Music superstar Justin Bieber is using his platform and influence to openly share the saving grace of Jesus Christ.
From leading tens of thousands of people in prayer at concerts to bearing witness to the actor who plays Philip in “The Chosen,” the popular series about the life of Jesus that is funded by many people, praised The young scholar became a bold missionary according to many accounts.
And now, a Colombian flight attendant, whose traumatic past led her deep into a dark spiritual world, has shared about a chance in-flight encounter with Justin Bieber, where he planted a seed that eventually led her to give her life to Christ.
Victoria Mandylor opened up about this experience recently on “The Becket Cook Show” with host Becket Cook, who was once a gay atheist, but has now surrendered to Jesus Christ.
“ Yes, he planted a seed, ” Mandylor said of Bieber. He is someone who was brought into my life to plant the final seed and water it. “
Mandylor was raised Catholic, but much of her belief in God changed after her uncle began sexually abusing her at age 12.
“ He groomed me beautifully from the time I came to the United States until I was 17 years old and… he raped me, ” she explained. “ It went on for many years and he mentioned God while doing it because he knew I believed in God. “
Mandylor recalls those painful years of her life. She lived in fear and also felt hopeless because her family members thought it was all her fault.
“ I had no self-esteem when I seduced a grown man, that’s what I was accused of. The family accused me of seducing him, ” she added.
Mandylor said her uncle followed her to school and she could not escape the abuse.
“ It was terrible because I knew it was wrong but he was also very skillful in convincing me that it was love, that love was a good thing, that ‘God is love’ and that he loved me more than my daughters, ” she said. “ It was a terrible time in my life. “
Mandylor’s uncle ended up in jail after she brought the case to light, but in the process, she lost her faith in God.
That’s when she turned to New Age religious practices like meditation and yoga to cope with the pain. Mandylor said she meditates every day, attends yoga classes and seeks help from gurus. But those “spiritual” experiences eventually opened the door to encounters with demons.
“ I really, really like this stuff but at the same time I get terrible sleep paralysis where I fall asleep and my soul escapes my body or I see strange entities entering the room trying to took me away and I couldn’t move, ” she said. ” I can not talk. I tried to scream but no sound came out of my throat. My limbs were completely frozen and I couldn’t do anything. “
“ But at that time I was curious about Jesus and I had a Bible, ” she added. “ When this alien-looking entity…came to get me, I just closed my eyes…and said, ‘Oh my God. In the name of Jesus, please remove that entity. Take it away from me, please’…And it disappeared. “
That experience didn’t completely convince Mandylor to give her life to Christ, but her job as a flight attendant on Justin Bieber’s private jet propelled her on her own journey of discovering Jesus Christ.
“ He got on the plane and the first thing he said to me was… ‘Do you believe in Jesus Christ?’ I just looked at him and said ‘Excuse me?’ then he said, ‘Do you believe in Jesus Christ? Do you believe that He is the Son of God, who was crucified and died for your sins? And do you know that you are forgiven?’ I said, ‘I’m a believer in spiritual things and I meditate a lot and I thought maybe he existed,’ ” she recalls.
“ I was very arrogant ,” she added.
The 29-year-old male artist then asked her if she had ever listened to Christian worship music.
“ He asked, ‘Have you ever listened to Christian music?’ and I was like, ‘No, not really’ and then he said, ‘I have a few songs to share with you and you need to listen to them because when I listen to them, I can feel the Holy Spirit. Spirit is residing within me. ‘ And then I thought, ‘What is this person saying?’ “
Mandylor decided not to listen to any of the Christian music Justin Bieber shared with her, but when she opened YouTube that night, a shocking video appeared. That’s the testimony of a former yoga instructor who experienced sleep paralysis similar to what Mandylor experienced. The title is “From Yoga to Christianity.” She was stunned because she had never searched for any such topic among them before.
It was the next step in her spiritual journey. She said God used some people after her encounter with Bieber to show her He was real.
The climax was when an old friend who was gay before invited her to the Reality Church of Los Angeles with him. In the middle of the service, she said something profound happened.
Mandylor explained, “ I fell to my knees and started sobbing. It’s like my life flashed before my eyes and I felt terribly guilty and then suddenly when I cried, the guilt was taken away from me and then I felt loved. That is heavenly love. ”
She continued, “ Peace enveloped me and I was sobbing and I couldn’t stand up…. and I felt the Holy Ghost. “
Mandylor gave his life to Jesus Christ that day. She said she has never been like that.
“ It was a supernatural experience ,” she said.
Less than a year later, she worked on another flight where Justin Bieber was a passenger, and she had the opportunity to tell him that she was now a Christian. She said he was excited about his conversion and they prayed together.
Mandylor says it wasn’t Bieber’s fame or influence that led her to discover who God is, but his simple and honest explanation of the Gospel message.
“ I had never heard anyone speak so simply, ” she recalls. Mandylor explained that Bieber said, “ ‘He [Jesus] is the Son of God. He died for you.’ It’s as simple as that. ‘He died for you.’ “
