Matthew 5:10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
Important Takeaways:
- ‘On the Very Edge of Extinction’: Iraqi Archbishop’s Dire Warning About Christian Persecution, Violence
- The Most Rev. Bashar Warda, the Archbishop of Erbil, told hundreds of religious leaders gathered for the G20 Religion Forum in Bali, Indonesia, he’s fearful for the state of believers in his nation.
- Christianity in his war-torn country is “on the very edge of extinction.”
- “The brutal logic of this is that there does eventually reach an end point where there are no minorities left to kill, and no minorities left to persecute,” Warda said. “Such is the bleak future of religious pluralism in Iraq today.”
- He continued, “I pray that you will find in our story a clear warning to you all.”
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1 Thessalonians 4:16-18 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.
Important Takeaways:
- For some Christians, ‘rapture anxiety’ can take a lifetime to heal
- “This is a real thing. It’s a chronic problem,” he says of rapture anxiety. “This is a new area of study, but in general, our research has revealed that religious trauma leads to an increase of anxiety, depression, paranoia and even some OCD-like behaviors: ‘I need to say this prayer of salvation so many times,’ ‘I need to confess my sins so often.’”
- “Now imagine,” he continues, “You are taught that at any minute, you could be left here on Earth. What does that do to the teenager who just had premarital sex, or even simply took the Lord’s name in vain?”
- Slade says suffering in silence, and the threat of losing one’s entire community, compounds religious trauma
- It can also lead people to redefine their faith, or abandon it altogether. The number of Americans identifying as Christian has been steadily dropping for years. A 2022 Pew Research Survey estimates about 64% of Americans identify as Christians, but that number could drop below half by 2070 – and could be surpassed by a majority population with no religious affiliation.
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1 Timothy 4:1 “Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons” Acts 4:12 “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
Important Takeaways:
- Why Are Witchcraft, Ouija Boards, Tarot, Horoscopes, and the Occult Raging? Experts Deliver Convicting Reality
- “The fascination with evil in society right now — they’re turning to the wrong side.”
- Jareb and Petra Knott are coauthors of the book “The Science of Deliverance: How Spiritual Freedom Brings Physical Healing”
- Petra said fear is another factor that leads people toward these practices.
- “Witchcraft gives people the illusion of control in their life, and so there’s a huge pull to witchcraft because people feel like they can do the right things and cause their life to be better,”
- “And then the church … has been reticent to talk about these things, so we’ve left a void, and now we’ve got people who go to the church and ask questions, and they’re not getting answers.”
- “[They’ll say], ‘I’ve done horoscopes, I’ve done séances, I’ve done Ouija boards, I’ve done, you know everything under the sun … but I’ve never done any witchcraft,’” she said. “It’s because they don’t have the understanding that all of those things aren’t fun and games; they are witchcraft.”
- “Many facets of our society and our media culture are just putting in little tidbits of friendly witchcraft,”
- When individuals are finding solace in the occult and not in Christ, he said it’s an issue for the church
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Luke 8:13 And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy. But these have no root; they believe for a while, and in time of testing fall away.
Important Takeaways:
- Christians could be U.S. minority by 2070, Pew Research study finds
- Pew study, titled “Modeling the Future of Religion in America.”
- If current “religious switching” trends continue, as many as 52% of Americans will likely be non-religious and 35% will likely be Christian in 48 years, the Pew Research group said Tuesday.
- Researchers described religious switching as changing one’s identity from one faith to another or none, and stressed that their findings represent “only possibilities” for religious change in America, not “predictions of what will happen.”
- In the early 1990s, “about 90% of Americans identified as Christians” but a “steadily shrinking share” of those raised as Christians have retained their faith into adulthood, Pew said. By contrast, a growing number of Americans say they’ve shed their early identity, as noted by the 2020 survey.
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- How Should Christians Respond When History Is Being Rewritten or Even Deleted?
- “Who controls the past controls the future” said George Orwell
- Arthur Schlesinger, a historian and former confidant to President John F. Kennedy observed: “History is to the nation much as memory is to the individual…
- Milan Kundera, a well-known Czech writer and historian who opposed the Soviet takeover of Czechoslovakia in 1968 said… ‘The first step in liquidating a people’ he said, ‘is to erase its memory. Destroy its books, its culture and its history. Then have somebody write new books, manufacture a new culture, invent a new history. Before long the nation will forget what it is and what it was’.
- The secularists are insisting that we turn a corner so that we lose sight of the Judeo-Christian influence of our past, and if we do choose to look back they want us to see our religious history as a blotch, not a blessing. They want us to substitute their worldview in the place of our historic religious roots, knowing that if we lose our history we will lose our future – a future they wish to control.
- Our calling and privilege is to represent Christ in this turbulent moment in history. This is not a time for us to deny the negative parts of our history and paint a picture that ignores the sins and racism of the past: we can learn from history without having to destroy it. How many children will receive a better education in our schools should monuments be destroyed? These monuments are a part of our history and should serve as teaching opportunities that both warn and instruct us: “If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Psalm 11.3).
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Matthew 5:10 ““Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Important Takeaways:
- Christians Face Increasing Intolerance? Poll Reveals Americans’ Stunning Take on Faith and Religious Liberty
- According to Lifeway: nearly six-in-10 (59%) say religious tolerance for Christians in the U.S. is on the decline.
- Notably, the majority of people in every religious group — Catholics (59%), Protestants (69%), and those of other religious beliefs (52%) — agree that Christians face ramped-up intolerance.
- The survey results come as Christianity continues to decline, with the Pew Research Center finding that 63% of Americans identify as Christians, down from 78% in 2007.
- At the same time, the growth of the “nones” — those individuals who are either atheist, agnostic, or unaffiliated — continues to swell, expanding from 16% in 2007 to 29% in 2021.
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Psalm 33 : 10,11 “The Lord frustrates the counsel of the nations; He restrains the purposes of the people.11 The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the purposes of His heart to all generations.”
Important Takeaways:
- Why Your Professing ‘Christian’ Friends Have Become LGBTQ Allies
- One of the reasons why many professing Christians have become allies with LGBTQ people is because many of their friends and family have become members of the LGBTQ community.
- This is statistically the biggest reason why people become LGBTQ affirming. For instance, a 2013 study from Pew Research Center shows that 32% of Americans changed their minds on gay marriage because they “know someone who is homosexual.”
- When a loved one says their sexual sins are an intrinsic part of who they are, they’re suggesting that if we do not love their homosexuality or transgenderism—then we do not love them. That is a powerful, manipulative argument that many parents, siblings, and friends do not have courage or integrity to resist.
- Many of us love and fear our friends and family more than we love and fear God.
- In a leaked video about Florida’s Parental Rights In Education bill, an executive producer at Disney said they had a “not-at-all-secret gay agenda.”
- Therefore the most popular movies, TV shows, and books today feature characters and storylines designed to normalize LGBTQ sexuality.
- Related to this, another major—yet unacknowledged—reason why so many professing Christians have become LGBTQ allies is because of porn.
- We’ve normalized porn—we’ve normalized sexual sin, so we’ve normalized LGBTQ sexuality.
- This, coupled with failure from parents and pastors to teach Biblical theology and apologetics on sexuality makes many professing Christians unprepared to resist compromise.
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- Elites finally reveal their #1 enemy: CHRISTIANS
- Consider a few recent major media stories:
- “With the Buffalo massacre, white Christian nationalism strikes again” – The Washington Post
- “The Religious Right’s Hostility to Science Is Crippling Our Coronavirus Response” – The New York Times
- “White Christian Nationalism ‘Is a Fundamental Threat to Democracy’” – New York Magazine
- “How Christian nationalism paved the way for Jan. 6” – Religion News Service
- “Christian nationalism on the rise in some GOP campaigns” – The Associated Press
- “‘The View’ co-host blames ‘Christian nationalism’ for mass shootings” – FoxNews.com
- “It’s becoming increasingly clear that the United States is under siege by Christian fundamentalists and traditionalists,” warns MSNBC’s Ja’han Jones.
- “Christian Nationalism Is The ‘Single Biggest Threat’ to America’s Religious Freedom,” announces the Center for American Progress.
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Matthew 10:28 “And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”
Important Takeaways:
- Secular intolerance of Christians’ views is leading to self-censorship, report warns
- “Secular intolerance has a chilling effect on Christians, which directly affects their capacity to express their faith freely in society and is leading to various forms of self-censorship,” says the report, titled “Perceptions on Self-Censorship: Confirming and Understanding the ‘Chilling Effect,’” which includes case studies from France, Germany, Colombia and Mexico.
- “Some people do indeed fear being subjected to legal proceedings or being criminally sanctioned on charges of discrimination, while others fear being subjected to disciplinary proceedings in their work or places,” notes the study
- Many Christians interviewed as part of the study did not realize they were self-censoring. In some cases, they had self-censored to the extent that they now “stop seeing the characteristics related to self-censorship as a problem.”
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Mark 13:13 “You will be hated by all because of My name, but the one who endures to the end, he will be saved.”
Important Takeaways:
- Pentecost Massacre in Nigeria claims the lives of more than 50 Christians
- The attack on St. Francis Catholic Church took place in the morning when the faithful had gathered to celebrate Pentecost.
- While no group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, the targeting of Christians strongly suggests Islamic extremists were behind the assault.
- Our peace and tranquility have been attacked by the enemies of the people.
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