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My name is Arman Farzad, Iranian prince born November 1st, 1995.

On March 15th, 2023, I stood before a firing squad in Thran.

The crime, reading the Bible, and accepting Jesus as my savior.

I should have died that morning, but Jesus did something impossible.

Six rifles were aimed at my heart, ready to execute me for abandoning Islam.

But in that moment, when death seemed certain, Jesus intervened in a way that shook the very foundations of the prison.

This is my testimony of how the prince of peace saved this tyrannian prince from certain death.

My childhood was spent in the marble halls of our family palace in Thran where Islamic prayers echoed through ornate corridors five times daily.

From the moment I could speak, my father drilled the Quran into my mind.

By age seven, I had memorized over 50 suras perfectly.

The palace Imam would test me every morning after fire’s prayer, and I never disappointed him.

My father would beam with pride as I recited verse after verse in flawless Arabic.

His hand resting on my shoulder as he envisioned my future as a religious leader.

Every aspect of my royal upbringing revolved around Islamic devotion.

I attended the most prestigious Islamic academy in Iran where scholars praise my understanding of Islamic Jewish prudence.

During Ramadan, I fasted longer than required.

Even as a child, I performed the pilgrimage to Mecca three times before my 18th birthday.

Prayer rugs from the finest Persian weavers lined my bedroom.

And I never missed a single prayer time in 20 years of life.

Yet despite this perfect religious performance, something gnawed at my soul, a emptiness that all the prayers and rituals could never fill.

The palace library became my refuge during long afternoons.

I devoured books on Islamic theology, Persian poetry, and political science.

My father groomed me for leadership, expecting me to bridge religious authority with political power.

He often said, “Arman, you will guide our nation back to pure Islamic principles.

” The weight of these expectations pressed heavily on my shoulders, but I accepted them as my divine calling.

December 15th, 2022 changed everything.

While exploring a forgotten section of the library’s basement, I discovered a hidden compartment behind loose stone blocks.

Inside lay several contraband western books that had somehow escaped the government’s censorship purges.

My heart pounded as I recognized the leatherbound volume at the bottom.

A Bible.

My first instinct was revulsion.

This was Christian poison, the corrupted text that had led millions astray from Allah’s truth.

I should burn it immediately and report its existence to the religious police.

But curiosity, that dangerous human weakness crept into my mind.

What exactly did Christians believe that made them so confident in their faith, even unto death? I had heard stories of Christian martyrs who sang hymns as they faced execution.

What could inspire such unwavering conviction? That night, after midnight prayers, I returned to the basement with a small candle.

My hands trembled as I opened the forbidden book.

The pages felt ancient and sacred under my fingertips.

I began reading from Matthew’s Gospel, expecting to find obvious lies and contradictions that would confirm my Islamic training.

Instead, I encountered Jesus speaking words that pierce straight through my soul.

Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

” These words described exactly how I felt despite my privileged life and perfect religious performance.

I was weary carrying burdens I couldn’t even name.

Night after night I returned to that basement sanctuary.

I read about Jesus healing the sick, feeding the hungry, and speaking with divine authority that even his enemies acknowledged.

But what disturbed me most were his claims to divinity.

In Islam, I had been taught that Jesus was merely a prophet.

But here, he clearly declared himself equal with God.

Have you ever held something that could destroy your entire world? That Bible represented everything forbidden in my life.

Yet, it drew me like nothing ever had.

I began comparing Jesus’ teachings with passages from the Quran I had memorized.

The contrast was striking.

Where Islamic law demanded perfect obedience and threatened eternal punishment for failure.

Jesus offered grace and forgiveness to imperfect people.

I started hiding the Bible in my bedroom, reading it by candle light after everyone slept.

The palace walls that had once felt like protection now felt like a prison.

Every family dinner became an exercise in deception as I nodded along with conversations about Islamic supremacy and Christian ignorance.

My father praised my continued devotion, unaware that my heart was being transformed by the very book he would consider blasphemous.

The internal war raged within me for weeks.

Everything I had been taught screamed that I was betraying Allah, my family, and my heritage.

Yet, every page I turned revealed more of Jesus’s love and truth.

I felt like a man dying of thirst, who had suddenly discovered a flowing spring.

But drinking from it meant abandoning everything I had ever known.

By January 2023, I could no longer deny what was happening in my heart.

Jesus was calling me and his voice was becoming impossible to ignore.

The perfectly ordered world of my Islamic upbringing was crumbling, replaced by something infinitely more beautiful and terrifying.

I stood at a crossroads that would determine not just my earthly future, but my eternal destiny.

The seeds of my transformation had been planted in that dusty basement, watered by midnight readings of God’s word.

Soon they would grow into a faith that would cost me everything I thought I valued, yet give me everything my soul had always craved.

The Bible had awakened questions that consumed my thoughts day and night.

But I needed answers that only living Christians could provide.

In January 2023, I made a decision that would have horrified my family.

I approached Hassan, one of our palace servants who had worked for us for 15 years.

Something about his peaceful demeanor and the way he treated even the lowest staff with genuine kindness had always intrigued me.

Late one evening, I cornered Hassan in the kitchen after the other servants had retired.

My heart hammered against my ribs as I whispered, “Hassan, I need to ask you something that could be dangerous for both of us.

” His weathered face grew serious as he sensed the gravity in my voice.

“Are you a Christian?” The words hung in the air like a sword ready to fall.

Hassan’s eyes widened with fear, then softened with compassion.

After a long pause, he nodded slowly.

Yes, my prince, I follow Jesus Christ.

His admission could have meant his immediate execution.

Yet, he spoke with quiet dignity.

“How did you know?” he asked.

I told him about discovering the Bible, about the questions burning in my mind about the strange peace I felt when reading Jesus’s words.

Hassan listened intently, tears forming in his eyes.

Allah has been calling you, hasn’t he? He said, then quickly corrected himself.

I mean, Jesus has been calling you.

Hassan arranged a clandestine meeting with Pastor Cyrus, leader of Thran’s underground church.

The meeting took place in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city.

I disguised myself in common clothes, my royal identity hidden beneath a worker’s symbol garp.

The risk was enormous.

If caught, we would all face immediate execution.

Pastor Cyrus was a small elderly man whose eyes held depths of wisdom earned through decades of persecution.

When I explained my spiritual struggle, he opened his Bible to John chapter 3 and read Jesus’s words to Nicodemus about being born again.

You must be born again to see the kingdom of God.

Hear it aloud.

What does this mean being born again? I asked, leaning forward intently.

Pastor Cyrus smiled gently.

It means your spirit which was dead in sins becomes alive through faith in Jesus Christ.

It means you receive a new nature, new desires, new purpose.

Everything changes from the inside out.

He explained salvation in terms that shattered my Islamic understanding.

In Islam, you work to earn Allah’s favor through good deeds and religious observance.

But Christianity teaches that Jesus already did all the work.

He lived the perfect life you could never live and died the death you deserved to die.

When you trust in him, God sees Jesus’s righteousness instead of your sin.

What would you risk to find real peace with God? That question haunted me as Pastor Cyrus continued explaining grace versus works.

For 27 years, I had tried to earn my way to heaven through perfect religious performance.

The weight of that burden had crushed my soul, even though I hadn’t recognized it until now.

You see, Pastor Cyrus said, Jesus said, “Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

” He offers what? No amount of prayer or good works can provide complete forgiveness and eternal security.

Over the following weeks, I met secretly with Pastor Cyrus three more times.

Each conversation revealed more of Jesus’s love and truth.

I learned about the Trinity, about Jesus’s death and resurrection, about the Holy Spirit’s work in believers hearts.

Everything made sense in ways Islamic theology never had.

The most profound moment came when Pastor Cyrus asked, “Arman, do you believe Jesus died for your sins and rose again?” “Yes,” I whispered, surprised by the conviction in my own voice.

“Do you want to surrender your life to him as your Lord and Savior?” My throat tightened with emotion.

Accepting Jesus meant abandoning everything I had been raised to believe.

It meant betraying my family’s expectations, my heritage, my position.

Yet, it also meant finding the peace my soul had craved for so long.

February 14th, 2023 became my spiritual birthday.

alone in my palace bedroom.

At 2 in the morning, I knelt on my prayer rug and spoke different words than I had ever spoken before.

Jesus, I believe you are the son of God.

I believe you died for my sins and rose again.

I surrender my life to you.

Save me.

The moment those words left my lips, something supernatural happened.

A warmth flooded my chest, spreading throughout my entire body.

The crushing weight of religious performance lifted from my shoulders like chains falling away.

For the first time in my life, I felt unconditionally loved and completely forgiven.

I wept uncontrollably as waves of peace washed over my soul.

This was what I had been searching for through all those years of Islamic devotion.

Not a distant demanding deity who required perfect obedience, but a loving savior who had already provided everything needed for eternal life.

The next morning, I looked in the mirror and saw the same face, but everything inside had changed.

I was born again just as Jesus had told Nicodemus.

My prayers now went to Jesus instead of Allah.

My heart overflowed with joy instead of religious anxiety.

I had found truth and that truth had set me free.

But I also knew that this new found freedom would come at a price that could cost me everything I held dear in this world.

For 2 weeks after my spiritual rebirth, I lived in a bubble of sacred joy.

Every morning, I woke with Jesus’s peace flooding my heart.

Though I had to maintain the facade of Islamic devotion around my family, I continued performing the five daily prayers.

But now I silently prayed to Jesus while going through the familiar motions.

The hypocrisy tore at my conscience.

Yet I wasn’t ready to face the consequences of revelation.

February 28th, 2023 shattered my careful deception.

I had grown careless in my euphoria, leaving the Bible partially visible under papers on my desk while attending a family dinner.

Mahmood, our longtime servant who cleaned my chambers daily, discovered it while organizing my room.

This man had served our family faithfully for over a decade, but his loyalty to Islamic principles outweighed any personal affection for me.

The confrontation came that evening.

I returned to my room to find my father standing like a statue beside my desk.

The Bible open in his trembling hands.

His face was ashen, aged 10 years in a single moment.

Behind him stood Mahmood, avoiding my eyes, and two religious officials from the local mosque.

Arman, my father’s voice cracked like breaking glass.

Tell me this is some kind of academic research.

Tell me you haven’t betrayed everything our family stands for.

The moment of truth had arrived sooner than I expected.

But I felt Jesus strengthening me from within.

Father, I have found the truth.

Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior.

The Bible fell from his hands, hitting the marble floor with a sound that seemed to echo through eternity.

My father, the strong patriarch who had never shown weakness, collapsed into my reading chair and began to weep.

I had never seen him cry before, not even when his own father died.

Great heaving soaps racked his body as he buried his face in his hands.

“My son,” he whispered between tears.

“My beloved son, what have you done? What have you done to our family’s honor? The religious officials immediately took control of the situation.

Imam Rashid, whom I had known since childhood, looked at me with mixture of horror and pity.

Prince Arman, you have committed the gravest sin in Islam.

Apostasy carries the death penalty under Sharia law, but there is still time for repentance.

Within an hour, our palace filled with revolutionary guards and highranking clerics.

Phone calls were made to Theran’s highest religious authorities.

My mother collapsed when she learned the news, requiring medical attention from the family physician.

My younger sister, Yasmine, screamed accusations at me through her tears, calling me a traitor to Allah and to our bloodline.

The next morning, I was transported to Thran’s notorious Evan prison under heavy guard.

The transition from Silken Palace chambers to a concrete cell measuring 6 ft by 8 ft was jarring, but Jesus’s peace sustained me.

My cell contained only a thin mattress, a bucket, and a small window that allowed minimal sunlight.

Daily interrogations began immediately.

Revolutionary guard officers took turns questioning me, some using psychological pressure, others employing physical intimidation.

They demanded to know who had influenced me, where I had obtained the Bible and which underground Christians I had contacted.

I protected Hassan and Pastor Cyrus by claiming I had found the Bible and reached my conclusions independently.

“You are throwing away paradise for hellfire!” Colonel Hoseni shouted during one particularly intense session.

Your family’s wealth, your position, your eternal soul.

“All for what?” “A corrupted book and a dead prophet.

” Jesus isn’t dead, I replied calmly.

Though my body achd from hours of interrogation, he rose from the grave and lives today.

He lives in my heart.

The colonel struck me across the face, but I felt no hatred toward him.

Instead, I prayed silently for his salvation, which seemed to infuriate him even more.

Between interrogations, I spent long hours alone in my cell, praying and reciting Bible verses from memory.

The guards couldn’t take away the scriptures I had hidden in my heart.

Jesus’s words sustained me.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Other prisoners, hardened criminals and political dissident watched me with curiosity.

They couldn’t understand why I seemed at peace despite facing certain death.

One murderer named Tresa asked me directly, “Prince, why aren’t you afraid? Everyone knows apostates die.

” “Because I know where I’m going when I die,” I answered honestly.

Jesus has prepared a place for me in heaven.

Death is just a doorway to eternal life with God.

Ask yourself, where does your strength come from in crisis? My strength came entirely from Jesus Christ.

Every morning I woke with his peace.

Every night I slept secure in his love, even though the death sentence loomed over my head like a sword.

My family visited once during those early weeks.

My father had aged dramatically, his hair now completely gray.

My mother could barely look at me through her tears.

They begged me to recant, offering bribes of restored position, increased inheritance, anything I desired.

Son, my father pleaded.

Just say the words.

Tell them you were confused that you’ve returned to Islam.

We can arrange for you to leave the country quietly.

You can live anywhere you want.

Father, I replied gently.

I cannot deny Jesus Christ.

He died for me and if necessary, I will die for him.

Jesus sustained me through every beating, every threat, every moment of despair.

His presence in that dark cell was more real than the stone wall surrounding me.

March 5th, 2023.

Arrived with the weight of destiny.

I was transported from Effin prison to Tean’s revolutionary court in shackles.

But my heart soared with supernatural peace.

The courtroom buzzed with tension as international media representatives, government officials, and religious authorities filled every seat.

My case had attracted worldwide attention with human rights organizations and foreign governments monitoring the proceedings closely.

The preciding judge Ayatollah Husseini was known for his harsh sentences against religious dissident.

His black eyes held no mercy as he read the charges against me.

Prince Arman Farzad, you stand accused of apostasy, blasphemy against Islam, and corrupting the faith of believers.

These crimes carry the death penalty under Islamic law.

My family sat in the front, row, their faces etched with anguish.

My father clutched my mother’s hand while she dabbed tears with a handkerchief.

My sister Yasm mean stared at me with a mixture of love and betrayal that pierced my heart.

They had hoped this public trial might shock me back to my senses.

When asked to enter my plea, I stood tall and spoke clearly.

Your honor, I am guilty of accepting Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior.

I am guilty of believing that he died for my sins and rose again on the third day.

If this is apostasy in your eyes, then I am guilty as charged.

A collective gasp rose from the courtroom.

The prosecutor, a sharp-faced man named Mr.

Karimi, seemed almost pleased by my admission.

He called witness after witness to testify about my Islamic upbringing, my perfect religious performance as a child, and my sudden abandonment of the faith.

Imam Rashid who had taught me Quranic verses as a boy took the stand with visible reluctance.

I raised this young man in the pure teachings of Islam, he said sadly.

He memorized over 200 suras perfectly.

His apostasy is a betrayal of everything sacred.

When given the opportunity to defend myself, I stood before that backed courtroom and declared my faith boldly.

Honorable judges, I have found the truth that my soul had been searching for all my life.

Jesus Christ is not just a prophet as Islam teaches, but the son of God who came to earth to save sinners like me.

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