Shouting louder after terror-jail ordeal

From the dungeons of Iran‘s most notorious prison to the open arms of the Christian world, Sara Akhavan has lived what many would call a miracle.

Once a devout Muslim teenager, Sara’s life was turned upside down after a family visit in 1998. She was just 15 when her aunt who lived in Britain dropped a bombshell – she’d been a Christian for years. “The whole family rejected her. We refused to let her talk to us about Jesus. It is forbidden for Muslims. 

“We called her unclean,” Sara recalled, “but she stood firm. She told my mum, ‘One day, you’ll seek my God, Jesus.’ And she was right.”

Today, Sara, 42, lives in Spain, and devotes her life to spreading the gospel to Iranians both at home and abroad. Speaking in Geneva this February at the JC2033 global Christian gathering, her fiery faith stunned the room. “She’s a lioness,” declared Pastor Olivier Fleury.

But it hasn’t been an easy road.

Sara was arrested in Iran in 2010 alongside her sister Lily, simply for running secret house churches – a lifeline for underground Christians in a country where converting from Islam can mean prison, exile, or worse. She endured 37 harrowing days in Tehran’s infamous Evin prison, 23 of them in solitary confinement. “They said they’d keep me locked up until my hair turned as white as my teeth,” she said. “But I told them I was ready.”

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