Proof The Bible Is True

How does six-plus hours of Bible study on a Friday night sound to you? As someone who works at a ministry dedicated to serving persecuted Christians, the first time I heard of Secret Church, I assumed it was an underground church simulation. Maybe you’ve participated in something similar. You know – meeting in a “secret” location, under the cover of darkness, singing softly so “authorities” don’t hear, possibly getting “raided” by other church members dressed up in fatigues… that’s what I thought Secret Church was. And while those simulations are valuable to help us understand how Christians worshipped behind the [More]

Brother “Samuel” leads a media minibstry in Pakistan, reaching out to Muslims with the gospel of Christ. It isn’t always a popular message: Samuel has been threatened, his staff has been beaten and his office has been attacked. Charges under Pakistan’s blasphemy law are a constant threat. But God is at work! Muslims are accessing ministry resources and meeting Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Listen as Samuel shares the challenges of serving Christ in Pakistan—”anything can happen at any time”—and how he constantly re-commits himself and his family to the ministry that God has called them to, whatever the [More]

“I’m tired,” my son John complained, “And I have a bad headache.” “Have you had enough water to drink today?” I inquired. It’s my usual response, for I know (and my kids forget) that a lot of headaches and much of what feels like exhaustion comes from poor hydration. We don’t always feel thirsty; what we feel are the side effects of not having had enough fluids. As he went to get a glass of water, and then, surprised at how good that felt, drank another, I turned my attention back to reading my Psalms for the day. Next up [More]

My laptop ended up in the computer hospital this week. It’s never good when you tell your computer doctor what’s going on and he says, “I’ve never heard that before.” It sounds like such a simple thing to be without your computer for several days, but for someone who uses it for the family business and writes full-time, it’s major. I had to get creative to meet my obligations. My blog for Guideposts was due a few hours after my computer went haywire. As panic set in, I realized I could type the story in an email on my iPad mini. [More]

A U.S. missionary who was sentenced to fifteen years of hard labor in North Korea, and served in a labor camp for two years before ultimately being freed, is speaking out about his experience and how his missionary work was deemed a “threat” to the atheist government. “They (the prosecutors) said, ‘You attempted to overthrow the government through prayer and worship’ and they really took prayer as a weapon against them,” Kenneth Bae told CBS News this past week. “One of the prosecutors told me that I was the worst, most dangerous American criminal they had ever apprehended since the Korean War,” he recalled. [More]

Whether or not the United States is still a Christian nation has been debated by politicians and Christian leaders alike — from U.S. President Barack Obama to the Southern Baptists Convention’s (SBC) Dr. Russell Moore. “Whatever we once were, we’re no longer just a Christian nation,” Obama told CBN News while campaigning for the presidency in 2007. “We are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation and a nation of nonbelievers.” Moore recently gave his own take on the issue, clarifying that the question can be asked and answered from two distinct standpoints. Read [More]

Semse Aydin’s husband, Necati, was one of three Christian men martyred for their faith and ministry in Turkey. The next day, on national TV in Turkey, Semse offered forgiveness to her husband’s killers, along with the widow of one of the other martyrs. Listen to VOM Radio this week as she shares how the Holy Spirit enabled her to forgive, and how God has sustained her and her two children since she gave Necati to Jesus. You’ll also hear how Necati dealt with family members who were still Muslims, and how he went to meet with his killers, even though [More]

One of the great privileges of my life is interviewing Christians who have faced persecution. To be able to sit down with these brothers and sisters, drink tea and simply ask questions to explore their faith and their relationship with Jesus is a source of great joy to me, as well as a spur to my own faith and walk with Christ. Recently I interviewed John Short, a Christian who was detained in North Korea after he left gospel tracts outside a Buddhist temple. In the course of our conversation, Mr. Short said something that I’ve never heard before, or [More]

When I joined a missions organization in 2003 intending to go overseas as a 24-year-old, people didn’t understand. They asked me why. They told me there were plenty of people who needed help in the U.S. They wanted to know why I was leaving my job at the newspaper. It didn’t make sense to them, because it wasn’t a safe choice. But I knew I’d been put on earth for a reason that was bigger than my own comfort. So I went. In those two years, I learned about sharing the gospel in front of a crowd or one-on-one. I [More]

When we say largest megachurches in the world, Americans are likely to immediately think of the Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas—which boasts of some 43,500 people attending its services weekly—or Potter’s House in Dallas. However, Leadership Network’s Warren Bird, an expert when it comes to the subject of megachurches, recently released a research showing that Christian churches with the largest attendance are not located in the United States but in Asia and Africa. In an article on the Leadership Network’s website, Bird named the Yoido Full Gospel Church in Seoul, South Korea as the most attended Christian church in the [More]

Although the sexual revolution is perverse to the core, one thing we can all learn from it is the incredible power of unity. Church leaders should take note of how the Human Rights Campaign – the leading organization in this revolution – simplifies its message, galvanizes its base and mobilizes its army. It’s genius, even though…

“Yes most pastors don’t lead a lavish lifestyle and can even be in a hard place financially as the article points out. If you attend a small church have you asked your pastor if his financial needs are being met? if not you may want to.”  Admin A majority of evangelical pastors in the United States personally suffer from significant financial challenges as they serve in small churches — with most having little to no place to place to turn. The latest research released by the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) last week shows that the financial hardships experienced by [More]

Have you ever been betrayed by someone you loved? Have you ever faced seemingly insurmountable odds? Has it ever seemed as though there was no way out of your particular dilemma? If so, then you have a good idea of how David felt when he penned the words of Psalm 5. David had made a number…

Napoleon, defeated Spain claimed most of the Americas from its native inhabitants by virtue of first discovery. Conquistadors who explored North America include: Ponce de Leon, 1513 Panfilo de Narvaez, 1527 Desoto, 1539 Coronado, 1540 Cabrillo, 1542 Since gold was minimal in North America, the area was of little interest to the Spanish empire, and thus…

The Islamic Republic of Iran is the home of the fastest-growing church in the world (per Operation World). Thousands of Muslims there are choosing to follow Christ. Dr. Mike Ansari leads a movement called Heart 4 Iran, a movement to reach more Iranians with the gospel message of Christ’s love. Mike was born into an Iranian Muslim family, but his mother came to faith in Christ and was radically transformed, ultimately changing her entire family. Today Dr. Ansari broadcasts the gospel message into Iran, where people are hungry to hear. Listen below as he shares how Jesus is transforming Iranian [More]

Things will never be the same again in a far-flung village in southern Philippines after missionaries from the Christian Aid Mission brought the light of Christianity to tribal people who have known only spiritual darkness. A local ministry from the Mission spent eight months with the Manobo tribal community in northern Mindanao, holding Bible studies and chronologically teaching the narratives of the Hebrew Scriptures up to the New Testament. The local evangelists also screened portions of the 2004 Mel Gibson film “The Passion of the Christ” which greatly affected the people of the village, The Gospel Herald reports. Whole families [More]

A question frequently voiced today is: What has happened to America? How did we go from the greatest nation in the world to an immoral nation with failing schools, government-sponsored division and antipathy, and an orthodoxy of political correctness that punishes truth? The answer is that the two bedrocks America was founded upon and depended upon…

Christian leaders and writers in America have spent the better part of the past decade laboring over this question: “How do we get millennials to attend church?” While there are debates over the interpretation of the data on millennial church attendance, there’s no denying that overall church attendance for American millennials (born after 1981) has dropped with no sign of abating. In the midst of this seeming crisis, we can’t blame anyone for asking how to reverse a negative trend. However, it’s likely that these leaders and writers are asking the wrong question. A Simple Place to Begin with Young [More]

There you are in your living room with your family in search of some wholesome, inspirational entertainment. Maybe you’ve got hundreds of TV channels to choose from, yet it seems like there’s nothing suitable to watch. Been there? It’s time to meet ChristianCinema.com – the largest database of faith films to download for rent or purchase.…

Have you ever stretched a rubber band as far as it will go? To just about to the breaking point? That’s kind of how I felt one day awhile back. It had been an unusual amount of stress for my family, and I was done. Past my last good nerve. Over it. I felt like I was ready to snap.   I had a long list of errands on this day. I was so tired that it felt like I was running a marathon. I went to the grocery store, the department store and finally to the post office to mail a [More]

I’ve been stressing a bit lately. Maybe more than a bit. Since the beginning of the year, it seems like we’ve had an unending merry-go-round of things to deal with—and it’s felt like someone keeps making the ride go faster.   My husband and I have both been dealing with health issues, and we’ve had many weeks with two and three medical appointments. (I told Paul we need a new kind of social life!) Our family business has been extra busy, and there was that fun mountain of tax stuff to conquer. Add in being on faculty at several conferences, [More]

There has never been a successful and long-lasting atheistic civilization — and there never will be — is the opinion of many astute observers. And it’s also apparently the belief of radio giant Michael Savage, as he issued a dire warning on his Wednesday show. “Unless Christianity receives a new enthusiasm that sweeps the Western world, and Christianity itself rises up against the forces against it,” he said, “the entire West will collapse in your lifetime.” Savage, author of numerous best-selling books and host of the award-winning Savage Nation radio program, has long warned that the West is imperiled by [More]

Thousands of churches in the US have been asked to set aside time in their services April 17 in order to pray for persecuted Christians around the world. The Voice of the Martyrs is one of the ministries behind this effort, called “Stand With the Persecuted Sunday.” The first request of persecuted Christians, when VOM staff meet with them around the world, is that American Christians will pray for them. What is challenging to us is that they are not asking us to pray that they will be released from their suffering or that persecution will end; instead they ask [More]

On this date in 1945, German pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer was hung by order of Adolf Hitler in a Nazi concentration camp. The following is excerpted from a letter Bonhoeffer had written which was circulated to a hundred or so of his former students during World War II …To be sure, God shall call you, and us, only at the hour that God has chosen. Until that hour, which lies in God’s hand alone, we shall all be protected even in greatest danger, and from our gratitude for such protection ever new readiness surely arises for the final call. [More]

“Sister Amber” spent more than a decade in Tibet, providing vocational training to the people and sharing the gospel message of Christ’s love. She felt God’s call especially to work among Tibet’s nomadic tribal people, who jokingly call themselves “the roof on the roof of the world.” Amber watched as God brought about a great ministry breakthrough: people who’d been totally closed to her message were now asking to learn more about Jesus. But just days after the breakthrough Amber experienced persecution as police came pounding on her door. Listen to VOM Radio this week as she tells the story. [More]

Rev. Franklin Graham and a recently retired Army vet have teamed up to bring God’s word to active duty military service members. Matt Cassady, an Army chaplain who retired last November after serving two tours of duty in Afghanistan, has joined Faith Comes By Hearing as its new director of chaplaincy ministries for its Military BibleStick outreach ministry, the Christian Post reported. The organization distributes digital audio devices called Military BibleSticks. They are about the size of a pack of gum and the device allows military service members and veterans to listen to dramatized recordings of the New Testament and [More]

The cultural conflict over sexual morality is waxing hot in America. Now is not the time for Christians to run and duck for cover. Our own state of North Carolina has now become a central battleground in this conflict. Every day it intensifies as more mayors ban travel to North Carolina, corporations put pressure on legislators,…