Super-victors

Paul said this is the reason that “in all these things we are more than conquerors.” We are super-victors with a joy that comes from experiencing the very things which look as if they are going to overwhelm us.
Huge waves that would frighten an ordinary swimmer produce a tremendous thrill for the surfer who has ridden them. Let’s apply that to our own circumstances. The things we try to avoid and fight against— tribulation, suffering, and persecution— are the very things that produce abundant joy in us. “We are more than conquerors through Him” “in all these things”; not in spite of them, but in the midst of them. - Oswald Chambers

The lesson of Job is how sometimes, inexplicable tragedy happens. There's a lot we don't know - - we can't tell God how to run his universe! When the sufferer has a personal encounter with God, there are no more questions. Corrie Ten Boom said, "Now I know from experience that Jesus' light is stronger than the deepest darkness. There is no pit so deep that God is not deeper still."

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Practising our faith

 

Wherever Christians are restricted in practising their faith, the experience of meeting corporately for worship seems to have much more intensity and meaning.  After - or sometimes before - a long hard day of work in an anti-spiritual environment, they are most desirous of meeting with the family of God to express their love, adoration and praise to their Lord.

"God of love, help us to remember that Christ has no body now on earth but ours, no hands but ours, no feet but ours.
Ours are the eyes to see the needs of the world. Ours are the hands with which to bless everyone now. Ours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good". - Teresa of Avila

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Witnessing

Manuel was an effective evangelist among the mountain Quechua people in Peru. One day some Shining Path guerrillas intercepted him on the trail and ordered him to stop going to the mountains; stop handing out Bibles, cassettes and other Christian materials; and stop preaching about Jesus. They threatened his life.

Some weeks later Manuel’s dead body was found on the trail. His feet, hands and tongue had been cut off. With a knife they carved on his torso the message in Spanish, “We told you to stop!” The chopped body parts completed the message, “...visiting the villages; distributing Bibles; preaching about Jesus!”

There was a memorial service for Manuel attended by many believers. An evangelist preached the memorial service message and challenged young people to come forward and take Manuel’s place. Ten young people made the commitment. An elder standing at the side asked, “But young people. What if the same thing happens to you as happened to Manuel?”

One of the youths cried out, “If we die, a thousand will spring up and take our place!”


This from China --

"…in the provinces, believers are still fined, imprisoned, and tortured; local regulations still prohibit unofficial church gatherings", One lady was held for 110 days in captivity. She was hung upside down and beaten with electrical cords. Others with her were beaten with wire from the waist down.

Their crime was meeting with an evangelist. Their testimony was, "...that God's presence was so tangible during the torture that, in fact, she felt joyful. 'Because of these afflictions, we loved the souls of China more...and we prayed for those who were torturing us... We go out ready to preach the gospel, ready to go to jail, and ready to die for Jesus' sake." (CHRISTIANITY TODAY, May 16, 1994, pp. 33-34).

"It is interesting to note that the underground church in China is apolitical! They pray for their leaders but maintain a careful independence...more than a few believers [in America] trade in their Christian birthright for a mess of earthy pottage. We must continually ask ourselves: Is our first aim to change our government or to see lives in and out of government changed for Christ?” Ibid.

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Spiritual Strength

“We have all eternity to celebrate our victories, but only one short hour before sunset in which to win them." Robert Moffat

 "Put on all of God's armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil." - Ephesians 6:11

 All forms of prayer, to be effective. Must be Spirit-led, Spirit-directed. We must first pray for discernment from the Holy Spirit as to what to pray, who to pray for, what the points of prayer and ministry are, for the person or thing being prayed for, and how to pray it We must then "pray through", that is, pray with consistency, and as often as necessary, as led by the Holy Spirit, until we perceive that we have a release from the Holy Spirit not to pray it out anymore. This is the usual sip that the prayer of intercession or supplication has been answered in the Spirit-realm. It will only be a matter of time before the result manifests in the natural realm. Pray spontaneously from the heart, yielded to the Holy Spirit. Pray, asking, binding, loosing, and decreeing or agreeing, in Jesus’ Name. Include faith confessions in this type of prayer when led to do so by the Holy Spirit.

It is God’s will that Christians remain as emotionally and spiritually and physically bruised-free and victorious as possible through every attack the devil launches against them. Nevertheless, many spiritual battles have inflicted needless pain on born again believers, or will inflict needless pain, simply because Christian believers aren't aware that the devil is the one they primarily need to be waging spiritual war against during their time of struggle. Satan will do everything he can to try to get us to believe that he is not the instigator or originator of our pain. He wants us believing it is people period ... not people being influenced by the devil that is causing our pain. Or more deceptive still, he wants us believing God is the one behind it all.

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Willingly Suffer

Here is a thought from an unnamed Chinese Christian:


Where there is no cross, there is no crown. This lesson cannot be learned from books, and men do not usually taste this sweetness. This rich life does not exist in a comfortable environment. If the spices are not refined to become oil, the fragrance of the perfume cannot flow forth; and if the grapes are not crushed in the vat, they will not become wine.

 Another pastor shared this request - “We don’t ask that you pray for the persecution to stop, but that we will be faithful and stand strong in the midst of the persecution.”

Sister Pasqualita spoke at the “Mexico, I Love You” Congress. She had suffered severe ostracism in her small town in the very southern part of Mexico because she had become an evangelical. Other Christians had already been forcibly driven from the town.

One night a group of her persecutors surrounded her grass-roofed home setting it on fire. As she opened the door, someone fired a gun at her. A co-worker shares her story in his own words:

“When she was sharing her testimony she was crying. She said, ‘I thank the Lord that only twenty-one ammunition bits touched me.’ She had been shot all over her body and even in the neck. She was still able to run and fell into a hole where her persecutors couldn’t see her in the dark. She was losing blood quickly but some other townsfolk somehow took her out through the mob to another nearby town’s clinic. She survived but three other family members in the house were murdered.
“She complained to the Lord saying, ‘Lord, why now that I’ve given you my life and my family am I suffering this way?’ The Lord reminded her of a song that she used to sing very often, ‘I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back.’
“She continued, ‘Then I understood that when I decided to follow Jesus, it was in the midst of any situation, any persecution. My life now belonged to Him. I gained strength in that song. I am preaching again and I am encouraging the rest of the believers that when we decide to follow Jesus there is no turning back.’”

Today Pasqualita continues to be a strong Christian leader and teacher in her community and she still loves to sing, “I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back.”

We will be led into difficult times. We are perfected by our suffering, when we suffer like Jesus did, by the power of the Holy Spirit. Don’t waste your pain or your suffering. Use it for a witness, use it for the gospel. Christians are like nails—the harder you hit us, the deeper we go.

Christians are like flowers. The more you crush us, the sweeter the fragrance.



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I am always with you

Gul Masih was a Christian in Pakistan and was condemned to hang on a charge of blasphemy.  In prison he wrote this as a response to a Canadian woman:

"First of all, I am thankful to you that you have encouraged me. My Lord has come to me twice in my prison cell. One day, I was sitting in my cell thinking about this injustice in a sad and hopeless mood. Suddenly the cell filled with light and my body trembled. I saw my Lord. Four days after this, my Jesus came again and overshadowed me by raising His hands & blessing me. From that day on, I have been happy & at peace. My Lord is with me in Jail. He doesn't leave me alone. We are five members in our family. We have a great love for each other. I am very grateful to my Lord. He has fulfilled all my needs in the best possible way. I am also thankful to you and my other brothers & sisters who have supported me. I hope that by the grace of God we will see one another. Let us not forget the power of prayer."

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Worth dying for

I know, it sounds like I am talking about the independent Christian Rock band, but I am not.

I am talking about discipleship meaning that there is a person to follow and following Jesus means commitment and cost in every circumstance and situation.

Read this brief intro to an early Church father - Tertullian -

"Tertullian was the first to break the force of such charges as that the Christians sacrificed infants at the celebration of the Lord's Supper and committed incest. He pointed to the commission of such crimes in the pagan world and then proved by the testimony of Pliny that Christians pledged themselves not to commit murder, adultery, or other crimes. He adduced also the inhumanity of pagan customs such as feeding the flesh of gladiators to beasts. He argued that the gods have no existence and thus there is no pagan religion against which Christians may offend. Christians do not engage in the foolish worship of the emperors. They do better: they pray for them. Christians can afford to be put to torture and to death, and the more they are cast down the more they grow; "the blood of the martyrs is seed" (Apologeticum, 50). In the De Praescriptione he develops as its fundamental idea that, in a dispute between the Church and a separating party, the whole burden of proof lies with the latter, as the Church, in possession of the unbroken tradition, is by its very existence a guarantee of its truth."

The book of Acts is punctuated with this concept.  Do not forget that the Greek word translated "witness" in Acts is the root word martyr.  All this to possibly say that martyrdom is therefore a witness by blood.  Giving ones very life is considered the ultimate sacrifice.

Wonder why a M... who dies in 'jihad' is considered a martyr and is one category of M....assured of a definite place in paradise.

 George Otis Jr. writes:

"Should the Church in politically or socially trying circumstances remain covert to avoid potential eradication by forces hostile to Christianity? Or would more open confrontation with prevailing spiritual ignorance and deprivation—even if it produced Christian martyrs—be more likely to lead to evangelistic breakthroughs? Islamic fundamentalists claim that their spiritual revolution is fueled by the blood of martyrs. Is it conceivable that Christianity’s failure to thrive in the Muslim world is due to the notable absence of Christian martyrs? And can the Muslim community take seriously the claims of a Church in hiding? . . . The question is not whether it is wise at times to keep worship and witness discreet, but rather how long this may continue before we are guilty of “hiding our light under a bushel. . . The record shows that from Jerusalem and Damascus to Ephesus and Rome, the apostles were beaten, stoned, conspired against and imprisoned for their witness. Invitations were rare, and never the basis for their missions."

Check out these number crunches -  http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2011/02/christian-number-crunching  - Dr. David Barrett is basically saying that in as of early 1996 that annual average for Christian martyrdom worldwide is 159,000.  He also gives a great definition of what a martyr is.

This is important to me as I work at SAT-7 Canada to make a difference and encourage Christians and share faith with those who have never heard the gospel.

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Depths of Love

Almighty God, who has given many the  boldness to confess the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ before the rulers of this world, and courage to die for their faith: Grant that we may always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us, and to suffer gladly for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

From Common of the Saints, Of a Martyr, Book of Common Prayer, p. 246-247

 

The New Testament suggests persecution is a likely consequence of Christian belief: Jesus in Mark 13:9-11 does not say if they hand you over to councils, but that they will hand you over …

Today for affluent Christians such passages are viewed as references to a time long ago. But for Christians in the burgeoning churches of the Middle East and North Africa, persecution and martyrdom are modern realities.

In his book, A Distant Grief (published 2006), Ugandan writer and pastor Kefa Sempangi tells of a certain Easter Sunday - getting confronted by five of Idi Amin’s thugs who were going to kill him. 

"Despite the growing shadow of Idi Amin, Easter morning, 1973, began as a most joyous occasion for the redeemed church. The sun had just risen and the sky was empty of clouds when the first people began arriving at the compound where we worshiped. They came from almost every tribe, from the Baganda, the Besoga, the Bunyacoli, the Acoli and the Langi, the Baguari and the Bakisu. They came from as far away as Masaka, a town 80 miles southwest of Kampala. There were old men with walking sticks and young women with babies on their backs. There were small children with flowers in their arms. There were doctors and lawyers, businessmen and farmers, cotton growers and government workers, only a few traveled by car or taxi. Most came on foot or rode bicycles. Others crowded into lorries so lopsided they seemed ready to collapse at any moment. By nine o'clock, over 7,000 people were gathered. It was the largest crowd ever to attend Sunday service at the redeemed church. When there were no more places in the compound, people climbed trees or sat on the roofs of the lorries. A few large groups set up in nearby yards with their own amplifying systems and hundreds stood in the streets. Before the service, the elders and I met in the vestry, an empty house by the compound, to pray. We felt deeply the hunger in the hearts of the people who had gathered for worship. We knew their desire to hear the Word of God and prayed that their lives would be transformed by its power. As we poured our hearts out to the Father in agonizing intercession, desperate scenes from the previous week flashed again in my mind.     I saw a face burned beyond recognition and a woman huddled in a corner weeping. I saw a crowd of soldiers standing in the park cheering. And I heard the sound of boot crunching against bone. I remembered the arrogance of the mercenaries and the dreamlike deadness of my heart. And once again the triumph of evil overwhelmed me. I felt a deep fear. I myself had fallen, how could I hope to strengthen others on this Easter? Who was I to feed God's children in this most desperate hour? What words could I speak? My brothers and sisters needed courage to stand firm in the growing terror. They needed strength to sustain them in suffering. They didn't need my sermon, they didn't need my thoughts on the resurrection. My father had been right. In such times, men do not need words, he had said, they need power."
"I took my Bible and went to preach that Easter morning with new courage. My message was the suffering of Jesus Christ. I spoke of His triumph over evil and His victory over death. I spoke of the power of His resurrection. And behind me were the elders, sitting on a bench and praying. In front of me, thousands of unfamiliar faces. There were believers in need of encouragement and unbelievers in need of salvation. At 12:30 the sun was pouring hot on our heads and I tried to close the service." That's three and a half hours later.
"The people refused to leave. We have not come for a church service, someone shouted, we have come to hear the Word of God. Go rest yourself and then come back and preach again. The crowd clapped and shouted their approval. I went to the vestry for a brief rest and returned in the mid-afternoon. Hardly a person had moved. I preached for three more hours. And this time when I finished, no one objected. The sun was going down and everyone knew the hour had come to close the meeting. It was not safe to travel after dark. We didn't know whether we'd ever see each other again, or when God might call us home, but we went out in peace because we had seen with our eyes the salvation of the Lord. And with a loud 'Amen' from the people and a final chorus from the choir, the Easter service ended and I turned to the elders and we embraced praising God. It seemed as if days instead of hours had passed since we had met for prayer. I was exhausted but there was joy in my heart. God had answered our prayers. He had broken bread and fed His people. I had to push my way through the crowd and when I finally arrived at the house, I was exhausted and too tired to notice the men behind me until they had closed the door. There were five of them. They stood between me and the door, pointing their rifles at my face. Their own faces were scared with the distinctive tribal cuttings of the Kakwa tribe and they were dressed casually in flowered shirts and bell-bottom pants and wore sunglasses. Although 1 had never seen any of them before, I recognized them immediately, they were the Secret Police of the State Research Bureau, Amin's Nubian assassins. For a long moment no one said anything and then the tallest man, obviously the leader, spoke, 'We're going to kill you,' he said. 'If you have something to say, say it before you die.'
"He spoke quietly but his face was twisted with hatred.
I could only stare at him. For a sickening moment I felt the full weight of his rage. We had never met before but his deepest desire was to tear me to pieces. My mouth felt heavy and my limbs began to shake and everything left my control. 'They'll not need to kill me,' I thought to myself. 'I'm just going to fall over. I'm going to fall over dead and I'll never see my family again.'
"I thought of Pinina, home alone with Damali. What would happen to them when I was gone? From far away I heard a voice. And I was astonished to realize it was my own. 'I do not need to plead my own cause,' I heard myself say. 'I am a dead man already. My life is dead and hidden in Christ. It is your lives that are in danger. You are dead in your sins. I will pray to God that after you've killed me, He will spare you from eternal destruction.'
"The tall one took a step toward me and then stopped. In an instant his face was changed, his hatred had turned to curiosity. He lowered his gun and motioned to the others to do the same. And they stared at him in amazement but they took their guns away from my face. And then the tall one spoke again. 'Will you pray for us now?' he asked.
"I thought my ears were playing a trick. I looked at him and then at the others. My mind was completely paralyzed. The tall one repeated his question more loudly and I could see that he was becoming impatient. 'Yes, I will pray for you,' I answered.
"My voice sounded bolder even to myself. 'I will pray to the Father in heaven, please bow your heads and close your eyes.'
"The tall one motioned to the others again and together the five of them lowered their heads. I bowed my own head but I kept my eyes open.
"The Nubian's request seemed to me a strange trick. 'Any minute,' I thought to myself, 'my life will end. I do not want to die with my eyes closed.'
"'Father in heaven,' I prayed, 'You who have forgiven men in the past, forgive these men also. Do not let them perish in their sins but bring them unto Yourself.'
"It was a simple prayer, prayed in deep fear, but God looked beyond my fears and when I lifted my head, the men standing in front of me were not the same men who had followed me into the vestry. Something had changed in their faces. It was the tall one who spoke first. His voice was bold but there was no contempt in his words. 'You have helped us,' he said, 'and we will help you. We will speak to the rest of our company and they will leave you alone. Do not fear for your life. It is in our hands and you will be protected.'
"I was too astonished to reply. The tall one only motioned for the others to leave. He himself stepped to the doorway and then he turned to speak one last time.
"'I saw widows and orphans in your congregation,' he said. 'I saw them singing and giving praise. Why are they happy when death is so near?'
"It was still difficult to speak but I answered him. 'Because they are loved by God. Because He has given them life and will give life to those they love because they died in Him.'
"His question seemed strange to me but he did not stay to explain. He only shook his head in perplexity and walked out the door. I stared at the open door of the vestry for several moments and then sat down on a nearby straw mat. My knees were no longer strong and I could feel my whole body tremble. I couldn't think clearly. Less than ten minutes before, I had considered myself a dead man. And even though I was surrounded by 7,000 people, there was no human being to whom I could appeal. I couldn't ask Kiwanuka to use his connections. I couldn't ask the elders to pray. I could not appeal to the mercy of the Nubian killers. My mouth had frozen and I had no clever words to speak. But in that moment with death so near, it was not my sermon that gave me courage, nor an idea from Scripture, it was Jesus Christ the living Lord."

 Here are two other quotes from his book that I really enjoy - 

 We were, I knew, a needy people. We could not afford to be answered in abstractions. We could not afford to separate doctrine and life. Even our language reflects this need for the concrete. “Truth” for a non-westernized African does not refer to a statement’s correspondence with a fact. Truth is a quality of things. A mango tree is true if it bears sweet mangoes, a house is true if it is upright. A man is true if he knows how to run his home, control his temper, resist gossip.

A religion is true if it works, if it meets all the needs of the people. A religion that speaks only to man’s soul and not to his body is not true. Africans make no distinction between the spiritual and the physical. The spiritual is not a category among categories but the lens through which all of life is viewed. A tribesman from my village knows that cutting a tree, climbing a mountain, making a fire, planting a garden and bowing before the gods are all religious acts.

Kefa Sempangi  and his family made their way to Philadelphia, where a group of Christians began caring

for them.  One day his wife said, “Tomorrow I am going to go and buy some clothes for the children,” and

immediately she and her husband broke into tears.  Because of the constant threat of death under which

they had so long lived, that was the first time in many years they had dared even speak the word

tomorrow.     Their terrifying experiences forced them to realize what is true of every person: there is no

assurance of tomorrow.   

Here is a quote on what happened to his spiritual life while in Philadephia - 

 

The biggest change came to my prayer life. In Uganda I had prayed with a deep sense of urgency. I refused to leave my knees until I was certain I had been in the presence of the resurrected Christ. It was not just the gift I needed. I needed to see the Giver. I needed to know that the God of orphans and widows, the God of the helpless, heard my prayers. Now, after a year in Philadelphia, the urgency was gone. When I prayed publicly I was more concerned to be theologically correct than to be in God’s presence. Even in private my prayers were no longer the helpless cries of a child. They were spiritual tranquilizers, thoughts that made no contact with anything outside themselves. More and more I found myself coming to God with vague requests for gifts I did not expect.

 

The positive results of loving God wholeheartedly are many.  God will bring good from very terrible events and circumstances, personally and corporately.

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Loving God

I found this quote --

"God created people with free will, meaning that we can choose to love and obey God or not. It wouldn't be very meaningful if we loved or obeyed God because we were unable to choose otherwise. A computer or talking doll can be made to say "I love you," but it doesn't have the same meaning as when a human freely chooses to love. Thus, in order for anyone's choice to love and follow God to be meaningful, God permits everyone to choose freely what they will do"

 No sooner do we decide to love the Lord with all our being then we hear Jesus' words - and one of the most difficult commands is to love even our enemies.




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More than Family

Even when it comes to family, our love for God is to be challenged by no other.

There is no way in the world that most of us get this.  So many of get upset when they hear people choosing to follow God rather than their families desires.

Abraham has to be my role model in this area - even though I know that I could not have done what he did.  He waits until kingdom come for a son, a heir, and then gets tested by God.  God wanted to know if Abraham loved Him more than Isaac.  So there was a command to sacrifice.

 Abraham submitted and in his absolute trust of God, not knowing what God intended for such a plan contributed to all of us God's incredible love for us too in preparing a substitute...a foreshadowing of His own Son, the ultimate sacrifice.

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Intimate Friends

Jesus wants this kind of a relationship - one of special intimacy.

He gave His life for that to happen.  He showed us His own special relationship with His Father.

Unfortunately we like messing relationships up.  We do that because we really do not understand love.  I know that I have caught myself looking for what I could get out of a relationship as opposed to what I can give to it.

Oswald Chambers shared this devotional -

Are you seeking great things for yourself, instead of seeking to be a great person? God wants you to be in a much closer relationship with Himself than simply receiving His gifts— He wants you to get to know Him. Even some large thing we want is only incidental; it comes and it goes. But God never gives us anything incidental. There is nothing easier than getting into the right relationship with God, unless it is not God you seek, but only what He can give you.

There will be only one thing in this world that will sustain you -

 “Continuing a series on the person of Jesus: When Christ was in the world, He was despised by men; in the hour of need He was forsaken by acquaintances and left by friends to the depths of scorn. He was willing to suffer and to be despised; do you dare to complain of anything? He had enemies and defamers; do you want everyone to be your friend, your benefactor? How can your patience be rewarded if no adversity tests it? How can you be a friend of Christ if you are not willing to suffer any hardship? Suffer with Christ and for Christ if you wish to reign with Him. Had you but once entered into perfect communion with Jesus or tasted a little of His ardent love, you would care nothing at all for your own comfort or discomfort but would rejoice in the reproach you suffer; for love of Him makes a man despise himself. ... Thomas à Kempis, Of the Imitation of Christ May 11, 2000 Concluding a series on the person of Jesus: Jesus' good news, then, was that the Kingdom of God had come, and that he, Jesus, was its herald and expounder to men. More than that, in some special and mysterious was, he was the kingdom.”

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