PERSECUTION: “I AM WITH YOU ALWAYS” March 9 Read Deuteronomy 25:1 through 27:26 Adapted from The LIVE/DEAD Journal, Day 9 by Kevin Smith; Somalia, Eritrea, Djibouti & Kenya Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds. James 1:2 (NIV 2004) Thomas (not his real name) was one of the Bible–school students we taught in Eritrea. He was an amazing evangelist. Everywhere he went, people came to Jesus. One day he was forcefully drafted into the military. Security officials took him to a training camp, took away his Bible, forced him to stop praying with others, and told him to stop witnessing. Thomas wouldn’t stop witnessing, even after being threatened by his commanders. He dared to tell them what Jesus could do for them! Finally they imprisoned him and tortured him, hoping to shut him up. They pushed him facedown in the dirt, took a wire cord, tied his arms to his legs behind his back in a figure eight, and wrenched him into agonizing pain. They left him like that in the blazing sun for hours. The cord cut off his blood circulation, and in three hours his lower arm swelled to four times its normal size. Days later, gangrene set in, and the doctors decided they had to amputate to save his life. Just before the operation, the infection burst through his skin, rendering his fingers permanently immobile and leaving a huge scar on his forearm. Many others like Thomas are tortured to force their denial of Jesus. They have refused, stating: “No, I will not give Him up. Jesus died for me; now I will die for him!” These men and women are powerful. Why? We believe it is because of the words of Jesus in Matthew 28:20: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (NASB). Power in persecution comes from intimacy with Jesus, a sense of nearness that is felt most keenly in the hour of persecution. Another brother, Matthew (not his real name), described to me the horrors of being imprisoned for more than two years in a metal shipping container in Assab, a port town on the Red Sea. Heat indexes reached 140 degrees Fahrenheit, and he would bake inside that container. He was thrown a dry piece of bread and granted only a tiny cup of water each day. Once a day he was let out to relieve himself on the sparse, desert ground, suffering humiliation while his torturers looked on, mocking and jeering, asking him where his Jesus was now. With tears in my eyes, I wondered out loud how he could have borne such persecution. Matthew leaned across the table, half–standing with his face close to mine, and said, “Kevin, never have I felt so close to Jesus as when he was with me in that prison!” The power in persecution is the presence of Jesus Christ Himself! Harun, the leader of the national church, knew his days of freedom were numbered, so he began to teach his children what it means to be persecuted and how Christians are to respond. His kids were the same age as my own: 8, 5, and 2 years. Early one morning before the sun rose, soldiers came to his house and took him away. John, his 5–year–old son, was the first to wake up. When he realized Daddy was gone, he cried and wailed so loudly that his 8–year–old sister, Salome, was awakened. Putting her arms around her younger brother, she comforted him, saying, “No, John, no! Father taught us to count it all joy to suffer for Jesus. We must not cry; we must shout for joy!” Salome let out a yell that morning that could not and will not be overcome by any demonic power. We have much to learn from 8–year–old Salome’s faith in an ever–present Jesus. “I am with you always!” Harun has been imprisoned since 2004 and has not been home to see his children grow. His last words to me were, “Kevin, ask our brothers and sisters to pray for us; not that we should be free from this persecution, but that we will stand up boldly under it and proclaim Christ as we should.” Live Dead Challenge It is humbling to personally know believers who have been and are continually tortured, persecuted, and imprisoned for loving Jesus and refusing to stop living out their love for Him. Today, Marxist Eritrea is one of the most difficult countries to access with the gospel. Would you spend time today praying for Eritrea? Pray for the persecuted believers there who continue to bravely suffer for Jesus. Pray that God would send missionaries to the unreached peoples of Eritrea. In what ways are you embarrassed of Christ? Look today for some way you can stand up for Him. Ask Jesus if He would grace you with the opportunity to suffer for His name today. Today, what is my response to persecution? Unreached People Group: Nubians The Nubians of northern Sudan and southern Egypt are the descendants of the great kingdom of Kush. Kush was a powerful kingdom in Old Testament times, ruling Egypt (the Black Pharaohs of the 25th dynasty). Under Taharqa, they even pushed up into Israel to confront the Assyrians. Moses’ second wife, the man who rescued Jeremiah from the miry clay, the runner (poor man) who got outrun to take David news, and, of course, the eunuch of Acts 8 fame—all were Nubians. African Christianity, in fact, was Nubian–born. By the 15th century Islam had overrun the Christian kingdoms of Nubia, and by the 20th century almost all traces of Christianity were covered by sand. But not all. Nubians still take their newborns to the river and make the sign of the cross in water on their foreheads. When asked why, they shrug and say, “We don’t know. That is what our ancestors did.” Nubians are proud of their heritage, and the Nubian gate is distinct and ornate. Every time you knock on a door, would you pray that the door of Nubian hearts would be opened again to the Savior they have neglected and forgotten?
Posted on: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 12:30:11 +0000
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