Displaying items by tag: Praise

Jean du Rand’s father leads a vibrant church, and there were Afrikaans Baptist pastors on his mother’s side; but in 2010, while a member and songwriter in a successful South African band, and still in his teens, he became involved in alcohol and drugs. He didn’t find the happiness that this lifestyle was supposed to bring, and during a university lecture he experienced God’s presence. The Holy Spirit said, ‘You know Jean, I have plans for your life. You can come with Me now and leave this place, or you can come in five years. I’m going to use you either way, and it’s up to you how much pain you want to traverse.’ Jean chose ‘now’. He is now about to release some Afrikaans worship songs ‘with a difference’. You can hear one of his songs on Youtube:

Four Christians in the eastern state of Jharkhand, in prison since May on charges of forced conversion, have been released. Voice Of the Martyrs Canada (VOMC) said their troubles began when the father of one of the believers said they had attempted to physically force him to convert to Christianity. Police had said that Somaru Manjhi's daughter, Sumanti, was to be married on 30 May. The 65-year-old man said he was beaten with a bamboo stick by Sumanti, her fiancé Rupash, and two Christian missionaries after he opposed his daughter's desire for a Christian wedding. VOMC said, ‘We are pleased to report that after investigation, the four falsely accused Christians have been released from police custody. However, while praising God for their release, we remain mindful of their need for God's help and protection as they return to their communities and families.’

A was 19 when Jesus spoke to her in a dream. She dreamt that she walked into a Christian’s home and heard a magnificent voice. ‘I have never heard anything like it before or since,’ she said. ‘Later, I was very unwell for two days. I asked my friends to take me to church and there I wrote a prayer request on a piece of paper and asked the pastor to pray for me. All signs of illness disappeared. I knew Jesus was the truth and I committed my life to Him.’ A was forced to leave her family as the Christian faith is ‘Haram’ deserving death. She fled into the woods and prayed, ‘If the men in my family find me now, they will kill me. You know how angry they are at me. You know the community expects them to punish me. Show me the way.’ She was taken in by a pastor’s family and now attends a twice-weekly Bible study.

IS terrorists have mounted a number of attacks on churches in Egypt in the last two years, but on 11 August tight security foiled an attempted suicide attack on a church in Mostorod, north of Cairo. Security guards stopped the attacker from entering the church grounds to target worshippers. The bomber then detonated his explosives about 250 metres from the church, killing himself and a passer-by. Egyptian security services subsequently made seven arrests in relation to the attack. At the time of writing, no organisation has claimed responsibility. Please pray for the friends and relatives of the deceased.

In June we prayed for the Christian film Voices of the Silenced to influence today's culture - see  But on the eve of its premiere Vue Cinemas refused to screen it. Dr Mike Davidson, who produced the documentary, sued Vue for breaching the terms of their contract. On 15 August the cinema chain, which operates almost ninety venues across the UK and Ireland, settled in full the legal claim brought by the makers of Voices of the Silenced. Dr Davidson said that he hopes that in the future cinema operators will not fold under pressure from LGBT activists wishing to silence those who want to move away from same-sex attraction and behaviour. Shot in eight countries, the film presents reflections from doctors and theologians, as well as the testimonies of people who have abandoned homosexual relations.

When Saleem left Bethlehem in the West Bank to attend YWAM’s Discipleship Training School in Belfast, he said he felt like a nobody ‘because of my past, and who I was’. But while his outreach team were in Rwanda, he played soccer with friends and talked to them about his past, the situation in his country, and what God was teaching him about forgiveness. ‘After I spoke, a Hutu stood up and said his family was killed by Tutsis in the war, and he was getting ready to go to the Congo to join a Hutu rebel group so he could get revenge by killing Tutsis.’ But after he heard Saleem’s testimony, God touched his heart, and he said he now was choosing the grace of God. That night God spoke to Saleem, ‘He said, “See my son, your past is important, and you are everything to me”. From that night on, I knew that I was really someone!’

God spoke to us, used us to pray for others and healed some of us during this first week of New Wine 2018.  Ben Williamson from Christchurch Woking said, 'I prayed for someone whose hands had no movement or feeling and both were healed and restored while I prayed. It was awesome to see God's power at work so clearly in front of my own eyes.' Steve said, ‘I want to praise God and thank New Wine for providing a ‘thin place’ where I have felt the healing power of the Spirit. Six months of kidney and back pain gone completely, I feel so liberated.’ Sanna said, ‘I came here, widowed 10 months ago, broken-hearted and missing my other half and best friend. To my surprise, my venue was all about restoration. I have been so blessed and I’m so very happy that I picked up the courage to come here with my teenagers.’

In 2016 you prayed for Nurse Sarah Kuteh who was dismissed from her job after talking to patients about her Christian faith and giving a Bible to one patient. After dismissing her, Darent Valley Hospital reported Sarah to the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), questioning her 'fitness to practise'. For nearly two years the NMC has held a series of hearings to determine whether Sarah would continue to be able to practise as a nurse. Supported by the Christian Legal Centre, the NMC panel unanimously ruled that Sarah was fully 'fit to practise' and revoked all restrictions on her nursing practice.

In the midst of horrific destruction, where thousands of homes were burnt to the ground by wildfires in Reading California, 67 hospital staff still went to work. All  doctors, nurses, volunteers and office personnel made sure that patient care did not suffer. ‘Some people have slept on the floor,’ the hospital chief executive said. ‘The Reading police chief lost his home, as did two of his officers, but they still went on duty to save others at risk. It was a similar story with at least one firefighter. But it wasn't just the thousands of first responders who put their own loss and devastation to one side and stepped up to help their neighbours. Many ordinary folk took in people who had lost homes, provided food, donated supplies and offered any support that they could. Hollywood movies show society falling apart when disaster strikes, but the opposite happened; people wanted to band together and help.

A recent Barnabas Aid editorial reads: ‘CH Spurgeon often said that before God could use someone He had to first break that person into pieces. Jeremiah knew the truth of this. From his youth (Jeremiah 1:6), he was called to do an impossible task that involved grief, suffering, abuse and rejection. He is known as the weeping prophet. The Lord reminded Jeremiah, as he watched the potter at work, that it was His sovereign choice to destroy and remake His people, as the potter reworked the soft clay from one shape into another (Jeremiah 18:6). He also used the image of a pot, shattered to pieces and impossible to repair, as a warning to the people of Jerusalem in their iniquity (Jeremiah 19). And yet God did restore His repentant people and, in the end, brought them back to Jerusalem out of their Babylonian captivity. God took the broken fragments and restored them into something useful. So brokenness does not have to be the end. It can be the prelude to glory. God can restore even the broken cup and use it for His purposes.’