International Christian Concern recently reported on the brutal killing of a pastor in Mozambique, a country located on the Southeast coast of Africa.

According to CBN, an Islamic extremist group linked to ISIS captured the pastor as he was crossing a field.

But what happened next was not only gruesome but also sadistic.

The extremists beheaded the pastor and then gave the head to the pastor’s wife and told her to take it to the police.

Though 57% of Mozambique’s 30 million population are Christian, Islamic extremists have been terrorizing Christians in the northern area of Mozambique. This included burning of churches and the murder of other believers, several by beheading

And this is not the first time Christians have been beheaded because of their faith.

In early 2015, people around the world were shocked by the beheading of 21 Coptic Christians in Libya.

Islamic extremists took the captured men, wearing orange robes, to a beach along the Mediterranean Sea near the country’s capital city, Tripoli.

They ordered their hostages to lie on the ground and then beheaded them. Then extremists videoed the execution and posted it on the internet.

Crucifixion was the most popular form of execution in the Roman Empire when the Apostle John had his vision of the end times in 95 AD. But he cited the emergence of a different method in the days leading to Jesus’ second coming.

Towards the end of the Book of Revelation, he writes about a special reward given to believers who were beheaded because of their faith in Christ.

“Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead and on their hand; and they came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.⁵ The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were completed. This is the first resurrection.” (Revelation 20:4-5 NASV)

And John tied its emergence with the end times when he added that they, along with those who died for refusing to take the Mark of the Beast, would be resurrected from the dead before anyone else.

READ: ISIS-Affiliated Extremists Decapitate Pastor, Hand His Wife Severed Head to Show Authorities in Mozambique