Transcript
Speaker: Saved by Grace podcast, bringing you stories of hope, restoration, and God's faithful love.
Speaker: I'm your host, Sylvia Puentes.
Speaker: And welcome to another episode of Saved by Grace.
Speaker: I'm your host, Sylvia Puentes.
Speaker: And today I have the great honor of having Mustafa Abu Bakr on the show.
Speaker: Brother Mustafa is from Mombasa, Kenya.
Speaker: He's a husband, father, Bible teacher, and author of Dead in Allah, Alive in Christ.
Speaker: Brother Mustafa, welcome to Saves by Grace.
Speaker: Thank you so much, my dear sister Sylvia.
Speaker: Thank you so much.
Speaker: It's such a privilege.
Speaker: I appreciate having me here.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: Brother Mustafa, it's a privilege and a blessing to have you on Saved by Grace all the way from Kenya to share your powerful and amazing testimony.
Speaker: You know, on Saved by Grace, our goal here is to share testimonies, to bring these testimonies forth of God.
Speaker: of God's love, God's redemption, God's faithfulness.
Speaker: And so today you're gonna share your testimony of encountering Jesus.
Speaker: So start us off, how that happened.
Speaker: What's your background?
Speaker: Yeah, again, Sister Sylvia, thank you so much.
Speaker: Thank you so much for having me here.
Speaker: Um, my name is Mustafa Abubakar and, um, I come from Mombasa.
Speaker: Mombasa is in Kenya, in East Africa.
Speaker: So, um, I was born and brought up in a family of 12.
Speaker: Um, my father was a polygamous.
Speaker: It's an extended family.
Speaker: I'm actually the 11th born in that family.
Speaker: My dad was, um,
Speaker: without Muslim, and he made sure that all his children attended those Islamic education centers.
Speaker: So I was brought up in a strictly Muslim family.
Speaker: So my father was a very, very hardworking man, very, very intelligent, very, very wise, very, very clever, very, very bright.
Speaker: He was a bold man.
Speaker: courageous man, a very, very fearless man.
Speaker: He was a businessman, a farmer, as well as a magician.
Speaker: Young as I was, I knew my father to be a man of many business deals.
Speaker: I'm sharing about my father because this background is very, very important.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So as I said, he was a magician.
Speaker: So he used to hunt snakes and domesticate them and keep them for his magic show business.
Speaker: So he grew up to really admire my father.
Speaker: Really admired him and respected him for his boldness, for his fearlessness, for his courage.
Speaker: for his intelligence, for his hard work.
Speaker: I really grew up to admire him, respect him, and honor him.
Speaker: And I really wanted all the neighbors and everyone that would meet in the neighborhood to know that I am one of his sons.
Speaker: He was very, very famous in the neighborhood and very, very fearless.
Speaker: And so there's a sense in which
Speaker: because I admired him that much, because I honored him and respected him that much, there was a sense in which a part of my father really started growing and growing and taking root in my soul and heart.
Speaker: To be honest, he grew to be some kind of an idol.
Speaker: To me, my dad, my father was not an ordinary person.
Speaker: some kind of a hero, some kind of an idol to me.
Speaker: And honestly, I never thought, it never crossed my mind that my father would one day died.
Speaker: Of course, I used to attend funerals and burials in the neighborhood.
Speaker: Children would die, mothers would die, and fathers would die.
Speaker: But I thought
Speaker: that my father would never die.
Speaker: For me, death was something that befell other families, but not my family and not my father.
Speaker: It was really a vague idea.
Speaker: For me, death was a vague reality.
Speaker: But I remember one day my father became sick
Speaker: for a week, then two weeks, then three weeks.
Speaker: He was critically, critically sick and became very, very weak physically and even emotionally.
Speaker: And I remember in his last days when he knew, I believe that he knew that he was actually about to depart from this side of eternity.
Speaker: I remember he had become very, very weak.
Speaker: He was lying there on his bed and
Speaker: he called all of us, all his children, and we gathered around his death bed.
Speaker: And it is actually this event, my father's death, that really put me on a journey of seeking Christ and seeking the true God.
Speaker: So my dad called us and we gathered around his death bed.
Speaker: He was critically sick, very, very weak.
Speaker: And
Speaker: Lying there on his bed, my father looked very, very helpless and hopeless to some extent.
Speaker: Remember he looked into the ceiling, he gazed into the empty space and looked at us as well.
Speaker: And you could really tell from his eyes, you could see it, that he really knew that now time has come for me to depart from this side and
Speaker: go to the other side.
Speaker: So he gathered his strength and raised his voice.
Speaker: And I remember him instructing my elder brother, the eldest in our family, to take care of us all.
Speaker: And then he breathed his last and closed his eyes and he was normal.
Speaker: He was gone.
Speaker: He was dead.
Speaker: So no, death was now a reality to me from that moment onwards.
Speaker: And it was actually this event, my father's death,
Speaker: as I've said, that really started me on a journey of seeking to know the truth and seeking to know Christ.
Speaker: And this event has really remained in my mind for so long.
Speaker: And it not only remained in my mind, but my father's death started a series of questions, questions which were not...
Speaker: certainly and truly and satisfactorily and answered with assurance until I say that Jesus Christ found me.
Speaker: So I started asking myself the question, what is the meaning of life?
Speaker: Why was I born?
Speaker: Why am I in this world?
Speaker: Was I born just to live for a few years and then die?
Speaker: What is my destiny when I die?
Speaker: What happens in the grave?
Speaker: Looking at my father, no matter who he was, he was now dead, not to come back again.
Speaker: And this thought really staggered me.
Speaker: The fact that one day I will also die and face the grave, never to come back again.
Speaker: That really disturbed me.
Speaker: really stunning.
Speaker: Now, Brother Mustafa, I have a question for you.
Speaker: When your father passed away and you started seeking and searching, were you aware that you were seeking and searching to know Jesus or were you just seeking and searching for something more?
Speaker: I wasn't aware that I was seeking and searching for Jesus.
Speaker: That one I wasn't aware of.
Speaker: But I was just seeking and searching for something more, which was not clear what it was.
Speaker: It was longing for answers, longing for something more, longing for someone, but couldn't really figure out what it was.
Speaker: So I just had these questions.
Speaker: What is life?
Speaker: What is the meaning of life?
Speaker: Why was I born?
Speaker: Why am I in this time?
Speaker: Why just a few years and then die?
Speaker: What is my destiny to die?
Speaker: What happens with them?
Speaker: I really wanted sure, certain, satisfying answers to these questions.
Speaker: But I wasn't getting answers in the most
Speaker: wasn't getting answers.
Speaker: Quran wasn't getting answers.
Speaker: Islamic teachers.
Speaker: And when you speak of answers, talking about sure answers, certain answers, clear answers, satisfying answers.
Speaker: Maybe I should say something here that when it comes to life after death,
Speaker: Islam does not have clear answers.
Speaker: When it comes to life after death, Islam is not clear, sure, and satisfying answers.
Speaker: The Koran is not clear, the Islamic teachers are not sure.
Speaker: So I was left confused and I grew into other people.
Speaker: and many other questions.
Speaker: And to be honest, they really brought a sense of emptiness and hopelessness.
Speaker: The mere fact that I was not getting answers, sure answers, transpiring answers, clear answers, really brought a sense of emptiness and hopelessness.
Speaker: Even anxiety and fear in my life.
Speaker: So that's happened in primary school.
Speaker: So I cleared primary school and joined high school, very senior school, famously known as secondary school in Kenya.
Speaker: So I joined high school with this question, continued to struggle with this question.
Speaker: Remember my first
Speaker: exam from one I scored straight A's in all the subjects.
Speaker: I was position one plus.
Speaker: Again, I remember asking myself after all these straight A's what is the meaning of life?
Speaker: My father died, I also died with all these straight A's and as I've already said I really
Speaker: hungered, deeply hungered, longed from any period of misaligned life.
Speaker: I wanted to know more beyond the death, more beyond the death.
Speaker: He wanted to know, is there anything else beyond the death, or is death the end of it all?
Speaker: Again, deep down in my soul, I knew that the death
Speaker: was not the end of it all.
Speaker: But wasn't getting what was there after that.
Speaker: Said to learn the answers and the questions were not given clear answers.
Speaker: Said I was longing for more, but not getting the more that I wanted.
Speaker: Longing for more, though I didn't clearly know
Speaker: the more that I was longing for.
Speaker: So I became very, very anxious, became very, very angry, very bitter, resentful, easily irritated, became very, very depressed, felt very, very empty, frustrated, anxious, fearful and boring.
Speaker: I mean, I just lacked joy, peace and tranquility, delight.
Speaker: I was just feeling frustrated.
Speaker: I preferred being in isolation and the same.
Speaker: I remember in high school, there were those days and times when students were allowed to just go to a hall and just watch movies, listen to some good music, just rest and just dance.
Speaker: Honestly, I used not to attend these sessions.
Speaker: I was just angry and bitter.
Speaker: Others will go there and rest and watch movies and music and dance and prepare themselves.
Speaker: But I will lock myself in the school library.
Speaker: I will end up studying, but sometimes I was just crying.
Speaker: Though I didn't really know why I was crying, I'm just feeling empty and hopeless.
Speaker: And so what then?
Speaker: So you're feeling that even though on the outside it appears that everything that could possibly bring fulfillment, you have.
Speaker: you were on your way to creating a successful career, et cetera, but the emptiness inside was consuming you.
Speaker: And so bring us to that moment that marked your life.
Speaker: I cleared high school still with these questions.
Speaker: But at some point, I remember when I was in high school, I started attending the Friday prayers.
Speaker: Sorry, I stopped attending the Friday.
Speaker: I stopped performing the Friday prayers, that is Salat.
Speaker: I stopped fasting altogether during the month of Ramadan.
Speaker: But I remember I just kept on reading my English Koran.
Speaker: busy seeking for answers which I didn't get so I cleared high school I was very very bright very very intelligent my mind was developed my head was full but again my soul was still empty performed very very well in in high school um and I was uh called to join the uh university of Nairobi but I remember before uh
Speaker: joining the University of Nairobi, I started some businesses.
Speaker: I thought, let me start some businesses, make a lot of money, become a billionaire, probably find a place in the Forbes list.
Speaker: Maybe if I become rich and become a millionaire and a billionaire and start helping the poor do some philanthropy, I thought maybe that will give peace and joy and delight and satisfy and fulfill my empty soul.
Speaker: I'll go to the internet and read the stories of the richest men in the world and how they started their businesses.
Speaker: I was really researching on some great business ideas and how one can get rich quickly.
Speaker: My thinking was if I become a millionaire, make a lot of money, help the poor, then I'll have peace and joy.
Speaker: Then I'll find meaning and purpose and significance in life.
Speaker: That's why I joined the University of Nairobi and I thought, wow, now my dream of becoming rich is slowly unfolding and becoming a reality.
Speaker: I thought I'd finish my first degree, maybe get my master's very, very fast, get my PhD before 30 years old.
Speaker: I was pursuing a degree in chemistry.
Speaker: So I thought, let me work hard, get my degree, get my master's, get my PhD very, very fast.
Speaker: and maybe start a business empire.
Speaker: I was thinking of starting a pharmaceutical firm, become very, very rich, make a lot of money.
Speaker: Then I'll be fulfilled.
Speaker: I'll be happy.
Speaker: I'll be joyful.
Speaker: I'll be satisfied.
Speaker: I thought that was the meaning and the purpose.
Speaker: It made me drive the best cars, use the latest gadgets, have the
Speaker: sharpest fashion and live in a mansion and all those kinds of stuff.
Speaker: So I thought that would make me, that would give me joy and peace and delight and all that.
Speaker: But I remember when I joined the University of Nairobi, something happened.
Speaker: If I'm not wrong, I think it happened in the second semester.
Speaker: I will see some
Speaker: young men my age coming to campus with the best vehicles, slick cars, either Range Rovers, V8 or Mercedes Benz, and some were actually being escorted by my bodyguards.
Speaker: And I really admired their lifestyle.
Speaker: I thought, that's what I'm working towards.
Speaker: That's what I want.
Speaker: If I only get that, I'll be satisfied.
Speaker: I'll be...
Speaker: My soul will not be empty anymore.
Speaker: I'll have peace and I'll have joy.
Speaker: But then this event happened.
Speaker: A young man that comes from a very, very rich family who was actually one of these young men who had been brought to school in these offensive cars.
Speaker: This young man,
Speaker: He was actually a son of a prominent government official.
Speaker: This young man committed suicide, killed himself, he hung himself, and he left a knot behind saying that there are several things going on in his family, and because of that, he's not happy.
Speaker: He's feeling joy.
Speaker: He was complaining of frustration and depression because of all these things that are happening in his family.
Speaker: I really felt shattered to the core.
Speaker: I was thinking, here's a young man with the best of cards of fashion.
Speaker: I mean, he has all that I'm only dreaming when he's committing suicide, he's killing himself, saying that life is not making sense, he doesn't have joy, he doesn't have peace, his soul is empty and all that.
Speaker: This really disturbed me and I felt heavy for weeks and lost interest in my studies altogether.
Speaker: Remember, I'll go to the washrooms and just cry.
Speaker: Sometimes I'll go to the city park, a secluded place and sit, look at the sky and just cry.
Speaker: And I was asking myself the same questions.
Speaker: What is life?
Speaker: What is the meaning of life?
Speaker: Why am I in this world?
Speaker: What will happen next?
Speaker: when I die.
Speaker: So it was during this time in campus that I started drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes, went into cigarettes and marijuana.
Speaker: I thought maybe in alcohol, maybe in marijuana, maybe in cigarettes.
Speaker: I'll get joy.
Speaker: I'll get peace.
Speaker: I'll get fulfillment and satisfaction.
Speaker: But I remember...
Speaker: every time I smoked or every time I, I drank that emptiness, uh, and that hole in my soul and my heart became even wider and, and, and larger.
Speaker: I felt even more emptier after drinking and, and smoking and all that.
Speaker: And I became more, uh, frustrated and more, um, depressed.
Speaker: So I lost,
Speaker: interest in my studies altogether and dropped from campus.
Speaker: I remember leaving the University of Nairobi and leaving the country altogether and crossed the board and went to the neighboring country.
Speaker: Let me just rush ahead.
Speaker: So, went to the neighboring country, that is Tanzania, in a place called Arusha, stayed there briefly, but life was very, very... That was Mombasa, got a job in
Speaker: in a casino.
Speaker: And it was while working in this casino that again, I experienced and witnessed firsthand how people can really be miserable and depressed and hopeless and joyless, even with money.
Speaker: So over and over, you're seeing that all of the things that you believed were going to bring you fulfillment.
Speaker: were not bringing you for fulfillment.
Speaker: And every time you were confronted with that, the letdown was even greater for you, correct?
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: So what was that moment then that brought you to that place where you had that encounter?
Speaker: Yeah, so I worked in the casino briefly and then talked to
Speaker: my elder brother to give me some cash and start a high school business.
Speaker: That is after working at the casino.
Speaker: So my elder brother gave me some cash, started a high school business.
Speaker: Initially the idea was that this high school will be a Muslim school.
Speaker: in school.
Speaker: That was the idea initially.
Speaker: But I remember a friend advised me that just take Muslims, that would not be a very good marketing strategy.
Speaker: So just take both Christians and Muslims.
Speaker: So we took both Christians and Muslims and with that, the Christians started their own society, started their own union that was led by a particular teacher.
Speaker: So one of these days, these students were invited by a neighbor in school for what is called a weekend challenge.
Speaker: So they went and being the head of school, I joined them.
Speaker: So I went there, they did their singing, they did their dancing, everything else.
Speaker: It was time for the word to be taught and some of my students were quite indisciplined.
Speaker: They were making noise when the preacher was preaching.
Speaker: So I was asked if I could get in and just sit at the back.
Speaker: would make them at least disciplined so that the preacher could preach.
Speaker: So it was during that time that I was sitting at the back and the guy was preaching.
Speaker: He was actually a health, wealth and prosperity gospel preacher.
Speaker: But at some point he veered off from what he was presenting, from what he was preaching on and
Speaker: said to the students, guys, you know that we were created by God and this God is a Christ holy God.
Speaker: He's in a class of his own, in a category of his own altogether.
Speaker: He's set apart.
Speaker: He's without sin.
Speaker: He cannot have any fellowship or communion or relationship with any sinner.
Speaker: He's a holy, holy, holy God.
Speaker: And he's not only holy, but he's a just God and he must punish sinners.
Speaker: And
Speaker: I remember he quoted Romans 3, 23, and he said, we've all sinned and fallen short of this God.
Speaker: And outside this God, you will never have peace.
Speaker: You will never have joy.
Speaker: You will never have any delight, any fulfillment, any satisfaction, meaning, or purpose in this life.
Speaker: Bless, repent of our sins, and believe in his son, the son that he sent to live and to die and to raise again.
Speaker: to save sinners.
Speaker: So he called the students to depend on their sins and to put their faith in Jesus Christ.
Speaker: He briefly spoke about Christ that he came to live the life that we were supposed to live and died the death that we were actually supposed to die on the cross and that he rose again triumphantly on the third day so as to save his people from sin.
Speaker: And he said in this life without Christ,
Speaker: without you putting your faith and trust and resting in him, you will not only have fulfillment and satisfaction and delight and meaning and purpose in this life, but you'll one day die and outside of him you'll spend eternity in hell.
Speaker: You'll be thrown out there into the darkness, into the fiery finance where they'll be weeping.
Speaker: and gnashing of teeth.
Speaker: So it was that moment that something struck, cut through my soul and my heart.
Speaker: And I remember, went back to the school library, the high school library and picked a copy of the Bible.
Speaker: So reading this Bible and I read the entire thing, Genesis to Revelation in six months.
Speaker: And even though I wasn't understanding everything, but I can say confidently,
Speaker: that it was during this time that all my questions were truly answered.
Speaker: To be honest, I found the Bible to be generally plain and clear and straightforward and consistent.
Speaker: And all my questions, all my questions were answered.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: In hearing your testimony, Brother Mustafa, we see and we know that God is love.
Speaker: Not a loving love.
Speaker: God is love.
Speaker: Jesus went to that cross not to cancel a debt, but he paid the debt in full, putting himself
Speaker: to take on everything that we should have taken on.
Speaker: But he did it as the ultimate act of love because his great desire, his great desire is that we all be reconciled back to him.
Speaker: The message that we want to impart is that we were created with, by him,
Speaker: with a space in us that only relationship with him can fulfill.
Speaker: And that is why, you know, Jesus came.
Speaker: God came in the form of man as Jesus to take on every sin, every iniquity and pay that debt.
Speaker: And because he wanted you, he wanted me, he wanted each and every person to be reconciled back to him, to have relationship with him, not only here on earth, but eternally in heaven.
Speaker: And you certainly had a divine appointment.
Speaker: And before that day of your divine appointment, he was already pursuing you, putting that hunger and that desire inside of you to seek more.
Speaker: And it's a beautiful testimony because once again, it shows his love for his children.
Speaker: It shows that he's pursuing us always relentlessly because he wants us
Speaker: He wants us reconciled.
Speaker: He wants us with him.
Speaker: As I went to the Lord in prayer for you and your testimony, he gave me a scripture for you.
Speaker: He impressed the scripture on my heart, Jeremiah 29, 13.
Speaker: You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all of your heart.
Speaker: And I surely believe, obviously, that you were seeking him with all of your heart.
Speaker: Brother Mustafa, could you share?
Speaker: I know that that wasn't that, you know, that moment of encountering Jesus that way and...
Speaker: encountering him through his word, which is a lie, which is true.
Speaker: It didn't stop there.
Speaker: Can you share with our listeners about your ministry?
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, so 2014, in May,
Speaker: the Lord really gave me this insatiable curse and hunger for the scriptures.
Speaker: It was just insatiable.
Speaker: It was always reading and studying and searching, meditating upon the word of God.
Speaker: It was during that time, I was really reading, studying, searching, meditating upon God's word.
Speaker: I had this strong impression that
Speaker: I will spend my life teaching, proclaiming and preaching this, that I'm really devoted to reading and studying.
Speaker: And I have this desire to proclaim the same, teach the same, share the same and witness the same.
Speaker: So initially, I was just sharing the gospel and witnessing the seven good news of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Speaker: But as time went by,
Speaker: three years, four years, five years down the line, started getting teaching and preaching opportunities in different places.
Speaker: And since then to date, the Lord has really opened a wide teaching and preaching ministry door.
Speaker: So I'm involved in training pastors back in Kenya, Kibasa.
Speaker: I'm also involved in training pastors in Tanzania, that is Jerusalem.
Speaker: I'm also involved in training pastors and evangelists in South Sudan.
Speaker: I actually have one class in Cuba that I'm teaching pastors and seven classes in east of South Sudan, a place called Awil.
Speaker: I'm also involved in training pastors in Uganda.
Speaker: So my ministry is basically about or largely involved in training pastors and church leaders in Kenya,
Speaker: Tanzania, Uganda, and South Sudan.
Speaker: But I'm also passionate, very, very passionate about training organizations and churches and ministries on how to evangelize and share the gospel with Muslims.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: you
