Every time I try to ask questions, casually, carefully, I hit walls.

The Zoroastrian community in Yaz is small and insular.

They have learned over 1,400 years to be careful about who they trust.

I was beginning to think my brother’s note had been written in delirium, that Porandock did not exist, that I was chasing ghosts.

And then on the third day, you as I stood in the courtyard of the fire temple watching pilgrims circumambulate the sacred flame, a child approached me, a little girl, maybe 8 years old, wearing a simple blue dress.

She looked up at me with eyes far too knowing for her age and pressed a folded piece of paper into my hand.

Before I could say anything, she turned and disappeared into the crowd.

I unfolded the paper.

In neat Farsy script, it read, “Come to the Tower of Silence at sunset tomorrow.

Come alone.

If you bring your chaperone, you will learn nothing.

If you come alone, you will learn everything”.

There was no signature, but I knew this was from Poorand.

The next afternoon, I told I was feeling ill.

Probably something I ate.

I needed to rest in the guest house.

She could go explore the bizaar.

She looked suspicious but agreed.

As soon as she left, I changed into darker clothes, wrapped my chador tightly, and then slipped out through the back entrance.

The towers of silence sit on two hills outside Yaz, about 15 km from the city center.

I hired a taxi to drop me a kilometer away and walk the rest of the distance as the sun began its descent toward the horizon.

D, that is the Farsy name for these structures.

circular stone towers where Zoroastrians historically placed their dead, believing that earth and fire were too sacred to be polluted by corpses.

And they left the bodies exposed to the elements and to birds of prey.

The towers have been abandoned for decades.

They stand empty now, silent monuments to a dying religion.

I climbed the rocky path to the larger tower, my breath coming hard in the thin desert air.

The sun was touching the horizon, painting the desert in shades of copper and blood.

And standing at the entrance to the tower, waiting for me, was an old woman.

She was perhaps 70, perhaps older.

Her face was deeply lined, mine, her hair silver beneath a simple white headscarf.

But her eyes, her eyes were fierce and bright and infinitely kind.

She spoke first in Farsy with an accent I could not place.

You came alone.

Good.

That means you are serious.

Are you porn docked?

I asked.

She smiled.

I am.

And you are Nazan and Kam, sister of Raza, who I met 3 weeks before they killed him.

My heart stopped.

You knew my brother.

I knew him.

And I know why you are here.

She gestured toward the tower entrance.

Mine’s come.

We do not have much time before your chaperone realizes you’re gone.

and raises an alarm.

We entered the tower.

Inside it was cooler, shadowed.

The stone walls rose in a perfect circle toward the open sky above.

In the center was a raised platform where bodies once lay.

Porandock moved with surprising grace for her age.

She sat on a low stone bench and motioned for me to sit across from her.

Your brother came to me after he started having dreams.

She began without preamble.

dreams of a man in white who called him by name.

He was terrified.

He thought he was going mad.

But I told him what I’m about to tell you.

He was not going mad.

He was waking up.

Waking up to what?

I asked.

To the truth that has been buried under 1,400 years of Islamic conquest.

The truth that Persia knew before the Arabs came.

The truth that is rising again.

She reached into her bag and pulled out a small stone tablet, maybe 10 cm across, inscribed with ancient script.

This is written in Pahlavi, Middle Persian, the language of Zoroastrian scriptures.

Do you know what it says?

I shook my head.

She traced the letters with one weathered finger as she translated.

When the fire temples go dark, the morning star will rise over Persia, and the children of Zoroaster will bow before the sun of light.

I stared at the tablet.

What does that mean?

It is a prophecy written in the fifth century, shortly before Islam conquered Persia.

And our priests knew something was coming.

A great darkness that would extinguish our sacred fires.

But they also knew the darkness would not last forever.

They prophesied that one day a greater light would come.

Not a Hora Mazda, someone else.

Someone who would fulfill what Zoroaster only foreshadowed.

“You are talking about Jesus,” I whispered.

“I am talking about the man your brother met in his prison cell and the man who has been appearing in dreams to thousands of Iranians for the past 15 years.

The man who is about to do something in this nation that will shake the entire Middle East”.

She leaned forward, her eyes locked on mine.

Nazan, do you know how many Muslims in Iran are having dreams of Jesus right now?

Do you know how many have secretly converted and are meeting in underground churches, terrified to speak openly?

No, more than 1 million.

But that is the regime’s own internal estimate.

1 million Iranians who no longer believe in Allah, who have encountered Jesus and can never go back.

My mind was reeling.

That is impossible.

If that were true, if that were true, the regime would be in a state of absolute panic, which they are.

Your family knows this.

Your uncle knows this.

That is why they are cracking down on Christians with increasing brutality.

That is why they are arresting house church leaders and sentencing them to 10, odd, 15, 20 years in prison because they know they are losing control.

But why Christians?

I asked.

Why not just more political opposition or because this is not political?

Poor And doct interrupted.

This is spiritual.

You cannot arrest a dream.

You cannot torture a vision.

You cannot execute an encounter with the living God.

The regime can crush political movements.

They have done it for 40 years.

But but they have no defense against a movement that comes from heaven itself.

She pressed the stone tablet into my hands.

Your brother died because he was part of this movement.

He was killed for the same reason Christians have been killed for 2,000 years.

Because when you meet Jesus, you cannot be silenced.

Even torture cannot make you deny what you know in your bones is true.

Tears were streaming down my face.

Pandock, I do not understand.

I have prayed to Allah my entire life.

I’ I have followed Islam.

How can I just?

You will understand, she said gently.

But not from me.

You need to meet him yourself, just like your brother did.

She stood and helped me to my feet.

There is a place, a valley northwest of here near Kazan.

It is called Alamoot.

Do you know it?

I nodded.

Alamute was the legendary fortress of the assassins, a heretical Shia sect that once controlled parts of Persia through fear and murder.

The fortress ruins still stood.

Go there, Purand said, uh, fast for 7 days.

Pray to Jesus, not to Allah, to Jesus specifically, and ask him to show himself to you.

He will come.

I promise you, he will come.

How do you know?

I asked.

She smiled because he came to me 40 years ago and I have been preparing people like you ever since.

She embraced me.

An old woman I had just met, holding me like a mother.

Your brother’s death was not in vain.

Nanian, he opened a door for you.

Now you must walk through it.

I returned to the guest house after dark to find Ila in a state of barely controlled panic.

Where were you?

She demanded.

I came back and you were gone.

Do you know what your father will do to me if something happens to you?

I lied smoothly.

I had gone for a walk to clear my head.

I lost track of time.

I was sorry.

She did not believe me, but she also could not prove anything.

We returned to Tehran 2 days later.

And the bus ride back was torture.

My mind was spinning with everything Porandock had told me.

1 million secret believers.

A prophecy written 1,500 years ago.

My brother meeting Jesus in prison.

Dr.eams and visions spreading across Iran like wildfire.

And an invitation.

Go to Alamoot.

Fast for 7 days.

Ask Jesus to reveal himself.

I had two choices.

Dismiss all of this as the delusions of an old woman and a grieving brother’s hallucinations.

or believe that something impossible was happening beneath the surface of the Islamic Republic.

Something that would explain why my brother looked free when they dragged him away.

Something that would explain why Christians sang in prison while being tortured.

Something that would explain why despite every advantage and privilege I had enjoyed my entire life, I felt like I was suffocating.

I chose to believe.

Back in Thrron, I began planning my escape to Alamote.

And it could not look like an escape.

It had to look like an extension of my academic research.

I fabricated a story about a conference on medieval Persian history in Cosvin about 100 km north of Thrron.

From there, Alamoot was only another 100 km into the mountains.

I told my parents I would be gone for 2 weeks.

They were suspicious.

They were always suspicious.

But my academic credentials were solid.

And I was 27 years old.

Technically an adult.

I technically entitled to some autonomy.

They agreed.

But they assigned another chaperone.

This time I had a plan.

I would go to Cosvin, attend the conference for 3 days, establish my presence, then I would tell my chaperon I needed to do field research at the Alamude Fortress ruins for my thesis.

It was not unusual for graduate students to spend days at archaeological sites.

I purchased camping supplies in secret, a small tent, dried food that would not spoil, water purification tablets, and my brother’s Quran, which I would carry like a talisman.

The night before I left, I did something I had never done before.

I locked my bedroom door, sat on my prayer rug, and instead of reciting the opening chapter of the Quran, I spoke in Farsy directly to a god I was not sure existed.

Jesus, I do not know if you are real.

I do not know if my brother was right.

I do not know if the prophecies poor and do showed me are true, but I am going to Alamoot to find out.

And if you are real, if you are who they say you are, if you are worth my brother dying for, then I need you to meet me there.

Because if you do not, I have nowhere else left to turn.

I have lost my sister.

I have lost my brother.

I have lost my faith in everything I was taught.

You are my last hope.

Please, if you are there, show yourself to me.

I wept on that prayer rug for an hour and then I packed my bag and prepared to walk into the unknown.

Two weeks later and I stood at the base of the Alamoot Valley staring up at the ruins of the fortress and I knew I was about to either meet God or lose my mind completely.

The fortress stood on a narrow ridge surrounded by sheer cliffs.

The assassins had chosen this place because it was nearly impossible to attack.

It was a place of power, of control, of fear.

I was about to discover that the only power that could break that ancient stronghold was not another version of Islam.

It was something completely other.

The Alamude Fortress was where a heretical Islamic sect once controlled Persia through manipulation and murder.

They promised paradise to their followers while dealing in death.

I was about to discover that true paradise looks nothing like what they taught me.

And the man who offers it is not who I expected.

Thousands of Iranians across the world are experiencing the same spiritual hunger I felt standing at that mountain.

They feel it in their prayers that no longer bring peace.

They sense it in dreams they cannot explain.

They know something is shifting beneath the surface of the Islamic Republic.

If you are one of them, if you have felt the emptiness of rituals that no longer satisfy, like if you have questioned whether the God you were taught about is truly God, write one word in the comments, seeking.

Let it be a declaration that you are not alone in this search.

Let it be a signal to others who are on the same path.

Because what I am about to share next is what happened when I stopped seeking in the dark and finally found light.

The journey to Alamute took 2 days.

I attended the conference in Cosvian as planned and I presented my research paper.

Iworked with other graduate students.

I played the part perfectly.

On the fourth day, I told my chaperon, a nervous woman in her 40s named Zara, that I needed to visit the Alamood Fortress ruins for my thesis research.

I would be camping at the site for a week.

There was a small abandoned village nearby with a stone house where I could shelter.

This was common practice for archaeology students.

Zara was uncomfortable with this plan, but she also did not want to spend a week sleeping on the ground in the mountains.

I convinced her that she could stay in a hotel in nearby Gazorcon village and I would check in with her by phone every day.

She agreed reluctantly.

A local guy drove me up the winding mountain road to the ruins.

We passed through valleys so remote that cell phone reception was non-existent.

The Albor’s mountains rose around us, snow still clinging to the highest peaks even in late spring.

Uh, the guy dropped me at an abandoned stone house about half a kilometer from the fortress ruins.

The house was small, one room with stone walls, a dirt floor, and a collapsed section of roof that led in the sky, but it had four walls and shelter from the wind.

I will return in 7 days, the guide said.

Are you sure you want to stay here alone?

I am sure, I replied.

He looked at me like I was insane.

Then he shrugged, took his payment, and drove back down the mountain.

And I was alone.

I I set up my simple camp inside the house, a sleeping mat, my pack with food and water, my brother’s Quran, a small solar charger for my phone, though there was no signal.

I sat on the mat and looked around at the barren stone walls and the ruins of Alamoot visible through the window.

The assassins who once ruled from this fortress were called Hashines.

The origin of the English word assassin.

They were a Shia sect that broke from mainstream Islam, developed their own twisted theology and an controlled territories through fear and strategic murders.

Their leader was called the old man of the mountain.

And he promised young men that if they killed for him, they would enter paradise.

Marco Polo wrote about them.

Crusaders feared them.

Other Muslims considered them heretics.

The Mongols finally destroyed them in the 13th century.

And now their fortress was empty, a monument to another regime built on fear that had crumbled to dust.

I thought about my uncle, the supreme leader, and sitting in his compound in Thran, ruling through that same currency, fear and promised paradise.

And I thought about my brother, who had found something stronger than fear.

The first night, I began my fast.

I laid out my prayer rug, the same rug I had prayed on five times a day for 27 years.

And I did not face Mecca.

I faced the open doorway of that stone house.

And I spoke to Jesus again.

I am here.

I am waiting.

My brother said you would come.

Poor unocked said you would come.

I So here I am.

Show yourself to me.

Nothing happened.

The wind blew cold through the mountains.

Darkness fell.

I wrapped myself in blankets and tried to sleep.

By the third day, the hunger had become a kind of clarity.

And on the third night, I stopped being alone.

Now, what I’m about to share next, I have never spoken about this in detail until now.

This is the core of why the Iranian regime declared me dead.

This is why my testimony went viral.

This is why 3 days ago, they were probably hoping I would die in that air strike.

Because what happened in that valley is happening to thousands of Iranians right now tonight as you watch this.

And if you want to understand where this is all heading, if you want to be part of what is unfolding across the Middle East, you need to subscribe so you do not miss what comes next.

This movement does not wait for anyone.

The prophecies I received that week in Alamood are being fulfilled right now.

Yo, in real time as the regime collapses, as succession chaos unfolds, as the hidden church prepares to emerge, let me show you what Jesus showed me.

On the third night, I woke at 3:00 a.

m.

to the sense that someone was in the room with me.

Not a sense of danger, not fear, but a presence so heavy with holiness that the air itself felt thick.

I opened my eyes and sat up slowly.

The room was dark except for faint moonlight coming through the collapsed roof, but I could see clearly, impossibly clearly, a figure sitting on the floor across from me.

It was my brother Raza.

He looked exactly as he had the last time I saw him alive, 21 years old, wearing the simple gray shirt he always loved, his eyes warm and sad.

“Raza,” I whispered.

He smiled.

I am not really here, sister.

Not the way you think.

But he wants you to know.

I saw him before I died.

And he was worth everything.

Who?

Who did you see?

But even as I asked, and the figure began to change, it was still sitting in the same position.

But it was no longer my brother.

It was a man in simple white clothing.

His hands were resting on his knees and I could see wounds, deep, terrible wounds in his wrists.

His face was Middle Eastern with dark hair and a short beard.

His eyes were the most striking thing, deep brown, ancient, filled with a sorrow and a joy so vast I could barely stand to look at them.

He spoke in Farsy.

Nan’s voice was gentle.

Nazanin, just my name, nothing else.

and I shattered.

I collapsed forward, weeping uncontrollably.

Great heaving sobs that came from somewhere deeper than grief.

Sobs that were equal parts terror and relief and recognition.

He waited until the storm passed.

Then he spoke again.

I knew your brother.

I was with him when they killed him.

I held him as he died.

And I am with you now.

Are you Are you really?

I am Jesus.

I am who your brother died believing in.

And I am who Poor And Doc told you about.

I am who has been calling you your entire life.

And you did not know my voice.

Why?

I managed to ask through tears.

Why are you here?

Why are you doing this?

He leaned forward slightly and I could see the wounds on his hands more clearly.

Not healed, but somehow glorified.

Scars that told a story.

You were told your whole life that I am foreign to Persia, that I am a western god, that I have no place in this land.

But Nazin, I was here before Islam.

Yeah, I have been calling this nation since before Muhammad was born.

And now the time of harvest has come.

Harvest.

The seed has been planted in secret for generations.

Watered with the blood of martyrs like your brother, hidden underground, growing in the dark.

But the time for hiding is ending.

What has been sewn in tears will be reaped in joy.

And you are going to see it happen.

When?

I asked.

Soon.

Very soon.

Your calendar year 2026 will be remembered as the year when everything changed.

When the underground church broke the surface.

When believers stopped hiding.

Continue reading….
« Prev Next »