Finding Home & Healing in Bible Study: Beeliada’s Story

Beeliada still laughs when she remembers how she ended up at her first InterVarsity Bible study at Southern Utah University (SUU).  

She had given her friend Mark excuses for weeks, until one day, she ran out. Mark didn’t hesitate. 

“He took my hand and dragged me! I didn’t know what to say, so I followed him and went,” Beeliada said. 

In her heavy anxiety, God met Beeliada with comfort as the group studied a passage of Scripture about worry. This was what she had been needing; she just didn’t know it yet.   

Struck by the Unexpected 

Born and raised in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Beeliada had no intentions of ever going to the United States. 

In 2020, when she was just in high school, her father got sick and tragically passed away. This began a long season of grief that turned into severe anxiety. 

“I was getting panic attacks very frequently. Nobody really knew. People thought it was just grief. I was always crying, always hyperventilating, for no reason,” she said.

Though she thought God had failed her, his plan for her wasn’t over yet. 

While Beeliada was trying to decide what to do for college, a friend of her father’s paid her a visit. As they talked, he urged her to apply to Southern Utah University since he worked there, even offering to pay the application fee. 

Beeliada was intrigued; just two days before, someone from church told her God wanted her to go to the United States, but she hadn’t believed them. 

“I did not apply to a single school in the U.S. It was never my dream,” she said.

Taking up the offer from her father’s friend, Beeliada went ahead and applied to SUU... and was accepted immediately. So, she followed God’s call to the U.S.

Seeking Home

Beeliada’s transition to SUU wasn't easy. Dealing with anxiety alone, still processing the loss of her father, and finding herself in an unfamiliar country, she felt abandoned by God. 

But soon, she learned she wasn’t the only international student from the Congo on campus when she met Mark. After that incredible experience at her first InterVarsity Bible study, she started attending every time Mark invited her, though she didn’t go if she didn’t happen to run into him first.

Beeliada realized she needed more as she continued to suffer with anxiety. “I really wanted to heal because I was in such a dark place mentally,” she said. “It felt really out of control.”

Her counselor suggested Beeliada invest more in her faith and engage in spiritual practices. She realized she also wanted to take her faith more seriously, so decided to go all in with InterVarsity. 

The Gift of Community

It wasn’t long before InterVarsity felt like a home to Beeliada.To her surprise, there were many other international students in the SUU chapter, and they shared meals with each other and worshipped in their native languages. Beeliada loved experiencing pieces of the others’ cultures, while also learning about American culture as she went places and celebrated holidays with the chapter.

Bible study, however, was what was truly transformative. The communal inductive method InterVarsity uses reminded Beeliada of how she studied the Bible in the Congo.

“My faith was strengthened because I was actively reading the Bible and being in community. I started feeling a huge change in me,” she said. 

As she engaged with Scripture, Beeliada’s mental health also began to improve. She realized God had never left her after all. 

Stepping Into New Things 

By the end of her time in college, Beeliada served as a Bible study leader after realizing that her battle with anxiety didn’t disqualify her from leadership. She enjoyed learning what it meant to be a biblical leader as she experienced Bible study from this new angle.

“[In] InterVarsity, we’re servant leaders. We serve,” she said. “[Leadership] grew me because it put me in a posture where I had to seek God because I cannot pour on people if I don’t let God pour on me.”

Beeliada graduated in the spring of 2026. She plans to stay in the U.S., find a job, and get connected to a church where she can keep studying the Bible. She still marvels at the plan God had for her life all along, to bring her to the U.S. amid tragedy to grow deeper with him through her InterVarsity community. 

“[My chapter] was really a gift from God,” she said. “God knew I would have been a part of InterVarsity long before I did.”

To learn how you can be part of students’ healing journeys through InterVarsity, go here to get involved.