Editor’s Note: Distributing Bibles in Islamic nations is not a trivial task or without danger. Over the past two decades, we have freed hundreds of our smugglers from capture and have buried over a thousand involved in distributing or receiving Bibles. In America, we are blessed to casually sit in a favorite chair and read the words of God that He has preserved for every generation. But in the Islamic world, possessing a Bible can be a death sentence. They are not offered like tracts on the street corners of free countries. Our people carefully determine the sincerity of the person to whom they witness before offering them a Bible. Once given, that person reads it covertly, carefully concealing it from their family members. They must find hiding places for their Bible in their home or outside under a rock or buried in the ground. The articles we prepare for you come from our smugglers and are the testimonies of those whom you, by your donations to our Smugglers ministry, have helped them bring to Christ. Here is a recent example.
One of the Bibles you provided us was given to a 47-year-old man who grew up in a typical Muslim family. Like any young Muslim child, he was raised to love and obey the Prophet of Islam and be loyal to his religion, sect, and family. He demonstrated this by memorizing and obeying the Quran without discussion, performing prayers on time, and fasting during Ramadan. He persevered in what he learned to gain the Prophet’s approval and the praise of his family and Imam. When he was sixteen years old, he worked in a men’s barbershop to learn a skill that would help him in the future if he failed in school.
In addition to supporting his family, he saved some money on the side to purchase a gift for his mother on Mother’s Day. After finishing his shift at work, he went to the store to buy a gift for his mother when he was seen by one of the imams who taught in the mosque.
“Where are you going?” the imam asked.
Happily, he answered that he was going to buy a Mother’s Day gift. In anger, the Imam rebuked him, saying that Muslims do not participate in the holidays of infidels and don’t act like them unless the Prophet and his successors do. He went home and wondered why getting a gift for his mother would disobey the teachings of Islam.
He reasoned that while growing up, he wore a style of clothes that the Prophet and his successors did not wear, so why was this any different? This event made him start reading books that discussed the lives and history of the Prophet and his successors, and he was shocked by their actions and biographies. He wondered whether Islam and Sharia laws are valid and applicable in every place and time. He was afraid of this question or to speak out about it with his religious leaders, so he continued his research while applying the rules of Islam to his life.
When the sectarian war began, seeing with his own eyes the Islamic practices of the militias while claiming to implement the Sharia law, a big question arose in his mind: Is Islam a true religion?
One day, he was sitting with a friend, and they talked about what the country had become. Then, with all boldness, his friend said, “The solution for our country is in a book called the Bible because our religion is wrong, our minds and souls are full of sins, and we don’t have a correct relationship with the True God.”
He didn’t argue with his friend but instead asked him if he could have the Book to read, and that began his journey to salvation.
At first, he was reading the Word of God while trying to defend Islam within himself, but he couldn’t find any way to defend it in the face of the Truth in the Word of God. At the same time, he had many questions, so his friend arranged a meeting with me, and I began to explain to him what the Lord Jesus said when he said we must repent and believe the Gospel. He began attending our church, and several weeks later, after one of our meetings ended, he came to the knowledge of salvation and accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. After a couple more weeks, his wife and three children came, and they all accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior.
The Word of God is the most powerful witness to the Truth about the Father and His Son. We need more Bibles. Please pray for us.
