part of the offering will help open a church for children at Pernambucano Adventist Academy, which is located in the region of Brazil where Andrielle lives. Thank you for planning a generous offering for this important project.