A Christian's Message to the Men Who Beheaded His Brothers

Last Sunday the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) released a video showing the simultaneous beheading of 21 Egyptian men who were kidnapped from Libya. As everybody knows (except, apparently, the U.S. President), the men were murdered because they were Christians. The video released by the terrorists was entitled “A Message Signed With Blood to the Nation of the Cross.”

I wrote about another beheading by the “Religion of Peace” here. This is just the latest in an extremely long line of brutal, indefensible acts of barbarism committed by followers of Islam. (Since the beheadings, ISIS burned 45 people to death in Western Iraq.)

This has always been the way. Those who follow the god of this world hate those who follow the true God.

But we don’t hate them back. At least weren’t not supposed to.

I read a wonderful story in Christianity Today about the brother of two of the murdered Coptic Christians. (Read the whole story here).  On a Christian TV program, Beshir Kamel said he was proud of his brothers Estafanos Kamel (25) and Samuel Estafanos Kamel (23) because their martyrdom was "a badge of honor to Christianity." The last words of some of the Coptic Christians were "Lord Jesus Christ."

Beshir Kamel thanked ISIS for not editing out the men's declaration of belief in Christ because he said this had strengthened his own faith. He added that the families of the ex-patriate workers are "congratulating one another" and not in despair: "We are proud to have this number of people from our village who have become martyrs," he told the program.

Asked what he would say if he were asked to forgive ISIS, he related what his mother said she would do if she saw one of the men who killed her son. "My mother, an uneducated woman in her sixties, said she would ask [him] to enter her house and ask God to open his eyes because he was the reason her son entered the kingdom of heaven."

Invited to pray for his brothers' killers, Beshir prayed: "Dear God, please open their eyes to be saved and to quit their ignorance and the wrong teachings they were taught."

Reminds me of my Savior's words from the cross: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."