Few conversion stories are as well known as that of Nicky Cruz: from the leader of a violent gang in New York to a preacher who has spoken to millions of people about God’s forgiveness. His life shows that no history of violence is beyond the reach of grace.
Born on December 6, 1938, in Las Piedras, Puerto Rico, Nicky grew up in a home marked by spiritism and by physical and emotional abuse. At age 15, he was sent to live with a brother in New York, but soon ended up living on the streets of Brooklyn.
There he joined the Mau Mau gang and, within a few months, became its leader. Violence was routine: repeated arrests, armed fights, and the death of a close friend earned him a reputation as beyond hope, a verdict confirmed by a psychologist who considered him destined for prison, the electric chair, and hell.
In 1958, the young preacher David Wilkerson began seeking him out on the streets with a simple message: Jesus loved him and would never stop loving him. Cruz responded with threats, but Wilkerson persisted, until Nicky finally attended an evangelistic crusade he organized in New York.
That night, Cruz surrendered, asked God for forgiveness, and, together with other gang members, turned in weapons to the police. In the following years, he studied at a Bible school and became the first director of Teen Challenge, the recovery ministry founded by Wilkerson in New York.
His autobiography, Run Baby Run, published in 1968, became an evangelical classic translated into more than 40 languages, and the 1970 film The Cross and the Switchblade brought his story to movie screens around the world.
Married to Gloria and father of four daughters, Nicky continues preaching the gospel to gangs, inmates, and urban communities through Nicky Cruz Outreach and TRUCE, an urban evangelism ministry founded with his daughter Alicia and son-in-law Patrick Dow in 1991.
His public journey also had moments of controversy: in 2006, statements of his describing homosexuality as a perversion led activists in London to call for the cancellation of a TRUCE event in the city. Cruz publicly apologized, stating he had nothing against gay people, and the event went ahead.
Even today, now in his eighties, he repeats the same message he heard from Wilkerson: no life is too far gone for the mercy of Jesus. His story continues to inspire urban evangelism and recovery ministries around the world.
