Growing up in Iran, Padina memorized the Quran before she started school. She faithfully recited her prayers every day.
“I hated Christians and I became very happy when I found out that they were being persecuted. They always told us that if they killed a Christian, we had a one way ticket to heaven,” she told Hormoz Shariat, president of Iran Alive Ministries.
She was fastidious about applying the Quran to her life. If she forgot the ceremonial washing before prayer, she would stop mid-prayer, go back and wash correctly and start all over again.
“I was a very strong Islamic believer,” she affirmed.
But all her religious piety was in vain. She grew depressed to the point of wanting to commit suicide.
“I felt so distant from Allah,” she confided to Hormoz.
Meanwhile, her mother, afflicted by multiple sclerosis, grew deathly ill.
Padina confided to her mother about her suicidal tendencies. Instead of discouraging her, she shocked Padina by asking her to kill her also — a double suicide!
“I will do this for you, and we will both die,” she told her.
But then one day, mom in her deathbed tuned in to the satellite broadcast of Hormoz Shariat, who has been called the “Billy Graham of Iran.”
“If you are hopeless, if you are oppressed, if you are planning to commit suicide, the Lord says, ‘Stop.’ He has a hope and a future for you,” Hormoz said on the broadcast. “If you’re planning to kill yourself, stop and call me right now.”
Padina’s mother was so desperate that she didn’t care that Islam punishes with death those who convert to Christianity. She didn’t care that the Koran dooms all “apostates” to hell. She didn’t care, so she dialed.
After conversing for half an hour with Hormoz, she repented of her sins and received Jesus into her heart with the prayer of faith.
Meanwhile, her daughter was watching from the kitchen with alarm. Read the rest of how Christianity revival in Iran.
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