My teammates and I often wondered why God chose a disagreeable, demanding person like him to be a part of planting churches among his Muslim people.
But God did choose him.
Ajmal was the first known Muslim-background believer in our city. And in spite of his difficult personality, God used him to introduce many others to Jesus Christ.
Then he was abducted. Over the course of four days, Ajmal was beaten, tortured, and ordered to return to Islam. Finally, his abductors took him out of the city, shot him in the head, and left him for dead. They put a note on his body, threatening to kill other Muslims who were considering following Jesus.
Miraculously, Ajmal didn’t die. The way he remembers it, Jesus came and cradled Ajmal in His arms immediately after he was shot. “I will never leave you or forsake you,” Ajmal heard Him say.
“A million times out of a million, this bullet trajectory will kill the victim.”
He woke up to find a stranger holding him in his arms. The stranger took him to the hospital. Obvious signs of torture covered Ajmal’s body, and he had open wounds where the bullet entered and exited his head. Fluid dripped from his nose—the doctors said it was brain fluid.
After performing some tests, one of the doctors said that the bullet somehow caused no long-term damage.
“A million times out of a million, this bullet trajectory will kill the victim,” the baffled doctor said. “It’s an unexplainable miracle.”
Before this attempt on his life, Ajmal’s witness was helping birth a movement to Christ. One of the men he led to faith is now a key leader in the growing community of believers.
And now, God is using Ajmal even more. Bible studies are multiplying rapidly. And more Muslims are discovering the hope of eternity through Jesus Christ.
Ajmal can still be difficult sometimes.
But we’re privileged to walk beside him, through the miraculous and the mundane, as he proclaims the truth that Christ will never leave or forsake those who call upon His name. Pray that many more men and women from Ajmal’s people group will embrace the Savior.
Halil believed he had no choice but to kill a Frontiers field worker who was teaching his family about Jesus. But before he could follow through, the Gospel began to change his heart.
This account comes from a long-term worker. Names and places have been changed for security.
Main photo by Ashley Jonathan Clements