“Here in this grave are 22 people who were killed. All of them were Christians. Just like how my wife and children were killed.
All we want is for the killings of Christians in Nigeria and Africa to stop.”
In a small rural northern Nigerian village, Pastor Josiah stands alongside his daughter Salama* at the edge of a mass grave, where he has just led the village in a time of remembrance for all those they have lost.
The mass grave is simple, in fields on the edge of the village, marked by rocks laid in the shape of a cross. This father and daughter are feeling the pain that is hurting their whole community: They have lost many members of their own family to the extremism currently besieging parts of sub-Saharan Africa.
Their family
“Rowland loved singing in the church band. No matter the church he went to, he would join them and sing,” Josiah says, talking about one of his sons as he looks through precious family photographs
“Jonathan was never lazy, always up and doing things. He was very hardworking. Timothy was a quiet person. He was always calm and resourceful.
“This is my favourite photo of my wife and I together, it was the first picture of us as a married couple.” Josiah stops, gazing down at the picture. After a long pause, he continues, “My wife was an industrious woman. She was hospitable—no one came to the house without her attending to them.
“This is my favourite photo of my wife and I.”
“She was considerate, to the point that she allowed me to shine in the public eye whilst she looked after our home. Her spiritual life made me proud. Her favourite song said, ‘Oh Jesus, well of peace and rest. Your name is comfort to me. Whatever suffering I face in the world, whatever evil the enemy plans, my heart will not be disturbed. Because I find rest and safety in your name.’”
‘Did she die?’
“On 28 November 2022, I woke up to the sound of gunfire surrounding the house. Before I realised, they’d scaled the fence and entered our compound. When my wife heard the shots, she ran out into the living room. That’s where she was shot.”
This attack was part of the relentless violence being waged across the country by radicalised members of the Fulani ethnic tribe. Every year, thousands are killed in this insurgency; kidnapping is also increasingly common. Christians, especially leaders like Pastor Josiah, are often vulnerable targets.
Pastor Josiah continues, “I kept hearing voices in the Fulani language saying, ‘Open the door.’ As I did so, they grabbed my hands, tied me up, took me outside and laid me on the ground. My two sons were already there with their hands tied too. My eldest daughter, Salama, was also taken with us.
“As we were taken out of our compound, I could hear Rebekah crying, ‘I’m going to die, I’m going to die!’ But I was powerless; I couldn’t do anything at that point.
“The kidnappers took us, and we started walking to the bush. We were walking all night and didn’t stop until 7am when we got to their camp. I kept thinking about Rebekah. Did she die? Was she still alive?”
Where do Christians experience the
most persecution?
‘You follow Jesus. Where is He now?’
Josiah and his children spent two months and two weeks in captivity where they faced significant challenges: “It was extremely cold, we had little food, and we contracted illnesses. In the morning, we were given bean cakes inside a water bottle and that was it, until about 8 pm when they gave us maize with soup. They scattered it on the floor like we were animals. I let my children eat and when they were done, I had what was left. All the men were tied up, even when we slept.
It wasn’t just physical abuse and mistreatment that Josiah and his family experienced in their captors’ hands. “The kidnappers mocked us,” Josiah remembers. “They said, ‘You follow Jesus. Where is He now?’ They said we should join them and serve Allah.
It was clear that the extremists were hostile to the Christian faith. “In captivity, there were also some Muslims among us. When it was time for prayers, they were untied to go and pray, but as Christians, we were never allowed,” Pastor Josiah says “Because the kidnappers knew I was a pastor. If I just bowed my head, they would start to say, ‘He’s praying!’ They would aim their weapons at me. We could only pray in our hearts. Even when one of the Christians died, his family asked if I could pray. But the kidnappers refused.”
Pastor Josiah stands by a mass grave for Christians. Josiah’s wife and sons were among the victims of extremist violence.
“I ask God, ‘Why?’”
In January, the kidnappers told Pastor Josiah they were sending out his two sons to get the ransom payment for their lives.
“I gave my sons my food rations that day and told them who to meet when they got home to help us. The kidnappers took them on bikes and left. That was the last time I saw them [my sons].
“The day my daughter and I were set free, I was told that our ransom had been paid along with a motorcycle the kidnappers had demanded. They left us at the roadside and from there, my daughter and I walked back towards the village.
“That was the day I was told my boys, Jonathan and Timothy, had been killed by the kidnappers [when they’d been sent to collect the ransom].”
Initially, Pastor Josiah and Salama were taken to the city of Kaduna to recover. Grief compounded later as another of Josiah’s sons, Rowland, was killed while raising the alarm of yet another attack in their village.
Like Job in the Bible, Josiah laments, “I felt like the world was crumbling in on me, as if I was alone with this pain. I kept thinking, ‘Why did this all happen to me?’ When I remember Rebekah and the good life we had together, I ask God, ‘Why?’”
Working with Open Doors
Josiah is wise. As a church leader, he knows that his questions are part of the grieving process. “It is natural for someone to think a lot when something like this happens,” he explains. “And to question God, even as a preacher, as to why He has let it happen.”
Thankfully, Open Doors partners are walking with him and his daughter. Through your prayers and support, they are able to access trauma care at a trauma centre in Nigeria supported by Open Doors. Pastor Josiah receives one-on-one trauma debriefings with Philip*, a volunteer trauma caregiver. Each year at the centre, trauma caregivers like Philip provide work with thousands of Christians who have suffered violent persecution because of their faith, helping them start to heal emotionally and spiritually.
“I was living life with anger and hatred. I wanted to fight the kidnappers and avenge what was done to me. I was traumatised.” Anything can be a trigger point. “Sometimes my heart still skips a beat when I hear a loud sound,” he says.
The counselling support he has received have helped immensely.
“It is natural for someone to think a lot when something like this happens, and to question God, even as a preacher, as to why He has let it happen.”
“If I hadn’t come for trauma healing, bad thoughts would have occupied my head,” Josiah shares, “but after my times at the trauma centre, I feel a lot better, and my heart is now at rest. Crying has become a part of me—it’s the biggest thing I’ve taken away from here—that crying helps you to release the pain.”
Josiah details his healing experience at the trauma centre:
“Forgiveness has helped me to heal a lot from the bitterness and hatred, and I have forgiven them. I can now interact with regular Fulani in my village because it is not all of them who are involved in this. And now, when I see militant Fulanis, I pray that God should forgive them, to help open their eyes, because the way the devil is controlling them, they don’t know what they do. I am praying that God will draw them to Himself and make them become people who preach the gospel.”
What Pastor Josiah has learned at the trauma centre, he’s now passing on to others who are also in pain. “Coming here has felt like training for my work. It has helped me to focus on my work with boldness – it has strengthened and encouraged me,” he explains. “If I hadn’t come, I wouldn’t have the strong will to continue. I would have given up because I was heartbroken, without hope. I was thinking, ‘Is this how my ministry ends, in trouble?’
“But sitting with Pastor Philip has helped me envision the future…God still has things for me to do, and if I can overcome this trouble, God will take me where He is leading. But we need to remain prepared because attacks might happen again. Even if they come and take me now, I’ll either go with them or they will do their worst – I have decided this in my heart.”
‘They kill Christians’
Pastor Josiah is facing the reality shared by thousands of other Christians face in northern Nigeria and other parts of sub-Saharan Africa. The targeted violence is shaking the foundations of whole communities and threatening the future of the church in these regions.
In 2025, 4,491 Christians were killed for their faith in sub-Saharan Africa— an average of 12 believers a day, nine of which were in Nigeria.
Pastor Josiah shares his perspective and experience: “The attacks of Christians are on the increase. In my own opinion, they attack us because of our religion. They kill Christians. When I was taken, it was clear from the questions the kidnappers asked that they had come specifically for me.”
Echoing thousands of church leaders in sub-Saharan Africa, Pastor Josiah stresses the urgency to pray and act for the future of the church. “We should pray for believers because of the many hardships they are facing,” he says. “Christians are finding themselves in situations that they have no choice in, and these events make believers faith shake. One man that was kidnapped with us was crying, saying that he’ll denounce Christ, that he would start worshipping Allah.
“Some end up being killed, while others are put through suffering. I know many churches where they don’t worship there any longer, because the church buildings have been destroyed. Those whose houses are destroyed in attacks have to go and try to start life afresh somewhere again. Because of this, some of our children have gone to the cities and are losing their way. Because of what’s happening, some have entered poverty, and their wives have left them. Some are losing their faith. And some are despairing when suffering comes—they feel like life has finished, that there is no hope at all.”
Right now, your gift will support persecuted Christians in sub-Saharan Africa
Pastor Josiah has an idea to help make this happen in his community. He has asked his trauma care worker, Philip, to visit his village to help him find ways to deliver trauma care to the many in his congregation who are also traumatised by violence and insecurity. In this way, the care that Pastor Josiah is receiving will be multiplied in his community to help bring healing to many more in need of support.
But Pastor Josiah understands that this kind of multiplication will not come easy. He knows that as long as he’s leading a church, he remains a target. He asks for our prayers: “In the bush, I had already felt like it was over for me, so when I came out of captivity, I felt like God was not yet done with me. By the grace of God, I am still alive. Charms won’t protect me, implements of war will not save me. It is God who protects me.
Hope
Thanks to God and Open Doors supporters, there is hope for our persecuted family in Nigeria and across the region in the midst of the violence.
Pastor Josiah says this support is making a difference in the lives of believers and shares his gratitude: “My brethren in Christ, I want to say thank you for the relief you have given to help those going through persecutions and hardships. We are saying thank you very much. We are seeing your messages, we are seeing changes and the power of God in the form of your prayers and help in many ways. I’m happy because of what you are doing.”
“Those who are praying, don’t think your prayers are not being felt – they are. Through them, I have understood the love of believers. Prayers reach anywhere…I saw the devil eye to eye, but the believers’ prayers brought me out. There is power in prayer. So, I am pleading and praying that you keep on supporting through your prayers and help.”
Pastor Josiah has an idea to help make this happen in his community. He has asked his trauma care worker, Philip, to visit his village to help him find ways to deliver trauma care to the many in his congregation who are also traumatised by violence and insecurity. In this way, the care that Pastor Josiah is receiving will be multiplied in his community to help bring healing to many more in need of support.
But Pastor Josiah understands that this kind of multiplication will not come easy. He knows that as long as he’s leading a church, he remains a target. He asks for our prayers: “In the bush, I had already felt like it was over for me, so when I came out of captivity, I felt like God was not yet done with me. By the grace of God, I am still alive. Charms won’t protect me, implements of war will not save me. It is God who protects me.
Stop the Violence / Start the Healing
The level of violence facing the church across sub-Saharan Africa is horrifying, yet the world is only starting to take notice. You can stand with them by signing the Arise Africa petition. These are the final few weeks to reach our goal of 1 million voices of prayer and advocacy from around the world to present to the United Nations so that those in power will stand up, take notice and act to bring protection, justice and restoration for the church across sub-Saharan Africa.
“Because I am a pastor, it is possible to fall victim again, as the village in which I pastor now is also facing attacks. Pray that God will give me the might to complete the promises I have made, for the work of the gospel.
“I have held on to the Word of God since I came out of the kidnapping and made an oath to continue preaching the Word of God. But I need prayers so I want to fulfil the call of God on my life. Please pray that my family will stand by me and that I finish in victory.”
