Sharing Love From Sweden - Eva Haglund - Praying For The Nations

Shalom Steve!

I send you many greetings from Sweden!  It is about 5+ C just now. Spring is beginning to wake up. 

I was outside praying for Sweden today. God shows me how to pray. 

I have thought about intercession and think that we all need to be one and pray. If we stand together praying it is also strong. I feel myself that I want to take a new step in the school of intercession for nations and for the chosen country of Israel. I want to grow in this. There are nations who are bleeding today and they need our prayers.

To intercede for a friend, for a relative or a country is also to show love to people. It needs a lot of intercession. In Eph. 6:18 we can read about " supplication for all the saints". We can also read in the Bible about a house of prayer. We need church buildings to be more of house of prayers today with both young and old together. 

In Acts. 12:5 we can see about Peter " constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church". It is interesting to see in Acts. 12:12 that there were many praying in a HOME - in a house as was Mary's. We also need prayer meetings in homes and in the Bible they were in Mary's house. 

Jesus asked the disciples -could you not pray one hour and we can ask ourselves - can we pray one hour? If we are not used to this we maybe can begin with 15 minutes and increase at home. It is also better to have ONE prayer for Israel than NONE at all. 

The nations need our prayers. There are BIG needs! Israel needs our help. They need our hearts in prayer!

We need different sorts of prayer. We need spiritual warfare for instance but also our tears In prayer as Jesus was crying for Jerusalem. Jesus loved and loves Jerusalem and the holy city needs our prayers today!

I think there needs tears in prayers for the nations also. If we do not have tears we can ask God for it. In Lament. 3:48-51 is written, "My eyes overflow with rivers of water for the destruction of My people. My eyes flow and not cease, without interruption, till the Lord from heaven looks down and sees. My eyes bring sufferings to my soul because of all the daughters of my city".

In Ps. 126:5 we can read " Those who sow in tears will reap in joy".  I think it also can be tears for the nations.

Worship and dance to Jesus is also strong spiritually. When we lift up God as Paul and Silas in the storm enemies flee and it happens spiritually when God is in the center of the worship. 

We need to understand more in the Body of Christ also the importance spiritual dance to Jesus. Worship God with the body. We also need prophetic dance. Miram and David danced to God. I have read about prayer dance and have practiced it a little. It was interesting to read about. 

Personally I think that sometimes a prayer night feels long, but you can also include dance worship (but careful if you have neighbors you can disturb!)

About intercession-  I think as we bless  Israel with  prayers He bless the nation we live in also. Anyone who blesses Israel is blessed so Jesus gives back when we pray so.

LET US PRAY FOR THE NATIONS

Let us pray... 

Like a child in our arms - 

Let us pray for our nations.

Let our hearts be crushed -

nations are bleeding...

Let our tears fall for the nations 

Like a child you carry in your arms.

Crying for a child you love - love to the nations.

Israel is like a precious child for God.

Let our hearts be moved.

Stockholm

Many greetings and blessings from Stockholm! Please pray for Sweden!

Eva Haglund

Christians slaughtered in Pakistan, Kenya

Sunday, September 29, 2013 |  Raymond Ibrahim, Israel TodayShare on blogger

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The following by contributor Raymond Ibrahim is again telling of how the world has an obsession with picking out every perceived flaw with Israel, while ignoring the very real persecution of Christians and other minorities around the world.

Muslim slaughter of non-Muslim “infidels,” while a habitual thing, saw an especially dramatic weekend in the nations of Pakistan and Kenya. Even so, these are simply the latest in a long list of jihadi attacks on the Christians of both nations.

Last Sunday, September 22, in Peshawar, Pakistan, Islamic suicide bombers entered the All Saints Church compound right after Sunday mass and blew themselves up in the midst of some 550 congregants, killing, according to the latest count, nearly 90 worshippers, including many Sunday school children, women, and choir members, and injuring at least another 120. The now destroyed Protestant church was built in Peshawar some 130 years ago. The Taliban claimed the attacks.

According to Margrette, a parishioner who survived (though her sister’s status was unknown), “I heard two explosions. People started to run. Human remains were strewn all over the church.”

Armed attacks on churches are hardly uncommon in Pakistan, even though Christians are less than 2% of the population, while Muslims are 97%. In 2001 Islamic gunmen stormed St. Dominic’s Protestant Church, opening fire on the congregants and killing at least 16 worshippers, most women and children. Last Christmas, “when Christian worshipers were coming out of different Churches after performing Christmas prayers, more than one hundred Muslim extremists equipped with automatic rifles, pistols and sticks attacked the Christian women, children and men.” The attack came in response to fatwas condemning Christmas celebrations.

As for Muslim mob violence (as opposed to preplanned terrorist strikes) this is a common fixture that regularly flares up against Pakistan’s Christians and other minorities, most often in the context of “blasphemy,” that is, offending Islam or its prophet. A few months ago, in March, because one Christian was accused of blasphemy, some 3,000 Muslims attacked the Christian Joseph Colony of Lahore, burning two churches and 160 Christian homes.

According to one Christian eyewitness, “The police was doing what it does best—nothing! Their bias towards Christians is quite evident, because when the Muslims were raiding our church and property, they just watched, but when we confronted them, they started hitting us with batons and used live ammunition to deter us.”  

In 2009 in Gojra, eight Christians were burned alive, 100 houses looted and 50 homes set ablaze after another blasphemy accusation.

Thousands of miles away in Kenya (83% Christian and 11% Muslim), on Saturday, September 21, Islamic terrorists linked to neighboring Somalia’s Al Shabaab (“the youth”) raided the Westgate shopping mall, slaughtering at least 62 people and injuring at least 150.

Among the Islamic terrorists are several Americans.

Yet, to anyone following events in Kenya closely, this jihadi raid simply follows a long line of attacks targeting, as in Pakistan, Christians, often in their churches. For example, in just the four months between April-August 2012, at least 14 Kenyan churches were attacked by Al Shabaab-linked Islamic terrorists, with many Christians killed. Since then, even more have been attacked, often by hand-grenades, leaving many dead, again, often including women and Sunday school children.

In the mall attack, the jihadis further made it a point to try to differentiate between Muslims and non-Muslims, to slaughter only the latter. According to Elijah Kamau, “The gunmen told Muslims to stand up and leave. They were safe, and non-Muslims would be targeted.” Another Christian eyewitness who managed to escape said, “an Indian man came forward and they said, ‘What is the name of Muhammad’s mother?’ When he couldn’t answer they just shot him.”

Al Shabaab boasted of its care to distinguish between “infidels” and Muslims a barrage of Twitter messages: “Only Kuffar [“infidels”] were singled out for this attack. All Muslims inside #Westgate were escorted out by the Mujahideen (Islamic Holy Warriors) before beginning the attack.”

This is an old jihadi tactic often used when attacking places other than churches, which do not require this extra care (presumably, according to jihadi thinking, everyone inside a church deserves death, whereas a Muslim may be in an open mall). For example, in Nigeria in October 2012, Islamic militants stormed the Federal Polytechnic College, “separated the Christian students from the Muslim students, addressed each victim by name, questioned them, and then proceeded to shoot them or slit their throat,” killing up to 30 Christians.

And in September 2011, Muslim militants “went to shops owned by Christians at a market at about 8 p.m., ordering them to recite verses from the Quran. If the Christian traders were unable to recite the verses [and thus proving they are not Muslim], the gunmen shot and killed them.”

While it is good that the world has been exposed to these two latest attacks on non-Muslim “infidels,” let there be no mistake:these are no “aberrations,” but rather the natural culmination of jihadi hatred for non-Muslims, chief among them Christians, which has been manifesting itself with increased frequency in both Pakistan and Kenya for years.

Raymond Ibrahim is author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians

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Jerusalem, the World and The King of the World

Hebrew words. With Pictures!

4HIM - Real Thing

Jesus (Yeshua) IS the real One. 

We need to be His voice in the real world.

Get out of the "church" and into the streets.

Where the people are.

Steve Martin

"WE SPEAK TO NATIONS"

YouTube:

We Speak To Nations - Lakewood Church, featuring Israel Houghton

When my wife Laurie and I went to China in 2002, representing the USA staff of Derek Prince Ministries, and part of a small group smuggling Chinese Bibles and Derek's Mandarin Chinese translated teaching books, I had the latest Integrity Music's CD of the Month with me.

It had come in the mail just a few days before we left on this adventorous journey, so I was as excited as ever to hear it. (It had become the newest edition of my 14 year long subscription collection of Integrity's Hosanna! Music. Thank you Michael Coleman for your leadership at Integrity!)

That specific praise and worship CD, rotating in my portable player, was Lakewood's "We Speak To Nations". (IPods had just come out the year before. Steve Jobs' of Apple latest big tech craving was a bit above my budget.) The title song was also "We Speak To Nations."

Israel Houghton at Lakewood Church 

- Houston, TX (Joel Olsteen)

As I sat on the 22 hour train ride from Guangzhou to Beijing, I played this song over and over again. The Holy Spirit (Ruach HaKodesh) made sure it sank deep into my spirit. I am grateful He did.

During those long hours on the tracks (both train and CD - pun intended) I literally had tears running down my face, while I sat listening with ear buds on, as others slept. The sound of the nations was calling to my heart.


We can speak to nations in many ways. These days it is primarily through social media.



But even still, a main format can still be by singing, in person.

As worship leaders who love Jesus (Yeshua), and thus the nations, my wife and I will continue to sing in and to the nations, especially Israel, which we especially love.

And...Lord willing too, we plan on taking the Ahava Love Band with us to Jerusalem in 2014 to do just that!

Laurie and I as the lead vocals with the band.

Maybe there will be other nations the Lord will send us to after that.

Ahava (love in Hebrew),

Steve Martin

It's time to go...

Derek Prince Ministries staff (2002-2004) - bottom of photo

Vision for Israel staff (2006) - top portion of photo

"My iris are on the world." - The Lord's creation amazes me. See?

"My iris are on...

...the world."

Photos by Steve Martin, May 1, 2013, Charlotte NC area

(Riddle Interpretations: "His eyes (iris) are on the world (ducks)." 

or - "The flowers are stacked above the ducks.")

Just a simple thought. Any others you want to suggest?

If His eyes are on the flowers, and the birds, even the sparrow, 

you can believe that His eyes are on you.

He calls out you to daily, drawing you to Himself, through His creation. 

If you do not know Jesus Christ, Yeshua HaMashiach, call upon His Name today, and He will hear you. You will see Him for Who He is, the Lover of your soul.