Freedom's Stand Nominated for Golden Scroll Novel of the Year

Advanced Writers and Speakers Association (AWSA) announces the finalists for the 2011 Golden Scroll Book of the Year Awards. Finalists will be honored at the AWSA Golden Scrolls Awards Banquet, Sunday, July 10th, from 1 to 3 pm at the Omni at CNN Center in Atlanta.

The 2011 Golden Scroll book awards Novel of the Year finalists are Kathi Macias for Red Ink, Golden Keys Parson for A Prisoner of Versailles, and Jeanette Windle for Freedom's Stand.

The Nonfiction Book of the Year finalists are Nancie Carmichael for Surviving One Bad Year, Jane E. Schooler, Betsy Keefer Smalley and Timothy J. Callahan for Wounded Children: Healing Homes, and Margot Starbuck for The Girl in the Orange Dress.

Other awards to be presented at the Golden Scrolls Award Banquet are the Publisher, Editor, Fiction Editor, and AWSA Member of the Year, The Beyond Me Award as well as the prestigious 2011 Golden Scroll Lifetime Achievement Award.

Bestselling author and international speaker Patsy Clairmont will be the keynote speaker with Linda Gilden as emcee. Authors Carol Kent and Pam Farrel will present awards. Recording artist Gwen E. Smith will perform a parody written by Martha Bolton dedicated to editors and publishers. A dessert reception immediately follows the banquet.
At 4, our guests are invited to hear author and Hollywood screenwriting consultant Linda Seger who will discuss turning Christian books into movies.

The Golden Scroll Awards banquet and reception are open to the public. Tickets are $45. For more information or to register for the banquet, go to www.ScrollAwards.com.
AWSA, an outreach of Right to the Heart Ministries, consists of over 300 top ICRS women authors who both publish and speak nationally. See www.AWSA.com.

For more info please contact Linda Evans Shepherd at LSwrites@aol.com or 303-772-2035.

Back Stage With Freedom's Stand

My youngest child has at last cut the umbilical cord and is taking those first tottering steps in the big, wide world outside my hovering embrace. Not some unanticipated late-life flesh-and-blood offspring [my husband just breathed relief!], though the birthing has been far more prolonged and arduous than any of the four humans who list me as parent on their birth certificates.

No, it's just that my latest book, Freedom's Stand, rolled off the press this month. Its exquisite face looks up at me from the pages of CBD catalogs. It holds hands with illustrious neighbors in Tyndale's summer fiction ads. It makes its own way beyond my control into bookstores and libraries. As a parent, I hold my own breath, urging it on to a long and healthy life in that competitive, even cut-throat that is today's book publishing world.

Much has been said elsewhere both by myself and others about the message and story of Freedom's Stand [see Christianbook.com's Fiction Blog], my own heart for Afghanistan and its people, issues of religious freedom and the persecuted church. So I won't linger on the book's contents here. In brief, Freedom's Stand is the sequel to 2010 Christian Book Award and Christy Award finalist, Veiled Freedom, set in contemporary Afghanistan. Veiled Freedom brings together on Kabul's dusty streets a disillusioned Special Forces veteran, an idealistic relief worker, and an Afghan refugee, each in their own personal quest for truth and freedom. Returning in Freedom's Stand, these three unlikely allies soon discover that in a country where political and religious injustice runs rampant, the cost of either may be higher than they realize. Will any one of them be willing to pay the ultimate price?

But one question I've been asked repeatedly in interviews may have value to ICFW readers. "I know you weren't on the ground over there that long nor able to travel widely due to security concerns. How were you able to portray such a realistic depiction of Afghanistan and its people?" Here are a few of my own stratagems in writing Freedom's Stand which any good novelist can duplicate to bring alive a distant place and people.

Google Satellite Mapping: Where exactly does the Kabul Stadium, where the Taliban once stoned female offenders before soccer matches, lay from the Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood, home to embassies, private contractors--and my main character's humanitarian project? What is the landscape around Afghanistan's notorious top security prison, Pul-e-Charkhi, or its interior layout? Can I triangulate a villain's luxury compound, a refugee's sanctuary, and a defensible escape route in the reality of the high, dusty plateau overlooking Kabul where Pul-e-Charkhi sits?

All of this and so much more is possible with today's technology--and those once-classified global satellite maps. Even in Kabul, Afghanistan, zoom will get you close enough to track your characters through every back alley, plot every location, mark every prison access entrance. [Looking for the US embassy? It alone is missing from close-ups. But if you know where to look, what's behind that sudden blur is clear.]. For continual reference, I kept mounted on my office wall a full-sized, fold-out driving map, available quite reasonably on Amazon from Nelles or International Travel Maps, for virtually any country.

Boots on the ground: Yes, I had boots on the ground for every aspect of my book--military, private security contractors, humanitarian aid, medical, pilot, State Department. These were the same who read the manuscript before press to ensure I had no errors. Finding boots on the ground is not as hard as it may seem, thanks to that 'six degrees of separation' principle we hear about. If you don't know experts in the fields you want to write about, you likely know someone who does, or their friends know someone. It is often just a matter of putting the word out. And since human beings do like to share their expertise, you'd be surprised how available most prove to be for input, if only to make sure you get their world right on page!

Blogs: But there is another type of 'boots on the ground' far more accessible and often fruitful. In this day and age, one can find people anywhere on the planet with time on their hands and a willingness to spill their daily lives, post pictures of their environment, vent their opinions and feelings in blog form. During the writing of Veiled Freedom and Freedom's Stand, I followed numerous blogs representing the worlds of all my main characters. Military and private security. Humanitarian and state department. Afghan medical students and journalists.

An embassy security bash with those demining robots for which your tax dollars paid purloined and reprogrammed to serve drinks--all in living jpeg! A UN secretary's chronicle of daily life and romantic liaison with her Afghan driver--including a non-subtle advertisement of his upcoming availability when her contract is up.

An Afghan journalist's frustrations and hopes for his nation--until he suddenly disappears from internet existence like so many other journalists under the Karzai regime. The frustration of being a female aid worker in a Muslim country. The pride of mission in a Special Forces medic saving an Afghan villager's life. The confusion and anger and curiosity about Western life of a Pakistani medical student. Living on the ground with your character counterparts can add details of daily life, personality, emotion, motivation that I can personally testify the best interview will not produce.

Research: And of course there is no substitute for just plain research. Before starting to write, before even traveling to Afghanistan, I literally saturated myself in the country. Histories, biographies, country studies, political commentary, regional literature, travelogues, I had easily read 30,000 pages material before I ever picked up a pen or computer keyboard. I kept a Google Alert to follow daily news happenings there. I explored Afghanistan's streets, food, art, culture, restaurants, hotels through such expatriate resources as Lonely Planet, Bradt, Essential Field Guides. I studied its setting through watching on-site films and documentaries. Here is just a small sampling of my bookshelf from this project alone:

Ghost Wars-The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden by Steve Coll, Charlie Wilson's War by George Crile, First In by Gary Schroen (the Pakistan CIA field agent who was first into Afghanistan after 9/11), Kabul Winter by Ann Jones, The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad, Inside Afghanistan by John Weaver, Opium Season by Joel Hafvenstein, Prisoners of Hope by Dana Curry and Heather Mercer, The Sewing Circle of Herat by Christina Lamb, The Hunt for Bin Laden by Robin Moore, Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson, Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. Along with many, many others.

Empathy: In the end, there's no substitute for empathy with a country, culture, and people group to bring it alive on page. And that can't be taught. I have personally learned empathy in part by walking the streets of more than thirty countries on five continents, getting to know and love people from countless different backgrounds, listening to their viewpoints, identifying with their pain, burning with their injustices. And coming to see through their eyes as well the beauty in very different landscapes, cultural practices, social styles than my own.

But some of the best novelists I know have such a natural gift of empathy, they bring foreign places alive without ever leaving home [check out ICFW member Kathi Macias' international fiction titles like No Greater Love and People of the Book for a great example]. Bottom line, empathy with others learned in any circumstance and background can be applied to any setting with enough good research.

And for that, just follow the tips given above.

Walking Where Jesus Walked

"I walked today where Jesus walked . . . through Bethlehem . . . the little hills of Galilee . . . the Mount of Olives . . . I knelt today where Jesus knelt, where all alone he prayed, the Garden of Gethsemane . . . I picked my heavy burden up, and with Him at my side, I climbed the Hill of Calvary . . . I walked today where Jesus walked, And felt Him close to me."

BCM Tour Group 2011 on Mt. of Olives overlooking Jerusalem

Somewhere in my childhood, I know I heard more than once the lyrics of this classic Bill Gaither hymn. But I'd forgotten them until on the flight home from Israel last week a seatmate [thank you, Corrie!] passed me the earpiece to her MP3 where the song was playing. I'd never been to the Holy Land before, never expected that in this lifetime I would ever walk the physical earth where my Savior walked. I never even really thought it would make any difference. After all, I had a Bible and a vivid imagination. I could picture well enough the settings and stories of Christ's life.

Petra

But of course I couldn't, and all who ever said to me, "You won't understand until you've been there," were right. From March 28-April 9, 2011, I was privileged to take part in a Holy Land tour sponsored by the ministry of which my husband serves as president, BCM International. With a total group of 33 people, we toured Israel from Caesarea and Tiberius to the Golan Heights and ancient city of Dan to its southernmost city of Eilat, crossing the border there into Jordan to visit Petra.

Masada

My husband Marty and I with tour bus

We saw Megiddo, stood atop Mount Carmel, sailed the Sea of Galilee, visited Masada, the Dead Sea. For four days, we explored the sights, sounds, and smells of Jerusalem where Christ spent His final days. We prayed at Gethsemane and broke the bread of Communion at the Garden Tomb.

Garden of Gethsemane

Place of the Skull, Golgotha

Nor did we focus only on a Biblical past. Since junior high, when I'd first read Leon Uris' The Exodus and O Jerusalem, detailing the rebirth of Israel as a nation, I'd wanted to see for myself just how Israel had developed since independence in 1948. While I'd followed the news of that region all my life, the reality I encountered was not at all what I'd expected. Those who told me before this trip that I'd never be able to truly describe it to others, that they in turn would have to see for themselves, were right. Seeing Israel for oneself, I can say now, will permanently change one's perspective on Scripture, prophecy, politics.

And so like others, I come back to urge my friends and family, "If at all possible, you must go see for yourself." But here are a few high points that struck home to me I'd like to share:

Outside the Garden Tomb

Israel. It is such a small country for such a rich and tumultuous history! Smaller than the state of New Jersey, only 424 kilometers (263 miles) from north to south, averaging less than 50 miles wide with more than half its land area a waterless desert, Israel is only a diminutive blot on a map of the Middle East, its territory less than 1-100 that possessed by Arab neighbors all around. Why did God choose such a tiny spot on the globe, instead of the mighty Roman, Babylonian, Persian, Greek, Egyptian empires, in which to step into human history?

Communion Service at Garden Tomb

Perhaps because within the microcosm of such a small nation, one single Life walking its dusty paths, speaking and healing in its small villages and towns, turning upside-down its social, political, and religious structure, could have a far greater impact than in an empire's capital? A life-changing impact that would multiply until a small nation's borders could no longer contain it, and the world as we knew it would be changed forever?

Valley of Samaria from Mount Carmel

Mount Carmel: I pictured a mountaintop, but not one rising as a citadel in the midst of the vast plain of Jezreel where it sits. Meaning that when Elijah faced off with King Ahab and 400 priests of Baal, it wasn't just those on Mount Carmel who could witness it, but every town and village down on the plain would see that strike of lightning with which Yahweh proclaimed victory over Baal. What a show that must have been!

Sea of Galilee

Galilee: I never pictured the Sea of Galilee as sitting in a bowl with lush, green hillsides rising up from its banks like a natural amphitheater. So when Jesus 'went up on a mountainside and sat down' [Matthew 5:1], all the villages, fishermen, and farmers roundabout could see Jesus and the crowds even from across the lake and hurry around the shoreline (or on a boat) to hear His preaching and bring their sick to be healed. The Dead Sea: Okay, floating in the Dead Sea truly is indescribable. The closest comparison I can come up with is being a multi-limbed beach ball. Even trying to stand up is a challenge. Jerusalem: Coming up from the barren, empty desert that is the Negev and Sinai peninsula into the green, forest-clad mountain valley of Jerusalem, one understands for the first time how beautiful this land must have appeared to the tribes of Israel after wandering forty years in the wilderness.

Jerusalem's forests and hills

Nor did I picture how mountainous Jerusalem is, its original walled expanse rising up the hillside with Mount Moriah (temple site) at the highest point, its neighborhoods, dense forests, and gardens today cloaking peaks, ridges, and valleys where Jesus once walked and preached through small villages and countryside. The Psalms now come alive when they speaking of "let us go UP to the house of the Lord."

Steps leading up to Herod's temple at time of Christ

Mount of Olives: I never imagined that standing on the Mount of Olives, Jesus and His disciples could see directly from that one spot the Temple on Mount Moriah across the Kidron Valley, the entire city of Jerusalem, the plains of Judah, the hills of Samaria, and even beyond Israel's borders. Suddenly Jesus weeping there over the city of Jerusalem and later telling His disciples from that spot to take His Gospel to 'Jerusalem, all Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth' has a much richer meaning. And why on all the planet He would choose this beautiful spot for His return to earth one day [Zechariah 14:4] now makes total sense.

Old City with Mount of Olives in background

Bethlehem Bible College: Bethlehem, part of the West Bank under control of the Palestinian Authority, though only a few kilometers from Jerusalem, bore no resemblance to my imaginings of the birthplace of Christ. To my surprise considering the news, the passage between the two was a matter only of a peaceful and nonintrusive security checkpoint, the city on one side as prosperous and busy as on the other. Byzantine and Crusader churches covered any remains of a first-century town of David. Our visit to Bethlehem Bible College was more exciting to me than walking around the Church of the Nativity. Witnessing living, present-day followers of Yeshua Mesias carrying the Good News to the land of Christ's birth was far more inspiring than ancient cathedrals.

Bethlehem Bible College Campus

Forests, Fruit, and Flowers: "I will make rivers flow on barren heights . . . I will turn the desert into pools of water . . . I will put in the desert the cedar and the acacia . . . I will set pines in the wasteland" [Isaiah 41:18-19].

Every 19th century description by travelers to Palestine, as it was called then as a province of the Ottoman Empire, portrays a desolate wilderness, completely deforested with virtually no green at all. I'd read as a child of the reforestation projects and reclamation of wastelands pioneered by the returning Jewish 'aliyah' in the decades prior and following Israeli independence in 1948. So I was curious to see how those projects had developed. I did not expect the sheer extent of change I would see. Thick forests of pines, oaks, eucalyptus, olive orchards and fruit-bearing trees cloaking every mountainside. The flat plains that had been wasteland and swamps a century ago now kilometer after kilometer of wheat and barley, olive trees, fruit plantations.

Fruit orchards of Hula Valley, Galilee, once wasteland

The nation of Israel farms its land cooperatively, its people living in cities and towns, mostly climbing up hillsides, to leave all available farm land for cultivation. They have pioneered the efficient use of drip irrigation, salt water desalination, and other water projects to make the waste lands bloom. What astounded me most was driving through a cut in the hills. At first glance I thought narrow ledges climbing the cliff-side held wild brush. Then I realized they were planted with herbs--rosemary, sage, mint, etc. Every inch of land is utilized.

Wheat fields in Galilee

Even in the desert, one passes kilometer after kilometer of tall date plantations and hi-tech greenhouses that use underground water sources to grow flowers and vegetables. Whatever one's politics, there is no denying the incredible transformation the nation of Israel has accomplished with its scant square miles of territory--and what its neighbors have NOT done with exactly the same resources and many times more territory.

Negev Desert Greenhouses

Security: I don't know why I was expecting high walls with barbed wire, lots of soldiers with guns, a hand always on my purse and an eye over my shoulder. Perhaps because this is exactly what I've encountered in too many of the poorer nations I've traveled around the planet. I did not expect the complete lack of tension, freedom of borders, and virtual invisibility of security measures our group indeed encountered. Even the border crossing into Jordan was less complicated than boarding a plane in New York or Miami (the only place we even had to watch for pickpockets was the Muslim quarter of Jerusalem's Old City). Passing from Israeli territory into the West Bank was a pause at a highway intersection, the Arab neighborhoods of Ramallah overlooking our Jerusalem hotel no less prosperous-looking nor walled-in than those on the Israeli side. We saw far more IDF [Israel Defense Force] young soldiers on educational tours at Biblical sites than on duty.

Looking across Israeli fields into Syria from Golan Heights

And yet Israel is so small that we stood at times on hillsides where we could see at once into Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, a reminder that the country is ringed by enemies that seek its annihilation. While we were there, a missile from Gaza blew up a school bus on a road we'd just traveled, an Arab-Jewish spokesman whose virtual reconstruction of the Temple at the time of Christ we'd watched in Jerusalem was murdered by Islamic extremists for teaching peace to Arab school children. Just across from our Jerusalem hotel, a bomb had gone off shortly before our arrival. While regretting the tensions and injustices felt by both sides, I had to wonder if my own country would react with as much calm or restraint in the same circumstances as we witnessed in Israel. I could go on forever, but I will not try the patience of readers by doing so.

Date plantations in desert on Negev-Jordan border

Did I come back from Israel completely changed forever? I couldn't really say. But impacted profoundly--a definite yes. I will never read Scripture in the same way. I will never hear the news in quite the same way. I come back with at least some small understanding of the passionate love and pride Israelis have for the soil they've reclaimed. The complexity of this small nation's problems and place in world history and politics. The impossibility of true solutions until hearts are changed on both sides and brought into reconciliation, Jew and Gentile, through the love of Yeshua Mesias, Jesus Christ [Galatians 3:28; Ephesians 2:11-19].

New Jerusalem from our hotel

Above all, I come back with a fresh burden on my heart to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. May the peace of God transform the hearts of its inhabitants. May the sheltering arms of El Shaddai protect its neighborhoods from enemies. May the day come soon when it will truly be what it was meant to be, but has not yet been in its history: a place of peace, of worship, and a light to all the nations of the earth.

Read What Advance Readers Are Saying About Freedom's Stand

Freedom's Stand, sequel to 2010 Christian Book Award finalist and 2010 Christy Award finalist, Veiled Freedom, arrives in bookstores May, 2011. It is already available for pre-order on Amazon, Christianbook.com, Barnes & Noble and other on-line catalogs. Here is what some advance readers have to say about Freedom's Stand:

STEVE SAINT, author of The End of the Spear: "To be good, a story has to be entertaining. To be really good, a story has to leave something in your soul that makes your life richer and you more valuable to those who are touched by your story. I have previously only been to Afghanistan once. I barely scratched the surface of that tumultuous, passionate, assertive country with its multiple cultures and deep struggles. I wanted to go back. And now I have with an author who took down the veil so I could see the Afghanistan that visitors don't see. Freedom's Stand leaves me richer and more aware of many hurts I have missed. It has made the people of Afghanistan and their struggles part of me."

DR. CARL MOELLER, President, Open Doors USA, author of The Privilege of Pain: “If you have ever wondered what life is like 'behind the veil' of Islam in Afghanistan, then Freedom's Stand will touch your heart like nothing else. It brings a message of hope for those whose lives are a desperate search for the reality of God.”

ANGELA HUNT, bestselling author of The Fine Art of Insincerity: "I've read several books about the terror and tumult in contemporary Afghanistan, but not until reading Jeanette Windle's Freedom's Stand did I realize that Islam's honored prophet Isa Masih holds the answer for this blood-stained country. You may know the prophet as Yeshua or Jesus the Christ, but Freedom's Stand beautifully illustrates how he brings inner peace by whatever name he is known."

CHUCK HOLTON , former Army Ranger, war correspondent, award-winning author and editor of American Heroes series with Oliver North: "In Freedom's Stand, Windle's thorough research, passion for accuracy and trips to the war zones of Afghanistan paint a picture so true-to-life that it may make her the subject of a fatwa or two. My hope, however, is that the story will open readers' eyes to the plight of Afghan women, and open their hearts to the love of Isa Masih - the only hope for Afghanistan and the world.

MAJOR JOE DECREE, retired Army Special Forces, combat tours Kosovo & Afghanistan, private security contractor Iraq: "Jeanette’s characters capture the despair of what Afghanistan is and the hope of what it could be. Within the lives of three vastly different souls she weaves a wonderfully believable tale about the unlikeliest coalition imaginable. But in the end they all seek the answer to the universal question of “what am I supposed to do now, Lord?” Jeanette understands the distress of men in combat, that hard decisions get made by people who do not want to make them but are trusted to do so. Personally, I would have liked to have had her with me in Afghanistan. We would have been a good team."

SUSAN MAY WARREN, bestselling author, including RITA award-winning My Foolish Heart: "Absolutely Riveting. Move over, Kite Runner, because Freedom's Stand captures the life and culture of Afghanistan as if you are standing in the middle of Kabul, smelling the fires of rubber tires, listening to the Islamic call to prayer, wrapped in a burqa, while still offering a gripping message of hope and salvation. The deftly drawn story captured me with every word, the plot so compelling that once I picked up Freedom’s Stand, I couldn’t escape the power the story. With sacrifice, betrayal, redemption and love, Freedom’s Stand is an absolute must read.

MARK MYNHEIR, homicide detective and author of 2010 Christy finalist The Night Watchman and The Corruptible: “Freedom's Stand is a fascinating, in-depth plunge into the cultural and religious struggles of the Afghan people and those who are trying to make a difference there. Jeanette Windle gives us another breathtaking story of love, faith, intrigue, and sacrifice, proving again why she’s one of the best storytellers around. Highly recommended!”

MARY DEMUTH, author of Thin Places: A Memoir and 2010 Christy Award finalist Daisy Chain: "It's not easy to capture a war-torn, enigmatic country like Afghanistan, but Jeanette Windle expertly places you right there, wooing you to fall in love with people in dire circumstances. This story of redemption and sacrifice will stick to you like Afghanistan dust, not easily wiped away or forgotten."

T.L. HIGLEY, author of award-winning Seven Ancient Wonders series, including 2009 Christy Award finalist Shadow of Colossus: "Windle writes with the power and authenticity of one who has lived on foreign soil and brought back truth we often do not see from our American living rooms. Freedom's Stand is rich with the history, politics, and culture of Afghanistan, and brings a people to life whom we are called to love. A rich and eye-opening tale."--

KATHI MACIAS, award-winning author of more than thirty books, including the Extreme Devotion series and soon-to-be-released People of the Book, set in Saudi Arabia: "In a time when Afghanistan is in the news almost daily, it is both refreshing and challenging to read a story of courage and candor, adventure and romance set among this ancient and passionate people. Only one with a love for the Afghanis and an understanding of their culture could bring such a story to life, and author J. M. Windle has done it. . . . Through endless intrigue and adventure, we are drawn into the lives of these Afghan people, as we learn their culture, fight their battles, dream their dreams…and ultimately travel with them as they discover the truth about the Prophet they know only as Isa. It is then that they must decide the price they are willing to pay to follow Him…or not. This book will do so much more than entertain us as readers, though it certainly does that. It will challenge us at the deepest level of our commitment and encourage us to stand for freedom…regardless of the cost."

Freedom's Stand [Freedom's Series #2] Heading Your Way At Last

It was worth the wait!

In Veiled Freedom, three very different protagonists come together on the streets of Kabul in their own personal quest for truth and freedom. Returning now in Freedom's Stand, former jihadist Jamil Yusof, aid worker Amy Mallory and Special Forces veteran Steve Wilson are about to learn the cost of true freedom. What could motivate any of the three to pay the ultimate price?

Three full years ago now, I began researching and writing my latest WIP [work-in-progress], its setting of Afghanistan a departure from my prior novels set in the Latin American context in which I'd spent so much of my life. I began writing my Afghanistan novel with a particular storyline of love, sacrifice, freedom and Afghanistan clearly in mind.

Those who've read my earlier novels (CrossFire, The DMZ, FireStorm) know that I am more likely to produce a 600-page Tom Clancy length tome than the typical CBA-length title. My current (and wonderful) publisher Tyndale House has been assiduously coaching me to write more normal length books. But I knew halfway through my writing that Afghanistan and the story I had to tell simply would not fit into 150,000 words. The result was that half my original story became 2010 Christian Book Award and Christy Award finalist, Veiled Freedom.

But if the first half of my original storyline became a powerful message and a great story on its own, how much more so my intended climax of Steve, Amy and Jamil's life stories. I did not expect when I began writing the second half that so much time would pass before it reached the hands of eager Veiled Freedom readers. I can say honestly that Freedom's Stand has been the hardest book I've ever written, ripping out my heart and soul with its message of courage, faith, and sacrificial love. But I knew by the time I'd penned the last line (make that typed!) that it was also the best with a story and message even more powerful than Veiled Freedom.

What is that message? If Veiled Freedom answered the question of what is true freedom (true freedom cannot be bestowed on another people through arms or an aid package, but only through individual hearts transformed by coming face to face with Isa Masih, Jesus Christ), the question Freedom's Stand addresses follows inevitably. Once you've found that true freedom in Jesus Christ, how far will love carry you in sharing it with others. In the context of Afghanistan, that is a far from rhetorical question.

The wait is not quite over. Freedom's Stand hits bookstores May 2, 2011. But I trust the following excerpt will whet your appetite for the rest. READ EXCERPT.

Meanwhile I find myself currently (fictionally speaking) in a very interesting corner of Central Africa. So keep tuned for that book (no name yet)--and hopefully the wait this time will be a whole lot shorter!

FREEDOM'S STAND [Book Back Copy]:
Jamil renounced a life of jihad when he encountered the life-changing message of Jesus Christ, but villagers and authorities in the hills of Afghanistan respond with skepticism . . . and even violence.

Relief worker Amy Mallory is shocked by the changes in her organization—changes with dire implications for the women and children under her care. And concern for her former assistant, Jamil, weighs heavily on her heart.

Former Special Forces veteran Steve Wilson faces off against the riots and corruption of Kabul's upcoming election. He's looking for something that will give his life purpose, but is confident that he won't find it in Afghanistan.

All three are searching for love and freedom in a country where political and religious injustice runs rampant. But when religious freedom becomes a matter of life and death, they discover that the cost of following Jesus may require the ultimate sacrifice.

At Whom Am I Really Angry?

I've been angry recently. Nothing personal. My teenage daughter has been remarkably civil. My adult sons are doing well. I have a wonderful husband. My bank account is in the black. I am warm, fed, clothed, and free to go about my business.

No, the anger seething in my veins is for others. For Afghan Christian Sayed Mossa, who sits on death row in Kabul for the crime of freely choosing a personal faith in God. I grit my teeth for his wife and six children, ages eight and under, who no longer have a husband or an income in a country where there are no food stamp programs. I clench my fists that Sayed's employer of fifteen years, the International Committee of the Red Cross, did nothing to defend or intervene for Sayed until pushed by media pressure to do so. I feel like screaming that my own embassy has agreed to bring up Sayed's case in private conversations with the Afghan regime--instead of trumpeting to the skies that Western free governments don't hand out aid and arms to regimes that murder people for their faith.

Read World Magazine Coverage

I am angry for Pakistani mother of five Asia Bibi, arrested when she refused pressure of Muslim female neighbors to convert from her Christian faith to Islam. She's finally had her day in court, only to be condemned to death under Pakistani blasphemy and apostasy laws. I stomp my feet for her husband and children, separated from wife and mother for eighteen months now. I am furious that those unjust laws are not some historic dictate, but were penned scarcely a quarter-century past by dictator General Zia al Huq, setting Pakistan on the path of Islamic extremism. Even as he penned them, his greatest ally, my own government, was pouring billions in military aid into his coffers without raising a voice in protest. A precedent that has continued to this day, encouraging oppression of religious minorities in Pakistan.

I am angry that Bristol Palin's dancing receives more media attention from such injustices. I fume that neither the ideological left nor right across the Western 'free' world has taken any definitive stand against arming and supporting regimes that deny basic human rights to their citizens. There's plenty more to stir my anger. Children starving in the streets across Latin America, Africa, Asia while their wealthy rulers waddle from mansion to Gulfstream jet to the Riviera. Warlords who turn machetes and AK-47s on innocents in their lust for power. The world seems increasingly filled with darkness and hate and cruelty. Or perhaps we simply have more knowledge.

And because I can do nothing to stop these things, I find myself angry at the only One who can. How can a heavenly Father described as all-powerful, compassionate, merciful so calmly sit in the stands as the Asia Bibis and Sayed Mossas suffer, children starve, war destroys? I know all the proper theological answers. I've heard them, even taught them, throughout my life in Christian ministry. God permits free will. This fallen world is product of human choices. God will bring ultimate good out of human evil. But I am still angry for those I love who are at this moment battered by dark storms while I sit warm, free, safe.
Yes, I love them, Asia Bibi and Sayed Mosa, my brother and sister in faith, and too many others in their situation. The homeless children with whom I've worked on dirty Third World streets, longing to scoop them up like so many stray puppies and take them all home. Abused, despairing women sold as possessions whose eyes look at me with such hollow distance I ache to put my arms around them and tell them all will be well, even though I know that isn't true. Families in my own birth country undergoing sickness, unemployment, broken relationships.

If such love can burn like a fire through my limited being, does not my heavenly Father, Creator of every living soul, love far more? Does He not have the power I lack to reach down and rescue? If God's love is immeasurably greater than mine, how can He not intervene? Even if this unjust world is an unavoidable consequence of human free will, why should the righteous, the innocent suffer while perpetrators walk free?

I've really tried not to be angry. It's not spiritual, I know. I'm not even sure why this particular set of injustices in a world filled with them has burned so hotly in my veins. Even as I've prayed for Asia Bibi and Sayed Mossa, shared their plight with others, I've screamed out my protest to the One who permits this to happen. And maybe our heavenly Father doesn't really mind when His children cry out their anger and confusion and pain to Him. Because this week, unexpectedly, even oddly, He gave me an answer.

It came through a Scripture passage so obscure I'd never noticed it before. I've been reading through the Major Prophets, currently Ezekiel with its strange angelic beasts and fiery living wheels. Ezekiel too was angry. As angry at the idolatry and perversion of his own people as at the devastation of Jerusalem under Babylon's battering ram. Ezekiel begged Israel's remnant to be spared even while he demanded God judge his compatriots' wickedness.
God did not answer by stepping in to set all right. On the contrary:
"For this is what the Sovereign LORD says: How much worse will it be when I send against Jerusalem my four dreadful judgments—sword and famine and wild beasts and plague—to kill its men and their animals! Yet there will be some survivors—sons and daughters who will be brought out of it. They will come to you, and when you see their conduct and their actions, you will be consoled regarding the disaster I have brought upon Jerusalem—every disaster I have brought upon it. You will be consoled when you see their conduct and their actions, for you will know that I have done nothing in it without cause, declares the Sovereign LORD." (Ezekiel 14:21-23).

What value does the Creator of the Universe place in the storms of injustice, tyranny, violence that I cannot grasp? What does His foreknowledge see emerging from the furnace of human pain and suffering that I do not? Certainly we are told that as fire refines gold to absolute purity, so suffering refines and purifies the human soul (Isaiah 48:10; James 1:2-4; 1 Peter 1:6-7).

I still don't know why brothers and sisters in faith should sit undeservedly in prison, even be martyred for their faith. But as I read God's answer to Ezekiel, I find myself consoled. Because my heavenly Father, Sayed and Asia's heavenly Father, does know. And this particular page in mankind's dark and dirty story is hardly the final chapter, not for Sayed Mossa and Asia Bibi, not for me. One day I will meet sons and daughters of the Kingdom whom God is redeeming through the very storms of disaster and injustice against which I fume. And I will see at last clearly what I must now take only on faith. That nothing God has done with His creation is without cause.

Until then I will trust that my Creator really does know what He's doing.

Who Is Sayed Mossa?

Sayed Mossa was scheduled for trial yesterday in Kabul, Afghanistan. He'd been in jail by then six months without seeing a judge. He was afforded no legal representation. Nor was he allowed advance knowledge of the charges against him. Though he had a fair idea of what those might be, none of them good. Possibly espionage. Treason against the state. Even the farce of trumped-up adultery charges have been bandied about. Definitely apostasy, defined as the leaving of Islam for any other faith. In Sayed's case, Christianity. All capital charges punishable by death according to the laws of Afghan 'democracy'.

I first learned of Sayed's arrest last May when I was finishing the rough draft of Freedom's Stand (coming to a bookstore near you May, 2011) sequel to my last Tyndale House Publishers title, Veiled Freedom, set in Afghanistan. His situation so closely paralleled the story of Freedom's Stand, I might have been reporting on it instead of writing a fiction plot. Not a complete surprise. Conditions on the ground in Afghanistan as I'd been writing were such that I knew it was only a matter of time before my fiction became reality.

What is the story of Freedom's Stand? If Veiled Freedom addressed the question of what is true freedom (which cannot be bestowed on another people through arms or an aid package), the question Freedom's Stand addresses follows inevitably: once you've found that true freedom, how far will you go in sharing it with others? A costly question to be asked in Afghanistan.

As Sayed Mossa has discovered. His arrest came after cell-phone images of Sayed and other Afghans praying in the name of Isa Masih [Jesus Christ] and being baptized were aired by Afghan media. Said images drew a brief flurry of media attention in the West, far more so in Afghanistan where calls immediately went forth for the arrest and execution of Afghanistan's theoretically non-existent Christian minority.

Why non-existent? Sheer, unabashed politics. When the current Afghan regime signed on to its post-Taliban new constitution in 2006, among its provisions was that Afghanistan would abide by the universal bill of human rights, including the right of every human being to freely choose and practice their own religious beliefs. Of course thinking, concerned followers of Afghan issues (including myself) quickly pointed out that the same constitution established Islamic sharia law as trumping all other statutes. And under sharia law, leaving the religious fold of Islam was apostasy, a capital crime.

No real problem, Western governments voiced even as they expressed unqualified support of Afghanistan's new constitution and regime. Since Afghanistan was officially 100% Muslim with no worship place of any other faith permitted to exist, the blatant contradiction would not be an issue. As long as the 'free' governments pouring aid and arms into Afghanistan could keep blinders firmly in place that no Afghan had any desire for freedom to choose their own faith in God, that basic human right like so many others under the Karzai regime could be safely ignored.

Meanwhile, the Afghan mullahs had a different interpretation. Yes, adherents of other religions were free to follow their faith in Afghanistan. But that freedom did not mean Muslims were free to convert to another faith (though followers of any other faith were always welcome to convert to Islam!). Since every Afghan was Muslim by genetic default, the only possible adherents of other religions were members of humanitarian organizations or other foreign residents. Permitting Afghan courts to maintain apostasy from Islam as a capital offense while complying with international law.

Western blinders were rudely ripped away with the surfacing of those cell-phone images. This wasn't actually the first time since Taliban rule a Christian had been put on trial. A similar situation had arisen with the arrest of returning Afghan refugee Ahmed Rahman in 2006. But he was quickly dismissed as a mentally disturbed individual brainwashed into converting to Christianity while working abroad in an infidel nation. Under-the-table negotiations eventually declared him incompetent to stand trial and sent him back into exile, therefore permitting both the Afghan regime and their Western allies to neatly avoid the freedom of faith issue.

Unfortunately, those smuggled-out images of local, ordinary Afghans daring to lift their voices in prayer and praise to a name other than Allah could not be similarly dismissed as a single aberrant returning from exile. No one knows exactly how many Afghan Christians were actually arrested in the witch hunt following the airing of those cell-phone images or remain in prison today. Estimates range from two to twenty-five. But it is now only too evident that plenty of Afghans yearn for the same freedom to choose the recipient of their prayers that we in the West enjoy as our inalienable birthright. Freedom a decade of NATO and USA investment certainly haven't brought to Afghanistan.

So just who is Sayed Mossa?

Here is who he is not! He is not an anti-government agitator. He is not a smuggled-in tool of Western infidels. He is not a zealot trying to get himself killed.

Instead, Sayed is a quiet, ordinary man, forty-five years old, married to one wife with six kids ranging from 8 years of age on down. He is also an amputee, having lost his right leg when he stepped on a landmine. For fifteen years, he had supported his family and served the Afghan people working for the International Committee of the Red Cross as an orthopedic therapist to help other victims of war. What he has undergone since his arrest is too disturbing to repeat here, but I hope you will take time to read it for yourself.

While I knew of Sayed's arrest, was kept abreast of his situation, had even written the ICRS on his behalf, I like others had been asked not to pass on information on his case. Until his story hit international media this last week with the publication of Sayed Mossa's own plea smuggled out of a Kabul prison. Now it is time to speak up!

Sayed's day in court scheduled for Sunday, November 21, has once again been postponed, not such a relief since it means returning to the horrific environment of an Afghan prison. Meanwhile with those blinders ripped away, what are the forces that claim to stand for freedom on this planet going to do about Sayed Mossa? In Freedom's Stand (coming from Tyndale House Publishers in May), one of the main characters makes a forceful point when addressing a similar, if fictional situation: "What won’t happen is that the ‘free West’ can keep enjoying forever their own freedoms while tacitly conceding those are now considered optional for the rest of this planet."

A statement I certainly hope remains fictional. But like Sayed Mossa's arrest, I have little doubt that if the current situation does not change, it is only a matter of time before my fiction once again becomes reality. Because I consider myself privileged to be an American, I would like to see my own government speak out unequivocally on abuses of religious freedom in countries receiving our arms and aid. I would like to see accountability attached to such handouts instead of the unrelenting compromise we've witnessed to date.

But there are at least ways we as individuals can make our voices heard. We can write our congressional representatives, demanding action. We can write the White House. We can speak out on blogs and through local media. Through letters of encouragement and support to those imprisoned for their faith. We can keep ourselves informed on the situation. Mindy Belz, editor of World Magazine, several of whose articles are linked in this blog post, has been offering excellent coverage of the situation. And we can pray.

Whatever we do--for the sake of Sayed Mossa and others like him, for the sake of our own children's future as free citizens--let us not remain silent!