Pakistani Muslim airforceman turns to Christ
ICC Note:
The Bible Society tells the encouraging testimony of Siddique Paul, a former Muslim who came to faith in Jesus despite great opposition, including imprisonment and family pressure.
By Karen Mudge
10/30/2012 Pakistan (Eternity Newspaper)- Born into a Pakistani Muslim family, Pastor Siddique Paul struggled from childhood with a secret.
Born Mohammad Siddique, the son of a mosque leader, Siddique was drawn to the Bible as a young boy and a young adult, but kept coming back to the Islamic faith in which he was raised.
But when his wife fell sick in 1997, Siddique had an encounter with the Christian faith that had an ongoing impact. The doctor caring for his wife refused to let Siddique pay for her medicine, saying he’d prefer if Siddique and his wife would visit him once she was well.
“I was inspired by his kindness and love because the medicine was costly,” says Siddique. So he asked for the doctor’s name. Siddique recalls, “In our Urdu language the doctor’s name means ‘servant of Messiah’. I got shocked and thought, ‘he is a Christian’. After that I really showed my heart.”
He begged the doctor to introduce him to a Christian family who were acting on the teaching from the Bible. Siddique enjoyed the Christian family and asked them many questions. The family humbly told Siddique that they were laymen, not scholars, but said to him, “Our love is here, if you want to come and visit us again, our house will always be open to you and we will say welcome in Christ’s love.”
Siddique attended church with the family. During the service, he issued a challenge to Jesus regarding his three year old daughter who was very ill. He said to Jesus, “You are not here, but if you exist, if your blood has power, if you heal my daughter before I reach home, I will try to think about you. Not believe – just think.”
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This miracle began to melt Siddique’s heart towards Christianity. From that point, despite what he had been told about the Bible and Christianity’s corruption, he knew: “there is something good in Christianity. How else could my daughter get healed in a short time? The doctors weren’t able to heal her.”
Visiting the church again, Siddique decided to begin a comparative study from the Koran and the Bible. He prayed very neutrally as he began: “O God and master of this universe, please show me your right path, the right way, the truth.” Having prayed this prayer, Siddique was confronted one day with a vision of God’s glory, while reading the book of Jeremiah.
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When he went to the pastor of the church, the pastor prayed for him and compared Siddique’s experience to that of the apostle Paul on the road to Damascus. He read Acts Chapter 9 to Siddique. “He prayed very prophetically for me and said that he believed one day I would preach the gospel of the living Lord.”
Siddique continued spending much time with his comparative study, and in 1998, without informing his wife, his family, or his work, he accepted the Lord Jesus Christ and was baptised. Siddique changed his name from Mohammad Siddique to Siddique Paul.
Although Siddique went on to join a Bible college and share his story with small groups of people in churches, he did not tell his wife about his conversion. When, in August 1999 God laid a burden on his heart to tell Fozia, Siddique finally obeyed. Her response was exactly what he feared. She considered him unholy, demanded a divorce, and informed both his family and hers of his conversion.
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In June 2000, Siddique’s employer, the Pakistan Airforce, arrested and imprisoned him to face a district court marshal. They accused Siddique of burning the Koran, violating his oath in the name of Allah to the Airforce, and claimed that, as a uniformed Airforce man, he had no permission to write his booklet.
Siddique cried out to God in his small, dark prison room. “I was weeping and crying. I heard the voice of my living Lord and God directly in the jail: ‘They cannot harm you, because I have broken the teeth in their mouth already’. My Lord took a stand for me; he favoured me and spoke to me.”
“When I went with handcuffs and security to court, I prayed and believed in God to save me. A wonderful miracle took place in my life.” The judge’s sentence: no dismissal from service; no reduction in rank. But a further 62 days of detention.
In the months that followed Siddique’s release, he and Fozia prayed constantly to be used by God. From 2001 to 2003, all eleven members of Fozia’s family accepted the Lord Jesus and were baptised.
However, when the Pakistani Airforce intelligence heard Siddique was sharing Christianity, he was ordered again to report to an airbase court.
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