user: Please write a short summary for the following article:

Wife of pastor Saeed Abedini, jailed in Iran for his faith, explains the ‘shock’ of his release

U.S. evangelical pastor Saeed Abedini is among the four Americans Iran were released on Saturday, according to reports.

Abedini, 35, of Boise, Idaho; is a convert from Islam to Christianity and pastor who had been imprisoned since July 2012 for organizing home churches. His case was the most high-profile religious persecution for Christians in recent years, regularly mentioned by evangelical pastors in pulpits across the country.

His case put a face on the issue of religious persecution, especially in the Middle East, for Christians across the globe. For more than three years, evangelical activists have pressed President Obama for his release, arguing the Americans’ release should be part of a larger nuclear deal.

[Iran to free Post correspondent Jason Rezaian, 3 others, Iranian reports say]

His wife, Naghmeh Abedini, who grew up in Boise and lives there with the couple’s two children (Rebekka, 9, and Jacob, 7) told the Washington Post on Saturday that she woke her two children up early at 7:30 to tell them of the news that their father had been released.

“They were shocked,” she said. “You can probably hear them now, jumping up and down, asking ‘When are we going to see him?’ It’s been a time of rejoicing.”

Naghmeh Abedini has been a high-profile advocate for her husband, posting updates on social media regularly and speaking regularly at Christian conferences across the country.

Saeed Abedini had established small house churches in Iran, and he was convicted in 2013 of threatening Iran’s national security. Born and raised in Iran, Abedini became a U.S. citizen in 2010. In 2012, he visited the country of Georgia, and when he tried to enter Iran to see his parents, his passport was taken and he was put under house arrest, later put in prison, his wife said.

In November, Naghmeh Abedini began to back away from the high-profile speaking of her husband’s campaign, telling supporters by e-mail that he has been abusive to her and she can “no longer live a lie.” Christianity Today published two e-mails Naghmeh Abedini sent to supporters about her troubled marriage, which began in 2004.

She confirmed that she had experienced “physical, emotional, psychological, and sexual abuse through her husband’s addiction to pornography.” She wrote at the time, “The abuse started early in their marriage and has worsened during Saeed’s imprisonment,” which she confirmed on Saturday. The two had been speaking by phone and through Skype, but she said she has not spoken with him since October.

She said the timing of those emails, which were leaked to media, was unfortunate.

“When he gets home, we can address the serious issues that have happened and continued,” she said.

She said her husband will undergo a medical examination and they can assess his physical and emotional state. She said he had been beaten and interrogated when he was first imprisoned and suffered internal bleeding, but she does not know his current physical condition. She said that once they leave Iranian soil, they will discuss if she will fly and meet him somewhere or if they will meet when he returns to the U.S.

Naghmeh Abedeini, 38, who attends the nondenominational Calvary Chapel in Boise, said it’s unclear whether her husband will continue to be a pastor, though it’s always been “his heart.”

“I think he would have to deal with a lot of issues,” she said. “There will need to be a time of healing for him and his family.”

She said she has grown interested in religious persecution, not just Christians but Sunni Muslims, Baha’is and others under threat in the Middle East.

“As a Christian, I believe God gives freedom, including to be an atheist,” she said. “My husband has opened my eyes to the plight of people of different beliefs.”

Naghmeh Abedeini was born in Iran and moved to the U.S. with her parents when she was nine and became a citizen when they did. She was working in project management for a manufacturing company when her husband was put in prison but left her job so she could travel and speak on her husband’s behalf.

She said her faith has grown stronger since her husband was put in prison.

“We’ve all learned to have peace no matter what came our way in the midst of ups and downs,” she said. “We’ve trusted God and his timing, and today was the timing.”

In October, she wrote op-ed letter to President Obama for The Washington Post where she wrote about the agony her family has faced, and said she had hoped that the nuclear deal would mean hostages like her husband would be freed.

[Naghmeh Abedini asks Obama to help bring her husband home]

She said on Saturday that initial meetings with the U.S. State Department about her husband were very difficult, describing them as “stand-off-ish” since they had issued travel warnings to U.S. citizens about Iran. She said she began to have more hope after Secretary of State John Kerry urged her husband’s release in 2013.

Russell Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, said in a statement in response to the release that the prayers of Christians all over the world have been answered.

“This day of celebration should remind us to pray and work all the more for the multitudes still persecuted for their faith all over the world, including in Iran,” Moore said. “We hope and long for the day when Iran, and nations like it, are free from those who wish to enslave the conscience at the point of a sword.”

Religious freedom oversees has been a large part of the 2016 presidential campaign with GOP candidates urging the need for protection of Christians in places like the Middle East.

Others freed on Saturday also included Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, Amir Hekmati, 32, of Flint, Mich., and Nosratollah Khosavi-Roodsari, Iranian officials said.

The release is part of the nuclear deal between Tehran and six world powers where the Iran agreed to an exchange for at least six people imprisoned or charged in the United States.

Want more stories about faith? Follow Acts of Faith on Twitter or sign up for our newsletter.

Bernie Sanders may get further than any other Jewish candidate for president. Why aren’t we discussing it?

How one evangelical activist changed his mind on gun violence


assistant: The pastor has been imprisoned since July 2012 for organizing home churches.