Nigeria

Learning to Rest in God’s Sovereignty Sept. 11, 2014, began as a happy day for Mary Patrick. She and her older sister were walking to a wedding in a nearby village with the bride-to-be and the bride’s younger sister. But their lives, like those of many other young women in Nigeria, changed forever with the terrifying sound of yelling and gunfire. Mary, who was 24 years old, quickly hid in a nearby house with the others when the Boko Haram attack began in Adamawa state, in northeastern Nigeria. They hid in the house for four days before being captured while trying to escape. “The only thing I was thinking when they took me is that I will die,” Mary said. “I know they will kill me. I’m just praying to God everything that I do that is wrong, that the good Lord will forgive me.” The horror that Mary faced during four months of captivity with Boko Haram became clear to a VOM worker when he tried to buy her a meal. “I wanted to buy food for her and bought some meat,” the VOM worker said. “She told me she couldn’t eat the meat. She said, ‘In the camp

A Sisterhood of Grief and Comfort Deborah and Christina have lost children, husbands and homes in Boko Haram attacks, but even great suffering has not shaken their trust in God’s providence. As Deborah chatted with a neighbor under a mango tree one day, five young men drove up, jumped out of their truck with machine guns and walked purposefully toward her home. Her nieces, 9-year-old Palmata and 7-year-old Kumai, whom she had adopted, ate their after-school snacks just outside the front door while Deborah’s husband sat inside the house preparing for a Bible study that evening. Deborah quickly followed them into her house, but one of the men stopped her in the hallway. “You have to lie down!” he barked at her. As she lay on her stomach, the armed man pressed his boot into her lower back. Then she heard four shots in the room where her husband was studying. Overcome with terror, Deborah started praying. She believed that she would be next. To her surprise, the killers left her cowering in the hallway. Once outside, however, they grabbed her young daughters and forced them, screaming, into their truck. “Why are you taking us?” Palmata cried. Deborah scrambled to

A Daughter Betrayed Ruth was leafing through the Bible in her room when her younger sister walked in. “Mom! Ruth has one of those books that belongs to the Christians!” her sister yelled as she ran from the room. Panicked, Ruth shoved the Bible under her mattress. Ruth’s mother and sister ransacked the room looking for the forbidden book, but they somehow overlooked it even though they flipped the mattress. “If I find a Bible, only Allah could save you,” her mother warned. Ruth lived in a Muslim village located in Adamawa state, northern Nigeria. She and her brothers and sisters lived with their mother, while their father supported the family by working in another state. Like 60 percent of Muslim girls in the north, Ruth never learned to read. At age 19, she still spent her days helping her mother with housework. Ruth didn’t think much of Christians; they were infidels, and the ones she knew behaved immorally. However, one Christian boy — a pastor’s son — always nodded politely and smiled when she walked past. Still, she wanted nothing to do with him. Then, one day the boy stopped Ruth and told her he had dreamed that she

A Fulani Muslim’s decision to follow Christ led him from experiencing persecution to helping new Christians grow in faith. “Turn away from Islam and follow me,” the man in white told him. When Abel awoke the next morning at his home in Nigeria, he had no idea what the dream meant. And no matter how hard he tried, he could not forget the man in his dream. “The next day, again, it happened to me,” Abel said. “I had that same dream for three days.” Abel shared the details of the dream with his father and mother, who called it demonic and urged the 28-year-old to recite Muslim prayers to cleanse his mind. He followed their advice, but the dream persisted. Seeking relief from his anxiety and confusion, Abel decided to tell a Christian friend about the dream. His friend then arranged for Abel to meet a pastor, who told Abel he believed the man in the dream was Jesus. After explaining that Jesus is more than the prophet that Muslims portray him to be, the pastor shared the gospel with Abel. The pastor’s explanation of the dream angered Abel, who had always been taught that the Bible had been