{"id":1306,"date":"2021-12-29T06:59:00","date_gmt":"2021-12-29T06:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/?p=1306"},"modified":"2022-01-11T16:47:41","modified_gmt":"2022-01-11T16:47:41","slug":"christian-widows-orphans-remainging-faithful","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/christian-widows-orphans-remainging-faithful\/","title":{"rendered":"Christian Widows, Orphans Remaining Faithful After Attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Melissa was just four years old when she lost her mother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On July 1, 2012, she went to church with her mother in Garissa, Kenya<\/a>, as usual. Melissa went to Sunday school while her mother, Sandra, joined in worship with other members of the Africa Inland Church. But the service ended abruptly when gunmen burst into the sanctuary and opened fire on worshipers. Melissa huddled with the other children in Sunday school as worshipers ran from the building. Later, after other parents had collected their children, Sandra\u2019s best friend picked up Melissa and told her that her mother was in the hospital. The next day she was told that her mother had died.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The attack, carried out by members of the militant Muslim group al-Shabab, had killed 14 believers and injured 58. Twelve children were orphaned that day, and The Voice of the Martyrs has helped support them since the attack. Melissa is being cared for by her elderly grandparents. Like many in the area, they are subsistence farmers in a drought-prone region where crops are undependable. The support from VOM will help ensure that Melissa is able to attend school and that she and her family will always be able to buy food. VOM\u2019s support also lets Melissa know that the body of Christ cares for her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While they continue to grieve, many families affected by the Garissa attack maintain their joy in the Lord. The wife of one man killed in the attack chose to have John 3:16 engraved on his headstone. These believers know that God\u2019s love extends even to the men who took the lives of 14 Christians in Garissa. And their confidence remains firm in the God who helps them endure and overcome impossible circumstances (Heb. 10:35\u201336).<\/p>\n\n\n\r\n\t

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Request your free magazine<\/p>\r\n\t\t\tSubscribe<\/a>\r\n\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t\n\n\n

***<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pauline Ayyad lost her husband at the hands of terrorists in Gaza City in 2007.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rami Ayyad managed a Christian book store for the Palestinian Bible <\/a>Society. Although he received regular threats from extremists and the book store had been bombed twice, Rami always told his wife, \u201cJesus is the love of my life and I will never deny him, regardless of what happens.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Saturday, Oct. 6, 2007, Rami was kidnapped by three men \u2014 \u201cfundamentalists with long beards\u201d as he described them to Pauline in a phone call after he\u2019d been taken. Early the next morning, his body, marked with knife wounds and bullet holes, was found near the book store.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pauline and Rami had two young children, and she was pregnant with their third. She was very angry, especially at the person who shot her husband. \u201cI used to blame God all the time,\u201d she said. \u201cI told the Lord, \u2018What good is going to come out of this? What good could happen to me after the death of my husband?\u2019 I hated Muslims. I hated everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then the Lord spoke to Pauline through Ecclesiastes 3. She realized Rami\u2019s death was according to God\u2019s timing and that his killers were God\u2019s tools, used for his purposes. \u201cThat was the beginning of the forgiveness journey,\u201d she said. \u201cI forgave them, but very much on the surface. I wasn\u2019t really forgiving them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"a<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In the months after her husband\u2019s death, the Bible <\/a>Society moved their staff, including Pauline, out of Gaza. They were no longer safe in the territory run by the Islamist group Hamas. Pauline and her three children resettled in the West Bank city of Bethlehem. They received support and encouragement from Christians around the world, but she still struggled with her feelings toward her husband\u2019s killers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The process of forgiveness that God had started in Pauline was finally completed five years after Rami\u2019s murder. At a conference in 2012, Pauline realized that the Muslims living around her were the ones that she needed to reach. \u201cI released my forgiveness to those people,\u201d she said, \u201cand I felt like a totally different person. I felt I had a new spirit, a new heart and a new mind full of forgiveness and full of acceptance to the situation that the Lord allowed in my life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, Pauline is involved in several forms of outreach to Muslim women in her Bethlehem community. She also operates a small gift shop near the Church of the Nativity, selling souvenirs to tourists to support her three kids. In partnership with the Palestinian Bible <\/a>Society, VOM has provided some support over the years, including providing some inventory for the shop in 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pauline has seen the Lord\u2019s loving hand at work in her life. \u201cI started finding out, six years after Rami\u2019s death, what a great honor it is to be the widow of a martyr,\u201d she said. \u201cJesus, for us, became a reality, became a husband, became a father, became a brother, became a helper, became everything \u2014 a person you can rely on, you can depend on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy message to widows is don\u2019t bury yourself with your husband. No, go outside and be a testimony. Experience Jesus and let him lift you up and use you in a miraculous way to bring glory and honor to his name.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As fellow believers, we can help meet the needs of widows like Pauline and orphans like Melissa. But we rely on the Lord to do the final work of bringing comfort and forgiveness to those who keep their confidence in him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Melissa was just four years old when she lost her mother. On July 1, 2012, she went to church with her mother in Garissa, Kenya, as usual. Melissa went to Sunday school while her mother, Sandra, joined in worship with other members of the Africa Inland Church. But the service ended abruptly when gunmen burst into the sanctuary and opened fire on worshipers. Melissa huddled with the other children in Sunday school as worshipers ran from the building. Later, after other parents had collected their children, Sandra\u2019s best friend picked up Melissa and told her that her mother was in the hospital. The next day she was told that her mother had died. The attack, carried out by members of the militant Muslim group al-Shabab, had killed 14 believers and injured 58. Twelve children were orphaned that day, and The Voice of the Martyrs has helped support them since the attack. Melissa is being cared for by her elderly grandparents. Like many in the area, they are subsistence farmers in a drought-prone region where crops are undependable. The support from VOM will help ensure that Melissa is able to attend school and that she and her family will always be<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1307,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[30],"class_list":["post-1306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-field-stories","tag-kenya","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nChristian Widows, Orphans Remaining Faithful After Attacks - Stories<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"As fellow believers, we can help meet the needs of widows like Pauline and orphans like Melissa as they recover after losing loved ones.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/christian-widows-orphans-remainging-faithful\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Christian Widows, Orphans Remaining Faithful After Attacks - 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