This year I’ve been reading the stories of many modern-day Christian martyrs. They greatly inspire me, and give me a different perspective on the fear-mongering which afflicts American society. In reality, we live in a country with amazing Christian freedom. We don’t understand what real persecution involves, and what it means to be obedient in the face of death. But many Christians around the world live with this constantly.

This morning I read the story of Shukri, an Iraqi Muslim from Fallujah–charismatic, witty, the type of person everybody likes and enjoys being around, who makes you laugh. The life of every party. He became a Christian, along with his family, through the witness of other Iraqi Christians. They, in turn, led many others to Christ.

Then they felt God definitely calling them to the ISIS stronghold of Mosul. In ancient times, Mosul was the city of Nineveh, where God called Jonah. They viewed themselves as following in Jonah’s path.

So the entire family moved to Mosul, and Shukri began distributing Bibles in a mosque. One morning, during his private time of worship, he sensed God telling him, “Today is the day you will see me.” He told his wife this before he left for the mosque. Sure enough, he was accosted on the street by a group of ISIS men, horribly tortured, and then killed.

But he was exactly where God wanted him to be.

His wife stayed. She led two couples in their apartment building to Christ, and before long, 23 believers were meeting for worship in the middle of the night. The family was eventually forced to relocated to Erbil. But she wrote, “Many more are interested in knowing our wonderful Savior. They are desperately afraid of ISIS and need the hope the Gospel gives them. By staying in Iraq, we show that Jesus is our Protector and that we do not fear the sinister works of men.”

(From the book “Killing Christians: Living the Faith Where it’s Not Safe to Believe.”)