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Over 260 million Christians live in places with high levels of persecution. Every day they face danger and struggles, yet most of the West is ignorant or indifferent. Why?

Todd Nettleton with Voice of the Martyrs, USA says the problem is two-fold. There are problems both with the Church and the government.

1 Corinthians 12 talks about the Body of Christ. The Church should be eagerly watching and caring for every member. However, often the Church does not see or seek out those actively suffering with persecution.

Nettleton says, “It’s a misapplication of Scripture, which calls us when one part of the body is suffering, the other parts of the body are supposed to feel that. If we are cut off, [we] can’t feel that and so there’s the aspect of the Church and why doesn’t the Church pay more attention?”

Some of that answer may be ignorance. Voice of the Martyrs, USA seeks to change that. One of their purposes is, “To promote the fellowship of all believers by informing the world of the faith and courage of persecuted Christians, thereby inspiring believers to a deeper level of commitment to Christ and involvement in His Great Commission.”

However, the Church is not alone in a quiet response.

Government leaders do not often actively pursue these issues for several reasons. Nettleton details two of those reasons.

SOURCE: Mission Network News, Anna Deckert

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The Pakistani government made 39 innocent Christians pay a large sum of blood money, known as a diya, before releasing them from prison.

“There was no evidence against [these Christians],” says Bruce Allen of FMI. “But [the government] said, ‘hey, if we can get diya paid to the victims’ families, then the judge is absolutely free to commute a sentence and release these prisoners.’”

And over 193,000 US dollars (the equivalent of the sum paid) was paid as diya, or blood money. Allen says this payment is a part of Islamic law in Pakistan, and that it doesn’t mean the men have been considered guilty of committing the crime.

But the families of the Christians never could have paid this price. Allen says most Christians in Pakistan are impoverished, and these families especially so, since their husbands couldn’t earn any money.

Allen says, “These were charitable donations most likely from overseas, where people said, ‘if we know that the judge is considering the payment, then we want to help these families out to do this.’”

Irfan Bashir Masih, one of the Christians released, said that he was not even present when the two Muslim men were killed. He had no hope that he would see his family again until the money was paid. Read more here.

SOURCE: Mission Network News, Kevin Zeller

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In West Africa, a region plagued by military coups and Islamic terrorism, Senegal stands as a pillar of peace and stability. How to pray for West Africa.

Some analysts attribute these traits to the widespread influence of Sufi Islam; Muslims comprise 90- to 95-percent of the country’s population. Among the Wolof people, one of Senegal’s largest ethnic groups, that percentage is even higher.

While these factors support stability, they also challenge Gospel growth.

“The literature really is the major way of sharing the Gospel individually,” Helen Williams of World Missionary Press says about New Testaments and Scripture booklets in widely-used languages.

“[However], one of the things about Senegal – because it is so closely tied to Islam and the Muslim culture – you have to develop relationships with people before they will trust you to accept something,” she explains.

“Much of it has to do with people not wanting to be seen with a Christian.”

World Missionary Press partners with Every Home for Christ and one of the few evangelical believers in Senegal to make God’s Word known. More about that here; the “partner profile” is at the bottom of the page.

“He’s from the Wolof tribe and he came to Christ after some family issues and struggles,” Williams says of WMP’s national coordinator.

The Wolof people remain highly unreached. There are many efforts underway to introduce the Wolof to Christ, but they have little known progress. WMP is striving to equip their partner so he can prayerfully make inroads in the Wolof community.

SOURCE: Mission Network News, 

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Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) is taking Vacation Bible School to the skies! Well, figuratively. MAF has created a brand new VBS program called SOAR!. Kids get a daily flight plan, learn about unique places around the world, and learn about God’s mission for their lives.

MAF’s Director of Learning and Development Mike Snodgrass says, “We feel like we have a really good story to tell about how MAF partners with other mission agencies to share the love of Jesus in really isolated areas around the world.

“We also know and feel that the SOAR! program that we’ve created is unique because of our focus on missions throughout the whole week, not just a part of the VBS. Currently, there’s really no VBS that’s focused entirely on missions and especially not mission aviation.”

MAF serves people in isolated and hard-to-reach areas with the love of Jesus through aviation. They often work with other ministries and non-profits to provide things like emergency aid and medical or teaching services.

Since they are in the heart of the missions world and work in so many different areas, it was natural for MAF to spearhead a VBS focused on the Great Commission.

With SOAR!, Snodgrass says, “Number one, it’s all about the kids because we know that that’s the focus of any VBS. We want kids to discover who Jesus is and ultimately accept Him as their Lord and Savior.

“We also want to let kids learn about the Great Commission. A lot of kids just don’t know about missions work in general.

SOURCE: Mission Network News, Lyndsey Koh

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At the time of this writing, this coronavirus, now classified as COVID-19, has officially resulted in over 60,000 proven infections with more than 1,300 deaths. The true numbers are without a doubt much more, as many have died at home and no report was made to the authorities, and the numbers will probably exponentially increase before it is brought under control.

In Hong Kong, while there have been 50 proven infections with only one death to date, the whole city is on lockdown and probably over 99% are wearing face masks in public places including church meetings. The borders to China have been effectively closed and everyone coming from China, including HK citizens, must be quarantined for two weeks; all schools have been canceled; and all civil servants and many in other professions such as those working with banks work from home.

There has been panic buying and illegal price increases of face masks, which are in short supply, and other items such as toilet paper, sanitary items and even rice. These are not in short supply, but fake news and false rumors resulted in panic buying.

But for the church, this has been a blessing in disguise, and a great opportunity to pray and spread the gospel. There have been many citywide prayer meetings in which Christians from all groups and different denominations gather to pray and worship, thus resulting in more unity. Prayer meetings in most churches are much better attended than previously.

Many Christians and local churches are using this as an opportunity to help many in the panicking society, and to share Christ with others. Several weeks ago, when face masks were in short supply in Wuhan, many Christians were on the street freely distributing them to the people with a gospel message and prayers for the people.

Revival Christian Church has a ministry to provide free-of-charge small bottles of disinfectant alcohol, which are in short stock in the stores, and through this, share the gospel with the people in our district.

While many other churches canceled their services last Sunday, RCC had services as normal. But the temperature of everyone was checked at the door, and the whole congregation wore face masks. The attendance was actually higher than normal as many from churches that had closed the meetings came. There was a record of over 1,900 who watched on Facebook live. When the altar call was given, in both services, dozens came forward to rededicate their lives to the Lord, to accept Christ and receive healing.

This is an exact repeat of the SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) epidemic in 2003, which killed 774 worldwide and 299 in Hong Kong. At that time SARS resulted in a massive economic depression to the Hong Kong economy, property and stock market crash, massive unemployment, yet revival in the church. Due to the fear of possible death resulting from infection by the virus, many came to church and became Christians. It is possible this will be repeated in this COVID-19 epidemic.

SOURCE: Charisma News

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