The price of conversion

TURKEY — Cuneyt Atesman, 35, has worked for Agapé since 2002. From next summer, he and his wife are going to attend a Bible School in Norway. He has a good relationship with a Pentecostal congregation in Trondheim which has worked in Turkey for many years.

This will be the latest stage in an unusual story. Cuneyt was born into a Muslim family, but his parents died when he was young and he was brought up by relatives. His early history may account for his slightly ‘dangerous’ look – though his gentle manner belies his appearance.

In his youth he was an extremely active Muslim and as a member of Islamic committees, he travelled as far as Saudi Arabia and England raising money.

It was in England that a significant event took place. “My wife had a vision of Jesus with his arms open. And afterwards, she asked me to go into a church with her – she was hoping to see Jesus again in the church.”

Bad mood

He went with her, waiting – albeit in a bad mood – while she prayed. “I was angry with her. After a while things calmed down between us but I could not find peace in myself.”

Evidently the strange experience his wife had had unsettled him, too, bringing to the surface doubts about his faith that had formerly lain hidden. These rose to the surface when, six months later, this pillar of the Muslim establishment threw out his Islamic books – including even his copy of the Koran.

“I had my doubts about Allah and Islam,” he says candidly. “All my life I had prayed to meet God but I had never really met him.”

Touchingly, his wife was so scared about what he had done that she went and retrieved the books. What would the neighbours say if they saw him throwing away the Koran? But as she did so, he had an experience strangely resembling hers.

Bright light

“Lying down on the bed with my eyes closed, I had a vision: I saw a bright light and I thought it was Jesus. He said to me, ‘What are you looking for?’ ‘What does this mean?’ I thought. ‘Is it a dream? Is it my own imagination?’ I said, ‘The truth,’ and he replied, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life.’

“Then he laid his hand on my head and blessed me. I felt an energy run through me from head to foot and I was shaking.

“My wife asked if I was OK! Jesus told me to tell her not to be afraid. He said, ‘I am with you both and I will guide you.’”

When the trembling stopped, Cuneyt felt peaceful and his questions seemed to have been answered. “I told my wife, ‘I can see Jesus!’”

God’s will

Some months later, the couple were guided to the Bible Society bookshop in Istanbul. Normally the shop would have been closed: it was Ramadan and the time when they arrived was seven o’clock in the evening. But the shop manager was still there. He told them he had been “waiting for some people to arrive.”

“I told him our story and he said that it was God’s will that he was there to meet us and help us. We each got our own New Testament. This was in 1999.”

God had not yet finished with Cuneyt’s family, however. Later he talked to his brother, telling him he had met Jesus and had begun reading the New Testament.

“My brother said, ‘I have begun reading it, too.’ So I told him I’d become a Christian and then he told me his story.”

Suicide

His brother had evidently been feeling so low that he had been contemplating suicide – “but the Word came to me, ‘Come to me all you who are heavy laden [Matt 11:28].’”

Jesus had led each brother to himself individually. In a strongly Muslim country such as Turkey, however, there is always a cost to conversion.

Wife left him

After his brother was converted, his wife, a Muslim, left him – though he is able to visit his children. And in the case of Cuneyt and his wife, their friends gave them the cold shoulder and some even threatened to kill the couple because they were Christian.