He was only nine years old, but David Nasser vividly recalls the day armed Iranian revolutionaries came to his school in 1979 with his name and his sister’s on the list they carried with them.
“We were in a military base – that’s where we lived as a family when the revolution first happened. My father was a high ranking military leader, and so I remember a soldier coming to our school and calling my name out in front of the entire student body. He actually read a few names, but my sister’s and mine first. I made my way to the front of the entire student body in that assembly.”
“This soldier took a gun, pointed it at my head and told me because of Allah’s design that he was going to have to take my life.”
But David’s story wasn’t supposed to end that day.
“And that was just terrorism. That was just bringing fear to a lot of the people who were in charge of the old guard.”
“The school principal got between me and the gun and begged the soldier to come back another day. I went home that afternoon to tell my dad what happened. He said I’m not going back to school, and we’re planning our escape.”
In the midst of the chaos all around them, David’s family managed to strategize a way out of the country.
“We used my mom’s health issues. We leveraged that to get out of Iran. We went to the doctor she’d been going to see for her heart, and we cut a deal with them. ‘If you help us escape, you can have our home, our cars, our clothes – everything that we own.’ And so the doctors were in on the plan.”
“My mom acted like her heart was really bothering her. So my mom was taken to the hospital. The doctors came out and said, ‘She needs surgery.’ Even though she didn’t really need it.”
“We pretended like we were going to Switzerland for this supposed operation. That wasn’t even really happening. We bought two way airline tickets like we were going and coming back. We got homework assignments like we’re going and coming back and the house sitter. But we weren’t coming back. We were running for our lives.”
So many years later, David still carries the scenes from the airport the day his family escaped.
“I remember the Iranian airport. I was terrified. Holding my dad’s hand at the airport, he just kept shaking. He kept saying, ‘This is a dumb idea, and they’re going to capture us.'”
“But they didn’t.”
“We landed in Switzerland for the operation, and, instead of going to the hospital, we went to the American embassy. We fled for our lives, for asylum. Basically, political asylum – a fancy way of saying a desire to become refugees here in America. But back then nobody was allowing Iranians into America.”
This was the same period when revolutionary Iran was holding Americans hostages in Iran, provoking an international incident and driving a wedge between the two nations.
“We were stuck in Europe for about nine months trying to get to the States. And the doors just wouldn’t open.”
“Until one day, my mom got us together And she said, we’ve exhausted all these opportunities and ways to try to make it to the United States, and so I have one other idea. Let’s pray to the American God and ask Him to let us into His country. She showed us a picture of a guy with a beard and a mullet! This is horrible theology. But that’s what we did, and that’s the first time I heard of Jesus.”
“I remember flying here to the states thinking – you know, I don’t like religion. I saw it destroy my country. But hey, Jesus, thanks for letting us into your country. So we came here to the states, and that’s when things started to shift a little bit for us.”
This incredible journey would bring David Nasser and his family first to Texas, then to Alabama, and, finally, to a relationship with Jesus. Although his path took him through danger and times of isolation, he found a powerful ministry of evangelism. He’s written Jumping through Fires, detailing his story, and today serves as Senior Vice President for Spiritual Development at Liberty University.
