Christian music star Natalie Grant has just contracted COVID-19, The Christian Post reports. The 48-year-old singer-songwriter is asking for prayer for her daughter, who is asthmatic.

In an Instagram post, Grant gives her followers an inside look at what her symptoms are like and what she is dealing with. “I’m terribly achy, extra tired, can’t taste anything and just super bleh. Though I realize I’m only at the start of it,” she said.

However, she is still grateful for many things, including “not having lung/breathing issues,” having “a loving family” and having a “supportive husband who is stepping in to fully take care of the kids.”

Grant also talked about those who have COVID-19 and are alone. “I’m thinking of those right now that are having so much difficulty breathing, and are afraid. My heart is with the single parent that has this stupid virus and is panicked about who is going to take care of their kids. I mean, how do you even isolate?” She said in her Instagram post.

In the post, she called single parents “all heroes” and said she was sorry for many people who have lost someone to the novel coronavirus. She also thoughtfully expressed what it would be like to lose a loved one to disease and not be able to say goodbye, “Most of you never even got the chance to say goodbye and I’m grieving with you.”

But, above it all, she says…

Josh Dickson, the National Faith Engagement Director for Biden for President, is calling Christian voters to consider electing Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

Dickson’s remarks are part of a new series by Christianity Today that seeks to make the case for presidential candidates on both sides of the political spectrum as well as a third-party option.

As Christian Headlines previously reported, Paula-White Cain, Trump’s faith advisor, made her case as to why Christians should re-elect the president for a second term.

Like many Christians, Dickson grew up in church and aligned himself with the Republican party. As a four-year-old boy, Dickson celebrated the presidential victory of George H.W. Bush and later cast his first presidential vote for Bush’s son, George W. Bush, while he was in college.

Through his experiences in multiple youth ministries, Dickson explained that is where he learned to implement Jesus’ teachings through words and actions. He resonated with Christ’s words in Matthew 25 that calls for believers to “to care for the hungry, the stranger, the sick, the prisoner, and anyone in need.”

“This is why, after college, my faith led me to teach in a low-income school on the South Side of Chicago,” Dickson wrote. “And that’s where my world changed.”

While Dickson was impressed with his students’…

Theologian and Trump voter Wayne Grudem has written a lengthy response to his friend John Piper, who last week posted a blog explaining why he isn’t voting for Joe Biden or President Trump and questioning why so many Christians back the Trump administration.

“I think it is a drastic mistake to think that the deadly influences of a leader come only through his policies and not also through his person,” Piper wrote. “Flagrant boastfulness, vulgarity, immorality and factiousness are not only self-incriminating; they are nation-corrupting.”

Grudem said he and Piper have been friends for more than 40 years but that the two men have “reached different conclusions about this year’s presidential election.” The Christian Post published Grudem’s response.

Grudem, a professor at Phoenix Seminary, agreed that a candidate’s character is important but asserted that – generally – it should not be the primary issue.

“In most elections, and with most candidates, we have to choose between two rather ordinary human beings, both of whom have flaws. In that case, an evaluation of their policies becomes decisive,” Grudem wrote.

Biden and the Democrats, Grudem argued, would pass laws that infringe on religious liberty and the sanctity of life.

“Piper’s argument fails to recognize that people can decide not to imitate the sins of a leader, but they cannot do…

Three people were killed at a church Thursday in Paris after someone attacked church members with a knife.

After the attack at Notre Dame Basilica, the prime minister raised its security alert status to the highest level, AP News reports.

The church killings were the third attack in two months in France, following the start of a trial of 14 people linked to the January 2015 killings at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket. The gunmen claimed to be part of the Islamic State group and al-Qaida. The newspaper had published caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.

Police were able to wound the assailant in Thursday’s church killings. He is in the hospital, but police have not released his name.

“He cried ‘Allah Akbar!’ over and over, even after he was injured,” said Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi. “The meaning of his gesture left no doubt.”

The attack also came after Islamic State extremists had released a video on Wednesday calling for attacks against France.

Also Thursday, in Avignon, police shot an armed man to death after he refused to follow officer’s warnings to drop his gun. At the French consulate in Jiddah, a man stabbed and wounded a guard.

Less than two weeks ago, an attacker beheaded a French middle school teacher who showed the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad for a class on free speech.

In September, a man attacked bystanders with a butcher…

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden says in a new interview that if elected he would prioritize passage of the Equality Act, a bill that has sparked concern from religious liberty groups over its impact and from some LGBT activists over its effect on female sports.

Biden told the Philadelphia Gay News in an interview published Wednesday he wants to see the Equality Act passed and signed into law during his first 100 days in office. The Democrat-controlled House passed it last year, but the GOP-led Senate never brought it up for a vote. A spokesman for President Trump said last year the “bill in its current form is filled with poison pills that threaten to undermine parental and conscience rights.”

The Equality Act would amend federal laws to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in public accommodations and facilities, education, federal funding, employment and housing.

“To help achieve our vision of equality, I will make enactment of the Equality Act a top legislative priority during my first 100 days – a priority that Donald Trump opposes,” Biden told the publication. “This is essential to ensuring that no future president can ever again roll back civil rights and protections for LGBTQ+ individuals, including when it comes to housing. I will also direct my Cabinet to ensure immediate and…

LAHORE, Pakistan, October 28, 2020 (Morning Star News) – A 13-year-old Christian girl kidnapped by a Muslim man in Pakistan leapt toward her mother when she spotted her outside a courtroom on Tuesday (Oct. 27), but her family was not permitted to enter as a judge validated the 45-year-old abductor’s Islamic “marriage” to the child, sources said.

Refusing to acknowledge documentation of the girl’s age and the Catholic family’s pleas that Ali Azhar forcibly converted Arzoo Raja to Islam, Sindh High Court Justice K.K. Agha ruled the marriage was valid and instructed police not to “harass the newlywed couple,” said rights advocate Ghazala Shafique.

“All of us, including Arzoo’s family and people supporting their cause for justice, are in deep shock and grief after the high court allowed the accused to walk away with the minor girl in front of our eyes,” Shafique told Morning Star News.

In trial court earlier in the day, Azhar’s defense team argued for dismissal of the kidnapping charges while the legal team for the family asserted that Arzoo was the victim of forcible conversion and marriage, Shafique said. The family and their legal team were awaiting a court ruling after the hearing when they learned that Azhar’s team had filed a petition in the high court, she said.

“We rushed to the high court where Arzoo and the accused Azhar were present…

Saying they want to impact a new generation of men for Christ, the filmmakers behind the faith-based film Courageoussaid this week they will re-release the hit movie in theaters next year with new scenes, a new ending and an update on what happened to the lead characters.

Film directors Alex and Stephen Kendrick made the announcement Sunday at their home congregation, Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga.

Courageous was a surprise hit in 2011 when it opened in the Top 4 at the box office and ended its run with a worldwide gross of $35 million. The story follows a group of male police officers who are striving to become better fathers.

“The issues … facing men 10 years ago are certainly as applicable today,” Alex Kendrick told the church.

His brother, Stephen, said the goal is to “reach a new generation of men, but yet it be a better version” of the movie.

The new version of Courageous will include never-released scenes that didn’t make it into the theatrical film. It also will include a new ending that shows the lead characters a decade after the events of 2011.

“The new ending shows what happened to these characters and their families 10 years later – because we’re 10 years older,” Alex Kendrick said. “Two weeks ago, we assembled the cast and crew here in Albany at the church, and we shot new scenes around Albany. So you can see what…

Protestant pastors are nearly unanimous in their decision not to endorse a political candidate from the pulpit this year, although roughly one-third say they have endorsed a political candidate outside of the church setting, according to a new LifeWay Research survey.

The poll found that 98 percent of Protestant pastors have not endorsed a candidate from the pulpit this year, although 32 percent say they have endorsed a candidate “outside of their church role.” The latter figure is an increase from 2016, when 22 percent of pastors said they had endorsed a candidate outside of their church role.

Two-thirds (65 percent) of pastors this year have not endorsed a candidate outside of their church role, a decrease from 2016 when more than three-fourths (77 percent) answered that way.

“Pastors are more decided on who they are voting for in 2020, so it’s not surprising that more pastors have shared their opinions with others personally,” said Scott McConnell executive director of LifeWay Research. “The candidates endorsed by pastors may be local, state or national. But those who do so in an official church capacity are a rare exception.”

Americans are divided on if pastors should endorse candidates. Although 43 percent of U.S. adults believe it is “appropriate for pastors to personally endorse candidates outside of their church…