Extreme Weakness

Okay, it has been a very looong time since I've done a Jesus Freak Friday post. (I just looked and the last one was Good Friday!!! Oops!) And, I know today is Thursday (it is, isn't it?), but I don't want to go another week without doing a Jesus Freak Friday!! :D So, whether or not you were waiting, here it is....


But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” ````````````````` 2 Corinthians 12:9


“If you will renounce your faith and trample the cross, you will go free,” the Bolshevik gang said. “If you do not, we will kill you.”

Reverend Mikhail had seen eighty thousand of his fellow Russian Orthodox leaders and lay people murdered by the Communists. Amidst all of that pain and suffering, he decided that God, if he did exist, would not have allowed such misery.“I don’t believe,” he thought as he faced the gang. “What does a cross mean to me? Let me save my life.”

But when he opened his mouth to go along with the gang’s orders, the words that came out shocked him. “I only believe in one God. I will not trample on the cross!” The gang put a sack around his shoulders as a royal garment and used his fur hat for Jesus’ crown of thorns. One of them, a former member of Mikhail’s church, knelt before him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews.” They took turns beating him and mocking his God. Silently, the reverend prayed. “If you exist, please save my life.” As he was beaten, he cried out again, “I believe in one God.”His show of faith made such an impression on the drunken gang that they released him. When he arrived in his house, he fell face down on the floor, weeping and repeating, “I believe.”

The Christian faith is full of paradoxes. Die to live. Lose to win. Be weak in order to be strong. In fact, unless we are willing to embrace our own failures, we cannot experience God’s strength. When we undergo hardship and trial or even witness the unjust suffering of others from afar, we may begin to doubt God’s goodness. That is a human, natural response. However, God does not reject our human weakness. He restores our weakness with his strength. Therefore, we can rejoice in our failures because they remind us that human strength is no substitute for godly power. We may fail, but our God remains strong. What are you learning about your own weakness? What does that teach you about God’s strength?

Extreme Sides

I was so happy when I found this. It is my favorite (or one of my favorite) story. Speaking of happy, I am SOOOOO HAPPY TODAY!!!!! I got a B- on my english essay! That might not seem like much, but it is quite a step up from my last paper! :) Since I got my paper, I have been singing "O Happy Day." Not necessarily the song, but the 'happy day' part. :D And the weather is beautiful today. It is wonderful, gorgeous, fantabulous. Did I mention that i was happy?! :D ;D :D Anyways, here is Extreme Sides...

Russia: Hypocrites


They were singing choruses when the two soldiers entered with rifles. The service came to a halt as the Russian soldiers stared at the believers with wild eyes.

“What are you doing here?” they shouted. “Worshiping your imaginary God?” The church members cowered in the pews, wondering if there were more soldiers and more guns outside.

“All those who are faithful to God, move to the right side of the church,” said one of the soldiers, his face a mask of hatred. “You will be shot for your faith. You who wish to go home and keep your life, stand on the left side. You must decide to live or die. Those who are faithful to this ‘God’ will die. Those who deny him can live freely.”

Ten minutes earlier, everyone had sung praises equally. Now it was a question of life or death. Some stood to the left, looking sadly or waving apologetically to those on the right. Some stood on the right, their eyes closed in last-minute prayers.

“You on the left are free to go,” one of the soldiers said moments later. Those people filed out, taking one last look at those who would soon be dead.When only those on the right remained, the soldiers put down their weapons. “We, too, are Christians,” they said, “but we wish to worship without hypocrites.”

Defining moments come to us when they are least expected, and we cannot prepare for them. We must experience them “as is” and learn from the consequences. A defining moment is any situation involving a question of character. It may be as complex as a church service interrupted by perpetrators who demand our allegiance to one faith or another. Or it may be as simple as deciding whether or not to walk out of an offensive movie. Our response to a defining moment will side us with that which is Christlike or that which is questionable. Ready or not, we meet our real character face-to-face the moment we decide to take sides.

He who is not with me is against me,

and he who does not gather with me scatters.

~
Matthew 12:30

St. Valentine, the martyr

St. Valentine was a priest near Rome in about the year 270 A.D. At that time the Roman Emperor was imprisoning Christians for not worshipping the Roman gods. During this persecution Valentine was arrested. Some write that he was arrested because he was performing Christian marriages, but others say it was for helping Christians escape prison.

During the trial they asked Valentine what he thought of the Roman gods Jupiter and Mercury. Valentine said they were false gods and that the God that Jesus called Father was the only true God. So the Romans threw him in prison for insulting the gods.

While in prison Valentine continued to minister. He witnessed to the guards. One of the guards was a good man who had adopted a blind girl. He asked Valentine if his God could help his daughter. Valentine prayed and the girl was given her sight. The guard and his whole family, 46 people, believed in Jesus and were baptized. Because these people had come to know Jesus, Valentine praised God right there in his prison cell. When the emperor heard about this he was furious that Valentine was still making converts even in prison, so he had Valentine beheaded.

(This was the closest I could get to a rose)

Valentine knew that he might get caught in his Christian activities. He knew that if he told the court the truth about the Roman gods that he would be thrown in prison. And he knew that if he continued to witness to Christ in the prison he would make his captors angry. But he continued, because he loved the Lord and his fellow humans. He was willing to risk his life to free the prisoners and spread the Good News of Jesus Christ to those who needed to hear it.

God showed us this love by coming in Christ to die for our sins. And St. Valentine demonstrated this love when he died for his friends. This is the kind of love that Valentine's Day is really about.

I got the above information at: http://www.just4kidsmagazine.com/stvalentine.html



If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

~

I Corinthians 13:1-3

Persecution is a reality

Another Jesus Freak Friday!!

This was posted on the Peresution Blog yesterday:

Persecution is a reality

I read a news article that warned the government in Burma (Myanmar) is trying to abolish Christianity. The article reported that an internal government document laid the foundation for abolishing Christianity and that anyone caught evangelizing would be arrested. The striking thing about this article was the spirit of Christians living under these stringent conditions. They are strong, on fire for God and they continue to spread the gospel.

Just like other restricted nations, Burma gives the impression of freedom of religion, but in practice, Christians are persecuted, churches are shut down and the government restricts the number of Bibles imported. The printing of Bibles and Christian literature is also restricted.

In the midst of the government crackdown, I was blessed to read about believers who are evangelizing, even though it is against the law, visiting Buddhist villages and sharing the love of Jesus. For these precious Christians, persecution is an unavoidable reality. A Christian quoted in the article said, “We will press on despite the risk of hostile crowds or government arrest, but God gives us strength deep inside and boldness to move forward.”
Burmese Christians are an example of the courageous believers who face persecution around the world. Pray God protects them and other believers in restricted nations, and ask Him to show us how we can pray for our persecuted brothers and sisters.

What version?

For some reason, this question just popped into my mind:

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ What version/translation of the Bible do you read? ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I mainly read out of a NIV study Bible
with notes on the bottom part of the page.

~

~
When I am reading the stories in the Jesus Freaks books about the people who sacrifice themselves for God's Word, I realize how easy I have it. I mean, I don't even know how many different translations/versions of the Bible we have in our house. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that is bad, not in the least. It just blows my mind (not literally :) to what lengths martyrs will go to to get a copy of the Scriptures.

If we are not interested in the Word of God,

can we really be interested in God?

Robert Godfrey

Jesus Freak Friday

I am going to start (and try to continue :) something I like to call "Jesus Freak Friday." On those days, I will post either a story or a quote from one of the Jesus Freaks books, Extreme Devotion, the VOM website, etc.

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Extreme Answers

Cuba: Tom White

We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well.-- 1 Thessalonians 2:8

When the black hood was placed over Tom White’s head, he didn’t know if he would see the light again. “Where are you taking me?” he asked the Cuban guards. The guards said nothing.

Tom had been secretly delivering Christian literature to Cuba for seven years. He and others had dropped gospel tracts out of planes into the ocean around the Communist island. But he had never heard from a single Christian in Cuba that the materials had arrived.

“Please, God,” Tom had prayed, “give us some confirmation that our work is helping.”

Now, six weeks later, he was taken to meet a Cuban intelligence officer, Captain Santos. Their plane had crashed in Cuba, and Tom and the pilot,Mel Bailey, had been captured and charged with compromising the stability of the nation.

“Our people have found thousands of these on the beaches and in the fields!” Captain Santos shouted, holding one of the sea packages that had been dropped years before.

Tom tried not to smile. “Thank you, Lord,” he prayed, “for answering my prayer. Thank you that our work has not been in vain.”

The answer to Tom’s prayer was costly. He spent twenty-one months in Cuban prisons. But in Castro’s prison, he met many members of the church and learned that even under Castro, Christ’s body was prospering. God answered his prayer.

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Do believers know what it means to have a costly answer to prayer? If we want God to answer our prayers, we must be willing to receive his answers under any circumstances. A costly answer to prayer is one that involves us in the process. We offer our prayers to God, but do we offer our lives if necessary? We may often pray for those suffering under oppression. But what if we are called upon to help deliver food and relief through a mission opportunity at our church? If we ask God to help in times of need, we must also respond when he asks us to be part of the solution. Is there a problem you have prayed about and not yet received a clear answer?

Could it be that God is waiting on your willingness to be part of the solution?

Faces of Persecution -- VOM

Please, go to this link: YouTube - Faces of Persecution.

This video is awesome -- done by Voice of the Martyrs. The first person 'interviewed' is James Jeda, an Extreme Devotion.

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More persecution--more growing!

~

Favorite quote of pastor Samuel Lamb--a Chinese house-church pastor

who has spent twenty years in prison for his faith.

Extreme Reminder

The following is a devotion from the Voice of the Martyrs devotional book, Extreme Devotions:

Extreme Reminder
Sudan: James Jeda

I thank my God every time I remember you.-- Philippians 1:3

“Collect some wood!” the soldiers snarled. Young James Jeda assumed that the soldiers were about to cook their dinner. Earlier that day, he had watched, horrified, as the radical Muslim soldiers killed his parents and four siblings in Southern Sudan. They spared James only to use him as a worker.

When the fire was well lit, James was surprised and terrified when they suddenly grabbed him, and he tried to flee. But the soldiers were too strong, and soon they had tied his hands and feet. “Good news for you, young one,” said a soldier. “We are going to let you live. But you must join us by becoming a Muslim.” “I cannot become a Muslim,” James said simply. “I am a Christian.” Infuriated by the young boy’s faith, the soldiers picked him up and hurled him into the fire. They packed up their gear and left the area, assuming James would die.Young James didn’t die. He managed to roll out of the fire and find help.Doctors were able to save James’s life, but he will always carry reminders of that day. His body bears skin grafts and scar tissue, and one arm is partially deformed by the burns. In heaven, those scars will be honor bars, a reminder of the day when James Jeda refused to turn his back on Christ.


Most people are suckers for souvenirs. One can hardly make it through the gauntlet of gift shops at an airport or train station without succumbing to the temptation to buy a memento of the trip’s experience. But what is there to remind us of our most significant life experience—our commitment to Christ? Some will look at their paycheck and remember the promotion they declined because they were not willing to compromise their morals. Others, upon seeing a public school classroom, will recall where they first learned what it was like to be persecuted. Still others will see a gravestone of a believer and be reminded of the meaning of commitment. These “souvenirs” are infinitely significant reminders of the price of faith in Jesus Christ.