Unhinged, fiery Assyrian evangelist got his start at six

By Michael Ashcraft –

It’s no wonder Sam Shamoun is an evangelizing virtuoso who can recall chapter and verse, not only of the Bible but also of the Koran, faster than you can dictate a command to Google search.

He got started when he was only 6 years old.

Literally, little Sam and his 9-year-old buddy who led him to the Lord went out to Devon Avenue of Chicago to street-preach and evangelize adults.

“Sam ‘the Man’ Shamoun is a force of nature – unhinged, unashamed, unbothered warrior for Christ with scripture on his heart and fire on his tongue,” a commenter says on a Pints with Aquinas video. “This dude rules.”

It’s hard to find a more formidable debater in the Islam vs. Christianity space. He’s probably the quickest on his feet to refute, with instant recall of a photographic memory of the Bible, the Koran, the hadiths and of Arabic scholars. He’s the Ben Shapiro of Islam/Christian circles.

Sam makes his point, exposes his opponents, and then reminds them he’s winning at every step. Any adversary unlucky enough to misspeak will be invited to Jesus: “You don’t believe what your book/prophet/scholars believe. Leave the darkness.”

Sam was a big fan of Bruce Lee and applies the master’s Jeet Kune Do to debate, he uses the attack to produce a counterattack.

He’s brutal and unafraid.

“I know I’m putting myself at jeopardy,” he admits on Pints with Aquinas. “All it takes is just the wrong Muslim to be at the wrong place or the right place for him and he can either shoot me or behead me. But you know we’re trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ, not because I’m a hero. That’s not it. I do it because I feel compelled to, meaning I really believe it’s the Holy Spirit that’s put this word in my heart to be up there upfront about my faith.”

Sam was born in Kuwait of Iraqi parents who were Assyrians. The family moved to Chicago as immigrants when he was very young. Even though his family attended the Church of the East, Sam didn’t get saved via his parents.

It was a 9-year-old pal who told him about Jesus. He began attending a Baptist church with his buddy, who was a precocious phenom. The pair went evangelizing on Chicago’s Devon Avenue.

Years after his womanizing, alcoholic father abandoned the family, Sam left the church in his teenage years and fell into pot, alcohol and bodybuilding, he says in a video on his own channel.

A man with the Nation of Islam, the heretical race-charged sect, got him to “dabble” in Islam.

“A Muslim apologist tore me to shreds,” he admits on the Hope Report YouTube.

Sam read the Koran and was impressed that it contained some of the very same stories and personages of the Bible.

“The Lord put a fire in my heart, as I started reading the Koran, to go back to my Christian roots and start reading the New Testament. I fell in love with the Jesus of the New Testament, who’s the Christ of history and the risen Lord of glory.”

He came back to Jesus.

The next distraction was a Jehovah’s Witness who targeted him by coming to his house and showing him from the scripture (by twisting scripture) that the Trinity was wrong.

“He baffled me,” Sam recalls.

Interestingly, the chief attack against Christianity of both the Muslims and the Jehovah’s Witnesses is against the Trinity. Originally what distracted and baffled Sam became his forté.

“I thank the Lord Jesus for the unbelievers and their objections because, had it not been for the objections, it would not have forced me to dig deep in scripture and seek the face of Holy Spirit to understand,” he says. “I was forced to study because I was attacked.”

In 1999, he decided to go into full-time ministry. Without ever bothering with a Bible degree, he began writing for a website pioneering outreach to Muslims called Answering Islam. He became their chief writer.

Sam incinerated Muslim apologist Shabir Ally in 2000 at the University of Iowa. Here was a layman (no Bible college, no seminary) taking on a PhD student (Shabir Ally), and he embarrassed him.

Overnight, the auto-didactic became a sensation.

As the Internet went from 3G to 5G, Sam moved from written words to his own YouTube channel. He also moved from Chicago to the Los Angeles area.

Sam debates live on YouTube. Not all Muslims carry the sword of Allah, but the ones who do are the ones who show up on his channel.

Sam never gets disconcerted, but his temper flares. “I have a Middle Eastern temper,” he says.

On a recent live debate, he addressed one interlocutor while others were threatening his life. “Tell you fellow jihadis to put their knives away, and answer the question,” he snapped. It seems his use of invective shows he’ll not be intimidated by the would-be killers who hate him.

“Sam Shamoun, a prominent figure in Christian-Muslim apologetics, has left an indelible mark on the landscape of interfaith debates,” says Dirty Polemics Wiki. “His fierce determination, extensive knowledge, and confrontational approach have sparked both admiration and controversy.”

To learn more about a personal relationship with Jesus, click here.

Related articles: 

• Meet the woman Islam fears most.
• Al-Qaeda is offering $60M bounty to kill this debater.
• Canadian Muslim terrified of the Messiah.
• Does Islam plan to take over Europe with violence?
• Is Islam inherently violent? Look at the history.
• Are there really mass conversions to Islam in the West?
• Sharia in London today.
• UK cracks down on Christians who threaten violence but allows Ali Dawah to threaten apostates..

About this writer: Michael Ashcraft pastors a church in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles.