Bless those who persecute
you. Don't curse them; pray that God will bless them. Romans 12:14 (NLT)
by Jim
Dailey (BGEA)
On Sept. 26, 2013, Saeed Abedini—aged
33 and an American citizen—marked one year within the walls of Iran’s notorious
prison.
In Ward 350, Saeed Abedini is kept with 30-40
other prisoners, twice the legal limit. When he sleeps at night, the arms and
legs of his fellow inmates are draped around him.
On several
occasions, Saeed has been beaten by guards, resulting
in internal bleeding. The psychological harassment is unending. Twice—once last
fall and again in May—Saeed was moved into solitary
confinement. The first confinement lasted four weeks, the second for 10 days.
His offense,
according to the Iranian government and court system that arrested him and
sentenced him to eight years, was “endangering national security.”
But the real
reason Saeed approaches his first anniversary of
imprisonment is because of his faith in Jesus Christ, the Savior who found him
in his Tehran bedroom more than a decade ago.
Saeed’s wife, Nagmeh, sits politely in her home in Boise, Idaho. Her two
children, Rebekka, 6, and Jacob, 5, have just
awakened.
Their
grandmother, born in Iran, takes them into her care as Naghmeh
settles into her living room, which is adorned with a Persian rug.
Quietly and
relentlessly, Naghmeh has labored on behalf of her
husband over the course of the past year to bring his plight to the attention
of the world.
A website, SaveSaeed.org, was started last December in conjunction with the
American Center for Law and Justice. The site has garnered more than 600,000
signatures from people around the world demanding his release from illegal
incarceration.
Naghmeh’s pleas for Saeed’s freedom have also been carried directly into Iran
through BBC Farsi and Voice of America Persia.
This past spring,
she spoke before the United Nations.
On Sept. 26—his
one-year anniversary—Naghmeh is hoping that believers
will congregate at all 50 U.S. state capitol buildings to conduct a prayer
vigil for her husband.
“My husband is in
jail simply because he loves Jesus Christ,” Naghmeh
emphasizes. “He was arrested as he worked on an orphanage we are building on
property we own and for which we had received all the proper permits. He was
also gathering peacefully with other fellow Christians in their private homes,
expressing his faith.”
When the call
came in the middle of the night to inform her that Saeed
had been arrested, she was surprised but ready. Her husband had been arrested
and detained several years earlier, when the couple had visited with churches
they had planted in Iran.
The detention
lasted only two months before he was released and encouraged to begin
humanitarian work, which led them to start an orphanage in Tehran.
“God is a
gentleman,” Naghmeh said. “He knew that I was not
ready two years ago to deal with the situation I am now facing with Saeed. He was gracious to me and was preparing my heart
even then. He doesn’t cut too deep when you are not ready.”