Christians Attacked on False Charges

Posted on January 15, 2012 by jacob

Hindu radicals armed with sticks and iron bars attacked 20 Pentecostal Christians in a private home in Anekal, near Bangalore.

The Hindutva nationalists accused the Christians of forced conversions. In the attack, Pastor Shanthakumar Srirangam, of the Agape Church, lost a finger of his left hand, while Vijay – a believer – was seriously injured in the leg.Even a woman, Mrs. Yashodamma, was attacked, resulting in a head injury, and perhaps permanent damage to a nerve of the right hand.

For Sajan K. George, President of the Global Council of Indian Christians, “such a severe and unjustified aggression against innocent Christians is a serious violation of human rights and religious freedom. For the Christian minority of Karnataka, 2012 has begun in terror. ”

After the attack, Christians called the local police at Sarjapur. The police registered the case and accompanied the wounded to the state hospital, but have yet launch an investigation. Full Story

Warfare

Posted on January 14, 2012 by malcolm

Nahum 3:14 Draw water for the siege, strengthen your defenses! Work the clay, tread the mortar, repair the brickwork!

Deuteronomy 20:12 If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city.

2 Corinthians 10:3 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does.

Psalm 44:6-7 I do not trust in my bow, my sword does not bring me victory; but you give us victory over our enemies, you put our adversaries to shame.

2 Timothy 2:3 Endure hardship with us like a good soldier of Christ Jesus.

Psalm 144:1 Praise be to the LORD my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle.

1 Timothy 6:12 Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses.

Convert from Islam Whipped

Posted on January 12, 2012 by jacob

A Somali convert from Islam was paraded before a cheering crowd last month and publicly flogged as a punishment for embracing a “foreign religion,” sources said.

Sofia Osman, a 28-year-old Christian from Janale city in Somali’as Lower Shabelle region, had been taken into custody by Islamic extremist al Shabaab militants in November; the public whipping was meant to mark her release. She received 40 lashes on Dec. 22 while jeered by spectators.

“Osman was whipped 40 lashes at 3 p.m., but she didn’t tell what other humiliations she had suffered while in the hands of the militants,” an eyewitness, told Compass, adding that whipping left her bleeding. “I saw her faint. I thought she had died, but soon she regained consciousness and her family took her away.”

The whipping was administered in front of hundreds of spectators after Osman was released from her month-long custody in al Shabaab camps. Nursing her injuries at her family’s home, in the days after the punishment she would not talk to anyone and looked dazed, a source close in touch with the family said. She has since been relocated.

“Please pray for her quick recovery,” the source said. Full Story

An Instrument of Death

Posted on January 11, 2012 by malcolm

“An instrument of life would not serve its purpose if it did not minister life. An instrument of death would be falsely named if it kept people alive rather than killing them….The point is not to know how you are to be kept alive, but how you are to lose everything and die.”

Francois Fenelon

Pregnant Woman Beaten in Pakistani Jail Granted Bail

Posted on January 8, 2012 by jacob

A judge this month granted bail to a Christian woman falsely charged with theft in Abbottabad after police failed to produce evidence incriminating her, she said.

Salma Emmanuel, 30, was freed on bail on Dec. 8. She and her husband were severely beaten for three days when they refused to confess, and she was taken to a hospital in critical condition on Nov. 7, the life of her unborn child also threatened.

The couple lost their life savings – gold ornaments of 100 grams – and both have lost their jobs as a result of the false charges and are depending on relatives to cover their living expenses, she said. “My husband goes out every day to find work but has been unsuccessful so far,” she said.

“This Christmas we didn’t have money to buy clothes for our children, and neither did we have any explanation to make them understand why we were so helpless. But we have witnessed the mercy of the Lord and have faith that this time shall pass, too.” The couple has three children – the oldest 12, the youngest 5. Full Story

Things

Posted on January 8, 2012 by thomas

Our woes began when God was forced out of His central shrine and `things’ were allowed to enter. Within the human heart `things’ have taken over. Men have now by nature no peace within their hearts, for God is crowned there no longer, but there in the moral dusk stubborn and aggressive usurpers fight among themselves for first place on the throne.

This is not a mere metaphor, but an accurate analysis of our real spiritual trouble. There is within the human heart a tough fibrous root of fallen life whose nature is to possess, always to possess. It covets `things’ with a deep and fierce passion. The pronouns `my’ and `mine’ look innocent enough in print, but their constant and universal use is significant. They express the real nature of the old Adamic man better than a thousand volumes of theology could do. They are verbal symptoms of our deep disease. The roots of our hearts have grown down into things, and we dare not pull up one rootlet lest we die. Things have become necessary to us, a development never originally intended. God’s gifts now take the place of God, and the whole course of nature is upset by the monstrous substitution.

Our Lord referred to this tyranny of things when He said to His disciples, `If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake shall find it.’ (Matt. 16:24-25).

–A.W. Tozer

Sheep

Posted on January 7, 2012 by malcolm

John 10:27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.

John 10:1 I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber.

Deuteronomy 22:1 If you see your brother’s ox or sheep straying, do not ignore it but be sure to take it back to him.

1 Samuel 15:14 But Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?”

Psalm 119:176 I have strayed like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I have not forgotten your commands.

Matthew 25:32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

Matthew 10:16 I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.

Fear This Grace

Posted on January 4, 2012 by malcolm

“It is more profitable for you and safer to conceal the grace of devotion; not to lift yourself on high, nor to speak much thereof, or to dwell much thereon; but rather to despise yourself, and to fear this grace, as given to one unworthy of it.”

Thomas a Kempis

Truth vs. Lies

Posted on December 31, 2011 by malcolm

Psalm 45:4 In your majesty ride forth victoriously in behalf of truth, humility and righteousness; let your right hand display awesome deeds.

Psalm 12:2 Everyone lies to his neighbor; their flattering lips speak with deception.

1 John 1:6 If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth.

Psalm 5:6 You destroy those who tell lies; bloodthirsty and deceitful men the LORD abhors.

Jeremiah 5:3 O LORD, do not your eyes look for truth? You struck them, but they felt no pain; you crushed them, but they refused correction. They made their faces harder than stone and refused to repent.

Proverbs 30:8 Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread.

2 John 1:3 Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, the Father’s Son, will be with us in truth and love.

I Was Deceiving Myself

Posted on December 28, 2011 by malcolm

“Did not Jesus say, ‘If anyone comes to me and does not hate … even his own life” – and by that He means our ego, our sinful self – “he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26)? I was deceiving myself! I thought I was a disciple of Jesus, but I really was not, because I did not have a hatred towards sin. At this time, more than thirty years ago, God suddenly opened my eyes and let me see what sin was all about. It has to be hated so much that Jesus says it is better to pluck out our eyes rather than give room to sin and tolerate it in ourselves. It would be better to cut off our hands than to tolerate what is evil and sinful.”

Basilea Schlink

Sound Doctrine Church

Keeping the traditions of the cross (2 Thessalonians 3:6)