Jesus Speaks Farsi

In this episode of Chai Time, we’re wrapping up our last series of 2023, “Many Threads, One Tapestry.” Jennifer and Dara Lynn have a conversation about what it means for our individual stories of meeting and following Christ to be a part of the larger story that God is writing for His church. So, pour yourself a cup of tea and join us for another episode of Jesus Speaks Farsi. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this third episode of our “Many Threads/One Tapestry” series, Hannah has a conversation with Hessam, a well-respected pastor and teacher in the Iranian church who has been a follower of Jesus for 40 years. Years after his life was transformed by the Gospel, Hessam continues to train and equip the next generation of leaders in the Iranian church. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this second episode of our “Many Threads/One Tapestry” series, Dara Lynn has a conversation with Darya, a German/Iranian worship leader whose songwriting and worship ministry has had a significant impact on the Iranian church in recent years. She shares about God’s restoration of her family, what living and ministering across two cultures is like, and why Iranians value their freedom to worship through song so highly. To hear Darya’s music, you can find her on Spotify under her name Darya and on YouTube at Darya Music. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this first episode of our “Many Threads/One Tapestry” series, Dara Lynn and Jennifer chat with Dani, a young Iranian man whose unique story includes growing up in a Christian family inside Iran. He also shares about his mother's work as a Bible translator, his miraculous escape from Iran as a teenager, meeting his wife Niloofar, and working in ministry full-time with her today. Dani’s story highlights how each of our unique stories of coming to Christ are all part of the larger story God is writing for His Church. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this episode of Chai Time, we’re wrapping up our most recent series, “Church planting in the Iran region.” Joe, Jennifer and Dara Lynn have a conversation about what planting a church in the Iran region looks like as well as how that differs from our Western understanding of church planting. So, pour yourself a cup of tea and join us for another episode of Jesus Speaks Farsi. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this third episode of our “Planting churches in Iran and Beyond” series, Dara Lynn talks with Keyvan, an Iranian man who came to faith as a teenager and now plays a significant role in helping train church planters in the Iranian church. If you’ve ever wondered how church planting works in the Iran region or how church planters become church planters, this is the episode for you. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this second episode of our “Planting churches in Iran and Beyond” series, Joe talks with Samuel, an Argentinian pastor and evangelist, about God’s calling him to minister to people across the world from his home country, specifically in Iran. His unique church-planting story includes smuggling Bibles into a closed country, meeting and marrying his Iranian wife Sara, and serving as a senior leader in the Iranian church movement. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this first episode of our “Planting Churches in Iran and Beyond” series, Joe talks with Kambiz about his story of encountering Jesus as a young soldier in the Iranian army and ultimately becoming a prolific church planter in the Iranian church. In this conversation, Kambiz shares his on-the-ground experience of what planting Persian-speaking churches in the Iran region actually looks like. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this episode, Joe sits down with David Yeghnazar, Executive Director of Elam Ministries, to talk about the recent growth of the Iran church and the lessons the global church can learn from what God is doing among Iranian Christians today. They also share compelling testimonies of ordinary Iranians being transformed by the Gospel and going on to impact the Iran region through evangelism, discipleship and church planting. Support the show

In this episode, we’re wrapping up our most recent series, “Life After Prison.” Joe, Jennifer and Dara Lynn get together to chat about this series’ conversations with Anahita, Ladan and Sara. They talk about what it means or doesn’t mean, to be “on fire” for Jesus, how being young (in life or in faith) doesn’t exclude believers from the call to ministry, and how persecution is never the end of the story. So, grab a cup of tea and join us for another episode of Jesus Speaks Farsi. To hear Anahita, Ladan and Sara’s persecution stories, check out episode two and three from our Persecution series and episode 4 of our Women In Iran series. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

As part of our series on Life after Prison, this episode includes a conversation with Ladan, a senior leader in the Iranian church who ministers to Iranian women in the Iran region. In this episode, Dara Lynn and Jenn talk with Ladan about how her experience of being in prison for her faith and how she learned what it meant to fully trust God in an incredibly challenging time. Ladan’s story highlights how her experience of being in prison for her faith became a dividing line for her between the first part of her life before prison and her life after. To hear Ladan’s testimony in our earlier series, “Persecution,” episode 2, please visit Jesus Speaks Farsi at your favorite podcast platform. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

As part of our series on Life after Prison, this episode includes a conversation with Sara, a senior leader in the Iranian church who works directly with Persian-speaking youth. Sara’s story highlights how God turns difficult seasons into blessing and beauty from ashes. She also shares about her recent experience of losing her father and how that hard experience is also stretching her understanding of faith and life with God, both here and beyond. To hear Sara’s testimony in our earlier series, Women in Iran, episode 4, please visit Jesus Speaks Farsi on your favourite podcast platform. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this season, we’re catching up with a few of our Iranian friends about what life and faith have looked like after their very personal experiences with persecution. Today, Dara Lynn is joined by Anahita, a senior church leader in the Iranian church who serves in the Middle East alongside her husband Matthew. In this episode, we’ll hear about how the time she spent in prison shaped her faith going forward and how God has used that experience to bless others in similar circumstances. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this episode, we’re wrapping up our most recent series, “Pray, Give, Go, Stay.” Joe, Jennifer and Dara Lynn spend some time talking about the implications of each of these opportunities to engage with the global church. They also share how their own imaginations were stirred as they talked with friends of the Iranian church about what it can look like to participate in the story God is writing for the church today. So, grab a cup of tea and join us for another episode of Jesus Speaks Farsi. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church, please visit elam.com/iran-story. And for more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

As part of our Pray, Give, Go, Stay series, Neil and Celeste Rogers share their experience ministering to refugees within their own community in rural Texas. They encourage those looking for ways to reach the nations to simply look in their own backyards. The opportunities for mission work among Afghan and Iranian refugees where we all live only continue to grow. One note: In this episode, Joe mentioned sharing available resources for ministry to refugees. If you’re in the US, we suggest connecting with Neil for information on reaching out to Afghans and Iranians in your community. You can contact him at wneilrogers@gmail.com. If you’re in the UK or Europe, you can email contact@elam.com for more info on how to reach out to Afghans and Iranians in your locality. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church please visit elam.com/iran-story. For more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

As we continue our series on how to effectively engage with the global Church through praying, giving, going, and staying, this third episode focuses on what it can look like to courageously go. Today, Joe and Jennifer are joined by Tom Hawksley, a Brit who has spent his adult life in ministry, particularly with the church in Iran. He shares about his unconventional way of learning Farsi, how he met his Iranian wife, and what Mark 16:15 means when Jesus says “Go and Tell.” For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church please visit elam.com/iran-story. For more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

As we continue our series on how to effectively engage with the global church through praying, giving, going, and staying, this second episode focuses on the personal and wider impact of obedient giving. Today, Dara Lynn and Jennifer are joined by Mark Howard, a non-profit development director with a pastor’s heart. He shares with us the impact obedient giving can have in the life of a believer as well as in the life of the global church. Mark also talks about his personal experience with the Persian-speaking church and how the ministry God has currently called him to is very different than the one he envisioned. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church please visit elam.com/iran-story. For more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this season of Jesus Speaks Farsi, we’ll be talking to friends whose lives have been deeply impacted and shaped by the story of Iran’s church – even though they’re all from the West. Our hope is that in hearing their stories on how they’ve become involved, your imagination would also be stirred for ways the Lord might have you become more deeply connected to what God is doing in the global church. In this episode, our focus is on what it can look like to participate in prayer with the global church. Joe and Dara Lynn talk with Louise Yeghnazar about the journey she’s been on with the Iranian church and what she’s learned about prayer from that experience. Louise shares personal stories of her own prayer life that we know you’ll be encouraged by. Louise also shares about her work with the prayer ministry, 24-7 Prayer. If you’re interested in the significant work they are doing, please visit, 24-7prayer.com. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church please visit elam.com/iran-story. For more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

This Good Friday, we wanted to share our friend Bahar’s story with you again. Her story is featured in our earlier series on Women in Iran, so if you haven’t already, we hope you’ll go back and listen to these incredible Iranian women share their experiences of meeting Jesus. In this episode, Bahar shares her story of growing up as an Iranian woman, which includes her experience of significant discrimination by men in her home country of Iran. When Bahar learned that a Man named Jesus Christ had valued her enough to die for her, she was amazed. Bahar shares about the freedom Jesus brought to her life and the impact she’s seen Him have on many others’ lives since. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church please visit elam.com/iran-story. For more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show

In this bonus episode, we're marking the twentieth anniversary of the modern Farsi translation of the New Testament. 2.5 million copies later, stories of life transformation like the one we share in this episode are happening every day in the Iran region. In this episode, Joe sits down for a conversation with Rasool, an Iranian Christian whose life was changed dramatically after receiving a New Testament. Rasool shares how, after a difficult childhood and a desperate season in early adulthood, a stranger reached out to him online to tell him that God loved him. Not long after, he received not one, but two New Testaments, which began a trajectory that ultimately led him to place his faith in Jesus. Rasool is now involved in full-time ministry and is happily married with a young son. For more information about the recent history and incredible growth of the Iranian church please visit elam.com/iran-story. For more information about our organization, please visit elam.com. Support the show