A former Satanist and self-proclaimed witch is opening up about her conversion to Christianity, saying she bought a Bible at a low moment in her life to disprove God but ended up embracing Christ and getting baptized. KM Tepe shared her testimony with author and Biola University apologetics professor Sean McDowell during an episode of The Sean McDowell Show, saying she began dabbling in the occult in college after growing up in a Christian home.
“We called ourselves a coven,” she said. “It was like four of us, and we did a lot of rituals, spellwork, and tarot cards.”
Eventually, she found a copy of the Satanic Bible and “read through that thing in like a day.”
“I was like, man, I really agree with all this,” she said.
She joined The Satanic Temple and became a “full-fledged atheistic Satanist,” although “there was a point where I was a practicing witch and a Satanist at the same time.”
“So I considered myself a Satanic witch,” she said.
The Satanic Temple is a secular, atheist organization, although Tepe acknowledges at one point, “I was dangerously close to theistic Satanism,” she said.
“I knew the names of demons. And I would call upon the names of demons.”
Her mom, a Christian, was devastated by her daughter’s turn.
“It was really hard on her because she knew if I would have stayed down that path, she knew what the outcome was,” Tepe said.
“When I came out as a witch to her, she was like, I want you out of the house. Like, I don’t want anything witchcraft [in the house],” she said. “At that point. I didn’t care because I was a very young adult and just didn’t care about anything, as you know, a lot of young adults do.”
The turning point in Tepe’s life came when her mom developed dementia and later died of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD). Her mom’s funeral was a Christian service.
“I was sitting there as a Satanist at my mom’s funeral,” she said.
She remembers being angry at God and telling Him, “If you love us so much, why would you take my mom the way that you did?”
“And I bought a Bible. I went to a used bookstore, and I bought a cheap Bible with the intention of reading it and highlighting every evil, malicious thing that God did to humanity,” Tepe said.
But “it backfired,” she said.
Instead of highlighting passages, she began developing questions about God that needed answers. She contacted the pastor who led her mom’s funeral. He urged her to read a copy of Evidence Demands a Verdict, a book that Josh McDowell originally wrote but later updated and expanded with Sean McDowell.
God showed her signs in her life, and she said He is real. She became a Christian and was baptized.
“God doesn’t hate you. God doesn’t hate anybody,” she said. “God is a benevolent and loving and forgiving God. Because if He wasn’t, He would have just given up on me years ago. But He didn’t.”
Today, Tepe is part of a ministry that reaches out to people like her. She describes herself as a “weirdo” who enjoys wearing dark clothes.
“We do have a very small community of really awesome people who are born-again believers, and a lot of us are emo-Gothic-alternative. We love Christian metal music. So if that’s you, you found us.”
Her testimony, she said, is simple: Jesus is peace.
“You don’t have to be a certain way in order to be forgiven,” she said. “You don’t have to be a certain way in order to believe in Christ, and you don’t have to look a certain way. You don’t have to talk a certain way.
“You can be forgiven. You can have peace in life.”
WATCH: From Satan to Jesus (Interviewing an Ex-Satanist)
Photo Credit: ©YouTube/Sean McDowell
Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press, Christianity Today, The Christian Post, the Leaf-Chronicle, the Toronto Star and the Knoxville News-Sentinel.