Italian evangelist foresaw own death

His mother was urged to abort him. A childhood brain tumour meant he never grew taller than 4’1”. Yet pint-sized Italian street-preacher Alessandro Sacco became a mighty voice for the gospel, leading many to Christ throughout Italy and Africa.

Italian street preacher Alessandro Sacco, who had a premonition of his own death.

Tragically, Alessandro was killed in an auto accident in Mexico City on March 6th, at the start of a two-month North American evangelistic tour. He was 34.

An unusually large hole in the road caused his car to flip. Alessandro died immediately, while others in the vehicle had minor injuries.

On the eve of his departure for Mexico City, he received this striking vision posted on Facebook:

“Peace to all of you. I’m leaving for Mexico. I wanted to share with you something that happened to me. Yesterday night during a prayer meeting, the Lord gave me a vision. I could see myself from the back, I was tall and thin and in front of me, there was a long golden staircase.

“Suddenly four steps disappeared and I ran towards them and I opened some kind of door. The sky was wonderfully blue and suddenly a very strong light passed through my body and a voice told me: ‘Still a little time and we will meet.’ I am in peace. Pray for me, for this travel and for my difficult health condition. I will be back in April, God willing. A hug to all of you in Jesus Christ.”

“We had him in our church and our house two weeks ago,” says Francesco Abortivi, a ministry associate who worked with Alessandro at Adventive Cross Cultural Initiatives. “He kept telling us about his fights with God about his health. He joked saying he almost had an illness for every letter of the alphabet. I can remember arm palsy, diabetes, a blind eye, a tumor in his hip, just to name a few. “

Alessandro prayed often for an improvement in his fragile health. “He prayed and fasted so much for his healing,” Abortivi notes. “When Jesus in person told him ‘my grace is enough’ he got so angry at Him! But he obeyed and preached the Gospel wherever he went.”

“God used his disability to reach people that would not normally listen: prisoners, killers, robbers, suffering people, orphans, students… wherever he went people would listen to this child-faced little man and be changed. You just can’t argue when someone who lost everything talks to you about God’s love. You just accept it. As a brother in the church said, ‘he’s a little man, but a spiritual giant.’

Alessandro came from humble roots, born into a poor family in Sicily. While his mother carried him, one of her relatives said, “you are so poor, why do you make so many children?” With a relatively small amount of money, “you can abort and delete the problem of the fourth son."

His mother briefly considered abortion, but a close friend said, "You don’t know what God wants to do with this child: Do not kill him!"

Mark Ellis is a senior correspondent for ASSIST News Service.