"All Christians must be killed according to Islamic law. Such people do not have a place in Somalia, and we will never recognize their existence and we will slaughter them."
-- Islamic leader in Somalia
Persecution News
Better Days for Libya's Christians?
Back on September 13, Mustafa Abdel Jalil told a crowd (ten thousand strong) that in its post-Gaddafi era, Libya would look to Islam - moderate Islam - as its source of legislation. Mr. Jalil, who formerly served as Gaddafi's minister of justice before turning against him to join the rebels, is currently serving as the head of Libya's National Transitional Council. During his speech in Tripoli, he said, "We will not accept any extremist ideology, on the Right or the Left. We are a Muslim people, for a moderate Islam, and we will stay on this road."
Yesterday, Libya entered the post-Gaddafi era.
What is clear is that the recent unrest has taken its toll. According to the Barnabas Fund, last April in the Tripoli area alone, the largest Christian denomination had dwindled from 100,000 to around 5,000; another went from 1,200 to 250; another from 1,000 to fewer than 12. It seems that when the rule of law, however corrupt, breaks down in Islam-dominated countries, Christians face disproportionate amounts of terror and abuse.
Libya is 97 percent Sunni Muslim and is notorious for persecuting Christians (ranked 25th out of 50 on the Open Doors World Watch List). When Mr. Jalil promised that his country would rely on Islam to help reform its social woes and political problems, he was choosing not to acknowledge the Draconian penalties that sharia places on the Christian population, including harsh punishments for anyone who evangelizes Muslims or distributes Arabic Bibles. This is one of the reasons Christian communities in Libya are mostly composed of expatriates and immigrants.
In the coming weeks, as Libya takes steps to order its government, please be in prayer.
Specifically, pray:
- That Jehovah God would provide for the Christian communities in Libya who are suffering physically from water shortages, limited food supplies, and life-threatening medical problems.
- That the love and compassion of Jesus Christ would be manifest in the words and actions of believers, especially those who are enduring persecution for their faith.
- That God would sway the heart of Libya’s leaders, including Mufasa Abdel Jalil, as they influences the formation of the new government, and grant them wisdom and justice in decisions that impact Libya’s religious freedom.
- That the Western Church would actively seek ways to encourage and support our brothers and sisters in their trials, and that God would fill our hearts with a longing to intercede for the Muslims of Libya who do not know the love of God that is in Christ Jesus.
O Lord, we ask for you to “let the assembled peoples gather around You. Rule over them from on high.” (Psalm 7:7) We know You are good and we trust You even amidst times of turmoil and pain. You are our Father, and we seek your face on behalf of Libya.
Amen!
Defining the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA)
Last week, President Obama authorized 100 U.S. troops to travel to Africa to help stop the Lord’s Resistance Army. The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is a guerilla army force that claims connections to Christianity, yet this group has persecuted Africa’s Christians for more than two decades.The LRA commits atrocities that include pillaging, enslavement, sexual slavery, rape, murder, and brainwashing children and utilizing them as child-soldiers.
A far cry from biblical Christianity, the LRA’s religious motivations appear to be based on extreme occultic tendencies and tribal animism. Interestingly, the LRA’s interaction with the Muslim government of Northern Sudan has increased the group’s syncretism. The LRA reportedly incorporates Islamic principles into its operations. Most significantly, the Lord’s Resistance Army is used as a proxy militia by Northern Sudan to debilitate the Christian populations in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Sudan, and Uganda.
I. Overview of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA)
A cult-like rebel army group that employs terror tactics in its fight to overthrow the Ugandan government, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has terrorized Africans with brutal, horrific measures since the early 1990s. The LRA initially began as a rebellion movement against current Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni. LRA rebels say they are “fighting for the establishment of a government based on the biblical Ten Commandments.”
Joseph Kony, self-proclaimed prophet and Ugandan native, commands the LRA. The guerilla force is infamous for its violence, including the routine abduction of African children from villages, who are terrorized into functioning as guards, concubines, and slaves in the LRA.
The LRA is approximately 2,500 strong and operating in two languages: Acholi, the language of the majority people group in northern Uganda, and Arabic. The use of the Acholi language ensures that the LRA maintains operations and a power base in Uganda. Conversely, the LRA’s use of the Arabic language demonstrates the group’s increasing familiarity with Islam. Practically from its inception, the Lord’s Resistance Army has been supported by the Muslim government of Northern Sudan, Uganda’s neighbor to the north. Under the leadership of Omar Hassan al-Bashir, the Muslim leadership in Northern Sudan has harbored the LRA within its borders and has reportedly “armed, trained, and [given] intelligence” to the group.
Conflicts within Africa are rarely isolated events. While the LRA-Ugandan conflict heightened throughout the 1990s, so did the civil war in Sudan. Complex alliances ensued. Uganda’s president Museveni sympathized with the primarily-Christian South Sudan. Ugandan support for South Sudanese military forces alienated both the LRA and the Northern Sudan government and resulted in the Northern Sudan-LRA relationship. It appears that the Northern Sudanese government views the LRA as a ready-made vehicle for the expansion of Islam in Sudan, Uganda, and other Central African nations.
According to Elizabeth Kendall, writing for the ASSIST News Service, “There is more to the LRA than mere human evil.” From its very beginning, the religious makeup of the LRA has been a mixture of skewed Christian beliefs, tribal animism, and superstition. An October 2009 release from the ASSIST News Service states,
According to testimonies from defectors and rescued children, Kony routinely enters a trance to become possessed by a spirit—claimed to be the Holy Spirit. If Kony talks while possessed, by repute whatever he says comes exactly true. The spirit reportedly alerts Kony to military movements, instructs him whom to kill and is always hungry for more human blood.
Other news reports identify Kony as a “notorious witchdoctor who believes that he is the reincarnation of Jesus.” While in name the LRA aligns itself with the God of the Bible, in reality, the rebel group exhibits extreme occultic tendencies and collusion with demonic forces.
In recent years the group’s continued interaction with members of the Islamic world has resulted in even greater syncretism. Reports have surfaced that Joseph Kony now incorporates “tenets of the Islamic faith” into his religious practices. The LRA’s close dependence upon the Muslim government of Northern Sudan has allowed Muslim beliefs and practices to infiltrate the group’s worldview.
Regardless of the precise religious motivation behind the LRA’s actions, the group’s ruthlessness is nearly incomprehensible: the coercion enacted toward African youth to become sex and labor slaves; the massacre of thousands of innocent African civilians; and the immediate and painful execution of those who disobey or rebel and those who are believed to be in league with evil spirits. The guerrilla force is famous for cutting off the lips of its victims. The International Criminal Court (ICC) summarizes the LRA’s crimes as “enslavement, sexual slavery, rape, murder, intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population, enlisting children and pillaging.”
In 2005, after nearly a decade and a half of guerilla warfare against the civilian populace of Uganda and other Central African nations, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Joseph Kony and other top leaders of the LRA. In 2006, the LRA and the people of Uganda embarked upon a “peace and reconciliation” process. Though this stage of “forgiveness” is said “to have lapsed as often as it has advanced,” the Ugandan government pursued official peace negotiations with the Lord’s Resistance Army. An astounding outcome is seen in the U.S. Department of State’s “Advancing Freedom and Democracy Report” for Uganda: “No LRA attacks [were] reported in 2007.”
Yet unsurprisingly, the peace process came to a halt in early 2008. Following the brief and politically-motivated reconciliation negotiations, Joseph Kony refused to sign the “Final Peace Agreement” with the Government of Uganda. The LRA returned to its former tactics in full force, complete with expanded territory. Kony remains at large, sought by the ICC for his crimes against humanity.
As of April 2008, the LRA continues its mass killings of African civilians with a renewed vigor. A spokesperson for the Ugandan army reveals though that recent killings have targeted people groups other than the Ugandans. “We have not rescued many Ugandans recently …We are rescuing Central Africans, Congolese and Sudanese.” In response to the LRA’s territorial expansion, the governments of Uganda, Southern Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) launched “Operation Lightning Thunder,” an offensive against the LRA in early 2009.
The guerilla army denies seeking re-alliance with Northern Sudan, though the relationship between the LRA and the African Muslim community persists. The LRA is currently based in the DRC.
This second phase of the LRA’s existence (following the attempt at reconciliation) is marked by two new factors. First, the Ugandan Daily Monitor reports the loss of ideological or political motivations. The newspaper suggests that the rebel army force has transitioned into committing acts of violence simply to remain in existence. The LRA abducts children “to replenish” its guerilla numbers and raids and pillages villages for sustenance and continued survival. Whether or not the motivations of the group have changed, the violence of the Lord’s Army continues to be unparalleled. Secondly, the LRA’s horrific campaign has spawned imitator groups. “Dissident branches” of the LRA, or even entirely separate groups, have purportedly abducted children and committed atrocities in the same central African region, following in the footsteps of the Lord’s Army.
II. African Christians and the Lord’s Resistance Army
Central Africa’s Christians have not been spared in the nightmare created by the Lord’s Resistance Army. How do the history and politics of the LRA affect Christians in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Sudan, and Uganda?
Listen to two accounts from earlier this year, documented by the Barnabas Aid, an organization that supports persecuted Christians:
In the South Sudanese region of Mundri, LRA fighters abducted two ten-year-old boys, one of them the son of a lay preacher in a local church. When the father and another church member followed the LRA soldiers, they were captured, bound and brutally murdered in front of the boys, who were later found abandoned and traumatised in the bush.
The Lord’s Resistance Army makes direct attacks upon the Christian community and the African church:
In DRC a congregation was at worship on Christmas Day [2008] when it was attacked. At least 418 people were killed, 67 children abducted and 1,023 houses burnt down. Around 150 people are believed to have been murdered the next day at a concert organised by a church in Farajde City. On 26 December 45 people, mainly women and children, were hacked to death inside a church near Doruma, DRC. In Duru 75 people were killed and a church burned down. Then on 24 January … a church building filled with worshippers holding a prayer vigil was torched by the LRA.
A Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin, from the ASSIST News Service, documents this additional instance:
In early September [2009] a large band of LRA soldiers stormed into a church in Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala’s diocese [in remote southern Sudan], desecrated the building and abducted 17 youths … 12 people were subsequently abducted from a village near Nzara, and six people ambushed in the forest outside Nzara were killed after being nailed to pieces of wood fastened to the ground. Those who discovered the bodies likened it to a grotesque crucifixion scene.
Unfortunately, the instances detailed above are not freak coincidence. The LRA does not merely cross paths with African Christians on occasion. Instead, the persecution inflicted by the LRA specifically targets the Christian population in central Africa. Recently, thousands of Christian civilians in South Sudan have been forced to flee their villages, as attacks by the Lord’s Resistance Army have taken on an increased brutality. The modis operandi of the LRA continues to be terror and intimidation. These tactics are expressed in the continued abduction, brainwashing, and slavery of children, including those from Christian families; the widespread displacement of Christians from their villages; the desecration and burning of Christian churches; and the mutilation and murder of African Christians of all ages.
Several factors help to explain the reality of the persistent and focused persecution of African Christians by the Lord’s Army. First, the regional focus of the LRA. The army currently operates primarily in South Sudan, northern Congo and eastern Central African Republic, where the populations are comprised of predominately Christian peoples. Secondly, Islam’s influence upon the LRA. The army’s dependence upon the Muslim government of Northern Sudan is a two-way street. While the LRA gains training, funds, and protection, the Muslim Sudanese government benefits as well. By supporting the LRA, Northern Sudan essentially gains a “proxy militia” against Africans who “reject Khartoum’s Arab Islamic imperialism.” Northern Sudan uses the LRA to carry out the Islamic vision. The result of these factors? Churches and Christians are common targets of the Lord’s Resistance Army.
Linking the LRA’s campaign to the greater Islamic commitment to “jihad” gives a broader context to the horrific situation that African Christians face. The holistic nature of Islam dictates that even regional “skirmishes,” such as the LRA’s rebellion against the Ugandan government, should be used to silence Christians and to expand the authority of Islam. Central Africa’s Christians live not only with the threat of the LRA; our fellow Christians in Africa also bear the brunt of a rapidly-expanding and increasingly-dangerous Islamism.
Consequences of the LRA’s violence are many. The LRA’s brutal campaign has resulted in a widespread refugee situation: over nearly two million Africans in Northern Uganda have been driven from their villages and are living in temporary camps. Many have lived in Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps for close to a decade. This displacement compounds other refugee problems in Africa, specifically those created by the situation in the Darfur region of Sudan. The northern and western parts of Uganda have been beset by famine.
The forced withdrawal of several major international humanitarian organizations, such as the World Food Program, demonstrates another significant repercussion of the LRA’s decades-long rampage. As fewer organizations are on the ground to provide aid to the Central African population, the burden to help victims of the LRA’s violence rests upon the shoulders of African Christians. Yet when the LRA traumatizes the region’s Christian community, the rebel army debilitates the very individuals who routinely provide “virtually all services, provision of shelter, humanitarian aid, healthcare, education, care of orphans and rehabilitation of victims” in the Central African region. The LRA’s continuous attacks maim and greatly impair the African Church.
Lastly, and most significantly, the Lord’s Resistance Army has inflicted the most permanent damage to Africa’s children, Christian or otherwise. An estimated 25,000 children have been kidnapped by the LRA over the past two decades. World Vision, an international aid organization, reveals,
A significant number of children have escaped from LRA captivity or are rescued by the Ugandan army. But these children have been traumatized by their experience and … sadly, these children are frequently mistrusted or hated by their communities for what they have done, or are perceived to have done, while with the LRA.
When the LRA abducts children to fight with the guerilla army, it not only removes the young victims from their familiar environment of home and family, but the Lord’s Army subsequently forces the children to commit atrocities against their very own families and villages. LRA leaders use threats of torture and death to terrorize the child prisoners into doing their bidding. Such despicable tactics set the LRA apart as a terrorist group.
The LRA’s manipulative and destructive use of goods and persons demonstrates the ferocity of the guerilla army. Paired with the leadership and support of the Muslim Northern Sudanese government, the effects of the rebel force are far-reaching indeed.
Figure 1: Central African Republic, the DRC, Rwanda, Sudan, and Uganda (Encarta.com)
Figure 2: LRA attacks, December 2007 - January 2009 (BBCNews.com)
- Smyrna would like to thank Brittany for compiling this report
Bibliography
Barnabas Aid. “Central Africa: Attacks by Lord’s Resistance Army on Churches.” Prayer Focus. February, September, and October 2009.
CBN News. “Missionary Fights for Children of East Africa.” 12 September 2009.
Economist.com, “Kingdom Come,” 16 September 2009.
“Uganda: A country adrift, a president amiss,” 12 February 2009.
GlobalSecurity.org. Military. Africa: The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).
Holmes-Brown, Bev. “Where Devastation Meets Forgiveness.” ASSIST News Service. 20 May 2007.
Kendal, Elizabeth. “The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) Terrorises.” Religious Liberty News Bulletin. 7 October 2009.
International Criminal Court. Prosecutions. Northern Uganda. “Lord’s Resistance Army.” July 2004.
Invisible Children. “Uganda Today.”
Nyakairu, Frank. “Are resurgent Ugandan rebels backed by Khartoum?” Reuters. September 10, 2009.
“LRA rebels deny CAR abductions.” Ugandan Daily Monitor. 31 March 2008.
Okeowo, Alexis. “Forgiving the Lord’s Resistance Army.” Time 10 November 2007.
Petraitis, Richard. “Joseph Kony’s Spirit War.” 2003.
US Department of State. Country Notes: Uganda, May 2008.
Virtual Presence Post: Northern Uganda. “Peace Process.”
World Vision. Our Work. “World Vision’s Work in Northern Uganda.”
Iranian Pastor Sent Back to the Tribunal that Sentenced him to Death
A year ago, a pastor in Iran was sentenced to death for apostasy, or abandoning Islam. On Sunday, September 25, the tribunal that sentenced him to death is scheduled to begin reviewing his case again.
The pastor had appealed to the supreme court of Iran, which sent him back to the tribunal that sentenced him to death last year. The tribunal is to reconsider his case and determine if he really was a Muslim between the ages of 15 (the age of accountability) and 19 (the year he became a Christian). If the tribunal decides that he was a Muslim at one time, then the death sentence against him still stands.
Although he was raised in a Muslim home, he claims that he was never a Muslim “by choice, conviction, belief or consistent practice” (Middle East Concern). In Islamic countries, however, those who are born into a Muslim family are often assumed to be Muslims.
Please pray for this pastor. Ask God to give him courage and spare his life.
Sources: Middle East Concern, Assist News
*******
UPDATE: The pastor was found not to have been a practicing Muslim, but his was still found guilty of apostasy because of his ancestry. He may be executed if he continues to remain steadfast in his fatih. Read more here.
Pastor Still Under Death Sentence
Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani is still facing a death sentence in Iran for apostasy, or leaving Islam.
He was arrested in October 2009 after he protested the Koranic study forced upon his son. While in prison, Muslims tried to pressure him into converting to Islam. His wife was arrested in June 2010. Authorities threatened to take their sons away and give them to a Muslim family. By July, two judges “agreed to make him ‘liable to capital punishment,’” and in early October his lawyer was verbally informed that the pastor had been sentenced to death for apostasy. His wife was reportedly sentenced to life imprisonment in August, but by October her appeal was granted and she was released.
Pastor Yousef’s execution was originally set for October 24, 2010. The written verdict against him was not delivered until November, and his hanging was also delayed. He appealed to the supreme court of Iran and waited for six months for a hearing.
The supreme court’s verbally issued verdict created much confusion. Some thought it annulled the death sentence, and others thought it upheld the sentence. Based on an accumulation of reports over the past two weeks, it appears that the death sentence was upheld, and annulled only on the condition that Pastor Yousef “repents,” or returns to Islam.
His lawyer just recently received the written verdict. The supreme court is reportedly sending Pastor Yousef back to the same tribunal that sentenced him to death last year. The tribunal is to reconsider the case and determine if Pastor Yousef really was a Muslim before he became Christian. If the court determines he was a Muslim, then the execution order stands. Other reports indicate that sending him back to the tribunal may just be a delay tactic in order to put more pressure on him to convert to Islam. He could be executed, released, or subjected to another trial.
The lawyer who defended him has also been sentenced to nine years in prison and has been banned for 10 years from teaching or practicing law.
Pray for Pastor Yousef and his family. Ask God for his freedom. Pray that he, his wife, and his sons will be strong in the Lord. Pray also that the charges against his lawyer will be dropped.
Sources: Assist News, BosNewsLife, Voice of the Martyrs USA, Middle East Concern, Compass Direct, Christian Solidarity Worldwide, Jubilee Campaign, and Mission Network News.
Jihadist Tidal Wave in Nigeria – Christians Targeted
July 10 – unbeknownst to the jihadists, the worship service had already ended. Most of the congregation had already departed down Church Road towards their homes. Only a few members of the All Christian Fellowship Mission remained inside for a meeting. Two of them were killed instantly, two others died in the hospital and seven more were seriously wounded.
It was the grace of God.
It could have been much, much worse.
The explosion was powerful enough to damage the Faith Mission Church next door. Boko Haram, “the Nigerian Taliban,” claimed credit. It wasn’t the first time. Back on June 7, Rev. David Usman of the Church of Christ was shot dead in his church…along with his assistant. On June 26, a young girl was caught trying to smuggle a bomb into a church service.
Boko Haram formalized their links with al-Queda last summer. Since then they have been recruiting heavily. Their aim is total Islamic rule. They boast that 100-plus jihadists trained in Sudan and Somalia have recently returned to Nigeria, ready for action. Boko Haram members have warned Nigerian Muslims to avoid law-enforcement personnel and Christians – both groups are “infidels . . . marked for elimination.”
Security is tight. Fear is everywhere.
The grace of God…
It was 2:30 pm last Sunday when those jihadists, motorcycle engines revved, drove by the church and tossed that bomb…. Nigeria is 5 hours ahead of Virginia…..it was only 9:30 am here. I was sitting in church, listening to a sermon on Jesus, the Bread of Life.
There were no cries of “Allahu Akbar,” no blasted walls, no bleeding friends. After church we had a Sunday School picnic. Little kids blew bubbles, gigg
ling. We sat in the shade and ate peaches.
But it’s only a 14 hour flight from here to Selija, Nigeria. In less than a day I could be staring at the blown-out rubble of the All Christian Fellowship mission, the place where, three days ago, some of my brothers and sisters were martyred.
The Body of Christ, though separated geographically, is called to be ONE. One Lord, one spirit, one purpose. One in joy. One in suffering. One in prayer.
Join me now. Intercede for Christians in Nigeria. Ask our Father to give them wisdom. Ask Him to pour out His spirit and allow them to forgive their attackers. Pray that they will know His all-surpassing power and peace, even as they are being increasingly crushed by persecution (2 Corinthians 4:7-12).
We are all jars of clay, formed by the same Maker.
We are the Body of Christ, called by His Name, saved by His blood.
Let us pray for each other.
Let us pray!
For further information on the situation in Nigeria, read Elizabeth Kendal's article at Religious Liberty Monitoring: The Boko Haram Threat
Christians Vulnerable in Syria
Sunni vs. Shi'ite power struggle in Syria
The population of Syria is 90 percent Sunni Arab, but the Syrian regime is allied to Shi'ite Iran and Hezballah. Right now, the Sunni US-Saudi axis is struggling against the Syrian regime to gain regional power. With Syria's chaos deepening, and Iran and Saudi Arabia interfering, the country risks an Iraq-style sectarian conflagration.If such a conflict eventuates, Syria's Christians will be just as vulnerable and threatened as Iraq's now almost annihilated Christians have been.
There is much fear. Please pray for the Christians in Syria.
PLEASE PRAY SPECIFICALLY FOR GOD TO:
* impart wisdom and restraint to all world leaders involved: the al-Assad
Two Indian Christians Languish in Saudi Prison
Summary:
LOS ANGELES, March 28 (Compass Direct News) – Friends and family of two Indian Christians arrested after a prayer meeting in Saudi Arabia in January have tried in vain to secure their release. The Christians were incarcerated for attending the prayer meeting with other Indian nationals and accused of converting Muslims to Christianity, though the government has not leveled formal charges, sources said.
Yohan Nese, 31 and Vasantha Sekhar Vara, 28, were arrested on Jan. 21 when mutaween (religious police) raided an apartment where the two had lingered after attending the prayer meeting. Religious police interrogated and beat them to the point that they suffered injuries, according to sources. Authorities asked them how many Christian groups and pastors there are in Saudi Arabia and Riyadh. The religious police also put pressure on them to convert to Islam, according to sources. The next morning, Jan. 22, authorities took the two Christians to the Religious Court in Riyadh, where they were sentenced to 45 days in prison.
To date the Christian Indians have been in prison for 67 days. Nese and Vara’s situation in prison is “horrible,” said the source, as they are cramped in a prison cell with only enough room to stand. Vara’s pastor in India, Ajay Kuma Jeldi, said Vara had told him by telephone that he was in prison for religious reasons and that he had been pressured to convert to Islam but had refused. “If I have to die for my God, I will die for him here,” Vara said, according to Pastor Jeldi.
Read the full story HERE.
Christmas Threat in Iraq
During the week of Christmas, Islamic groups repeated their threats against churches in Iraq. Congregations in Baghdad, Mosul, and Kirkuk canceled all services after dark during the Christmas season and have decided not to put up Christmas decorations. Some have resorted to airport-style security at their entrances. Since the October 31 attack on a church in Baghdad, an estimated 1,000 Christian families have fled from the cities of Baghdad and Mosul alone.
Please pray for Christians in Iraq this Christmas. Ask God to protect them from violence and to give them joy. Pray also for Iraqi refugees who are without a home this winter.
Police Shut off Believers' Utilities
The predominantly Muslim country of AZERBAIJAN claims to be religiously tolerant, but Christians are facing persecution. When believers gathered in a private home on October 31, police shut off the gas and electricity before recording, photographing, and filming everyone present and arresting four men. Late that evening, the four were sentenced in a closed hearing to an initial five days in prison. One of the men is being threatened with a 12-year prison sentence.
Pray that they will be allowed to worship freely. “For whoever would save his life will lose it.”
Michel Loua: Faithful to the point of death
"His only crime was that he was a faithful pastor and church builder, and that he could not be bought or bribed or silenced.”
You may have heard about the November 2010 martyrdom of Michel Loua, a 47 year-old pastor in Guinea, West Africa. After graduating from a seminary in Texas in 2009, the pastor-missionary returned to Guinea to carry on with church building. That was in June, 2010. By mid-October, he was thrown into a government prison...although no evidence or accusation was ever filed against him. Three weeks later, he was tortured and shot - possibly as a political sacrifice, to satisfy a Guinea Muslim belief which demands the death of an infidel to seal the legitimacy of new leadership.
His son, Joal, is fourteen, and his daughters Debora and Mary, are twelve and four. At the time of his death, his wife, Elisabeth, was 8-months pregnant with their fourth child.
This story is heartbreaking, but also inspiring. Pastor Loua's death was not a result of blundering, mis-placed faith. Born and raised as a Muslim in Guinea, he knew that ministry in his native land was dangerous. When he converted to Christ at the age of 22, Loua faced immediate persecution. His head bore a deep scar from where his own relatives had tried to stone him. He had been receiving threats against his life and ministry since 1985.
Jesus warned us, "You will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and hated by all nations because of me." (Matthew 24:9, but our Saviour also longed for the day when we would have unending fellowship with Him. Jesus prayed, "Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory..." (John 17:24)
Pastor Loua kept the faith to the point of death, and now he is with Christ, in the presence of the full glory of God.
This Christmas, please remember the families of martyrs like Pastor Loua.
Give an on-line gift to the Martyrs Fund Here
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