The Underground Church in the Middle East

Before we head in to today’s interview,  there are some pretty heavy topics covered in this interview like suicide and rape. Did you know that the fastest growing church in the world is in one of the top 10, most dangerous places to be a Christian? This interview that you're about to hear is a really special moment that Jennie was able to have a couple months ago. She traveled to an undisclosed foreign country and was able to meet with Pastor X. Pastor X's identity has been masked. 

Throughout history. Persecution has always grown the church. What if I told you that the fastest growing churches in the world are actually happening in the 10, most dangerous countries for a Christian to live number one on the list: Iran. When the Ayatollah Khomeini came to power over 40 years ago, Aronian saw the true face of radical Islam. 

Now those mosques are empty. Why? God is moving powerfully inside of Iran. The Iranian people are meeting Jesus through dreams and visions and power encounters. And now there are an estimated 1 million believers in Iran, alone, men and women in the underground church are bringing the gospel to people who have experienced Jesus for themselves. This church movement has no bank account, no 501C3, no centralized leadership, no denominations, no church buildings or seminaries. And if any one of them is caught, they could be executed at the least in prison. And yet it is exploding. It's currently being led by former prostitutes, drug Lords, Islamic radicals, and many of them women. You're about to hear my interview with the pastor who catalyzed the disciple-making movement throughout the middle east. This is his only interview and he risked his life to do this for us, for you. 

Well, pastor, I'm so honored to be sitting down with you and I'm excited for so many people to get to hear your story. So let's start with how you met God. 

I was born in a Western country at the age of nine. I came to Jesus through the wordless book, and I've been a follower of Jesus for many years and very simple, nothing supernatural, just as simple prayer as a child, believing Jesus as Savior. When I was 16 years old, I left the church. I was so upset and jaded by church because I just felt like it was a clique. It didn't have that community. So I tried to find community through friends and my friends introduced me to drugs. And I started doing drugs when I was 16 years old and started selling drugs and doing a lot of things I thought would bring me happiness, but it just brought me a complete depression. 

So let's talk about that. Come back and how you really wanted Jesus again. And you wanted to walk with Him. 

Okay, I was at a party and someone OD’d in front of me and the Lord spoke to me and said, I didn't create you to destroy. And so very soon after that, I cleaned up my life and I started going back to church. And my life is basically about simple obedience. The key thing Jennie is simple. Obedience can change the whole trajectory of your life. And that's what happened to me. 

I know one of the reasons you do the work that you do that we're about to talk about is your wife, and her love for God. And really her story is incredible. 

Yes, my wife was a radical Muslim at the age of three. She wore the burqa at the age of five, started reading the Qu’ran. At the age of nine memorized The Qu’ran. At the age of 13 was so in love with God that they took her out of school and put her in Islamic fundamentalist school. At the age of 17, she became an evangelist for Islam. And so she'd be the one who would be like the religious police in the country that she's i. At the age of 23, she had a personal heartbreak and tries to kill herself. And when she does this, her mom is diagnosed with MS. She told her mother look, you're dying. I want to kill myself. Let's kill each other. So they made a suicide pact. So on a Thursday night, they kicked the father out. They kicked the sister out and they're about to take sleeping pills and turn on the natural gas. 

So they turn on the TV and there was a Christian satellite broadcast. The pastor said, my brothers and sisters, why do you want to kill yourself tonight? Jesus wants to change your life. And she was so taken back by that. She's like, you know what? I'm going to call this program and prove to them that Jesus is dead and then kill myself. So I can be the first woman in front of a law saying I did everything you've asked me to do. And you've done nothing for me. So they called the program and her mom speaks to the pastor. And after about 20 minutes, she comes to Christ. And my wife was furious. Like, how dare you? Blast feed Mohammad. You idiot. You imbecile, you Kofar you infidel. And so she's about to kill herself. And her mom says, before you kill yourself, my last wish is that you talk to the pastor. 

So she said fine. She talks to the pastor. And after two hours, the pastor could not convince her to come to Christ. So he said this. So you've served Allah all your life in the fruit of it is that you're suicidal, depressed. And you want to kill yourself, give Jesus one week. And if he doesn't do anything for you, go ahead and kill yourself. So my wife took the challenge. So she did this sinner's prayer. She said, I'll do this stupid prayer. Then live on satellite with a gun, I will kill myself to prove there. Jesus is dead. Amen. So she hangs up the phone and at 5:00 AM in the morning, she hears her mom's screaming and she jumps up thinking the MS has hit her lungs. And she sees that her mom was walking perfectly in the house. So they run to the hospital. They do a blood work and MRI, and there's no MS in her mom's body. So they asked my wife, who'd you pray to? And she said, I didn't pray to anyone except Jesus. And so immediately she brings five people to Christ right there. So the next week she calls the pastor and says, I was the girl that wanted to embarrass Jesus. But Jesus embarrassed me. Now I bring five people to Christ, what do I do with them? And this was over a decade ago. Wow. 

So you are comfortable in a Western country. You had a good job. You had friends, you had a life and, and something didn't feel right? So, so you all were married and, and had your future ahead and you wanted to stay. 

That's correct. I put my life in a Western country. I had everything a person could dream of in a Western country. I had a house, a great paying job. I had cars, I had money. I had everything, but I wasn't happy. I bring my wife from the country she was in, into this Western country and I gave her the great life, the abundant life. And after two months, she comes up to me and says, I'm depressed. I'm like, how are you depressed? You came from a third world country. We're in a first world country. And she says, because the church here is under a satanic lullaby and I'm falling asleep. And every time I try to wake up, the lullaby goes faster. Let's go back to my country. And I was so shocked by that statement. 

So you leave everything and you go and you begin to share Jesus in the middle east. And so talk about that first time that that's going on and what's happening. 

When I first went into the country and all over the middle east, we would say Jesus and 8 out of 10 people will come to Christ. Right then in there, Jesus is coming in dreams, visions, and power encounters. He's making a mess of the country. And we're just the cleanup crew. You have to realize, Jennie, this is the biggest revival happening in the middle east. Since the Islamic conquest in Jesus is going after these people in Muslim nations. Because when I look at a Muslim, I see a passionate person in love with God, but the wrong God. And so we have all these Saul to Paul experiences like my wife, once she found out the real God was Christ. She's ready to die for him now. And that's what's happening in the middle east. It's so amazing. And then persecution came and very hard persecution came. 

And what happened was all of a sudden we were, we ran all these cities and then we started to lose the cities. We started losing the churches. We started losing leaders and members. And I became very upset. I almost became depressed because all of my leaders are getting arrested. They're looking for me. And I would read the book of Acts. And I would say, Lord persecution grows the church, why is persecution killing the church? And finally, the Lord answers me. And he says, you made converts, not disciples. Converts will run away from me in persecution. Disciples will die for me. And I said, Lord, what does that mean? And He said, look at your wife. And so I'm looking at her. And He says, because she encountered me, she'll die for me. You must give the word of God, but it must be sealed by the power of God. And so that's what we do right now. We take people on a journey of discipleship from the first moment I see them and we disciple them to Christ. And then we disciple them to leadership. 

What's the difference between a convert and a disciple?

A convert basically knows Jesus as savior, but not as king. A disciple first knows that Jesus is king and then savior because when you know he's king and he's the only one who's leading you, then you're willing to die for him because you trust him. Even in the worst situation, it needs a change of allegiance. That's what's so simple. And yet, so obvious someone who has an allegiance to Christ, it shines it screams. It's not about theology. It's about following Jesus, denying yourself, putting yourself up on the cross. But why would you do that? Because you trust God. Because you've pledged your allegiance to him. 

Are there denominations or divisions in the underground church?

In the countries we're in? No, they're not because it's still very infantile. There's no denominations, no divisions, no persecution keeps you clean. When you're in persecution, it makes you focus on the main thing, which is to bring people into Jesus, not theology. 

This is so backwards. This is so backwards from how the west lives. 

Thats right! But if you look in the gospel, Jesus, didn't chase anyone. And I'll make it worse. Jennie, he actually made it harder to follow him. Imagine the rich young ruler saying, “Look, what do I have to do to follow you? I've done everything you've asked, or I've done everything that the Torah says.” And then what does Jesus say to him? “Sell everything and follow me.” That actually makes it harder. I know if I had a prophetic word and I said that to someone and they walked away, I probably would have run after them and been like, okay, let's start with 10%. Let's start with a little and move up there. What did Jesus do? He let them walk away. Following Jesus is the hardest thing that we're going to do. Dying to ourselves every day is very hard. This is why in the west, some people think wearing a mask is persecution. When you look in the church in the west, there has to be something more than just going to church on Sundays. There has to be something more. Walking with Jesus is supposed to be exciting, not mundane, repetitive, boring. When you read the Bible, that's definitely not the feeling you get when you read the New Testament. So I know that there was something more, there is has to be something more.

Describe what you're hearing in the stories of people that are truly encountering Jesus in a vision or dream. Are these similar? 

I was just thinking of this one time I was in the city and it was out no man's land. And one of my leaders is like, you have to hear the story. So we go there and this man, he basically lives on dirt. He has this mud hut. There's no satellite, there's no internet, no electricity, no gas. And then he says this to me, Jennie. “A man wearing all white comes to my house every night. And he tells me to write these things down.” And so I said to him, may I see your notebook? And so I opened his notebook and I go to page one and it says, “In the beginning was the word. And the word became flesh.” Jennie. He had the whole book of John in his notebook. Jesus came every night, to his house. And he wrote the whole book of John. And the first thing I thought Jennie was like, can you pray for me? Whatever you're doing to have Jesus come and see you, I would love him to see me. Isn't that what he said, blessed are those who haven't seen him, but Jesus is he's coming for these people. He's coming in mysterious ways, even to the point where he's giving people parts of the Bible. That's crazy. You have to realize that we have to let God bring people to Jesus because when God does it, it's always supernatural. 

Talk about the leaders that are leading this movement, because most of you are very unsuspected. You are not seminary trained. You did not, um, grow up in a mission agency and got sent. You all came from rough backgrounds. Talk about some of the leaders in the church and, and their backgrounds. 

When I met my wife, she already had 250 people, 25 house churches in five cities as a woman in this country. We have to realize that women have a place in the kingdom. This is not about being a woman's movement more than it is empowering women to rise up to the great call. Like the Esther call that Esther had, or Deborah's call. Women are leaders. And one of the people we do have on the team is an ex prostitute. She's had a very hard life and she became a prostitute, but she had a power encounter with Christ in her heart was actually for other prostitutes. And so she's been leading other prostitutes to Jesus. And like I said, when we look in Genesis men and women together as a complete picture of God, that's how it should be in the kingdom and should also be in the church, men and women together as a complete picture of God. God is after the family. Right? So women definitely have a place in this.

Are you afraid of death?

Of course, who isn't. I still have fears. I still have ups and downs. I still doubt all that happens, but it's just our faith. You just have to keep having a childlike faith, a simple faith. 

I do believe that there has been a hopelessness that people are tired of and they want something different. And what you’re part of the world is doing for us. And just to tell you personally, where this came from, for me, why we're sitting here is because I watched Sheep Among Wolves. And it was the most impactful thing I did in the last year. That I sat in the comfort of my house quarantined. And I turned on the story of the church exploding in the most dark and difficult part of the world. And I wanted that for us. And I pray that we would learn from what is happening over there. I pray, we would believe God like you believe God. I pray, we would have a willingness to lay down comfort and to do whatever is needed to follow Jesus. So you've been a part of seeing over a million people come to Christ in your life. So what do we do? 

We plan for it. We go back to our radical roots. If you look at the word radical, it means going back to your roots. And if we want to be a radical church, we need back to the roots. And where do we see that? In the book of acts in the book of acts, we see a house church network with a corporate expression. And that's what we need to go back to because when hundreds and thousands of people come to Jesus, there's not enough buildings, but definitely Jenny there's enough houses. 

Let's say that you had a child that grew up in America and wanted to stay. What would you tell them to do? How would you tell them to live? Practically? 

I would tell them to have a lifestyle of engaging the lost, showing that you care. We go to our stores, we go to discount stores. We go to clothing stores and we don't even engage anyone. It's like, we're asleep, we're sleepwalking. We're like zombies. And then all of a sudden it comes Easter or Christmas. Okay. Let's go talk to some believer and bring them to church. Bring them to church? The whole problem with the Western model is come and see, because that's not what Jesus said. Jesus said, go and find. We don't even see a come and see model. It's all about going and finding the lost, going, where they are. And so that's what I would tell my child is every day, I want you to meet at least five new people a day. And you say that now, when you think it's so hard, but it's not - don't you go to the supermarket? Don't you go to the gas station? Don't you go to the dry cleaners? Of course. So engage them, go to your local coffee shop. Do you even know their names? Probably not. Especially if they don't have a badge on their shirt saying what it is because we don't engage people anymore. 

Everybody listening to you right now is saying, I don't want to live under that lullaby. I want to live the life that Jesus has called me to. What does that look like? 

I think the biggest thing the Western church has to realize is that evangelism and discipleship is not an event, but a lifestyle. We should be engaging. The lost there's so many places in the west where there's self-checkout lines. Or when you go to the gas station, you put your credit card in and you don't even walk in. Or even when you go to your local coffee shop, you use an app and you don't even walk in and just get your coffee and leave. Are you really a light in that moment? Are you really a city on a hill in that moment? And that's the biggest problem that we see in the west. Everyone wants to run home and watch Netflix. Why? I don't understand it. We don't even engage anyone. Another challenge, I guess I could say to the Western churches, look at your contact list. What's the percentage of unbeliever to believer on it. I promise you it's 90% believer, 10% unbeliever. Is that really what Jesus wanted? Jesus hung out with sinners, but the Western church hangs out with itself. That's why it's a club. And this is why there's no community. 

Tell the Western church why they shouldn't live afraid. 

They shouldn't live afraid because He who's inside of you is greater than he who's in the world. This is why you need to experience Jesus, mind, body, and soul. This is why you have to hear His voice. When someone puts a gun to your head, what do you really believe in at that moment? Everything becomes real in that second or when they come after you or when they want to do evil things to you. How was it Jennie? That it says in Hebrews for the joy that was set before him, he went on the cross. How much do you believe in the resurrection? This is our faith. We believe in the resurrection that there's death before life that we have no problem with death because it's the gateway to life. It is the door to life.