If Not For God - The Voice Of Todd Nettleton

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Welcome to If Not For God, stories of hopelessness that turn to hope. Here is your host, Mike Zwick. Oh, and we have another great show for you today on If Not For God, a very special guest.

I think we're going to get to go all over the world today, you know. So Todd Nettleton is the host of The Voice of the Martyrs Radio, heard on by more than 1,000 radio stations and by thousands of podcast listeners weekly. Todd has served with The Voice of the Martyrs for more than 20 years. He has traveled the world and conducted face-to-face interviews with hundreds of Christians who have endured persecution in more than 30 nations. As The Voice of the Martyrs principal media spokesperson, Todd has done more than 3,000 interviews with media outlets ranging from Moody Radio to the BBC to the Los Angeles Times. His book, When Faith is Forbidden, 40 Days on the Frontlines with Persecuted Christians, will be published in March 2021 by Moody Publishers.

And Todd Nettleton, this morning, you actually said you had some stuff on your mind. One of the things that you were talking about was that COVID-19, you said it's actually increased ministry opportunities in several countries, is that right? That is correct. You know, there is great news that even a pandemic cannot stop the Kingdom of God from marching forward. Let me just share stories from three countries where the Christians in those countries, and all three of them are restricted nations, places where you will get into trouble with the government for being a Christian. But all three places are places Christians have seen opportunities in the midst of COVID. One is in China. You know, China, the place where the disease apparently started, everyone in China has been forced to wear masks because of the pandemic. One of the churches, though, has looked at that as an opportunity.

They said, hey, China has this amazing surveillance system, cameras everywhere, facial recognition software everywhere to monitor every single person in China everywhere you go. But this particular church said, hey, right now, everyone in the country is wearing masks. The cameras don't recognize us.

The government can't tell who we are. Let's go out and use this opportunity. Let's be more bold for the gospel.

In the nation of Iran, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Christians there have looked at COVID as an opportunity. They have decided, hey, we're going to knock on the doors of our neighbors, especially our older neighbors that are more affected by the disease. We're going to offer to go to the store for them. We're going to offer to just check in on them, see how they're doing. We're going to offer to pray with them. And when they ask us, well, why are you doing this? Don't you know there's a pandemic?

Don't you know how dangerous this is? We'll have an opportunity to share the gospel with them. We'll have an opportunity to share. We're doing this because Jesus loves us and he loves you. And we wanted to tell you one more example in the Middle East. We have a partner ministry here at Voice of the Martyrs that is working to evangelize Muslims in the Middle East. They are working to disciple new believers and train them up in the in the kingdom. All of their activities had to be shut down when their their their entire country was put on lockdown. Everything had to close down, nothing, none of their outreach, none of their discipleship, no meetings, no nothing.

They went online, though. And they found that during that period of time, their traffic to their website, their the number of Muslims asking questions on their Facebook page increased dramatically. And so they actually were ministering to more people during the pandemic, during the lockdown than they were before the lockdown, because all of this traffic happening online, all of these Muslims who had to stay home as well, suddenly they could ask some questions that that maybe if they'd had people in their houses, they wouldn't have asked.

They wouldn't have been willing to say publicly, hey, I'm interested in knowing more about Jesus Christ. So even in the midst of pandemic in hostile and restricted nations, the kingdom of God is marching forward. Yet the the Genesis Chapter 50, verse 19 through 20, it says, But Joseph said to them, Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God? You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. Such a great verse for this period of time, because, like I say, even in the midst of a pandemic, you know, there is so much suffering, there is a lot of upheaval going on in the world. But God is turning that for good for his kingdom. He's turning that for good for the church in hostile and restricted nations.

And that's certainly something he could do for the church in America as well. Well, it says in Romans 828, it says that we know that all things work together for good to those who love God and for them who are called according to his purpose. I hear I heard a story one time that said that there were two men and one of the men woke up and said, Oh, God, another day.

And the second man woke up and said, Thank God, another day. So, you know, I know you see a lot of bad stuff, Todd. You hear about a lot of bad stuff, but it sounds like even in the midst of the bad stuff that God has his hand in this as well, and he's working it towards his good. One of the things that you told me about, too, was you said something was going on in India.

Is that right? There has been a wave of persecution in India over the last couple of months. And we have seen in the last three months, we have seen five different Christians martyred for their faith in Christ in India in four different states.

So this is not all in one little area. This is happening across the country. One of the things to understand about India, that the government of India under Prime Minister Modi is a Hindu nationalist government. In fact, some of the government leaders within that government have started to call India Hindustan, literally the land of the Hindus. And their teaching is India is a Hindu nation. Literally, the soil of India is Hindu soil. And if you're not a Hindu, you really don't belong here.

You should either become a Hindu or you should leave and go find somewhere else to live. We are seeing that play out. And, you know, like I say, five Christians killed in just a three month span of time. One of those who was killed was a man named Condi. And I am I've really been impacted by his testimony and by his courage. He came to the Lord in 2018. And from from the very first day, he was an evangelist. In fact, the first people he led to the Lord were his three brothers. And once he did that, once their family was now a Christian family, the Hindu leaders of the village brought them before the village elders. They basically sat them down and said, hey, you can't do this. You know, this is a Hindu village.

You can't be Christians and you certainly can't tell other people they should be Christians as well. Condi's house was attacked shortly after that. He and his wife moved into a different house. And all of this, you know, this is 2018.

This is only two years ago. In June, the house was attacked again. And Condi told his wife, he said, listen, they're not going to give up.

And on June the 7th, a mob of radical Hindus came to the house. They took Condi away. The last thing he said to his wife as he was being led away by this Hindu mob was, honey, even if they kill me, I want you to stay strong in your faith in Christ.

Wow. Even if I'm gone, you be courageous. You stay strong in your faith. The mob took away Condi. His body was found the next day, but his wife has honored his request. She has stayed strong in her faith. Interestingly, with her husband killed her and their daughters moved back into her father's house.

Her father's still a Hindu. He said, listen, you brought this trouble on yourself. Your husband wouldn't have been killed if you hadn't been Christians.

You caused this because I and his wife said, you know, her father was pressuring her. Give up your faith. She wouldn't do it. Thankfully, Voice of the Martyrs has been able to help her move into a safer location where she won't have that kind of pressure. But pray for her. Her name is Bindu. Pray for her.

Pray for their kids who are now being raised without a father and pray for the church in India, because, you know, this is one story. But it has happened repeatedly in recent months. Well, Robbie Robbie's here with me, and he was actually just telling a story because it sounds like in a lot of different places around the world, there's there's a lot of people who are going through a lot of tough things. But Robbie actually had a story where he was hit by a car going seven miles an hour. But Robbie, you said in the midst of that, you felt a peace, is that right?

Yeah. And, you know, that's the thing I guess we can kind of hope that, you know, as Stephen was being stoned, you know, he you know, he got to see Jesus, you know, standing, which is the only person we actually, I guess, get to see standing at this at the side of the father as he was receiving him. And I know that in two or three different instances in my own life of great physical distress, like the time I was crushed with a jeep or another time that I had a brain abscess, that when called upon, Jesus gives you this peace that transcends all understanding. And so there is a lot of hope, but also there's those other people in India that saw his faith and they saw his peace, which, Todd, I know this is, you know, this is part of the power of the gospel, right?

It absolutely is. And, you know, the church historian Tertullian has the famous quote, the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. And as you say, there were certainly people watching as Condi was led away by this mob. There were people in the mob who saw the way he responded.

They saw that he didn't fight back. They saw that his last words to his wife were stay strong in your faith, stay strong in your faith. Who knows what seeds were planted that day?

Who knows what fruit will be harvested in eternity because of his sacrifice? But as you say, certainly the Lord was with him. And I'm reminded, as you tell your story, I met a young lady in China several years ago who was hosting a house church, an unregistered church service in her apartment. And I, you know, I said to her, are you afraid?

Because at that time, you know, house churches were being raided just as they are now, the people who hosted them were being taken off to prison. And this was a girl of probably twenty, twenty one, twenty two years old. I said, are you afraid? And she said, yes, and I was kind of like, well, wait, because normally when I ask that question, they say, no, I'm not afraid. And she said, yes, I'm afraid. And as I was talking afterwards with her pastor who had taken me to meet with her, he said, you know, she's afraid. Because she hasn't been arrested yet. He said, once you get arrested and you see how God works and you see how God gives you courage and how God guides you as you're answering the interrogators questions, once you go through that and you see how God can protect you, then you're not afraid anymore. But she's never been arrested before. She hasn't gone through that.

That's why she's still afraid. Well, and there's probably some people right now who are asking, well, gosh, there's so much stuff going on. How do I get involved?

Well, one of the things you can do is you can sign up for the free monthly magazine telling the stories of persecuted Christians at persecution.com, www.persecution.com. And I think, you know, Stu Epperson, is that right, Todd? I do. Stu Epperson had actually just given me a book and I read it. I believe it was Peter Jacek. Yes, Peter Jacek. OK, what can you tell us about his story?

Because it kind of reminded me a little bit of what you were just talking about, because he had an interesting story, I believe. Was he in the Sudan? He was in Sudan. He is a he's actually my coworker here at the Voice of the Martyrs. At the time, he was our Africa regional director, so he oversaw all VOM work on the continent of Africa. He went to Sudan to meet with pastors, to meet with church leaders and really explore, OK, how can Voice of the Martyrs help you?

What can we do to support the church here? And as he went to the airport after four days in the country, they gave him his boarding pass. And as he stepped away from the airline counter, a security man put his hand on his shoulder and said, hey, come with me. Peter thought, you know, this is just a little extra screening and I'll be on my plane in no time. But as they interrogated him, they began to pull out pictures of all of the meetings he had had in Sudan, all of the Christians he'd met with, all of the pastors he'd met with, like, who is this guy? Why were you talking to him?

What were you doing? And Peter realized they were watching me the whole time and this is not going to go well. He ended up spending 444 days in prison in Sudan and had some very difficult times. He actually his first prison cell was him and six members of ISIS inside the cell together.

And obviously he was not treated very well there. In fact, they were making plans to waterboard him when God miraculously stepped in and rescued him. But even in prison, Peter had this experience of God has a plan here.

Yes, God is doing something. God allowed him to lead some Eritrean prisoners to faith in Christ. God allowed him actually to preach in a chapel inside one of the prisons, you know, kind of mind blowing that they even have a Christian chapel inside the prison. But Peter had the chance to minister to hundreds of men inside that prison. And so in the course of that, God showed that he had a plan and I would encourage people. Peter's book is called Imprisoned with ISIS. I would encourage people get a copy of that book and read it.

You will be inspired by Peter's story. He has also been my guest on Voice of the Martyrs Radio. You can find that at VOMradio.net and he shared the story. I actually interviewed him eight days after he came out of prison and came out of Sudan.

So it was very fresh in his mind when we sat down to talk in the Czech Republic. Yeah, and I remember there was a part of the book where he said that his fellow prisoners were actually beating him and they were beating him one day. And he said all of a sudden he realized he couldn't feel any of their blows. Do you remember that part?

I do, I do. And the Lord just stepped in and really amazingly gave Peter the ability to suffer well, the ability to suffer without hating the people who were attacking him, the ability to pray for his enemies. And one of the things he said that he did, and I was very inspired by this, is he started repeating in his mind, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, the passage from Revelation, and he said that the spiritual tenor in his cell changed when he began to do that on a daily basis, many times each day, just praising the Lord, honoring the Lord's holiness in that prison cell with ISIS fighters all around him.

Yeah, and one of the things when you were saying that, it kind of reminded me of Matthew chapter 5, starting in verse 43. It says, You have heard that it was said, Love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be the children of your Father in heaven. He causes his son to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get?

Are not even the tax collectors doing the same? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than the others? Do not even the pagans do that?

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. And one of the things that I've seen, especially in other Christians, where, you know, I'm talking to them, even before I was a Christian, I remember seeing something different about them, even when people were disagreeing with them or laughing at them or whatever. It's just like they had this peace and it was almost like it didn't even bother them in a way. You know, I think that is one of the things that really separates Christians from non-believers, is that ability to see another person as someone that God loves, someone that Jesus died for, and to be able to show that acceptance and understanding and love, even to people that the world would say are our enemies. To me, that's one of the greatest witnesses of the Gospel, and I think particularly in hostile and restricted nations, as Christians respond to persecution, not with bitterness and anger, but with love for their persecutors. I'm reminded of a story several years back, in 2007, three men in Turkey, three Christians, were martyred for their faith. Two of them were Turkish believers in Christ, the third man was from Germany, and the next day, the two men who were married, their widows, the very next day, on national television in Turkey, offered forgiveness to the young men who had killed their husbands. This is, you know, 24 hours after the murders, and they're on national TV saying, we forgive the men who did this, we forgive them, they know not what they do, they actually echoed the words of Christ on the cross. A reporter in Turkey, and this is not a Christian reporter, this is a Muslim reporter in Turkey, talked about those two women offering forgiveness on national TV, and he said, and again this is a Muslim saying this, he said those two women did more for Christianity in Turkey than a thousand missionaries could have done in a thousand years, simply by showing forgiveness for their persecutors.

Wow, and it actually reminds me of this story, I believe it was Louis Zamperini, have you heard of him? I have, unbroken. Unbroken, and where what happened with him was he was actually beaten, he was mistreated horribly, and I believe he was a prisoner of war in World War II, and he was a famous runner in America, he was in the Olympics, but afterwards, after he got out, he actually went back to go visit many of the people who were persecuting him as a prisoner of war, and when he went to see them and he said that I forgive you, many of them became Christians. It is simply incomprehensible from a human perspective that someone could do that, that someone could suffer that much and offer forgiveness. It is an incredible proof of the gospel, if the gospel is not true, there is no way that you could forgive some of that kind of behavior.

So as we forgive, it is a witness for Christ, and it's a proof of the gospel, because there's no human explanation for that. Yeah, and what is, you know, a lot of the people who are saying, we talked about they can go to persecution.com, what can they do to get involved with you guys? Well, again, first thing, sign up to get the free monthly magazine from The Voice of the Martyrs, right at the top of the page, there's a button that says Free Magazine, just click on that, give us your name and address, that way every month you kind of know what's going on in the world as far as our persecuted brothers and sisters. You have names and faces of specific Christians that you can pray for, and there are ways to get involved, there are ways to write letters to Christians who are in prison right now, write letters to encourage them, write letters in their own language. There's a link to that on persecution.com. As well, we have a virtual VEOm Advanced Conference, and this is something we typically have had conferences around the country this year with all that's going on and with the travel restrictions. We haven't had in-person conferences, so we have moved it online, and this is a chance to hear firsthand from Christians who have gone through persecution, from gospel workers who are working in hostile and restricted nations, and really learn firsthand what God is doing in the midst of persecution around the world.

That's awesome, and one of the things I know that we can all do is we can all pray. Robby actually had a story where he was talking about prayer, and he mentioned a seagull. Is that right, Robby?

I was on vacation this year. I wasn't exactly being a person. As I was watching his seagull fly, I was amazed that he could, you know, just simply stay in place because the wind was underneath his wings, and he was lofted like that, and I was actually praying as I was watching, like, God, you know, how can I do that? And he said, don't you realize that when you pray, to an extent, you are flying? And that essentially the Holy Spirit is under your wings, and you're being brought up, right, to Jesus and the Father right there in the throne. And we have that ability at any given moment, right, to come to this place of intercession for these wonderful people that are facing things that we can't even begin to fathom, and intercede for what God's going to do with their persecutors in all the times as we are seeing. There's no doubt lots of people that have been praying during COVID that, you know, God wouldn't waste the pain. Yeah, that's good. And, you know, since we have a couple of extra minutes, Todd, a lot of people see things possibly turning in the United States.

Have you seen any of that, or what do you think of that? You know, our focus is on the 70 nations around the world where Christians face a pattern of persecution, but what I would say is that, you know, we don't know. We're not guaranteed that we'll have freedom like we always do now. I think the key for American Christians is to be ready. If we're ready to endure persecution and to victoriously follow Christ in the face of hardship and in the face of opposition, it won't matter if that opposition starts tomorrow or it starts 20 years from tomorrow. If we're ready today, then we're ready to go forward, even in the midst of opposition. And I think there's a couple ways to get ready. One of them is diving deeply into the scripture and making sure the scripture is shaping you as a follower of Christ every day. Work on your time in scripture, work on your time in prayer.

That's how we get ready. The other way that we get ready is by reading and knowing the stories of Christians who are going through persecution and are being victorious. Those are the people you read about in the Voice of the Martyrs magazine. Those are the people whose stories we share on Voice of the Martyrs radio every week. Knowing these stories and knowing how they endured and how they were victorious, that helps us get ready in case persecution is coming to our country as well.

Yeah, absolutely. And there are some listeners out there who listen to the Truth Network who are not Christians and don't have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. If somebody's listening today and if they may not understand this Jesus stuff or don't have a relationship with Jesus Christ, what would you say to them, Todd?

You know, I would say to them the same thing that I would say to a Muslim or to another person of a different faith that was asking him questions. Ask God to reveal himself to you. Ask Jesus Christ to make himself real to you. We know around the world that God answers that prayer. God may send a person your way. He may send a book your way. He may send a dream or something supernatural your way. But ask Jesus, Lord, I want to know you. Make yourself real to me. Help me to be able to know you. I believe God will answer that prayer.

That is awesome. And if you've never said yes to Jesus, it says in John 3 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. And if you've never said yes to Jesus, just pray with me right now. Dear Lord, I know I'm a sinner. I know I've committed horrible sins against you. It says in Scripture all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, Lord. And I repent. I turn away from my sins, Lord, and I ask you to forgive me of my sins, Jesus, and I accept you into my heart. In Jesus' name. Amen. And Todd, we want to thank you for being on the show today. And Robbie, if not for God. If not for God. This is the Truth Network.