I was really hoping that I would begin to regularly post here again - sadly, it seems that there is simply no way to be regular as far my attendance to this blog. As you know, I am a bi-vocational pastor, and our church has grown some; add to that the fact that my secular job has picked up, and I find more tasks than hours in a day.
However, I do occasionally get an opportunity to stop by here and drop a line.
I don't know how some of these other pastors come up with something brilliant everyday AND then post it! I am in awe of those folks! God has given us all gifts; regularity and the brilliance do not appear to be mine!
Anyway - enough of that - coming up in the next month is the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (November 9th & 16th); I would ask that you pray for the persecuted church. This is very near and dear to my heart as I have very good friends in India right now (they are indigenous pastors), and they are feeling increasing hostility. Likewise, I have a friend in Congo and it is not good there either.
And we should not forget Mosul, Vietnam, or any of the other places where Christians pay for their faith with their lives and/or freedom. I am writing this primarily to my friends in the USA and Canada as that is the cultural milieu that I find myself in.
Next month our church will be focused on the Persecuted Church. Besides preaching on the subject, we will enjoy a week when Wycliffe Bible Translators will speak, and then a friend of mine from E3 Sudan will update us on the situation in Sudan.
The Western Church operates in relative freedom, (although they want to decry how 'persecuted' they are!), and is often so inwardly focused, that I really want to urge each and every person to remember their brothers and sisters who are suffering for their faith in lands that seem so far away. We operate in ease here, both economically and religiously, yet all we do is complain about both, without really understanding what true suffering is. I would pray that this would change as the USA Christians turn their attention to those in lands where Christianity is a punishable offense.
There is much more I could write here, but go to the below websites - they say it better than I could.
Some websites:
Voice of the Martyrs
International Christian Concern
International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church
