Faithfulness and Joy Amid OppressionSample

The Brick Kiln Martyrs

The terrified couple clung to each other inside their one-room home near the brick kiln where they worked as bonded laborers, while the mob of angry Muslims outside shouted insults and threats. “They have burned the Holy Quran!” roared the mob. “We will teach them a lesson!”

Shama cried as her husband, Shahzad, tightened his arms around her and began to pray.

While the work in a brick kiln was grueling, it provided their family with food and a place to sleep. Christians, who are among Pakistan’s lowest social classes, have few employment options. Many are street cleaners, sewage workers and brick kiln laborers like Shahzad. Often, Christian families quickly become indebted to the brick kiln owner, and the debts are eventually passed on to the children. Many families, like Shahzad and Shama’s, become indentured for life. 

By 6 a.m., more than 500 Muslims had gathered outside the young couple’s home, yelling their threats. Shama’s husband couldn’t believe the events of the last few months had come to this.

***

Shama and Shahzad’s family prayed together daily and met for prayer twice a month with 10 Christian families working at the kiln. However, Shama was disturbed that her father-in-law, Nazar, practiced Muslim rituals, and she asked him to stop. “Jesus is our Savior; we believe only on Him,” she told him. She and Shahzad prayed for him, and finally, in 2013, he stopped the Muslim rituals. 

When Nazar began joining his son and daughter-in-law for daily prayers and telling everyone of his love for Jesus Christ, some assumed that Shama had converted Nazar from Islam to Christianity. Many at the kiln, including the owner and his clerk, already resented Shama because she did not work in the kiln. Shahzad would not let her because he was afraid the men would take advantage of her. 

In October 2014, Nazar became very ill. Shahzad, along with his brothers, took their sick father to a government hospital in Lahore, where he received medical care. Sadly, Nazar soon died. When Shahzad returned home, the kiln owner and clerk beat Shahzad for missing work. 

He and Shama decided they could no longer live at the kiln. “Tell us how much money we owe you,” they told the kiln owner. “We will return it and leave.” 

The owner and clerk didn’t want the Christian couple to go free, and they knew that accusing them of desecrating a Quran would get them beaten, jailed under Pakistan’s blasphemy laws or worse. 

At 5:30 a.m. on Nov. 4, the clerk and a few Muslim men from the kiln went to the leader of the local mosque and told him that the Christian couple had burned a Quran. The mosque leader then announced the offense to the village over a loudspeaker, and a mob immediately surrounded the couple’s home. 

Terrified, Shama and Shahzad locked their door as the crowd shouted for their deaths and banged against the door. After managing to break into their home, members of the mob dragged the couple out of the house and beat them. Then they took them to the office of the brick kiln clerk, where the owner and clerk beat them again. Shahzad and Shama pleaded for their lives, but the beating continued even though Shama was pregnant with their fourth child. 

The enraged Muslims then tied them behind a tractor and dragged them around the kiln yard for more than 30 minutes. Then, while the couple was unconscious, the mob stuffed their bodies into vent holes above the brick kiln oven. Autopsy reports later showed that both of them burned to death, having been alive when stuffed into the vents. The attack lasted four hours. 

Although local police were present during the attack, they did nothing to stop it. However, they did later arrest 76 people in connection with the murders, and they registered a case against more than 400 people involved. All of those arrested were denied bail and are being held until trial, including the brick kiln owner and clerk. The police also noted that there was no evidence that Shama or Shahzad had burned any part of a Quran. 

The Pakistani government has honored its promise to provide financially for the couple’s children and relatives. Shahzad and Shama’s three children, then 6, 4 and 1, moved to live with their grandfather in another village. 

As we cry out to the Lord against such blatant earthly injustice and grieve for the children, we rejoice that Shahzad and Shama chose to remain faithful to the Lord as they were beaten and killed by a brutal mob. 

Dear Lord, we grieve when we hear of this couple’s martyrdom and of their children who will now be raised without their parents. We cry out with the martyrs slain in Your name, asking, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” We praise You that they refused to deny You when they were beaten. Lord Jesus, You are worthy of our praise. We pray that Pakistani Christians will be emboldened by this couple’s witness, and we pray that we, too, will be inspired by this couple to be worthy witnesses for You. In Jesus’ name, amen.  

Photo caption:  Brick crosses mark the graves of Shahzad and Shama.