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Christians are being ethnically cleansed throughout the Muslim world. Yet, that gets a tiny fraction of the media attention, and none of the political attention. So, who will save the Christians of the middle-east from genocide?
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"Is there an unprecedented spiritual revival taking place in the Islamic world?"
I was recently asked this question during an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network. The answer, remarkably, is a resounding "Yes." Millions of Muslims have, in fact, been leaving Islam and turning to faith in Jesus Christ. It's a dramatic trend I've been writing about on this blog (see here, here, here and here), and one that deserves more far more attention and detailed reporting.
Here are excerpts: Best-selling author Joel Rosenberg recently spoke to CBN News about the incredible revival in the Muslim world. He cites a 19-page peer-reviewed study detailing the unprecedented wave of Muslims who are coming to Christ.
"From 1960 to 2010, the number of Muslims that have converted to faith in Jesus Christ has grown from fewer than 200,000 to some 10 million people" Rosenberg said, citing the study.
Rosenberg says the increase of Muslims converts to Christ could correlate to the turmoil in the Middle East.
"A lot as happened in the last fifty years in the Middle East. There's a lot of revolutions, war, turmoil, poverty, and what I think is happening, especially in the last 10-15 years, is many Muslims are deeply uncomfortable with the idea that ISIS, or Iran's leadership, or Assad are the type of people that represent Islam."
Many Muslims are finding their questions answered through dreams and visions about Christ.
"God is moving very powerfully using dreams and visions Muslims are having of the Man in white, of Jesus Himself," Rosenberg says.
But even though God is revealing Himself to Muslims through dreams and visions, Christians are still fundamental to fulfilling the Great Commission in the Muslim world.
"In a world of 1.6 billion Muslims, we have a long way to go. So if we are going to fulfill the Great Commission and reach every nation with the Gospel, we are going to have to pick up our game and be much more faithful," Rosenberg says...."This is a moment to be praying for them, that God would open their eyes."
A group of Taliban terrorists in Pakistan (Google)
After I heard the news that Islamic terrorists had killed more than 72 people in a public park in Lahore, Pakistan, last Sunday, I called my friend "Faisal" (not his real name) to grieve with him. Faisal is a Pakistani Christian who has lived in the United States for several years. He has friends who live near the Gulshan-e-Iqbal Park, a normally cheerful place where an unidentified killer detonated a bomb with the specific goal of slaughtering Christians during the Easter holiday.
The March 27 attack was the work of Jamaat-e-Ahrar, a splinter group of the Pakistani Taliban. Some of the people killed were buying tickets to fair rides or playing with their children.
"Everybody is in shock. A woman lost both of her daughters," said Faisal, who has a wife and a daughter of his own. "I was crying while I was watching the news footage. It is so sad."
The attack did not grab as much media attention as the March 22 Brussels airport bombing, which has claimed 35 lives so far. The death toll continues to rise in the Pakistan massacre because more than 340 people were wounded, many severely. After the Sunday blast, the park was soaked in blood and strewn with body parts and shreds of clothing.
Many of the victims were Christians who had come to the park after church services to enjoy the holiday. Survivors are now planning funerals for their relatives. The attack came just days after Pakistan's National Assembly recognized Easter and two Hindu festivals as public holidays.
Apparently Muslim extremists don't want religious freedom for anyone but Muslims.
After I comforted Faisal, who has family near the bombing site, we prayed together for Pakistan. I prayed in English but I asked Faisal to pray in his native Pakistani language, Urdu. I love to hear people pray to Jesus Christ in the same language used by Taliban militants.
How can we pray in the aftermath of such a horrific tragedy? Here are five ways I am praying for the Muslim world these days:
1. Pray that cowardly acts of violence will backfire. The history of the church is written in the blood of its martyrs. But whenever Christians have been killed for their faith, their blood becomes a seed for the advancement of the gospel.
Many nominal or liberal Muslims are deeply troubled by the actions of Islamic militants who belong to groups like ISIS or the Taliban. In Pakistan, my friend Faisal says liberal Muslims are distancing themselves from extremists, and they are condemning these acts of terror. "They are even donating blood to help the Christians. They are embarrassed and they are getting tired of Islam," he says. Pray that millions of Muslims will see the brutality operating in these terrorists groups. Pray that they will reject Islamic jihad and the doctrines behind it.
2. Pray that Muslim governments will pursue justice. In a televised message last Sunday, Pakistan's prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, condemned the Taliban massacre and pledged to fight terrorism in Pakistan "until it is rooted out from our society." But the United States and other Western governments must continue to pressure Muslim nations to oppose extremist groups. Pray that God will plant Christians in strategic positions in these governments so they can work to protect believers from the inside.
3. Pray that terrorist groups will be exposed and stopped. We tend to be fearful of militant groups like ISIS because their tactics are so cruel and intimidating. (An ISIS faction in Yemen allegedly planned to crucify Catholic priest Thomas Uzhunnalil on Good Friday, but some reports say he is still alive.) But if we could see this situation through God's eyes, we would realize that these terrorist factions are fighting a losing battle. They are the ones who are afraid. Soon they will be defeated.
Psalm 37:35-36 says: "I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a luxuriant tree. Yet he passed away, and he was not; I sought him, but he could not be found." Pray that God will dry up their funds, confuse their communication, create disloyalty in their ranks and lay a trap for them.
4. Pray for a continued release of miracles in Islamic nations. Reports out of Iran, Pakistan and other Muslim nations indicate that God is displaying His power like never before in this dark region. Muslims are coming to Jesus secretly, often because they have dreams about the Son of God. Muslim women are attending underground meetings and hiding Bibles under their black burkas. "Many Muslims are coming to Jesus secretly in Pakistan," says my friend Faisal. "I have seen many Muslims come to Christ because they saw miracles or because He answered their prayers."
5. Pray that Christians will not be intimidated by persecution. It isn't easy for my friend Faisal to live in the United States while his family struggles in Pakistan. Two days before Easter, some Muslim thugs broke into his family's home—one hour from Lahore—and stole furniture after demanding that they stop spreading the gospel. Those who follow Christ in Muslim countries suffer job discrimination, social harassment and a lack of government protection. Pray that Christians in these countries will be empowered with supernatural boldness to defend their faith—even in the face of terror.
J. Lee Gradyis the former editor of Charisma. You can follow him on Twitter at leegrady. He is the author of several books including 10 Lies the Church Tells Women, 10 Lies Men Believe, Fearless Daughters of the Bible and The Holy Spirit Is Not for Sale. You can learn more about his ministry, The Mordecai Project, atthemordecaiproject.org.
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(Photo: Reuters/Hasan Shaaban) Lebanese and Syrian Christian Maronites pray for peace
in Syria, in Harisa, Jounieh September 7, 2013.
American leaders denounced the burning of a Christian leader's library in Tripoli, Lebanon, last Friday night as based on false pretenses and said it's a threat to religious liberty.
"The really bad news is that this is not out of the ordinary," Robert P. George, chair of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), told The Christian Post in an interview on Monday. George emphasized the need to advocate for religious freedom across the world to prevent attacks like this one.
The Friday night fire burned two-thirds of some 80,000 books and manuscripts in the Al-Saeh library owned by Greek Orthodox priest Ibrahim Surouj, RT reported. The arsonists targeted Surouj due to an alleged pamphlet insulting the Prophet Mohammed was found in one of the library books. When Surouj met with Islamic leaders in the city, he stated that he had nothing to do with the pamphlet.
International Security Forces Brig. Imad Ayyoubi also denounced the connection. "Father Surouj has nothing to do with the article and the source of the website is from Denmark and was published on Jan. 7, 2010," Ayyoubi said, The Blaze reported. Hundreds of Lebanese citizens demonstrated Saturday in support of the priest.
The co-author of Silenced: How Apostasy and Blasphemy Codes are Choking Freedom Worldwide, Shea traced the backlash to any perceived insult to Islam back to its sources. She denounced the governments of Saudi Arabia and Iran, and called on the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to "end its own worldwide campaign of stirring passions against religious insult."
Shea called on the OIC to change course entirely, urging the organization to "condemn the violence that is now waged against the Lebanon Christian library, and, even more critically, against the Christian minorities in all parts of the Arab world."
USCIRF's George touched on Lebanon's history of sectarian violence. "This goes all the way back to the Lebanese Civil War," from 1975 to 1990, the USCIRF chair explained. "If you travel in Lebanon, as I have, you will start noticing security checkpoints. The country is suffering acts of violence, and often religiously based acts of violence."
"Beirut itself was known as the Paris of the Middle East," George explained, hearkening back to a more peaceful era. "It was held up as a city where people of various faiths could live together in peace," the USCIRF chair recalled, listing the different faith traditions in Lebanon: Maronite Catholics, Roman Catholics, Sunni and Shia Muslim, Eastern Orthodox, and Antiochian Christians.
Despite this violence, George praised the country of Lebanon for rebuilding an ancient Jewish Synagogue. Nevertheless, he lamented the loss of the Jewish population, which is now "vanishingly small."
"We see the Middle East emptying of its historic Christian populations," the USCIRF chair explained. George even referred to his own relatives who fled from Syria. "My father's family is Syrian, from the ancient Antiochian Orthodox community," he explained. "They lived peacefully with their Muslim neighbors, they were able to make a life for themselves, and now they have fled."
George argued that the responsibility of any government is to allow for religious freedom and to prevent and punish attacks against it. The government of Lebanon has a responsibility "to bring some amelioration to people who are being abused like this priest was abused," and to punish the perpetrators, he said.
But governments should not do this just to be on good terms with the United States. George argued that the economic and political success of a country depends on how it respects religious freedom. "If you want your country to flourish, you should establish religious freedom," he declared. "that's true for Lebanon, that's true for Syria, that's true for everywhere."
