Today is the day we remember Jesus’ birth. He came to set captive sinners free from the tyranny of death and sin.

As you celebrate today with friends and family, exchanging gifts, hugs, smiles, laughter, food, music, and more, please take time to pray for:

People around the world who sadly have no reprieve from their pain, such as:

- Pfc Bowe Bergdahl, held captive by the Taliban since June 30 (pictured)
- Christians who suffer loss and persecution in hostile lands like Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, various parts of North Africa, China, and elsewhere
- Christians who are imprisoned around the world simply because of their unwavering commitment to Jesus
- Those who ache with physical hunger and starve in spiritual hunger
- Those who have lost loved ones this year, whether through accidents, crimes, or war

People who have offered up their lives for the spread of the Gospel, such as:

- Street evangelists who daily receive insults, jeers, and taunts as they preach Christ crucified
- Missionaries working in lands as translators, church planters, computer specialists, managers, mechanics, school teachers, etc.
- Itinerant preachers who still circuit travel to exhort, rebuke, teach, and challenge churches full of believers to greater commitment to and intimacy with Jesus Christ
- The few and rare godly pastors who hold fast to Biblical truth and sound doctrine

And, of course, people who continue, even today, to “suppress the truth in unrighteousness”; adamantly refusing to repent and believe.

I’m sure I’m missing many people, but you get the idea.
Of all the gifts we could give today, the gifts of your time and prayers for these people are priceless.

Merry Christmas,
Anthony

Posted: December 25th, 2009 under Announcements, Current Events, Persecuted Church, Prayer, State of the Church, The Church, World Events, World Missions.
Comments: none

Underneath following the day’s inaugural events I have been challenged by recent comments by Paul Washer and, separately, Ingrid Schlueter on her SliceofLaodicea blog about the up-tick potential for real persecution coming to Christians in America.

Let me pose to you some of the same questions I have been trying to ask myself:

• Did you ever think you might one day get handcuffed, fingerprinted, and jailed for sharing the Gospel?
• Your plans for the future…what if they are all dashed because you lost your job because of your commitment to Jesus?
• If you ever did get arrested and convicted, have you thought how that would impact your current job and severely impact your prospects for finding other work?

These are scary questions, aren’t they? They would make the blood of any sane person run icy cold at the thought.  By the way, there are thousands of brothers and sisters in Christ who TODAY experience these things–and worse. Have you prayed for them lately?

While by no means trying to minimize (or sensationalize) what may lie ahead, it seemed to me most appropriate to take courage and comfort in Luther’s (translated) words.  Steve Green does a masterful job giving them voice:

A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing;
Our helper He, amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing:
For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe;
His craft and power are great, and, armed with cruel hate,
On earth is not his equal.

Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing;
Were not the right Man on our side, the Man of God’s own choosing:
Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He;
Lord Sabaoth, His Name, from age to age the same,
And He must win the battle.

And though this world, with devils filled, should threaten to undo us,
We will not fear, for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us:
The Prince of Darkness grim, we tremble not for him;
His rage we can endure, for lo, his doom is sure,
One little word shall fell him.

That word above all earthly powers, no thanks to them, abideth;
The Spirit and the gifts are ours through Him Who with us sideth:
Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also;
The body they may kill: God’s truth abideth still,
His kingdom is forever.

Posted: January 21st, 2009 under Challenge, Current Events, Evangelism, Hope, State of the Church, The Church, World Events, World Missions.
Comments: none

For every beast of the forest is Mine,
The cattle on a thousand hills.
I know every bird of the mountains,
And everything that moves in the field is Mine.
If I were hungry I would not tell you,
For the world is Mine, and all it contains.
- Psalm 50 :10-12

Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand,
And marked off the heavens by the span,
And calculated the dust of the earth by the measure,
And weighed the mountains in a balance
And the hills in a pair of scales?
- Isaiah 40:12

You, O LORD, rule forever;
Your throne is from generation to generation.
- Lamentations 5:19

The LORD reigns, He is clothed with majesty;
The LORD has clothed and girded Himself with strength;
Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved
- Psalm 93:1

In these historic uncertain economic times, when the president of the most powerful nation on earth has to announce that that nation’s “entire economy is in danger”, it is no small blessing to know that the Lord reigns.  Jesus’ glory and power are undiminished.  He is sovereign and in total control of absolutely everything.

Pray for our nation.  Pray for our leaders.  Pray for the Lord to receive the glory He deserves, no matter what.  Ask God for opportunities to lovingly share the gospel with people who may be under incredible stress and strain by all the uncertainty in the world.  Infinitely worse than financial ruin in this life is the spiritual ruin of someone spending eternity in hell.  If God is not willing that any should perish, how great a sin it is if we are.

Posted: September 25th, 2008 under Announcements, Challenge, Current Events, Encouragement, Evangelism, Scripture, World Events.
Comments: none

Did you see this?

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science/09/20/hadron.collider.damage.ap/index.html

Incidentally, did you see anything in the news that the super collider was dead *just 36 hours* after it was fired up?! No, you didn’t. That’s partly because the agency that boasted of it with such fanfare (CERN) didn’t announce the thing had broken until two days ago.

As for the thing failing, doesn’t surprise me at all, except for how quickly it did…and now they’ve done let their Lemon Law window close so they’re stuck with the thing.

Men set out to prove a big bang that never happened but Genesis 1:1 still stands. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Psalm 2 sums up how God doesn’t even have to lift a finger to show how foolish the “wisdom” of men is. In this case all He had to do is tell a couple of superconducting magnets to sieze up and they immediately obeyed.  No irreverance intended, but “Go God!” I think that is just the coolest

Dear scientists at CERN, this one’s for you:

Psalm 2
Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?
The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying,
Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the LORD shall have them in derision.
Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.
Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.
I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.
Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.
Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.
Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth.
Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.

Posted: September 21st, 2008 under Apologetics, Creation/Evolution, Current Events, Scripture, World Events.
Comments: none

So goes the headline to this article put out Saturday by the Associated Press.

The article is a stark look at the American landscape from politics, the economy, floods, and even the great gods of sports and entertainment. It is a good, concise article but one almost gets the feeling they left out more problems (like failing education, crime, and even the general lack of civility toward one’s fellow man these days) on purpose so as not to totally inundate John and Joan Q. Public with the realities of our times.

The last third of the article almost tries to end on a positive note, recalling the historical rebounds after similar times of upheaval. (One could even debate whether those times could be considered similar.) It ends with this thought, “maybe this is what the 21st century will be about — a great unraveling of some things long taken for granted.”

At the bottom of the article I followed a link to a Time magazine piece that discusses the fact that, according to The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life,

“70% of [survey] respondents agreed with the statement ‘Many religions can lead to eternal life.’ Even more remarkable was the fact that 57% of Evangelical Christians were willing to accept that theirs might not be the only path to salvation.”

Hmmm…coincidence? Other than the Lord, who can truly say? But when our hearts are set on the Lord, His Word promises peace, even joy, despite the despair that surrounds. Christian, your dependence upon the Lord in these times, and the resulting calm He gives, can be evidences used by Him to share the power of the gospel with those around you.  May these words from Horatio Spafford’s “It Is Well with My Soul” encourage you:

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

It is well, with my soul,
It is well, with my soul,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
Let this blest assurance control,
That Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
And hath shed His own blood for my soul.

Reader, if you don’t know Christ and are troubled by what you are bombarded by in the news, if you repent today, casting yourself at His feet and asking for His mercy and forgiveness, you too can have a part in His joy and peace and then you can say with this song, “It is well with my soul.”

Posted: June 23rd, 2008 under Current Events, State of the Church, World Events.
Comments: none