“If You exist, change my life.”

It was a simple prayer from a discouraged teenager who felt trapped in habits he couldn’t break.

Mikael grew up in a Christian home in Finland, a fourth-generation Seventh-day Adventist on his father’s side. His mother discovered the Adventist faith through evangelistic meetings shortly after marrying Mikael’s father. When she later learned she was pregnant, she made a quiet promise to God: I will dedicate this child for Your service.

As a small child, Mikael sensed that dedication without fully understanding it. He remembers pretending to be a pastor at age three, holding “home church” services in his living room. He was baptized at 11 and felt sensitive to God’s leading. But soon after, his family moved to rural Finland, where the Adventist church was small and Mikael felt isolated—both as a believer and as part of an ethnic minority.

Wanting desperately to belong, he began smoking, drinking, and partying during his early teen years. Weekends were filled with alcohol, and Sabbaths sometimes found him sitting in the back of church with a hangover. He never stopped believing in God, but he felt torn between faith and the pull of the world.

Adventist summer camps became a lifeline. Each year, Mikael felt drawn back to God—but once he returned to school, willpower alone wasn’t enough to change his habits. By age 15, his struggle reached its darkest point. “I made choices I deeply regretted,” he recalled. “It felt like a spiritual battle.”

At one camp, Mikael listened as a visiting speaker shared his testimony of transformation. Sitting in the back row, Mikael thought, When I’m 25, I’ll get my life together. Even then, beneath the confusion, he sensed a quiet calling—a purpose he couldn’t fully explain but couldn’t escape either.

The turning point came not through self-discipline, but surrender.

Late one night, after another weekend of partying, Mikael looked at his reflection at a train station and asked himself, Who am I becoming? Back in his dorm room, he prayed honestly: “God, I love this lifestyle. I don’t even want to change. But if You want to, You have my permission.”

Not long after, he prayed again: “If You exist, change my life.”

God answered—not with dramatic emotion, but with quiet transformation. Mikael found himself longing for something different. He stopped his bad habits and began spending time with friends who took faith seriously. One evening, after praying with them, he felt no rush of emotion—yet everything changed. “I didn’t feel anything,” he said. “But I was never the same again.”

Soon after, God began stretching him in unexpected ways. One Sabbath afternoon, while bored and wandering through a shopping mall, Mikael felt impressed to speak to strangers about God. Though he felt unqualified, he obeyed. As he spoke, faith that once felt distant suddenly became real. “It was like God was teaching me as I spoke,” he said.

That experience marked the beginning of a journey into ministry.

After high school, Mikael joined a mission training program in Australia. There, a dream began to form: planting a church back home in Finland. In 2019, he contacted church leaders and joined early planning efforts for a new ministry in Helsinki.

Then came 2020.

The pandemic halted plans, separated Mikael from his girlfriend overseas, drained his finances, and plunged him into deep discouragement. Sleep-deprived and isolated, he questioned why God would give him such hope only to take it away. Yet even in that season, God was quietly at work.

That summer, a small team formed. Then a house became available with less than a month’s notice. By August 2020, the doors of Oikos House opened.

What began as a fragile step of faith has grown into a vibrant Seventh-day Adventist church plant. Each Sabbath, young adults gather in the home for Bible study, worship, shared meals, and fellowship. People come from many backgrounds, over 30 nationalities, creating a warm, welcoming space where faith feels real.

Over the past six years, hundreds have passed through Oikos House. Many have chosen baptism. Others have grown deeper in faith and stepped into leadership. Young people once searching for belonging have found a spiritual family.

Mikael sees God’s hand clearly now. Today, Oikos House is outgrowing its space. The dream is bigger now: to plant another church and raise up a new generation of young leaders who will serve across Finland and beyond.

This quarter, part of the Thirteenth Sabbath Offering will help support future church plants  branching off of the Oikos House—places where faith is lived around the table, prayers are honest, and lives are changed.