Convert Faces Hatred, Threats in Middle East

His e-mails from the Middle East read like the latest from John Grisham.

“I was warned to escape the city and within hours they had sent some of their top hit men to get me. I was later told that their men were waiting for me at my residence.”

“I was invited to meet with certain sheiks. I turned the invitations down--I was too busy to meet with them--and I later found out it was a trap.”

“My extended family here turned on me and sided with the terrorist group to get me. When the terrorists said, ‘We want to hurt him,’ my family said, ‘We want to hurt him first.’ I don’t know if they wanted to kill me, though a letter they sent me was addressed to ‘The late . . .’ ”

Steve isn’t a character in a novel, nor does he work for the CIA, M-6 or the Mossad. For the past nine months, Steve--who doesn’t want his real name used--has been in the missionary business, proclaiming the Gospel in the Middle East.

You may remember his story. I wrote about him in February, just as he was leaving for the West Bank on a one-year mission sponsored by Irvine-based Roberts Liardon Ministries, which is sending 500 missionaries over five years to the areas of the world most hostile to Christians.

Steve, a shy, soft-spoken, 36-year-old Orange County resident, had spent part of his youth in the West Bank, where he was raised as a Muslim. As a teenager, he returned to the United States and converted to Christianity. Because he knew the Arab language and culture, he always felt the pull to go back to the villages of his childhood and spread the word.

He had always known that trying to make converts out of devout Muslims in the Holy Land would be tough and potentially dangerous. But he wasn’t prepared for the intensity of the attacks--both verbal and physical--against him.

“The reaction happened faster and was far more furious than I expected, but I knew something like this could happen,” Steve writes in an e-mail interview.

His mission trip started well with people in his childhood homeland welcoming him.

“I’ve spoken to almost 500 people and almost, without fail, they have been amazingly hospitable,” Steve said. “They almost always want to find out about me because they recognize my accent as being from the villages around Jerusalem.

“Many of the times, they try to win me back to Islam. But they are always most hospitable and courteous.”

The people Steve fears--and who he has run up against-- are the fanatics who take the Koran literally: “If they desert you, seize them and put them to death wherever you find them.”

“They called me the most evil evangelist in the history of the city,” Steve said.

After a few close calls--”What’s amazing to me is how many times God’s rescued me”--he escaped to the safety of a big Israeli city, where he’s found a job and continues to do missionary work.

“My church in the U.S. has asked me if I want to come home or go to another country, but I told them I don’t want to leave,” Steve said. “I won’t back down. I’m doing what I’ve wanted to do for so long.”

His faith has been shaken at times--not by death threats, but by the hurt all this has caused his extended family.

“I could, on the one hand, feel condemned for stirring up all this trouble,” Steve said. “I could feel like a failure. But I don’t. God gave me one convert when I got here. I feel this was God telling me that there are many people here who will respond to the Gospel. I can’t deny that God did something wonderful through my being here.”

Alone and a long way from home, Steve frequently turns to the Bible-- especially finding comfort in the Book of Matthew, Chapter 10, where Jesus warns of the persecution that awaits those who proclaim His name.

“Many of the things in those verses are almost a mirror reflection of what happened to me--such as the rejection of the family, being brought before councils and being betrayed by men who would try to kill you,” Steve said.

For example, he had befriended a trio of young Arab men who claimed to be Christians but, they told him, had to practice their faith in secret because they feared retaliation. One night, as Steve played the guitar and sang worship music, the men turned on him.

“All three of them surrounded me and they told me that they were not really believers, but that they had been waiting for me to return to Islam,” Steve said. “Upset that I hadn’t, one guy started hitting me and kicking me. He grabbed the cross off my neck and yelled at me, ‘You shouldn’t be wearing this. I could go straight to heaven for killing you right now.’ ”

Steve managed to flee, leaving his guitar behind.

Stories like that have fueled rumors among his friends in Orange County that a contract has been taken out on Steve’s life.

“No, there’s no price on my head,” Steve said. “People must be mistaking me for [Iranian author] Salman Rushdie. I’m fine. I’m now in a safe place and as long as I don’t go to certain cities and villages, I’ll be fine.

“There were two things I dreaded when I came here. One was that my family would find out about me and the other is that my village [where my relatives live] would find out. Now those two fears are no longer in my life.”

William Lobdell, editor of Times Community News, looks at faith as a regular contributor to The Times’ Orange County religion page. His e-mail address is bill.lobdell@latimes.com.