Kirk Cameron Interviews Ravi Zacharias

Pakistan – Young Christian Woman and her Father remain in Prison
Twenty-year old Sandul Bibi and her father Gulsher remain in prison in Pakistan despite four court hearings, according to VOM contacts.

"On Feb. 24 Sandul and Gulsher had another court appearance and nothing significant was determined," VOM contacts said. "This has been the outcome for the last four court hearings."

Sandul and Gulsher are charged with violating section 295-B of the Pakistani legal code, the 'blasphemy' law. Sandul is falsely accused of ripping pages from the Quran. On Oct. 9 a large crowd of Muslims attacked Christian families at a church, throwing stones and firing guns. They were shouting, 'Kill Gulsher and his daughter Sandul.' Sandul and her father, Gulsher Masih, were arrested after a mob from the local mosque surrounded their house. Loudspeakers from different mosques broadcast accusations that Christians had disgraced the Quran, calling Muslims to attack and burn their homes. The angry crowd threw stones and set fire to Sandul's home. Christians believe Sandul and her father were targeted and arrested because they were aggressively winning villagers to Christ.

The Voice of the Martyrs has supported Sandul and her family both financially and spiritually through this difficult time. VOM encourages you to continue lifting this family up in prayer and ask God to encourage them.

VOM has featured Sandul on the group's Christian prisoner Web site, www.prisoneralert.com. Praise God both Sandul and Gulsher have received letter of encouragement from our readers. VOM encourages you to visit this Web site and compose letters of encouragement and mail them to Sandul. You can also send letters to the Pakistani government requesting Sandul and Gulsher be released.

Reality Check 2009 Anchored in Truth

Reality Check Conference 2009
Anchored in Truth Ministries is excited to present the annual Reality Check Student Conference. Come join us for four days and three nights of solid preaching and truth driven worship that is glory of God focused, Christ honoring, and Bible saturated. Below are the conference promotional video and a brief message from Jeff Noblit about the conference. Feel free to download and use these videos to share with your church.

Thomas Jefferson-A Puritans Heart for His Country

The next event which excited our sympathies for Massachusetts was the Boston port bill, by which that port was to be shut up on the 1st of June, 1774. This arrived while we were in session in the spring of that year. The lead in the house on these subjects being no longer left to the old members, Mr. Henry, R. H. Lee, Fr. L. Lee, 3 or 4 other members, whom I do not recollect, and myself, agreeing that we must boldly take an unequivocal stand in the line with Massachusetts, determined to meet and consult on the proper measures in the council chamber, for the benefit of the library in that room. We were under conviction of the necessity of arousing our people from the lethargy into which they had fallen as to passing events; and thought that the appointment of a day of general fasting & prayer would be most likely to call up & alarm their attention. No example of such a solemnity had existed since the days of our distresses in the war of '55, since which a new generation had grown up. With the help therefore of Rushworth, [a popular book, John Rushworth's Historical Collections] whom we rummaged over for the revolutionary precedents & forms of the Puritans of that day, preserved by him, we cooked up a resolution, somewhat modernizing their phrases, for appointing the 1st day of June, on which the Port bill was to commence, for a day of fasting, humiliation & prayer, to implore heaven to avert from us the evils of civil war, to inspire us with firmness in support of our rights, and to turn the hearts of the King & parliament to moderation & justice. To give greater emphasis to our proposition, we agreed to wait the next morning on Mr. Nicholas, whose grave & religious character was more in unison with the tone of our resolution and to solicit him to move it. We accordingly went to him in the morning. He moved it the same day; the 1st of June was proposed and it passed without opposition. The Governor dissolved us as usualThomas Jefferson 1774---http://www.ushistory.org/Declaration/account/index.htm

Christians and Denominations

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom"

Proverbs 1:7

Arthur W. Pink


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"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" (Prov. 1:7). Happy the soul that has been awed by a view of God's majesty, that has had a vision of God's awful greatness, His ineffable holiness, His perfect righteousness, His irresistible power, His sovereign grace. Does someone say, "But it is only the unsaved, those outside of Christ, who need to fear God"? Then the sufficient answer is that the saved, those who are in Christ, are admonished to work out their own salvation with "fear and trembling." Time was when it was the general custom to speak of a believer as a "God-fearing man." That such an appellation has become nearly extinct only serves to show whither we have drifted. Nevertheless, it still stands written, "Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him" (Psalm 103:13).

When we speak of godly fear, of course we do not mean a servile fear, such as prevails among the heathen in connection with their gods. No, we mean that spirit which Jehovah is pledged to bless, that spirit to which the prophet referred when he said, "To this man will I (the Lord) look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word" (Isa. 66:2). It was this the apostle had in view when he wrote, "Honor all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king" (I Pet: 2:17). And nothing will foster this godly fear like a recognition of the Sovereign Majesty of God

Agony

Hail,Sovereign Love

Hail, Sovereign Love
Words by Jehoida Brewer

Hail, sovereign love that first began,
The scheme to rescue fallen man;
Hail matchless free eternal grace,
That gave my soul a hiding place.

Against the God who rules the sky,
I fought with hand uplifted high,
Despised His rich abounding grace,
Too proud to seek a hiding place.

Enwrapped in thick Egyptian night,
And fond of darkness more than light,
Madly I ran the sinful race,
Secure without a hiding place.

But thus th’ eternal counsel ran,
“Almighty Love, arrest that man!”
I felt the arrows of distress,
And found I had no hiding place.

Indignant justice stood in view,
To Sinai’s fiery mount I flew,
But Justice cried with frowning face,
“This mountain is no hiding place!”

Ere long a heavenly voice I heard,
And Mercy’s angel form appeared.
Who led me on with gentle pace,
To Jesus Christ, my hiding place.

On Him Almighty vengeance fell,
That must have sunk a world to hell;
He bore it for a chosen race,
And thus became their hiding place.

Should storms of thundering vengeance roll,
And shake the earth from pole to pole;
No flaming bolt shall daunt my face,
For Jesus is my hiding place.

A few more rolling suns at most,
Will land me safe on Heaven’s coast.
There I shall sing the song of grace,
To Jesus Christ, my hiding place!

Standing for Jesus in Orissa

Standing For Jesus In Orissa
"Nothing will happen to me. They know and respect me. Nobody will harm me."

Those were the last words Pastor Kantheswar Digal spoke to his son Rajendra and his wife, Karpul.

A Christian for more than 50 years, Pastor Digal was one of the few believers living in the small village of Sankarakhole, in Orissa state, India. He was well-known by the Hindus who shared his neighborhood. Yet, his son says, the family lived there in relative peace.

"We had no enemies there," Rajendra told our VOM workers about his small hometown. "We could practice our faith in Christ comfortably with no problems with anybody locally."

Nonetheless, on Aug. 24, 2008, when Hindu radicals began violent attacks against Christians throughout Orissa, venomous threats by agitators forced the Digal family to leave their village.

"They told my husband you better leave," says Karpul. "He should leave his house and go away if he wanted to stay a Christian because they were not going to allow any Christians to stay in our village."

The Worst of the Worst

The brutality against Orissa Christians spawned by Hindu fundamentalists was unflinchingly complete. Homes were burned. Churches were destroyed. People were killed. The entire Digal family fled their small village in the Kandhalmal district to the slums of the state's capital. All eight members were forced to live in a one-room, wooden shack.

On Sept. 20, 2008, Pastor Digal left his family in the makeshift shelter they had carved out for themselves. Over their objections he went to their home village to check on their house and livestock.

Pastor Digal was traveling on a local bus to his destroyed home when it was stopped by 18 Hindu radicals. What happened next was a horror unimaginable.

The radicals dragged Pastor Digal off the crowded, dusty bus. They ignored the sickening crunch of bone as both his legs broke. They proceeded to torture him, demanding that he return to Hinduism.

"I am a strong believer in Jesus Christ," Pastor Digal said. "You may kill me but I will never become Hindu."

The 18 men began to beat Pastor Digal. They tied his hands and legs. Witnesses watched as they stripped him of his clothes leaving nothing but a shirt. They burned his face and tortured him in unspeakable ways. Then they dumped this limp body in a creek where it floated for days.

"We Never Got Angry"

Fourteen days later, after frantically calling around Orissa trying to find his father, Rajendra saw his mother on a local television broadcast. She held a black and white photo of his father. He was dead, killed by radical Hindus because he was a Christian. Even though she lost her husband Karpul says "we never got angry after hearing about the news about my husband's killing."

Her son agrees. "I do not carry anger towards them because my Jesus was once also killed on the cross for all mankind, for the entire sinful world," Rajendra said. "My father dedicated his life for my village for people who still did not know Christ. I think for my village, my father also was killed. And by the sacrifice of his own life, they may know Jesus Christ and accept him as their only Lord and personal savior. "

The Digals were one of the hundreds of people helped by VOM ministry partners, thanks to our readers. They received help with relocation, food and other basic necessities. But the aftermath of the horrific violence in Orissa has left tens of thousands of Indian Christians without homes, jobs or stability. In January the government closed the relief camps in Orissa leaving thousands homeless and without protection. Even with the uncertainty, Orissa Christians say they are strengthened by the prayers and love of Christians all over the world. Your love allows them to remain bold for Christ.

"We strongly believe that Christians all over the world are praying for us," says Rajendra. "We are also praying for all of them. (Praying) that everyone should stand firm for witnessing for Jesus throughout their life."

Come to Him!!