WHAT IS MORE IMPORTANT?

I regularly receive emails or newsletters from around the world about what is happening to the church and Christians in countries where democracy and Christianity are not the dominant way of life. Most of the information is about how they are being beaten, tortured, raped, maimed, shot, made homeless or forced to live in forests.

The people doing the damage are usually people of other religious systems like the Muslims, the Hindus and tribal rebels groups, dictators and despots. Other religious systems have this idea that you should be one of theirs and if not you should be forced to become an adherent of their religion on pain of death.

Some Christians I am led to believe do change sides to stay alive, but it is becoming increasingly obvious that there are many who would rather die than renounce their faith in the one true God. The end result is that they do die at the hands of the butchers of Islam and Hinduism and whatever other ‘ism’ is dominant.

Whilst all this is going on we back at home are playing in the sandpit. Despite plea after plea for the church to pray for the needs of persecuted saints, we would rather maintain our social and well being programmes that keep us happy.

How many churches do you know that spend more time praying than any other activity in the church? If you are like me the answer is nil.

How many churches do you know that will spend the whole of Sunday morning interceding on behalf of the persecuted church? If you are like me the answer is nil.

We have to face the fact that prayer is not high on the agenda. Maintaining the status quo is.

With the number of persecuted Christians increasing we could as a church spend ALL our time praying for them. Instead of entertaining ourselves Sunday morning with a few songs, a sermon, communion, and a cup of tea, we could fall on our faces and plead with God for the persecuted saints. To stand in the gap for them and let them know that they have not been forgotten by the affluent and comfortable west.

The scripture tells us to do unto others as we would have people do to us. If we in the west were subject to constant harassment and suffering we would want the church elsewhere to pray for us. That being the case, we should be praying for the persecuted church…now.

Not as something we fit in with all the other activities, but as the major activity. As we get on our knees on their behalf and see God do great and mighty things as a result, we will reap more for the kingdom of God than all the other activities put together.

Our battles are in the heavenlies, against principalities and powers, not against flesh and blood. Therefore we need heavenly weapons. Our first and most effective is prayer. We ignore it at our peril so why do we do that? It is illogical and indefensible. There can be only one answer. Satan has deluded us into thinking that we can achieve the goal without God. A church without a full and active prayer life is a church without God.