Praise God for the release of kidnapped believers
Many Muslim background believers choose to keep their faith in Jesus quiet because the consequences can be very dangerous. But for others, they can’t keep their faith a secret. What they want more than anything is to see their friends, families, and local community experience the love of Christ, which is free and available. For Muslim background believers Nur and Afzal, Christ was the best thing to have happened to them, and they want nothing more than to share their faith with the people around them. Unfortunately, this decision came with its own set of consequences. They were kidnapped and interrogated and threatened. But the men remained strong in their faith.
Nur Alam (38) and Afzal Hosen (35), Christians in Bangladesh, received Christ in 2021 and later that year, they were baptized. They are very passionate and have a massive heart for the Muslim people, so they regularly distributed Bibles and religious booklets to the community. Some Muslims, especially the Muslim religious fundamentalists, didn’t appreciate their effort as much as others and deemed them enemies of the community.
On July 23, 2022, at around 5.30 pm, Nur Alam was kidnapped by religious fundamentalists. He didn’t know where he was taken but he was released the next day after vigorous interrogations and threats.
“On that day, two unknown people came to my home and asked me to follow them because their boss would like to talk with me who was sitting in a minibus. When I reached the door of that minibus, they suddenly picked me up and the bus very quickly left the place. I shouted for help, but nobody heard my voice. The windows of the minibus were tinted black so people could not see from the outside,” said Nur Alam.
The day after Nur Alam’s release, Afzal Hosen was also kidnapped by the same religious fundamentalists but in a different location. Afzal was interrogated in the same way Nur Alam was, with the same questions; “Why did you convert to Christianity?”, “Why did you leave Islam?”, and “How much money did you receive from the church to convert to Christianity?”
The evangelists’ answers never pleased the kidnappers, and they requested the two Christian men to return to Islam. “If you return to Islam, you will be given a new job and a new house to restart your life,” they said to Nur. However, Nur refused their gifts and chose Jesus each time. Then they said to him, “if you do not renounce your faith, we will kill you. If we kill you here, no one will find your dead body. And then we will also kill your wife and son!”
As frightening as this threat was, Nur remained firm in his faith and still chose Jesus. The perpetrators stormed out of the room in a rage and locked Nur Alam inside, but they didn’t harm him. Nur endured over 30 hours of no food, no water, and no sleep. He was weak physically and mentally, but his faith was strong still.
“I was praying the whole night and asking the Lord to take me home safe. I was imagining the face of my wife and son, but I still had hope and confidence in the Lord that He will protect me. At some point, during the interrogation, they became hopeless seeing my strong faith in Jesus. Knowing that their strategy is not working at all. They let me go, just left me at a place and told me not to share with anybody about what happened with me.”
The same line of questioning happened to Afzal but this time, they physically abused him with every ‘wrong’ answer. “They asked me why I had converted, how much money I received from the church, and to return to Islam,” Afzal continued “they also said that what I was doing was wrong and that I should stop converting others.”
The religious fundamentalists gave Afzal another chance to convert back to Islam and with the same threat, “if you don’t, we will kill you and your family.”
“You can kill me but you cannot take my faith in the Lord Jesus away from me. I am ready for any situation. I know well what I am doing,” said Afzal.
Afzal was taken to a deserted house where he was locked inside a filthy room with no food, water, or bed for over 24 hours, then he was released with the same warning to never tell a soul of what happened.
The family members of Nur and Afzal were stricken with fear and panic when their loved ones didn’t come home. They rushed to their local church to speak to their pastor about the situation, not knowing who else to turn to.
“Somehow I guessed who had kidnapped them,” said the pastor. He wasn’t entirely sure who but he knew of a group of people who hindered and interrupted his services before. “I forced them to bring them back or a kidnapping case will be filed against them. Then we waited for their return. Praise God, they were returned the next day.”
Please Pray
- Pray for brother Nur Alam and brother Afzal Hosen. Pray that they will be healed from the trauma of this experience and recover from physical and mental weakness. Pray for their protection.
- Pray for God to give them wisdom so that they would be able to deal with the religious fundamentalists with God’s wisdom and strength. Pray for God’s leading and guidance in their personal life that they would be utilized for the kingdom of God. They will be meant to come to the Lord for salvation.
- Pray for God to protect the family from any kinds of persecution and harm. Pray that they will take proper care of Nur and Afzal so that they would be able to recover soon and will be able to start their normal life.
