How a Radical Jihadist Led Me to Jesus (part 1 of 3)

“What have I gotten myself into this time?” were the words flashing through my mind as I sat across the table from Stephen Marshall, the director of a feature length documentary film (currently in post-production) examining the role of religion in the post 9/11 clash between the West and Islam. Stephen and I were sitting in an underground café in London discussing what I was about to do the next day. In less than 24 hours, I was about to be stuck in a cold abandoned warehouse for hours upon hours with a radical jihadist who wanted to destroy me, my country, my religion, and everything else I held dear.

As a 28 year- old evangelist born and raised in Jefferson County Missouri, a rural county outside the suburbs of St. Louis, the idea of representing Western Civilization in an epic debate seemed a bit far-fetched. I imagined what the cultural elite in Europe would think if they knew a Christian missionary from the Bible Belt was their de facto representative for defending their civilization over and against Islamic civilization. The thought suddenly struck me as humorous. How in the world did I get here?

It all started when I was a young child attending a missionary conference at my charismatic mega-church. As long as I can remember, I’ve always had a knack for adventure and a zeal for the things of God. When I was between the ages of 8 and 10, my church invited missionaries from all over the world to display exhibits and share about their ministries at an event they called the World Harvest Conference. Seeing the missionaries dressed in exotic costumes and hearing their stories made me want to “abandon it all for the sake of the call” just as they had done. For a young child who rarely traveled, the prospect of spending my life in a far away place and learning another language captured my imagination and gave me a vision for the future. By the time my uncle Charlie took his first trip to Africa, I was hooked. I knew I wanted to be a missionary too.

My first missionary trip was in 1993 to the country of Poland. A missionary from our church named Jack Harris was scheduled to conduct an evangelistic crusade in the town of Wroclaw, so he decided to take a group of young people from the church with him so they could experience a taste of the mission field too. While in Poland, I read a book by an evangelist named Mike Francen called “A Quest for Souls.” Mike was personally trained under the legendary T.L. Osborn and saw many of the same miracles that T.L. and his wife Daisy had seen throughout their 50-years of ministry together. For a 15 year old raised in the charismatic movement, looking at pictures of 100,000 people lifting their hands to receive Jesus as Savior was like an aspiring adolescent baseball player looking at a picture of Babe Ruth knocking the ball out of Yankee Stadium. For me, the choice was very simple. How could I stay in America and preach the gospel to those who have already heard when there are millions of people around the world who have never had a chance to hear the gospel once? From that day forward, I decided to dedicate my life to becoming a world evangelist.

As soon as I graduated from high school, I was out the door and ready to change the world. During my formative years, my parents made tremendous financial sacrifices to put my brothers and me through Christian school, so we never really traveled much. But now that I had the freedom to determine my future, I found myself traveling to places far and wide—places I never in my wildest imagination dreamed I would ever go. Places such as India, China, Tibet, Vietnam, Cambodia, Uganda, Grenada, and Laos. Some of these countries were places where those who decided to follow Jesus often paid a terrible price of suffering and persecution and, yet, the joy on their faces reinforced to me that following Jesus is worth the cost, no matter what the cost may be.

Although I could have continued my travels solo, God had other plans. I met my wife Rhiannon in Dallas, Texas while I was a student at Christ for the Nations Institute and we married on October 6th, 2001, approximately three weeks after 9/11. Shortly after our wedding, we decided that we wanted to put our School of Missions training to use by taking the gospel to those of the Muslim faith. We wanted to minister in a country that has a Muslim majority, but also enjoys religious freedom; so after a year and a half of quiet and peaceful suburban living, we packed our bags and moved to the country of Senegal, a country located in the westernmost region of Africa.

For a year and a half in Senegal we labored, we cried, we prayed, and met a lot of fascinating people. Some were fellow missionaries laboring in a very difficult field. Others were Muslim converts to Christianity, many of whom had dreams and visions of Jesus and personal testimonies of miraculous healings. Most of our family and friends thought that we were crazy evangelizing Muslims, especially since this was shortly after 9/11, but the fact is our interaction with Muslims was entirely peaceful. Not once did we come across someone who hated us and wanted us out of the country. Although we only lived in Senegal for a year and a half, my wife and I were able to travel to three other West African nations (including a trip to Mauritania where we battled a plague of locusts), conduct a nation-wide pastors’ conference, and lead a young man to the Lord who is now is a full time church planter in the southern region of the country.

As much as we loved Senegal, all good things must come to an end. Due to a tragic illness in the family and a growing vision for a world-wide ministry, my wife and I decided to move back to the U.S, but it wasn’t long till I was off traveling the world again. This time I found myself traveling to Pakistan, a place I soon discovered was largely overrun by radical jihadists sympathetic to the likes of people like Osama bin Laden. I didn’t want to be a prime target for kidnapping or execution, so I decided to concentrate my ministry primarily on the Christian minority, encouraging them in their faith and equipping them with Bibles and other tools for witness and evangelism.

It was shortly after my first trip to Pakistan that I met Stephen Marshall. One day as I was checking my e-mail, I noticed an ad I had previously overlooked in a mass e-mail for missionary mobilizers. The headline read, “Hollywood production company looking for a young missionary who travels the world to participate in a feature-length documentary.” A few days before I saw the e-mail, I already felt I had a direction from the Lord to begin engaging secular media with the gospel. I didn’t think anyone would respond, so when Stephen called me a few days later, I was pleasantly surprised—and overwhelmed. I knew that representing a Christian perspective to the secular media is a tall order, especially when you don’t have any control over the editing process. Almost immediately after I got off the phone with Stephen I wondered if I’d bitten off more than I can chew.

Author Bio:: Aaron D. Taylor is an author, speaker, a missionary/evangelist, and the founder of Great Commission Society. Aaron is currently writing a book about his conversion to pacifism. Aaron is moving with his wife to the West Bank next year to serve the Palestinian Christian community. To book Aaron D. Taylor to speak at your church or event, please contact him at 636-208-6828 or fromdeathtolife@gmail.com

for further reading . . .

• How a Radical Jihadist Led Me to Jesus (part 2 of 3)
• How a Radical Jihadist Led Me to Jesus (part 3 of 3)
• Jesus and the Kids
• The Real Economic Bailout!
• Leaving the Faith Undefended
• Striving for a Just Peace without the Myth of Redemptive Violence
• The Jesus Legend