Shaban Magazine began its journey of ministering to the emerging Persian church leadership since 2000. God has greatly blessed this ministry by those who faithfully supported it financially and those who invested in writing inspiring articles for it. It is with a very grateful heart that I share my thoughts about how Shaban came to be and what role I believe it has played in the growth of many leaders. In the very first issue of Shaban (year 2000), I shared what the purpose of the magazine would be. The verse that I believe God gave me was a verse that described King David’s mission. ”And David shepherded them with integrity of heart; with skillful hands he led them.” (Psalm78:72)
Too often, leaders in the church look at leadership as a position to hold, that is given to the them because they were the person who seemed to have the greatest knowledge and experience. Too often, there is little knowledge of what a Biblical call to ministry really entails. But in this very simple but profound verse we see that leadership is more about character, which flows from a heart of integrity. So Shaban was born to help leaders hunger and thirst for righteousness and to walk humbly with God and man. God uses humble leaders through the influence of their character. Thus, we must face the fact that a leader may teach what he knows but, in the end, he reproduces who he is. We wanted to raise up leaders who had the aroma of Christ. We wanted our leaders to also learn that Biblical leadership is to become a “servant leader” like Jesus; who did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life for us. (Mark 10:45) I had observed that many young leaders were very authoritarian in their leadership style and their leadership was causing many problems. God gives grace to the humble and we wanted to see God raise up men and woman who served Christ with broken and contrite hearts and not sense of entitlement.
But humble Godly leaders need to have the right tools to lead. David, “shepherded God’s flock with skillful hands.” Our concern was not just Character but leadership skills. Leaders needed to learn how to prepare sermons that informed listeners as well as brought transformation. They need to learn how to lead worship services that were Biblical and Christ centered. They would be faced with counseling needs and thus needed to know how to counsel Biblically. Many who were starting new churches needed to know the Biblical model for planting churches, making disciples and training elders. With a sobering realization of the many needs that existed in the rapidly growing Persian Church “Shaban” magazine accepted the challenge.
We wanted Shaban Magazine to be the voice of Iranian leaders writing for Iranian leaders. Thus, in the beginning years most of our writers where Iranian pastors and teachers who graciously gave of their time to write for us. Shaban was not a vehicle for us to translate Western articles and pass then on to our readers. It was a platform for our trusted leaders to address the issues of character and the practical issues that leaders where facing. Our philosophy was to avoid denominational preferences and stick to the topics that would speak to most leaders. On occasion, a writer would touch on a topic that would generate a complaint or criticism and our policy always has been to give the person who is taking an exception to what we printed an opportunity to write a counter perspective as long as they used Scripture as their primary resource. Interestingly enough, through the twenty years of Shaban’s history, no one has ever taken the opportunity we have given him or her to write a rebuttal. Our prayer for Shaban has always been, “Lord make us a blessing to the Persian church, and may our words encourage, inspire and instruct your church to be faithful to your Word and bring glory and honor to your only begotten Son”.
How Shaban Magazine was Born?
This year Shaban Magazine will celebrate twenty four years of ministry. But how did it all start? What shaped its vision? And how has it kept going for so many years?
Shaban Magazine was born in the hearts two brothers at a cross road in their lives. The year was 1999, and I had been pasturing the Iranian Christian Church of Washington DC but felt God calling me to move to Colorado and begin doing more for the Iranian church at large. It was about that time that I started TALIM Ministries. I was seeking God’s direction. I knew how to be a pastor but I was not sure what the next steps should be. It was during this time of searching for God’s leading for the next chapter of my ministry, that while in London for meetings, I reached out to a dear friend of mine, Brother Arman Roshdi. Un- been known to me, he too was in a transitional time in his life. When he learned more about my search he suggested we go on a prayer retreat together. He told me that he knew of a retreat house in Cheddar not too far from London. Arman drove me there and we spent a couple of days there. We ate a lot of fish and chips and spent hours sharing our testimonies with each other, praying and seeking God’s guidance. The conclusion we came too, was that the biggest challenge facing the Iranian church was the need for leadership training. And we felt that what we could do was to start a magazine that would help lay leaders, young pastors with the fundamentals of doing godly ministry. In the months that followed Shaban was born.
Both of us would write short articles and we invited other trusted leaders to do the same. Brother Arman would do the twelve-page layout and mail it to me. Then I would take it to a printer here in Colorado and then mail them to as many leaders whose addresses I had. The first issue was mailed to 86 leaders. The way we grew the mailing list was we offered the magazine free of charge to those who would share with us the nature of their ministry and this way we
became familiar with many leaders scattered around the world as well as gained insight into the way God was at work.
Why Shaban Was Born?
Perhaps you have wondered what were the needs twenty years ago that prompted us to start “Shaban”? I firmly believe God revealed to us that Shaban Magazine was His plan. “Surely the Sovereign Lord, does nothing without revealing his plan to his servants the prophets.” (Amos 3:7) We were only prophets in the sense that we wanted to speak God’s truth to build up His church in the current needs. So what was the church facing?
In the mid 1990s, the Iranian church had suffered a horrific blow with the martyrdom of its senior leadership. Key leaders like, Bishop Haik Hovsepian, Rev. Tateos Michaelian, Rev. Arastoo Sayyah and Rev. Hossein Soodmand to name just a few. In a short few years, the Iranian church found itself in a leadership crisis. The church had lost its trusted senior leader resulting in a critical need for God to raise up a new generation of leaders. The wise fathers who had guided the younger leaders where gone. There was a leadership crisis and we hoped that Shaban magazine might be used by God to help raise up a new generation of godly leaders.
The church was also facing another transition. More and more Iranian Christians were immigrating to the west, leading to one of the greatest Iranian Diasporas. This migration presented new challenges. Iranian Christians found themselves isolated from their mother church and often unable to find fellowship in their host countries due to language barriers and cultural incompatibilities. As one Iranian believer complained to me that the church in the West was not warm and welcoming like the church in Iran had been. As Shaban’s mailing list began to swell, we began to realize how important it was for many isolated leaders to receive it. I distinctly, remember getting emails and phone calls from Iranians in places like Australia and Sweden expressing their gratitude that we remembered them and stayed in contact with them. When Shaban arrived in the mail it was like a letter from home. It made many feel like they were not forgotten and cared for by leaders whose names they knew.
There was also a new challenge facing those living in the West. For many it was the first time that they were exposed to doctrines and teaching that were very different from what they had been taught in Iran. Also, there was a growing number who had become believers outside of Iran and had had no experience with the church in Iran. For some this caused a crisis of faith. It was confusing to learn about all the different denominations and their particular doctrines. May were being confronted with “Liberal Christianity” for the first time which questioned the authority of the Bible and seemed to be tracking more with western culture then what they had read in the Bible. All of this is to stay many of our young leaders where left to navigate these troubling waters by themselves. Shaban aimed to help our church scattered around the world to hold the course and stay faithful to the authority of the Bible. We urged our readers to do God’s work God’s way. Over the years the feedback we had received has been so encouraging. One reader, wrote, “The very week he was asked to preach his first sermon, Shaban arrived with an article on preaching”. Another reader, reported, “I was not sure what the Bible taught on divorce and the very week I had to give an answer to this question to a couple in our fellowship, Shaban arrived with an article about it. “ Another brother faced with having to lead a Bible study for the first time covered his Shaban magazine with brown paper and read an article to his group. He wrote me about all the praise he received for his amazing teaching. He was so thankful for Shaban Magazine. Others wrote how the articles in Shaban corrected some of their wrong beliefs and helped them develop more Biblically sound doctrine. For each person who took time to give us their feed back we are most grateful!
What Have We Learned
We have learned, although, the Word of God transcends culture, each culture has its own worldview and norms. We need to continue to learn what it means to be faithful to God’s Word in the context of our Iranian culture and historical context. Bishop Dehqani-Tafti understood this so well when he wrote his book on Christ in Persian poetry. The Bishop told me years ago, when I was in Iran, that the best way to reach the Iranian heart is poetry. He knew how to speak into the hearts of Iranians As Iranian Christian leaders we need to continue to strive to find ways to speak the Truth of God to the growing Persian church inside and outside of Iran. We need to continue to learn from Church History, from the Reformers who rediscovered the doctrines of grace and from those faithful Iranian leaders in our past. My hope is that Shaban can continue to speak the Truth of God’s Word to our leaders and help shape Biblically healthy leaders and churches. If you are a regular reader we are so grateful for you and pray that you have found our publication an inspiration and blessing.
I want also give special acknowledgment to Brother Arman Roshdi who so faithfully helped me prepare each issue of Shaban for so many years. He was a blessing to me and to many. Also, I am so grateful for the leadership of the Jude Project who brought Shaban back to life and has given us excellent leadership.
Pastor Tat Stewart