HADASSAH MINISTRY Pray, pray, pray, saints keep praying DAILY DEVOTION John 16:1-4 (ISIL) by BJ I have told you these things so that you won’t abandon your faith. For you will be expelled from the synagogues, and the time is coming when those who kill you will think they are doing a holy service for God. This is because they have never known the Father or me. Yes, I’m telling you these things now, so that when they happen, you will remember my warning. I didnt tell you earlier because I was going to be with you for a while longer. (John 16:1-4) Read: Luke 10:1 - 11:13, John 8:21-59 Relate: There is a bit of debate as to what exactly ISIL believes. They call themselves salafis. Basically that is an ultra fundamentalist movement to try and restore Islam to what it was in the first three generations. It should be noted that more than a fifth of those in Saudi Arabia view themselves as salafist and all twelve of the judges on ISILs kangaroo court are Saudi. Salafi detractors of ISIL call them wahhabi. Wahhabism is similar to salafism except it has a much more political and iconoclastic bent. ISILs destruction of certain muslim saints tombs fit nicely in line. Also, wahhabism is considered by many to be a derogatory term for salafis with delusions of grandeur. Declaring themselves a new caliphate and demanding all Muslims world over to recognize the spiritual authority of ISILs leader, Abu Bakr al-Badgdadi, might possibly be considered delusions of grandeur. (It was also the one act that motivated so many other Muslim leaders to finally condemn ISIL) There are also those who claim ISIL are actually Khawarij. That is basically the Muslim version of cult or apostate, but it comes from a group way back in the seventh century who rejected the current caliphs authority and emigrated into what is now southern and western Iraq. They are most noted for their belief that all who claimed to be Muslim but did not agree with them were deserving of death... sound familiar? No matter what else is said, one thing even their strongest detractors would agree on, is that ISIL is passionate in their beliefs. No matter how warped and twisted those beliefs might be, they have demonstrated over and over again a willingness to kill and to die for them. When they murder the Shiite, when they kill the Kurd, when they execute the Christian, they truly do believe they are doing a holy service to God. React: Persecution of Christians in Iraq isnt anything new. It has been going on for years now. A decade ago, on one day, eleven people died as five churches in Baghdad and Mosul were bombed. The tally of bombed churches had climbed to over sixty long before ISIS took the town of Qaraqosh and surrounding areas sending over a hundred thousand cultural Christians running for their lives. Under Hussein, there were roughly 1.4 million Christians in Iraq. That number grew to about 300,000 by 2012. Now it is much closer to 0. ISIS is only the last in a long line of Muslim groups persecuting and killing Christians while thinking they are doing a holy service to God. Most of those interviewed now living as refugees in Baghdad or in the Kurdish capital, Irbil, claim they have no intention of returning to their homes. They are making the journey that over a million of their friends and neighbors made before them. The question is, if all the salt has left or is leaving, what will stop the decay from growing? If all the light is gone, why do we wonder if darkness reigns? ISIS will not be beat by guns and bombs. Darkness only truly flees when light returns. Respond: God, I pray for those who have been forced from their homes and their lands at gunpoint. I pray that the refugees will find in You their refuge. I pray also for the friends and the families of those who had the boldness to stay and paid for that choice with their lives. I pray that the blood of your saints, that has been watering this land for over a decade, would begin to bear fruit beyond what any could have imagined. Most of all I pray for Your soon return. Come quickly, Lord. Bring a final end to all this horror and torment. its never as bad as it seems! Psalm 27:4-5 One thing I have desired of the Lord, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord All the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord, And to inquire in His temple. For in the time of trouble He shall hide me in His pavilion; In the secret place of His tabernacle He shall hide me; He shall set me high upon a rock. The world these days is full of bad news, with the threat of Ebola across the globe, tensions growing in the Middle East, economies on the brink of collapse, and nature constantly adding to the chaos with one disaster after another. Its a time of trouble all right, and for us believers it may sometimes be hard to believe -- but it never is as bad as it seems. Let me illustrate with a joke I like to share with my messages. Way out west (in America, of course), a cowboy is driving down a road, his dog riding in the back of his pickup truck, his faithful horse in the trailer behind. As he takes a curve on the highway he suddenly loses control of the vehicle and has a terrible accident. Sometime later, a State Police officer comes on the scene. A great lover of animals, the officers attention is first drawn to the horse. Realizing the serious nature of its injuries, he draws his service revolver and puts the animal out of its misery. Then walking around the accident he finds the dog, also critically wounded, and whining miserably in pain. This grips his heart and he quickly ends the dogs suffering as well. Finally the police officer locates the cowboy, who has suffered multiple fractures and can barely breathe. Hey, are you okay?, he says. The cowboy takes one look at the smoking gun in the troopers hand and quickly replies, with unexpected energy, “Never felt better! We are pilgrims in this dangerous world, which will wound us at times so badly it will seem unbearable – yet we have this promise from God, “in the time of trouble He will hide me”. Its because my real life, my true life is in Him and with Him no matter what happens to me here. So when the world approaches me with a smoking gun, ready to put me out of my misery, I can find a supernatural strength, and simply say, I never felt better! PROPHETIC WORD - Russ Walden The Father says today make a holy noise. The voice of praise is stilled in death, how shall the dead praise Me? You are not of the dead you are of the living. Get noisy in your praise today says the Father. Be inappropriate with your praise. Let your praise be of an exuberance that offends every religious spirit in the room. There is no dignity in tightly clasped hands, closed lips and closed hearts. Open your heart, your mouth, your hands and praise with militancy! Clap your hands, yes smite your hands together over your enemy for you enemy is defeated before he draws his weapon says the Father. Rejoice says the Father. Rejoice and know that My song is a song that sings in the song that you sing. My song thunders and rumbles through the earth shattering the bars of iron and the gates of brass that have held My people from their joy. The river of joy is reaching you today says the Father. It is bubbling up within to wash away the ashes of morning and the graveclothes, the sackcloth of sorrow. Be restored in your rejoicing says the Father for it is a new day, a day of blessing and renewal and restoration even in the sinews and tissues of your youth and your mind and your spirit. Release the shout and the flood of your mouth and I will be known and seen and manifest in your land!
Posted on: Fri, 31 Oct 2014 05:01:17 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015