“I’ve heard statistics as high as 70 percent of Iranians have rejected Islam"
Mission Network News
Which country do you think has the fastest growing Church in the world? China? Russia? Maybe a country in South America?
Here’s a hint: the official name of the country starts with ‘The Islamic Republic’.
Todd Nettleton with The Voice of the Marytrs, USA reveals, “The Islamic Republic of Iran is actually the place in the world where the Church is growing the fastest, something that would be pretty surprising to most Christians.”
The situation is bursting with irony. The Islamic Republic of Iran is listed on Open Doors USA’s World Watch List in the top ten hardest countries to be a believer. And yet, last year, Operation World listed Iran as having a 19.6 percent uptick in the Christian population annually — more than any other country.
Why is the Iranian Church going through such a growth spurt?
Here’s a hint: the official name of the country starts with ‘The Islamic Republic’.
Todd Nettleton with The Voice of the Marytrs, USA reveals, “The Islamic Republic of Iran is actually the place in the world where the Church is growing the fastest, something that would be pretty surprising to most Christians.”
The situation is bursting with irony. The Islamic Republic of Iran is listed on Open Doors USA’s World Watch List in the top ten hardest countries to be a believer. And yet, last year, Operation World listed Iran as having a 19.6 percent uptick in the Christian population annually — more than any other country.
The Laws That Backfire“Conversion is illegal, the above-ground churches have almost all been closed down,” says Nettleton. “So it is a country that has worked very hard to eliminate Christianity, and particularly to eliminate Muslim conversion to Christianity. But it’s the place in the world where the Church is growing the fastest.”
Why is the Iranian Church going through such a growth spurt?
Nettleton shares, “I’ve had Iranian Christians tell me, ‘The greatest missionary in Iran, the greatest evangelist we’ve had in Iran was the Ayatollah Khomeini.’ This is the guy who took power in 1979, he converted Iran to the Islamic Republic [saying], ‘We’re going to run our country according to what Mohammed would have us do, we’re going to run our country according to the Koran.’
“Now here we are thirty-plus years later, and most Iranians have rejected Islam precisely because of that. The country is run by the Mullahs. The government says, ‘We’re doing everything according to Islamic principles.’ So if the government doesn’t work, if there’s still corruption, if there’s still poverty, then that must mean Islam doesn’t work…. That failure has really, in the eyes of the people of Iran, become the failure of Islam.”According to Nettleton, the Iranian people are going through honest introspection about what they’ve witnessed in their country, and what that means for their lives…and their souls.
Note to Readers: This article is dated September 26, 2016.
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