I am currently reading a book called Secret Believers: What Happens When Muslims Believe in Christ by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen.
Dang, I love this book.
One of the authors, Brother Andrew, is a missionary who began smuggling bibles to Christians behind the Iron Curtain in 1955. You can read all about it in his first book, God’s Smuggler (also an amazing book).
Secret Believers takes place in the Middle East, and it follows several different people’s stories. You learn what was going on in their lives before they became believers, how they came to know Christ, and their faithfulness as they navigate their new faith and face persecution in a Muslim country.
In the book there is a young man named Ahmed. Ahmed suffered from terrible nightmares, in which he was usually burned. One of his friends encouraged him to ask the forbidden questions about Islam and he brought Ahmed a bible. Ahmed started reading the Bible and he was immediately drawn to Jesus and His teachings. It didn’t take long before he became convinced that Jesus alone gave real meaning to life. Ahmed became a Christian, and in this passage of the book, Brother Andrew, Ahmed, and some of Ahmed’s friends go to church to attend a meeting for Muslim-background believers.
Ahmed delivered a short message at the service. He recited Philippians 2 for the congregation, then he picked up his journal and read a mediation he had written:
“‘I am your great Lord.’
One day man uttered this expression through the lips of pharaohs and Caesars. He has reaffirmed it consistently through actions of kings, princes, presidents, and lords. In moments of inebriation from the cup of his own egotism, man, in his historic arrogance, has asserted that he is god. How has mankind deceived himself to such an extreme?
In the fullness of time, the one true God, who has no earthly likeness, the holy, eternal, and omnipotent God, chose to become a human being. He chose to come down to us from His high place. He came down from His high heaven to become one with us, to share in our pain and dreams. It’s what any truly great king would do to express solidarity with his people. He could not withdraw to his ivory tower. This God of love, filled with compassion and mercy, came down to us. He did not just descend to the atmosphere, no, He came down to our dirt. He walked among us as he still does, doing good. He heals those bound by the devil, whose egotism has overpowered them, blinding them lest they see the light that came into the world. They did not realize the darkness of their own selfishness. Selfishness is a most repugnant death. It leads down a false path causing one to gain the world and all things while losing the greatest thing—his own soul and the Savior.
Imagine it. Man asserts his deity and rejects God’s becoming man. Where’s the logic in that?”
Dang. Let that really sink in.
I got chills when I read this passage. This young believer truly understood the gospel.
God is moving so strongly in the Muslim world. Jesus is appearing to an astonishing number of Muslims through visions and dreams. Millions of Muslims are turning to faith in Jesus Christ— Praise God!
Having spent most of the Race in Muslim countries, that part of the world and its people definitely holds a special place in my heart.
