US Store Stands Its Ground to keep Christian-Themed Christmas Window Display

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US Store Stands Its Ground to keep Christian-Themed Christmas Window Display

A Maine furniture store has been receiving some negative feedback after decorating one of its windows with a religious Christmas theme.

Discount Mattress and Furniture at the Airport Mall painted its windows with a nativity scene and the caption, “Jesus is the reason for the season.” While it seemed like a normal Christmas display to some customers, others did not like the display of faith.

“(Customers have been) asking us to take them down. Saying we were mixing our business with religion. Saying it was offensive…saying they wouldn’t shop here, nor would their friends shop here,” said store owner Kathy Harvey.

Harvey said they eventually went on their store’s Facebook page and said the store was going to stand firm on the window displays.

“To those that asked us to take the scene down…we are sorry that you don’t believe as we do, but the windows are staying as displayed until Jan. 1. If our sales decline due to our window scenes then we will shut our doors and still give the glory to the Lord,” said the Facebook status.

Harvey said she does believe Jesus is the reason for the season. Christmas is a religious holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ. She said the store is simply asking for people to be tolerant of one another and their faiths.

“We think everyone should be tolerant of everyone’s beliefs,” said Harvey.

Their Facebook page has been flooded with opinions about the matter. Some have said they support the store’s right to free speech at a private business, despite the beliefs behind it…Read More

Source and Original Content by BCNN1

Facebook Launches Stickered for Messenger for Android

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Facebook Launches Stickered for Messenger for Android

Facebook, right around the holidays, has launched a Messenger spinoff app named Stickered for Messenger. The app deals largely with emoticon stickers used in the Facebook Messenger app, and lets users use them as overlays on their snapshots.

Stickered for Messenger app includes 52 categories of emoticons including Pikachu (Pokemon character), Teletubbies, Burgerhead man and more. The app, besides a Facebook ‘Like’ button sticker, additionally features a much needed and asked for ‘Dislike’ sticker with a thumbs-down. Users can drag, pinch, stretch and rotate stickers on the clicked image.

The ad-free app does not require a Facebook login. Stickered for Messenger is available to download from Google Play and is currently awaiting Apple’s approval to reach the App Store.

Stickered for Messenger however is not a standalone app, and requires Messenger to be able to send images to Facebook friends. Users can also add captions, and even apply stickers before the shot is taken with the app’s built-in camera. Users can decorate images already present in their gallery as well, and there is no limit to how many stickers can be applied in one image.

Facebook’s move to introduce a separate app for a feature that could very well have been integrated in Messenger is curious, and we may see the company bring it in as a feature if it becomes popular. Facebook Messenger last month reached the 500 million monthly active users milestone.

The social media giant, after testing the option to post Facebook Messenger exclusive stickers in Facebook comments for a couple of months, made the feature official in October. The social giant announced that stickers will be available in comments on users’ Timelines, in Groups, and also in Events.

Facebook might also introduce peer-to-peer payment system via its Messenger app soon. A Stanford computer science student Andrew Aude who reportedly used an iOS app exploration developer tool called Cycript spotted the alleged feature. As per the report, the peer-to-peer money transfer feature in the Facebook Messenger will reportedly allow users to send money with their debit cards much like Square’s Cash app. Facebook however, is yet to officially announce the feature.

Source and Original Content by NDTV

Pastors Who Are Poor Are Not Divinely Called by God

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Pastors Who Are Poor Are Not Divinely Called by God

Dr Uma Ukpai, the president and founder of Uma Ukpai Evangelistic Association, has said poor men of God did not receive divine calling.

He also told Daily Independent that it was untrue that people resorted to Church establishment out of joblessness.

According to Ukpai, “Jesus calls church business. He said, ‘I am about my father’s business’. He called church work business and what is business? Business is investment plus gain, minus loss. In church planting, no pastor can collect offering without giving account and survive. Every church has elders and the job of the elders is to make sure that account is given; it is not even publicly but given internally but the account must be given.

“Church is all about investment and the gain they make is not in money but in people; that is the gain they make. People also can be called money because for instance, if a pastor’s ministry can cause 20 women to get pregnant; those women will not forget the pastor. If a pastor’s ministry can produce one of the richest 10 men in the country, those men will not forget the man who made them what they are.

“When you are into ministry and you have what we call anointing, you have become profitable; you begin to touch lives; you begin to bless people; you begin to change the stories of families and your own story will change also because the man that waters others shall be watered by God. There is so much misinformation about the church. It is not all about money. If your pastor has anointing that can make the blind see, cripples walk, leprosy to disappear, that pastor is in money.

“The only man you can worry about is a man who has no anointing; a man who God has rejected; a pastor who God has not approved what he is doing. God does not bless what he does not approve. If God approves what a pastor is doing, he will have more money than he can spend. I am an example.”

On the forthcoming general elections vis-a-vis the challenges of Boko Haram insurgency, Ukpai said the crisis was part of Nigerian culture…Read More

Source and Original Content by BCNN1

Pro-Homosexual Bakeries Refuse Christian’s Cake Order

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Pro-Homosexual Bakeries Refuse Christian’s Cake Order

Over a dozen pro-homosexual bakeries refused to fulfill a Christian’s order for a cake bearing the message “Gay Marriage Is Wrong” in an experiment meant to see if such bakeries would accept orders against their beliefs just as they expect of Christians.

As previously reported, in May of this year, Ashers Baking Company in Newtonabbey, North Ireland—founded by Christians and named after Genesis 49:20—was approached by a same-sex “marriage” supporter to bake a cake bearing the phrase “Support Gay Marriage,” which also was to feature the logo for the homosexual advocacy group QueerSpace.

When the bakery declined, the customer reported Ashers Baking Company to the Equality Commission of Northern Ireland, which in turn sent a warning to to McArthur, stating that he and his bakery had discriminated against Lee. The bakery was ordered to either pay or face legal action.

In light of the incident, and other similar situations that have been reported across America, Theodore Shoebat of Shoebat.com decided to call 13 homosexual-owned or pro-homosexual bakeries to ask if they would make a cake for a “traditional marriage celebration” that bore the message “Gay Marriage Is Wrong.” Not one of them agreed to make the cake.

“We’re a gay cookie shop, so I don’t think that’s going to work,” one replied.

“I apologize but we don’t support that,” another said, “because half of our staff is gay.”

“We don’t really support that or agree with that, so I’m going to have to say no,” a third stated…Read More

Source and Original Content by CNN

Pakistan’s Interior Minister Issues Warning of Attack by Islamic Militants on Christians

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Pakistan’s Interior Minister Issues Warning of Attack by Islamic Militants on Christians

Pakistan’s Interior Minister has said Islamic militants are planning another terrorist attack.

Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan’s warning came as Christians gathered for a prayer service to remember of a Taliban massacre at a school that left 132 children dead.

“We are receiving intelligence from across the country that the militants are getting ready for another savage and inhuman counter attack. All of us need to be on the alert,” the minister said.

There have been a number of brutal attacks on Christians in Pakistan recently.

The attack on the school was not thought to be directly aimed at Christianity, though.

Speaking to Reuters Babar Masih, a local Christian, said: “As human beings we have been so greatly saddened by this incident that we do not have the words to describe our grief.

“The children who were killed were angels; they have awakened people by their sacrifice.”

Source and Original Content by Premier Christian Radio

Hindu Leader Vows to continue Conversions of Muslims and Christians in India

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Hindu Leader Vows to continue Conversions of Muslims and Christians in India

The head of India’s most powerful Hindu group vowed to press ahead with a campaign to convert Muslims and Christians to Hinduism, stoking a sensitive debate that has stalled parliament and threatened the prime minister’s economic reform agenda.

Mohan Bhagwat of the right-wing Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, which is also the ideological wing of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party, said India was a “Hindu nation” where many Hindus had been forcibly converted to other religions.

“We will bring back those who have lost their way. They did not go on their own,” Bhagwat said in a speech late on Saturday. “They were lured into leaving.”

Bhagwat’s comments came after Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party said it did not support forced religious conversions and called for an anti-conversion law.

India’s 1.2 billion people are predominantly Hindus but there are also about 160 million Muslims and a small proportion of Christians.

Modi is under fire for being slow to rein in hardline affiliate groups that have been accused of promoting a Hindu-dominant agenda that includes luring Muslims and Christians to convert to Hinduism.

This month, a group of Muslims complained that they had been tricked into attending a conversion ceremony by Hindu groups, while a Hindu priest-turned-lawmaker of the ruling party planned a conversion ceremony on Christmas Day, although it was canceled after the prime minister intervened.

Supporters define such events as a “homecoming”, saying that families signing up for the ceremonies were originally Hindus.

“We don’t want to convert anybody … but then Hindus should also not be converted,” Bhagwat said, adding that those who do not support religious conversions should bring in a law against it.

Bhagwat’s comments are likely to further irk opposition parties that have disrupted parliament over the conversion issue, demanding that the prime minister himself make a statement on the issue in the upper house.

Although Modi has privately warned lawmakers in his party to back off from controversial issues such as the conversion campaign, he has so far not made any official statement on the subject, leaving it to colleagues to fend off criticism.

Source and Original Content by CT

Corruption in Nigeria, even in Churches, Ushers Steal from Offerings

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Corruption in Nigeria, even in Churches, Ushers Steal from Offerings

ANTI – corruption preacher and Deputy National President (South South) Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigerian (PFN), Rev. Simeon Okah has said corruption is so endemic in Nigeria that even in churches, ushers steal from tithes and offerings.

Okah, founder and General Overseer of Flocks of Christ Mission, spoke on the new phase of his anti-corruption crusade as well as the security and political situation in Nigeria during an end of year press briefing at the church’s headquarter in Warri, Delta state.

He said, “Corruption has eaten so deep into the society that it is no just about politicians alone. In the church, you have to almost always pray with one eye opened because in some of the places, even some ushers and finance people steal the offerings. It is terrible.”

On perceived failure of the President Goodluck Jonathan to fight corruption in his government, he said there is hope for drastic change if Nigerians give the president a second chance to control the government.

“I agree that the President is surrounded by a lot of corrupt people and it is like when he removes one bad egg, he replaces with two bad eggs. But I have no doubt that the president is a favored child and he has the magic wand to make change.

“I believe he is being limited presently by the way he came in and the challenges of security being faced by his government and there the lure to please all sides. The moment he is returned for another term, things would not be same again. He is going to make the difference”‘ Okah said.

He added that those wishing Nigeria to break up in 2015 will be disappointed, adding that no break up will occur as the elections will come and go successfully, and “this a divine appraisal.”

Egyptian Govt Urged to free Christian Convert

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Egyptian Govt Urged to free Christian Convert

Several members of the United States’ Congress are calling on the Egyptian attorney general to free a Coptic Christian convert from Islam who was jailed by Egyptian authorities more than a year ago.

In a letter the politicians claim Bishoy Armia Boulous was jailed on charges “clearly related to his religious conversion” and that he has “reportedly been harassed and physically attacked on several occasions by officials of the Tora Prison in South Cairo.”

Sent to Attorney General Hisham Barakat and President el-Sisi, the letter goes on to say: “The dropping of all charges against Mr. Boulous and his swift release will help to demonstrate not only your administration’s commitment to equal protection under the law…but that millions of men and women across Egypt need not fear government prosecution simply for choosing to change their religious beliefs.”

Mr Boulous gained widespread attention in 2007 when he became the first known citizen to sue the Egyptian government for refusing to change the religious affiliation listed on his identification card from Muslim to Christian.

After his case became public several religious leaders called for his death.

In 2009 he was charged with blasphemy, or “defaming Islam,” a charge that has since been renewed. Bishoy’s next hearing is set to take place on December 28.

International Christian Concern Advocacy Director, Isaac Six, said: “This letter could not be more timely. For years Bishoy has suffered unimaginable hardship because of his courageous decision to demand a simple freedom that should be guaranteed, namely the right to change one’s faith.

“We applaud these members of Congress for taking a strong stance on behalf of Bishoy and echo their call for his swift release.

“How can the Egyptian government claim to protect its citizens’ rights to freedom of belief when anyone who attempts to change their faith is refused official recognition and subsequently prosecuted and tortured? The answer is, they can’t.

Source and Original Content by Premier Christian Radio

Ex-Muslim Priest Urges Muslims to Convert to avoid Hell Fire

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Ex-Muslim Priest Urges Muslims to Convert to avoid Hell Fire

While I was working in a muslim mosque as an imam, as a parish priest, I preach in my parish that Jesus Christ is not God, for me, God was only Allah, and I believed Allah never got married, so no sons for Allah. So I preached there that Jesus is not God. Then somebody ask me, who is Jesus?’’ from the crowd. Maybe a muslim, but he asked me, who is Jesus?’’ I was preaching he is not God, but the question is who is he? To know who is Jesus? I read the entire Koran once again: 114 chapters, 6666 in the Koran when I read it, the name of prophet Muhammad.

I found it in Koran 4 places, but the name of Jesus I found in 25 places. There itself, I was a little confused. Why does the Koran give more preference to Jesus? And second thing, I could not see any woman’s name in Koran: the Prophet Muhammad’s mother’s name, or wife’s name, no, in the Koran, there is only one woman’s name that i found is Mariam, the mother of Jesus no other woman’s name. And in the holy Koran chapter 3, the name of the chapter is family of Mariam,’’ and holy Koran chapter 19, the name of the chapter itself is ‘’MARIAM’’ one chapter is ‘’MARIAM’’ so I was very curious to know why does Koran says all these things about MARIAM, holy Koran chapter 3 verse 34 onwards says that Mary was born without original sin, she never committed any sin in her life, she was ever virgin.

Koran chapter 50 verses 23 say that she went to heaven with her physical body. Even the assumption is writing in the holy Koran and then about Jesus, when I read chapter 3 verses 45 to 55 verses, there is 10 point which the Koran makes about Jesus. The first thing Koran says (kallimatulli) the arabic word which means ‘’the of God’’ and second thing is ( ahimokuli ) which mean spirit of God and the third (isa masi) which means Jesus Christ so Koran give the name for Jesus WORD OF GOD, SPIRIT OF GOD, JESUS CHRIST. And then Koran says that Jesus spoke when he was very small, like 2 days old. after his birth he began to speak , Koran says that Jesus created a live bird with mud. He took some mud, he formed a bird; when breathed into it, it became a live bird. So I think Jesus can give life because he gave life to mud, clay, and then Koran says that Jesus cured a man born blind and a man with leprosy, e.t.c

Curiously, the Koran says that Jesus gave life to dead people; Jesus went to heaven; he is still alive and he will come again. When I saw all these things in the Koran I taught of what Koran says about Muhammad, according to the Koran, prophet Muhammad is not the word of God, not spirit of God he never spoke when he was 2 days old, he never created any bird with mud, he never cure any sick people, he never raised any dead people, he himself died, and according to Islam he is not alive and he will not come back.

So there is a lot of different between these two prophets. I didn’t call Jesus, God, you know my idea was ‘’He is a prophet but he is a prophet greater than Muhammad; so one day I went to my teacher, the one who taught me 10 years in Arabic college, and I ask him, teacher, how did God created the universe? Then he said God created the universe through the word,’’ THROUGH THE WORD. Then my question is: ‘’WORD’’ is creator or creation? He must clear this, my question is whether the WORD of God is creator or creation. Koran says Jesus is WORD of God. If my teacher says word of God is creator, which means Jesus is the creator, then muslim must become Christian suppose if he says the word is creation he will be trapped. You know why? He said everything was created through the word. Suppose if he said the word is creation, then how did God created the word? So he cannot say that the word is creator, or creation, so he was quite angry he push me out of his room and said word is not God, not creator or the creation you get out of here, ‘’he said

The reason why Muslim doesn’t accept to be Christian is because they are blinded with the wrong teaching of their priest, Imam. They said that the word is creation they try to prove it wrongly…… they say the word is not creator, not the creation, but not God. And no creation also. They don’t equal with God, that all their problem. So when he said that I told my teacher, word is not the creator or the creation.’’ So, that is why Christian says the word is son of God. Then he told me if there is son for God, I must show him the wife of God.

That without wife no chance of having a son then I showed him a portion from the Koran. Koran says that God can see without eyes, God can talk without tongue, God can hear without ears. It is writing in the Koran. I said if that is the case, so God can have a child without a wife. I took my Koran, I put it on my chest, and I said ‘’Allah’’, tell me what I should do because your Koran says Jesus is still alive, and Mohammad is no more. Tell me whom should I accept.’’ after my prayer I opened the Koran, I didn’t asked anyone, I asked only my Allah. When I opened Koran, I saw chapter 10 verses 94. You know what Koran says? It says if you have any doubt in this Koran which I give to you, go and read the Bible, or ask the people, those who read the Bible. The truth is already revealing that.

I beg all muslim to give their life to Christ because he is the only way to the kingdom of God. Please don’t perish like other muslims that is serving the god they do not know. I welcome you into Christ Jesus as you change your mind to accept him today. God bless you.

Source and Original Content by Just Gospel

Kenyan Christian NGOs hit by Anti- Terror Laws

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Kenyan Christian NGOs hit by Anti- Terror Laws

Several Christian charities are among 510 non-governmental organisations that have been shut down in Kenya.

New ‘anti-terror laws’ have allowed the government to deregister the groups, freeze their bank accounts and remove the work permits of foreign employees.

The measures were introduced after an increasing number of attacks from Islamist militants at the al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab group.

Last month Al Shabab killed 64 people, mostly Christian, in two separate attacks.

But the new laws faced fierce criticism and at one point sparked a punch fight in the Kenyan parliament.

Henry Ochido, the deputy head of the government-appointed NGO Co-ordination Board, said the NGOs had lost their position because they had failed to submit financial records.

He told the BBC 15 of the 510 were suspected of money-laundering and financing “terrorism,” but he refused to name them.

Many people in Kenya fear the government is using the threat posed by militant Islam to restrict freedom.

The AFP news agency says many of the charities are Christian although it’s understood none are from the UK.

Fazul Mahamed, the executive director of the board, told Kenya’s privately owned Standard newspaper: “The NGOs with accounting issues can only be allowed to operate if they successfully go through a thorough vetting process. Otherwise, they will remain deregistered indefinitely.”

Source and Original Content by Premier Christian Radio

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