Holding on to Jesus in the face of heartless brutality
On a recent trip to Egypt Jack Norman heard how converts to Christ are suffering at the hands of family members yet are standing firm in their faith.
Coming to faith in Christ is a life-changing moment for all of us. We rejoice in the forgiveness of our sin and the hope of salvation. However, for new believers in Egypt who leave Islam behind to follow Jesus it is life changing in another profound way.
They are frequently rejected by parents and siblings, who feel their conversion has brought shame on the family, and are made to suffer for their new faith – often in cruel and brutal ways.
When her family became aware that she was following Christ, ‘Ayesha’* was kidnapped by her brother, along with two of her four daughters, who were just eight and nine years old at the time.
For three days they were held without food as her brother tried to force her to recant her new faith. After three days he gave them a meal, but he made them eat it off the floor. Our partner told me: ‘This is a disrespectful action. It’s telling them: “You will not eat normally, like us. You will eat off the floor like the animals. And why do you have to do this? Because your mother left Islam to become a Christian. So you are equal to an animal. You are not equal to a human.”’
But this wasn’t the end of their suffering. At one point the brother boiled a kettle and poured the scalding water on his sister’s body.
‘She told us she couldn’t even put her underwear on because of the severity of the burns.’
He came back every day for three weeks, pushing her to recant and turn back to Islam but she refused, saying, ‘I love Jesus and He will come and protect me from you.’
Even more shockingly her uncle turned up one day and beat the two girls with a stick, breaking the younger one’s arm and her sister’s leg.
As she watched all this, powerless to intervene, Ayesha felt like she was ‘dying’ as she watched her daughters being beaten, ‘all because of my decision to become a Christian’.
The girls were crying and shouting in front of their mother because of the pain but for three days the children were denied medicine, hospital treatment or indeed any help at all.
Although this Christian woman is no longer suffering such extreme abuse, she remains with the family because the only way she can get away from them is to leave her children behind – a price she is not willing to pay.
‘More than 30 people were in the room waiting for me’
Another convert recalled how a few days after telling his wife that he had become a believer in Jesus she had asked him to pick her up from her parents’ house, but when he arrived there he found the whole family waiting for him.
‘I walked in and all the family were there; more than 30 people were in the room waiting for me. My wife turned on a recording device on which she had recorded my testimony. They all stood there listening.’
He was then asked by the family to sign papers giving up his right to his children, home, car and bank account. He had to leave the house with just the clothes on his back, not knowing where he would sleep that night. At the same time he did not know whether he would ever see his children again nor be able to access his bank account and be able to carry on working.
Later on his wife divorced him and he found himself in great debt as he could not pay the necessary court fees. However, our partners were able to help him with the finance and also to get legal assistance to close the case. Without that support to pay the debt he would have faced imprisonment.
Thanks to our partners people such as this man can still find fellowship and support, both spiritual and practical, as well as help to overcome trauma.
And, while the cost can be high, we hear many testimonies of how God is using our partners to help sustain those who come to faith.
There is also, say our partners, greater freedom to share the gospel than in the UK. While believers here can shy away from proclaiming their faith if they get negative responses, in Egypt Christians have already accepted that it will cost them, so nothing holds them back.
* Name changed to protect identity
HOW RELEASE INTERNATIONAL HELPS IN EGYPT
- Practical help for marginalised Christians in Upper Egypt who are trapped in poverty
- Equipping and discipling new believers
- Helping to strengthen the faith and resilience of deprived and vulnerable Christian women.
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