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What If He Is Alive?

Over the last decade and a half, Ruth and I have conducted, recorded, documented, and analyzed more than seven hundred personal, in-depth interviews with believers from seventy-two different countries where followers of Jesus have been persecuted for their faith and/or are being persecuted for their faith. The number of interviews is still increasing month by month.

Ruth and I have shared this journey from the beginning. Our life and work have long been part of a shared adventure that neither started nor ended in Somalia. Our pilgrimage to and through persecution has always been (and is now more than ever) a joint journey of discovery that has taken us to places and parts of the world that we never expected to see. It has also taken us to spiritual heights and depths that we never knew existed.

Ruth has experienced every trip that I have taken on this adventure—even when I traveled alone. She was always my first and fullest debriefer when I got home. She was my most valuable sounding board from the planning to the reporting of every trip. She also transcribed thousands of hours of taped interviews and helped me organize and analyze our findings.

More recently, Ruth has sat in and participated in many of our interviews. And she has done many interviews on her own in places and circumstances where custom and culture would have precluded my doing so. For example, she can talk privately with women in countries where Islamic law forbids them to be interviewed by me.

We are no longer meeting together with that great group of ninety college students (sixty of whom have since gone out themselves to spread the light and love of Jesus with lost people in some of the darkest places in this world). But we have developed an even bigger and much more extended family that we belong to—the worldwide family of God. I suppose that I always knew how immense that family was. Through the interviews, however, I have become acquainted with so many family members that I never knew I had.

Ruth and I often share the stories that we have heard and the things that we have learned to help the western church and many of its congregations grasp a new, and perhaps more biblical, perspective on suffering and persecution in our faith. We share often about how suffering and persecution relate to our faith. We desperately want our western brothers and sisters in Christ to realize that the greatest enemy of our faith today is not communism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Atheism, or even Islam. Our greatest enemy is lostness. Lostness is the terrible enemy that Jesus commissioned His followers to vanquish with the battle strategy that He spelled out for them in Matthew 28:18–20. He was addressing this same enemy when He plainly clarified His purpose in coming: “I have come to seek and to save those who are lost.”

Our hope is that believers around the world will get close enough to the heart of God that the first images that come to mind when we hear the word “Muslim” are not Somali pirates or suicide bombers or violent jihadists or even terrorists. When we hear the word “Muslim,” we need to see and think of each and every individual Muslim as a lost person who is loved by God. We need to see each Muslim as a person in need of God’s grace and forgiveness. We need to see each Muslim as someone for whom Christ died.

Nothing is more gratifying for us than taking the examples, the stories, and the experiences of one group of believers in persecution and sharing their spiritual wisdom with another group of oppressed Jesus-followers in a different place. Imagine the impact of telling Muslim-background believers that the leaders of ten million Chinese believers are calling their people to rise early every day to pray for their brothers and sisters in Islamic countries who are really being persecuted for Jesus’ sake! When we shared that incredible word with Muslim-background believers, they wept. They cried out to God, “Oh God, please let us live long enough to go to China to thank our brothers and sisters who did not forget us and who are praying for us every morning.”

How many of us who strive to follow Jesus today have ever wished we could have witnessed firsthand the kind of spiritual adventures and the world-changing, resurrection-powered faith experienced by believers in the New Testament? I believe that we can—and we don’t need a time machine to do it. We need only to look and listen to our brothers and sisters who are faithfully living for Christ today in our world’s toughest places.

When Ruth and I first departed for Africa with our boys almost thirty years ago, I was a young, naïve Kentucky farm-boy who believed that God was sending us around the world on a great adventure to tell people who Jesus was and to explain what the Bible was all about. Today, I realize that God allowed us to go out into the world so we could find out who Jesus was from people who really knew Him and actually lived the Word of God.

I have learned so much more than I have taught.

I now know that when Ruth and I began this pilgrimage into persecution fifteen years ago, we were asking the wrong questions and seeking the wrong sort of answers. What we discovered—through God’s grace and with the help of hundreds of faithful people—wasn’t so much a strategy, a method, or a plan. Rather, it was a Person. We found Jesus—and we found that Jesus is very much alive and well in the twenty-first century. Jesus is revealed in the lives and words and resurrection faith of believers in persecution.

These believers don’t just live for Jesus, they live with Jesus every day.

These believers have also taught me a whole new perspective on persecution. For decades now, many concerned western believers have sought to rescue their spiritual brothers and sisters around the world who suffer because they choose to follow Jesus. Yet our pilgrimage among house churches in persecution convinced us that God may actually want to use them to save us from the often debilitating, and sometimes spiritually-fatal, effects of our watered-down, powerless western faith.

Like most other Americans, I have suffered little or no persecution for my faith. Given my background, I had a hard time getting my mind around the reality of spiritual oppression. Early on, my questions reflected a lot of my own experience.

Most of all, I wanted to know why.

Why is there so much persecution directed toward followers of Jesus around the globe?

Why are believers in Jesus in other countries kicked out of their homes, disinherited, beaten, jailed, and even killed?

Why is a young woman who come to Jesus out of Islam routinely married off to a Muslim man thirty years her senior in order to silence her witness and limit her influence?

Over and over again, I wanted to know why.

Often, when we consider those kinds of questions, we already think we know the answers. The answers might be, for example, “The people who live in those places are uneducated. The people who inflict this kind of pain on believers are simply ignorant. Ignorance fuels persecution.”

Another answer might be: “Better government is the answer. If these people would just embrace western forms of democracy that would guarantee civil and human rights—then persecution would be against the law and it would stop.”

Another answer might be: “If people were just more tolerant, we could all live together in peace. Greater tolerance would end persecution.”

But none of these suggested answers even comes near the foundational cause of persecution as it relates to the Christian faith. After almost twenty years of walking through this world of persecution and talking to hundreds of believers who suffer for their faith, we can say without a shadow of a doubt that the primary cause of “religious persecution” in the world today is people surrendering their hearts and lives to Jesus.

Think about the implications of this truth . . .

For decades the western church has been taught to pray and work for an end to the persecution of fellow believers around the world. We enlist our congregations, our denominations, and even our governments to speak out and pressure oppressive regimes in hostile nations to end discrimination. Sometimes we even demand that the persecutors be punished.

We seem to forget that Jesus Himself promised that the world would reject and mistreat His faithful followers just as it rejected Him. Could it be that the only way that Almighty God could actually answer prayers asking Him to end the persecution of believers . . . would be to stop people from accepting Christ as their Lord and Savior? If people stopped accepting Christ as Lord and Savior . . . persecution would end immediately. That would be the only way to completely end persecution.

It sounds like a ridiculous question, but should we really be asking God for the end of persecution? By doing that, we might unknowingly be asking that people not come to faith in Christ!

Ruth and I have seldom encountered a mature believer living in persecution who asked us to pray that their persecution would cease. We have never heard that request. Rather, believers in persecution ask us to pray that “they would be faithful and obedient through their persecution and suffering.”

That is a radically different prayer.

Why is it that millions of the global followers of Jesus who actively practice their faith live in environments where persecution is the norm? The first and most basic answer is that these people have given their lives to Jesus. The second answer is that they have determined in their hearts that they will not keep Jesus to themselves. Having found faith in Christ, they have such a passion for Jesus that they must share the Good News of His sacrificial love and forgiveness with their families, their friends, and their neighbors. By doing that, these believers are choosing to be persecuted.

What that means is that, for most believers, persecution is completely avoidable. If someone simply leaves Jesus alone, doesn’t seek Him or follow Him, then persecution will simply not happen. Beyond that, even if someone becomes a follower of Jesus, persecution will likely not happen if the faith is kept private and personal. If a person is silent about their faith in Jesus, the chance of being persecuted is very small.

So if our goal is reducing persecution, that task is easily achieved. First, just leave Jesus alone. Second, if you do happen to find Him, just keep Him to yourself. Persecution stops immediately where there is no faith and where there is no witness.

The reason for persecution, then, is that people keep finding Jesus—and, then, they refuse to keep Him to themselves.

Believers in persecution taught us another important truth. The freedom to believe and witness has nothing to do with the government or political system. The freedom to believe and witness has nothing to do with the civil and political rights that might or might not be present.

This is one of the most important lessons that we learned from believers in persecution: They (and you and I) are just as free to share Jesus today in Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Communist countries as you and I are in America. It isn’t a matter of political freedom. It is a simply matter of obedience. The price for obedience might be different in different places—but it is always possible to obey Christ’s call to make disciples. Every believer—in every place—is always free to make that choice.

Jesus’ last instruction to His disciples was to be witnesses to all peoples. He did not limit His mission to western, democratic, or “free” countries. It was a blanket commandment. It was not a suggestion, or a recommendation, or an option. It was a commandment for all of His followers—to share His message with all peoples.

True to Scripture, believers in persecution would remind us that we are all equally free and equally responsible to share Jesus in every corner of the globe. The question is never, “Am I free to do that?” Rather, the question is, “Will I be obedient?” Believers in the world of persecution have already decided their answer to that crucial question.

Perhaps some of us have not yet settled the matter. The question we must answer is whether or not we have the courage to bear the consequences of obediently exercising our freedom to be salt and light to all peoples, wherever they live. The consequences for our obedience may be suffering and persecution. Even then, we are free to obey. Time and again, believers in persecution have demonstrated the power of determined and courageous faith. Time and time again, they have obeyed. They have willingly accepted the consequences of their obedience. Even in the most repressive places, these believers have understood that they are utterly free to obey Jesus.

Many of us, however, do not live in repressive places. Our biggest fear in sharing our faith might be mild embarrassment or rejection. In fact, we might even wonder why we should care about believers in persecution in other places.

The answer to that question is simple; when we care about believers in persecution, we identify with them.

Not long ago, Ruth and I were part of a response team that ministered to workers in a Muslin country after three colleagues were martyred by a militant Islamic fundamentalist. Understandably, that was a grief-filled, emotion-laden, and spiritually-challenging time.

Even so, what many of us who were there remember most from those days is joy. Of course, there was profound grief—immense grief. But the joy was unmistakable. During that time, we sensed an unearthly, heavenly identification. These servants, in their deaths, had partnered with our Master and His cross. They had shouldered their own crosses for the sake of Jesus and for the sake of witness.

During our time of grieving, we learned an important spiritual lesson: before we can grasp the full meaning of the Resurrection, we first have to witness or experience crucifixion. If we spend our lives so afraid of suffering, so averse to sacrifice, that we avoid even the risk of persecution or crucifixion, then we might never discover the true wonder, joy and power of a resurrection faith. Ironically, avoiding suffering could be the very thing that prevents us from partnering deeply with the Risen Jesus.

All over the world we encountered committed followers of Jesus who trust even His toughest teachings. They understand that anyone who wishes to save his life must first be willing to lose it.

They are willing to take that risk because they believe that, ultimately, good will defeat evil. Love will finally overcome hate. And life will conquer death forever by the power of our resurrection faith. They know that the final chapter of the greatest story ever told has already been written. And they know that, in the end, and, for all eternity, God will have His way.

In the meantime, in the here and now, a real battle continues. This is the same spiritual battle that the apostle Paul talked about. First-century believers understood Paul when he described an epic struggle that was “not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph. 6:12). Followers of Jesus in persecution today understand this battle well.

In fact, everyone in the world today who claims to be a follower of Jesus plays a part in this battle. Faithful believers who are paying a personal price in pain and persecution for the cause of Christ truly understand the crux and the cost of their faith. Their witness, their lives and their examples should inspire and instruct us. Their experience reveals what is at stake, and their experience also reveals much about evil and its power.

Believers who know what it means to suffer for their faith help us recognize and understand the Enemy’s tactics and his ultimate goal. Satan at his worst, evil at its core, and persecution in its essence does not overtly seek to starve, beat, imprison, torture, or kill followers of Jesus. The strategy of Satan is simpler and more diabolical than that. What is Satan’s paramount intent? Quite simply, it is this: denying the world access to Jesus!

Satan’s greatest desire is for the people of this planet to leave Jesus alone. Satan desires that we turn away from Jesus—or that we never find Him in the first place. If Satan cannot be successful at that, he desires to keep believers quiet, to diminish or silence our witness, and to stop us from bringing others to Christ.

It is that simple.

Once we understand the nature of this spiritual battle and the strategy of the Enemy, we see clearly the role that believers have been called to play. We also see the importance of our choices regarding witness and faithfulness and obedience.

At the beginning of every day, we choose. It is simply a matter of identification. Will we identify with believers in persecution—or will we identify with their persecutors?

We make that choice as we decide whether we will share Jesus with others or keep Him to ourselves.

We identify ourselves as believers by taking a stand with, and following the example of, those in persecution. Or we identify with their persecutors by not giving witness of Jesus to our family, our friends, and our enemies. Those who number themselves among the followers of Jesus—but don’t witness for Him—are actually siding with the Taliban, the brutal regime that rules North Korea, the secret police in communist China, and the Somalis and Saudi Arabias of the world. Believers who do not share their faith aid and abet Satan’s ultimate goal of denying others access to Jesus. Our silence makes us accomplices.

When Ruth and I speak and teach and share with western churches, we are often asked if we believe that persecution is coming to America.

My response is often rather pointed. I say, quite sincerely, “Why would Satan want to wake us up when he has already shut us up?” Why would Satan bother with us when we are already accomplishing his goal? He will likely conclude that it is better to let us sleep.

Our problem is not simply a lack of concern. And our problem is not that we are unaware or disinterested. We know what is happening around the world. Certainly, in light of what we have encountered in this book, we know about sacrifices that are made for the faith. We know more about the health and the whereabouts of other members of the body of Christ today than at any other time in history.

It’s not enough to feel grateful for the blessed circumstances in which we live. It’s not even enough to do a better job remembering and praying for the suffering believers around the world. It’s not even enough to identify with the other parts of Christ’s Body around the world.

Ultimately, the problem is one of emphasis and focus. Instead of recognizing, thinking about, remembering, praying about, identifying with and focusing on the suffering of fellow believers around the world, we would do well to shift our focus. Quite simply, we would do well to ask ourselves whether or not we are being obedient to Jesus. He is asking us—He is expecting us—He is commanding us to share Him wherever we go. He is commanding us to do that wherever we are today.

It is a simply matter of obedience. If He is our Lord, then we will obey Him. If we do not obey Him, then He is not our Lord.

Perhaps the question should not be: “Why are others persecuted?” Perhaps the better question is: “Why are we not?”

I cannot forget the words of my friend, Stoyan. He understood both the spiritual battle being waged and the significance of the decisions to be made. He said: “I took great joy that I was suffering in my country so that you could be free to witness in your country.” And then he raised his voice to say: “DON’T YOU EVER GIVE UP IN FREEDOM WHAT WE WOULD NEVER GIVE UP IN PERSECUTION—AND THAT IS OUR WITNESS TO THE POWER OF THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST!”

Stoyan had made his own decision long ago. It was settled for him.

You and I make the decision each morning: will I exercise my freedom to witness for Jesus today or will I be silent?