I once heard a renowned Ugandan Pastor say that America would never experience revival because we try to fit God into our schedule rather than our schedule into God.
I whole heartedly believe this…
However this week I awoke to an even greater tragic realization about American Christians, myself included.
This week a Jordanian pilot was burned alive by ISIS. The footage was posted and viewed countless times. One of the views happened to be from me.
*I do not encourage and would discourage watching the footage.
The video starts with the pilot held in a barred cage like an animal with a bunch of armed ISIS soldiers around. Fast forward to the last 3 minutes or so and one masked man lit a torch and like a tragically predictable movie the fire trail burned until it hit the cage. Now at this point you expect the guy to roll around in agony and then the camera to cut. Thats my years of hollywood magic shaping my expectations. Instead the pilot began to burn. And the camera never stopped filming him burn.
I watched as his skin charred his clothing and skin dripped from his body. I saw his skin bubble and split until finally he sat down and took his last breath. At that point a bulldozer dumped rubble on him and then ran over his charred remains.
You see watching this video I did so with the previous knowledge that in most burned alive situations people don’t die from the actual burns, but from suffocation due to lack of oxygen.
So imagine this, your are in the most intense pain a person can feel and you are not dying from it, but dying from one of the worst psychological deaths possible. They say drowning is the worst because of the suffocation. But I would say the idea of tremendous pain and suffocation that occurs in burning to death sounds a bit worse.
Sorry I know that was all pretty graphic, but it needed to be…
You see one of my favorite sections in scripture is found at the end of Hebrews 11:32-40
Hebrews 11:32-40 (NIV)
32 And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson and Jephthah, about David and Samuel and the prophets, 33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword; whose weakness was turned to strength; and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies. 35 Women received back their dead, raised to life again. There were others who were tortured, refusing to be released so that they might gain an even better resurrection. 36 Some faced jeers and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37 They were put to death by stoning;[a] they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— 38 the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground. 39 These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, 40 since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.
In this section of scripture we can clearly read that the legacy of the church was built on the hardship, torture, flogging, imprisonment, stoning, sawed in two of the early church.
From history we know that Christians were used in the coliseum as entertainment being killed by lions and other forms of blood sport.
If you do any kind of study of how the followers of Christ were killed they were crucified, beheaded, boiled alive and beheaded.
And even today we here reports of Christians being persecuted like this all over the world except…America.
Regardless of your political affiliation we can all agree there are things we would change or believe need to change in our government.
I believe we are seeing now more then ever a societal persecution of Christians in America but nothing like the physical persecution that the early church and even now Christians around the globe are dealing with.
Across the globe people in China are walking for days on end to go to a 4 hour service and days back just to hear the Gospel. Churches in America have eroded our services down to a clean hour so we don’t piss off the people in our church. We complain because we FEEL we are being persecuted for our faith because Gay marriage is legal and churches have a political bullseye on them.
We cry out when our values are challenged yet we don’t even live a life upholding these values.
I have to think how ashamed of us the founders of the church would be. We whine and cry about how hard it is to be a Christian even though we are not being raped, tortured or killed for our beliefs.
We are the most self absorbed group of people I know.
We support Pastor Saeed pages on Facebook and yet call our social outcasting persecution.
THIS IS NOT PERSECUTION…
If we would stop taking offense and and go on the offensive with sharing the Gospel I believe whole heartedly things would change.
But yet if it is not comfortable, easy or fits into our schedule we don’t want anything to do with it.
I LOVE THE CHURCH!!!!
I honestly think about the state of the church and where its headed. So much so, Im willing to call myself and others who will read this, to the recognition that we need to stop complaining about what it costs to follow Jesus and just follow Him.
The American cost to follow Jesus is nothing in comparison to the cost in China or Iraq.
If we could stop focusing on the trivial social hardships we are facing and start focusing on the enormous reality that the state of American faith is eroding and dying right before us, we can save the church and America.
I end with this…
Years ago I encountered a man from Africa while I was in Texas. You know that big state in the Bible belt. He was sent from his church in Africa to be a missionary to America.
CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT…
The home of the free and the brave has become so godless that poor churches in 3rd world countries are sending and supporting people to preach the Gospel in an area that is supposed to be the most Christian place in America.
In all honesty Im ashamed of myself.
After watching that man burn alive and seeing and reading the persecution people are facing all over the world; I cant believe I still allow myself to get down about the things I do.
I understand there is a different culture in America and that we are protected so our persecution comes in the form of political or social persecution rather than physical.
But to be honest if we realized that the Gospel doesn’t change or isn’t hindered by law or public opinion. I think we would be a lot more focused on spreading it regardless of whats happening in government or social media.
Lets step it up and step out!!