The widow of a murdered church leader in Laos has been telling Release International she forgives her husband's killers who tried try to destroy the church.

'Abigail' (whose real name cannot be disclosed for security reasons) says Christianity is spreading in Laos - despite persecution - and Christians are growing strong in the faith. She tells her story in the latest edition of Release's award-winning webcast World Update on the Persecuted Church.

The Lao authorities have arrested or detained at least 90 Christians in recent weeks following raids on three provinces.

In one incident, villagers are believed to have killed a Christian by pouring rice wine down his throat until he drowned. When family members buried him and put a wooden cross on his grave, village officials accused them of 'practising the rituals of the enemy of the state'.

And instead of tracking down the killers, they allegedly rounded up 17 Christian families and locked them up without food for three days to try to force them to renounce their faith.

The authorities have long regarded evangelical Christianity as part of a foreign-backed plot to undermine the communist revolution.

During a recent fact-finding visit to Laos, Release met Abigail whose husband was murdered for his faith.

Abigail is continuing her husband's work, looking after churches he set up.

He was away for longer than expected on church business when news came that his body had been found. He had been brutally murdered.

Before he left, Abigail sensed a dread that something like this could happen. She told Release: "I always said, please don't come home late because you have enemies who will try to kill you."

"Don't worry," he replied. "But I said, 'How can I not worry, because our children are still young?' If something happened to you, how would I live?"

But what she feared most happened. Her husband had been missing for several days before his body was found.

To begin with Abigail was distraught: "I was crying, crying, crying and asking God why he took my husband away - he was the one that the church and the people needed more than me."

Abigail's children were angry and wanted revenge, but she explained to them: "The punishment is up to God and not up to us."

When Release visited her church she was preaching from 1 Corinthians 13: 'Love keeps no record of any wrongs.'

But what if Abigail were to come face to face with her husband's killer, what would she tell him?

"I would tell him about God's love, that even when I do something wrong he always forgives me, so I would tell him I love him, because God loves him, too - and God will forgive him."

Even today, Abigail does not know who killed her husband - though she believes the killers' motives were clear - it was to stop the church.

"The reason I believe he was killed was because he served God. The church is growing. We are training and making more Christian disciples and leaders."

Now Abigail has taken on her husband's work in caring for the Christians he brought to the Lord.

Christians in Laos face a choice - of worshipping in churches heavily restricted by the state, or going underground. The stakes are high. They risk being seen as enemies of the state, of coming under surveillance, being arrested, imprisoned without trial - and tortured to renounce their faith.

But the harder the authorities stamp on Christianity, the more it spreads. The work Abigail's husband began will continue.

"I don't know who killed him," says Abigail, "but I know that God has a plan for the church, especially for the people to grow up and become strong in the faith."

Release asked Christians to pray for Abigail and the Christians in Laos, and support Release in helping them in their work and witness.

Release is supporting the families of Christians in prison and enabling wives to visit their husbands behind bars and to give them much needed gifts of food and clothing in jail.

Through its international network of missions Release supports Christians imprisoned for their faith and their families in 30 nations. It supports church workers, pastors and their families, and provides training, Bibles, Christian literature and broadcasts. Release is a member of the UK organisations Global Connections, the Evangelical Alliance and the Micah Network.

www.releaseinternational.org