God's Smuggler

by Brother Andrew

  It was during that second visit, when several of the men at Marj al-Zohour invited me to share a meal with them, that I got the idea to return the favor. One year after they were detained, Israel allowed the men to return home. I hosted meals for those men in five cities. In Gaza City I spoke to four hundred men—I had only expected about forty. I shared my testimony of how I came to Christ, and I gave away all my books and Bibles—there were not nearly enough to go around. At the end of the meeting, Mahmoud Zahar invited me to come and lecture at the Islamic University in Gaza. Four years later, I fulfilled that request and spoke to hundreds of students, faculty members and Hamas leaders.

  You asked, how does this help the Church? It opens doors between Christians and Muslims. I know of at least two occasions when Hamas warned the Gaza Baptist Church of threats just because the leaders had met. The Hamas leaders also know the Church provides relief in the refugee camps—all of it to Muslims in great need. I also wonder what would have happened if we had not gone to them. Doesn’t everyone deserve a chance to hear the Gospel? We earned the right to give the Gospel because I went and visited the Hamas leaders in their time of need. I can’t tell you what God did in their lives as a result. That is God’s business. All I can say is that a friendship started that continues to this day.

  There are a lot of Muslims in Africa. Did your travels take you into other African countries besides Egypt?

  There are many reports that more people in Africa are coming to faith in Christ than anywhere else in the world. Perhaps that is true, but in no way is it a Christian continent. How many wars are being fought in Africa? How much poverty is there? Of course, Islam dominates the upper half of the continent and is spreading downward. Nigeria is one of the front lines of battle, with the northern part of the country Muslim and the southern half Christian. There is a huge conflict there for the heart and soul of the country.

  Yes, I have had some adventures in Africa. Three of us traveled to Uganda in the 1970s to encourage the Church there. This was when Idi Amin was at the height of his powers and was purging the country of all those who were considered a threat to his dictatorial rule. While most of Uganda is Christian, Amin came from a small Muslim tribe. I was told that when he became president, the King of Saudi Arabia sent him a gold sword with the message, “With this sword you must make everyone in Uganda a Muslim.” It is estimated that Amin killed between 100,000 and 500,000 people. One of my friends, the Anglican Archbishop Luwum, was murdered by Amin himself—shot through the mouth.

  I did a lot of speaking in Uganda for Hospital Christian Fellowship, and they often transported me to meetings in an ambulance—they thought that was the safest way to travel. One day our Dutch director, Jan Pit, had an opportunity to speak at a prison on Lake Victoria, and there he saw a book written by Amin’s men listing the people yet to be arrested and killed. He found my name and his name on the death list.

  So he turned to the guard and said, “Would you like to have your name in this book?”

  The guard said, “Absolutely not!”

  “Neither do I,” said Jan, and he tore the page out of the book. Somewhere in my office I still have a copy of that page.

  Clearly ministry in Muslim countries can be dangerous. What do you say to Church leaders who are risking their lives?

  You mean, what are they teaching me? I had a chance to speak at a pastors’ conference in Pakistan with Haik Hovsepian, an Assemblies of God pastor in Iran. He had taken a very public position advocating for a pastor in prison, and he boldly shared the Gospel all over Iran. At the end of our week together in Pakistan, Haik and I parted at the airport. The last thing he told me was, “Andrew, when they kill me, it will not be for being silent.” Haik knew, and he was not going to be quiet. Two weeks later he was martyred.

  You mentioned Pakistan. That is the second largest Muslim country, after Indonesia. How is the Church doing in that nation?

  There are approximately 5.3 million Christians in Pakistan among more than 188 million Muslims. So Christians are a very small minority, and they live under tremendous pressure. I started going to Pakistan to meet Church leaders there. I learned that one of the biggest problems for Christians was the lack of access to quality education. In fact, an estimated 80 percent of Christians in Pakistan cannot read or write. That means that Christians, even if they have a Bible, cannot read it, and they have the most menial jobs. So the Christian leaders began to teach Christians how to read and write. This has allowed many men and women to read the Bible, better understand their faith and in some cases obtain better jobs.

  So what are the biggest threats to the Church in Pakistan?

  Pakistan has a terrible law called the Blasphemy Law. Anyone who is accused of insulting the prophet Muhammad is automatically given a death sentence. Anyone accused of desecrating the Qur’an gets life in prison. Simply the accusation by a neighbor with a grudge can ruin a person’s life. I have met with government leaders to plead with them to abolish this law. But because of pressure from fundamentalist groups like the Taliban, no politician is willing to risk his neck on this issue. Those who try meet violent ends. Like my friend Shahbaz Bhatti, minister for minority affairs under Musharraf. He was gunned down by one of his guards for simply suggesting that a woman accused of blasphemy might not be guilty.

  On a more personal note, we read in God’s Smuggler the story of how you met your wife, Corry, and the start of your family. How are they doing today?

  I have five grown children. Four of them are married, and Corry and I have eleven grandchildren. They live near us, and I see some of the grandchildren nearly every day. My single daughter inherited her father’s adventurous spirit. She is a nurse and worked in Afghanistan during the time of the Taliban, then Kurdistan during the Iraq war, also in Yemen and most recently Uganda. I must say, it is easier for her father to go to these places than it is to see his little girl go there.

  We have traveled a lot together and written several books. We told the story of Muslim Background Believers in Secret Believers. Can you give us an update on how the people we wrote about are doing now?

  Many readers will remember Butros (not his real name), who, with my mentoring, developed the ministry to strengthen churches in an Islamic nation. Butros is doing well. He continues to live and work in the country where he was called many years ago. He has received many threats and been interrogated several times. There is a radical madrassa (an Islamic school) that was built near the Logos Training Center. One morning Butros discovered painted on the walls around the center insults to the prophet Muhammad. Clearly it was intended to incite Muslims to attack and destroy the center, but Butros and his staff quickly painted over the graffiti and nothing more happened. Please continue to pray for him.

  I went to see Butros recently and to speak one more time to pastors there and to say good-bye. That was very emotional for me and for them. My final message was from Acts 4:21, when Peter and John were threatened by the Sanhedrin and then released. They went back to the believers, and as they prayed the place was shaken. My challenge: Don’t be afraid of IS (Islamic State). Go back to Father’s Book! Follow the example of the disciples! Continue to obey and fulfill the Great Commission (see Matthew 28:19–20) to go and make disciples of all nations, everywhere in the world. That includes the people of the other book!

  How is Ahmed, the convert from Islam who had to flee the country with his wife because of threats on his life?

  I am sorry to have to say that it is not good news. Ahmed missed his country, and after a couple of years he and Salima, his wife, returned home. For some time he boldly cared for many small secret communities of Muslim Background Believers, but eventually he was captured by the most radical group in his country. He was tortured and killed. Salima is raising their two children as a single mother. She was relocated to a nearby country for her safety and that of the children, because there was pressure from her family to take the children away and raise them as Muslims. Please pray for her and the family.
Ahmed was a faithful soldier for Christ. He boldly witnessed for Jesus every chance he had, knowing each day that it could cost him his life. And finally it did. I pray though that his children will follow his example and carry the faith into the next generation.

  You are now 86 years old and can no longer travel and minister like you once did. However, you keep informed about what is happening in the world. Right now we see the spread of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and attacks by Muslim extremists on Christians in Nigeria and other places. In a year or two the situation may change, but what should be our perspective?

  As I have told you many times, the battle is on! When we read about the conflicts in Nigeria and Somalia and throughout Africa, when we hear about Christians imprisoned in Iran, when we see the advances of the Taliban and how they now publicly support IS, we must realize that the battle is first and foremost spiritual. The devil will do everything possible to thwart the advance of God’s Kingdom. Jesus told us that if the world hated Him, it will also hate us. So we must not be surprised by the increase in persecution around the world.

  However, we are not weak. There is much we can do, starting on our knees. It’s true that I can no longer travel and see my brothers and my friends. But I can pray. Recently I have been challenging Christians to be more aggressive. For the most part I feel Christians are afraid and therefore on the defensive. God did not call us to defend ourselves or our Church or Christianity in general. He calls us to be on the offensive. From Matthew 28, Jesus says go therefore, aggressively, and make all nations—that includes all the ethnic minorities and majorities—My disciples. In other words, we must do everything possible to reach people and advance the cause of the Gospel. The very first generation of Christians did just that. That is why they were unbeatable!

  So let’s accept the challenge of the Great Commission. The success of groups like al-Qaeda and the Taliban should motivate us not with fear but with the realization that these people are lost and they need Jesus. Each one of us can be Jesus to Muslims in our community. Some of us are called to go to the Muslim world and to fundamentalists to show them the love of Christ. Let’s be obedient to the call of our Lord. I hope that my life demonstrates that there is no more exciting mission than following Jesus wherever He leads us.

  * Brother Andrew talks about this in a devotion about Moses, The Exodus Mandate (Open Doors International, 2014).

  †You can read the full story of Project Pearl in Night of a Million Miracles by Paul Estabrooks (Open Doors International, 2008).

  For Further Reading

  Light Force: A Stirring Account of the Church Caught in the Middle East Crossfire by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen

  Secret Believers: What Happens When Muslims Believe in Christ by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen

  Available through Open Doors:

  Operation Nineveh: 39 Days with Jonah by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen

  Prayer: The Real Battle by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen

  No Guts, No Glory! Slaying Today’s Giants: A 40-Day Devotional on David and Goliath by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen

  The Exodus Mandate: Moses Reveals How You Can Accomplish the Impossible by Brother Andrew and Al Janssen

  Night of a Million Miracles: The Inside Story of Project Pearl by Paul Estabrooks

  About Open Doors

  In the six decades since Brother Andrew’s journey to Warsaw, the organization that developed from his vision has continued to seek out and strengthen the persecuted Church.

  Today, Open Doors serves millions of persecuted Christians in over fifty countries, including some of the most dangerous places in the world. Our work has expanded from the communist countries of Eastern Europe to China, North Korea, the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia, India . . . wherever Christians suffer for their faith.

  These are the places where faith costs the most, where followers of Christ must keep their beliefs hidden and where living the Gospel means facing beatings, imprisonment, discrimination and abuse. For many Christians, it costs them their lives. They understand the full reality of Jesus’ statement “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (Mark 8:34 NIV).

  Open Doors works with churches and local partners to “strengthen what remains.”

  This is not about maintenance. It is not about keeping the persecuted Church going, just so that believers can continue to hold meetings. We support them because their witness means that their communities, neighborhoods—even their nations—can meet the living Jesus Christ. In the words of Brother Andrew, “The work of the church is not survival. She exists to fulfill the Great Commission. Her work is making disciples of all nations.”

  And the amazing fact is that the persecuted Church is doing just that. In Syria, North Korea, Iraq, Iran—throughout the world—the persecuted Church is not merely surviving, it is living and growing. That is what happens when, even in the harshest environments, God’s people demonstrate the powerful, transformational love of Jesus.

  Ultimately, what took Brother Andrew to Warsaw in 1955 was more than a train or a ticket; it was his willingness to obey God. He had no idea where the journey would take him, but he was prepared to say yes to God and to step out in faith.

  Today, more than ever, millions of persecuted Christians around the world need their brothers and sisters to make the same journey. Are you willing to walk alongside them? Are you willing to pray, support and speak up for the persecuted Church? Then this is the moment to start!

  Open Doors: How We Help

  Open Doors supports and empowers the persecuted Church through

  distributing millions of Bibles and Christian books every year;

  helping the victims of persecution through financial aid for those in need, advocacy for those unjustly imprisoned, rebuilding destroyed churches, obtaining medical help for the victims of violence, and much more;

  training church leaders and other believers to stand firm in the face of persecution;

  giving persecuted Christians the skills to earn an independent living and to escape poverty—including literacy programs, employment training and micro-loans so that they can start their own businesses;

  mobilizing the Church around the world to serve Christians living under religious persecution by praying, giving and speaking out.

  Find out more about how you can be involved in supporting the persecuted Church through Open Doors.

  Elizabeth and John Sherrill met as young people on board the Queen Elizabeth and were later married in Switzerland. Together they have published several thousand articles and written more than thirty books, including The Cross and the Switchblade with David Wilkerson and The Hiding Place with Corrie ten Boom. The Sherrills’ writing has taken them to five continents, and their work still keeps them on the road, reporting the Holy Spirit’s awe-inspiring deeds in the 21st century.