Building trust between Christians and Muslims in Nigeria

By Tim Allan

Sent by SIM USA, Toby arrived in Jos with his wife Alycia in 2009 certain of just one thing – that he wanted to share the love of Christ with those who did not know Jesus.

In that region, that meant sharing the love of Christ with anyone and everyone, including Muslims and Christians.

“We saw Christians invited into Muslim homes and Muslims invited into Christian homes.”

From that humble beginning has grown a ministry which now seeks to bring Christians and Muslims together in trusting relationships, so that all may know Christ.

Toby, who now leads iReach Global from his home in Texas, said: “When we landed in Nigeria we didn’t really know what we wanted to do. I had been in sales before joining SIM and my wife was a primary school art teacher, so we spent a while visiting various ministries and trying to work out where we could fit in.

“Then the first big crisis of our time in Nigeria came along, in 2010, when there was significant persecution of Christians by Muslim extremists. Hundreds of people were killed and, not surprisingly, there was a huge amount of hostility and mistrust between the communities.”

“God challenged me, and I challenged others, to think about what it would look like if we did as Christ calls us to do – to really love our neighbours as ourselves.”

The scale of persecution hit Toby hard, as he pondered how it could be that Jesus loves all mankind and wants to bring all humanity into his relationship with Him.

Toby said: “God challenged me, and I challenged others, to think about what it would look like if we did as Christ calls us to do – to really love our neighbours as ourselves. What would that look like in a city where Christians were frightened to walk in Muslim areas, and Muslims frightened to walk in Christian areas.”

That was how the idea to set up a community centre for both Christians and Muslims came about – an idea made reality when Toby was allowed to use a building near the main mosque in Jos. The centre was called BRiCC (Building Relationships in City Centres) and quickly became a hub for Christians and Muslims to get together.

Toby said: “Even though we didn’t have any experience, we ended up running all sorts of classes, for women, for men and for students. We did sewing and baking for women, computer classes, English classes. It was wonderful to see the people come in, a little suspicious and reserved at first but by the end they were firm friends. We saw Christians invited into Muslim homes and Muslims invited into Christian homes.”

As the years went by, Toby realised that many Christians in Nigeria were still too frightened of their Muslim neighbours to engage with them. He also realised that some training might help overcome those barriers so, with no prior experience, he and a friend wrote a seven-lesson programme called InReach.

Toby said: 

“We wanted to empower Christians to feel confident in talking to their neighbours, so the course focuses first on the individual’s relationship with God and then builds on that to help them understand how God sees people, who are all made in his image. We tried it first with just four students and one of them is still working with us now, more than 10 years later.”

The programme was so warmly received that it grew beyond their imagination. Because Jos is such a cosmopolitan city, students come from across Nigeria. Once they had taken the course, they would often take it with them back to their home states. 

“By the grace of God, we are now in a position to go it alone… We thank God for SIM and pray he will use our new charity mightily to build his kingdom.”

Toby said: “We know the course has helped bring communities together and we also know that Christians have been able to change the hearts of those around them.”

By the time the Abts family left Nigeria in 2020 due to a combination of family, Covid and security issues, the course was being run in 16 states across the country.

Now, five years later and with a change of name to Ireach, the ministry has grown still further.

Toby said: “When I came home, I started talking to my supporters about the programme and one of them, a gifted fundraiser, really wanted to get behind it. Through his work, we have now seen iReach start in Kenya, Chad, Uganda and Tanzania.

“We very much rely on organic growth. News of the programme is taken by students back to wherever they live and then we work through them to set it up there. I can’t say we had any great strategic plan, but we just allowed God to lead us to wherever he thought the programme would be welcomed.”

The work was originally funded through Toby’s supporters and an SIM project, but iReach Global is now in the process of becoming a fully-fledged charity. By the end of the year, both iReachGlobal and Toby will have transitioned out of SIM.

Toby said: 

“By the grace of God, we are now in a position to go it alone. We have a number of supporters who truly believe in the work we are doing. We are hugely grateful to SIM for the support and encouragement we have received but now is the right time to move away and see where God will lead us. We thank God for SIM and pray he will use our new charity mightily to build his kingdom.”