Category: Christian News

Date Published: 22-03-2016 Flowers and a candle for the victims of today’s Brussels attacks, are placed on the steps of the Belgian embassy in Berlin, Germany. Christians in Brussels are praying as news of this morning’s attacks unfolds, and Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel confirmed that “scores” of people have been killed or injured. Speaking to Christian Today from Brussels, Joe Szabo, senior pastor of the Christian Center, said that members of the congregation were caught up in the attacks, and that staff at the church met to pray this morning. “We do know of people from the church… who were in the airport, they were there when the explosion happened,” Szabo said. “Thankfully no one was hurt.” The church will specifically be praying for those injured in the attacks, and the families of those killed, during its Easter services, he added. “For the victims, for God to protect the city and our country.” OM Belgium, an evangelical Christian missions organisation, is located just five minutes from Zaventem Airport where two of the blasts took place. Field leader Jan Wisse said his brother-in-law was on a train following the blast at Maelbeek metro station an hour later. Wisse said his team held a prayer meeting this morning, and a number are currently helping the Red Cross. Another member has been sent to see what practical help the organisation can offer to victims who are recovering in a local sports complex. The Christian Center has been involved in responding to the refugee crisis in Brussels, where hundreds have fled from countries such as Syria and Eritrea. Already, controversial columnist Katie Hopkins has sparked outrage by blaming refugees for this morning’s attacks: Republican presidential candidate frontrunner Donald Trump – who has infamously called for a ban on Muslims entering the US – also appeared to blame refugees for the attacks. “My message to us is, we better get smart and we better get smart fast,” he said during a phone interview with Fox today. “In my opinion, this is just the beginning. It’s going to get worse and worse. Because we are lax and we are foolish. “I’ve been talking about this for a long time. Look at Brussels, Brussels was a beautiful city, a beautiful place with zero crime, and now it’s a disaster city,” he added. “It’s a total disaster. And we have to be very careful in the United States, we have to be very, very vigilant as to who we allow into this country.” Szabo said the Christian Center will continue to serve refugees in its community. “We are still believing that we are to love all people in our city. We pray for Muslims, for Christians and for the Jewish population. The bombing will not deter us from continuing to carry out our mission to share the love of God with all people,” he said. Though the church had to suspend some of its outreach to refugees today because public transportation has stopped, it did distribute food to refugees closer to its building. “As soon as the security allows us to move in”, volunteers will be heading to refugee centres in other areas of the city as usual, Szabo added. Carlton Deal, founding pastor of Brussels church The Well, said in an email to Christian Today that the Maelbeek metro station is a just a kilometre from the church’s office. “Stories of near misses are pouring in from our community: a last minute flight cancellation, an impromptu decision to walk instead of take the metro, a friend of a friend who was on the metro when the bomb exploded, but is unhurt,” he said. “All day long sirens are sounding, police and ambulance vehicles rushing to respond to needs, helicopters hovering overhead.” Belgian police and emergency personnel work near the Maalbeek metro station. Several years ago, The Well held a week of service called ‘Serve the City’, which has now grown to a movement that spreads across 100 cities around the world. One of the ways volunteers continue to serve is by helping in refugee centres in Brussels. Deal wrote in a Serve the City Facebook post today: “Let’s… be very attentive to the needs of the most vulnerable in our city and neighbourhoods in the coming days. Join our weekly projects or share with us news of ways you have been able to care for people in need. “On a day like this, we see more clearly the brokenness around us. We grieve all that is lost, but not as people who have no hope. May the events of today deepen our compassion and strengthen our resolve to cross the line.” In his email to Christian Today, Deal added: “We normally serve homeless friends and refugees tonight, but we have cancelled all activities, for the safety of our volunteers. “However, we do not view refugees in any way as the cause for the Brussels attacks. We will return to serving them absolutely as soon as possible. We care deeply for them, and see them as people who are running from the same bombs we are.” He said: “If we’re placing blame we have to look to immigrants not refugees, and, in the same breath, ask ourselves how much we have helped them to integrate into Belgian society. Third and fourth generation Muslim immigrants in Molenbeek still report feeling foreign and alienated, with few prospects for meaningful work and a successful European life. Radical imams and jihadists find them easy prey. “This is where we have to start. Live in their neighbourhood. Become their friends. Hear their stories. Feel their pain. Grieve together about all that is lost and look to Jesus, the risen Lord, our eternal hope. “Pray with us that in these challenging days, Jesus would continue to make of us a well, from which people in Brussels may drink His living water,” Deal said. “We are a community of faith and mission. We love, we serve, we believe – for such a time as this.” Islamic State has claimed…

  More people, including Muslims, are coming to Christ in Syria than ever before, as the five year anniversary of the civil war approaches, according to a persecution charity. “We’re in a big harvest. God is waking up a sleeping Church,” one pastor told Open Doors. “The Muslims coming to faith are ready to die for their new beliefs; that is a different kind of Christianity.” The war in Syria has devastated its population, with 7.6 million people internally displaced and 4.6 million refugees having fled the country. While the number of Christians officially in the country has decreased since the beginning of the war due to persecution, people – including Muslims – are still coming to faith in Jesus. “What attracted me is the loving environment of the church,” said one Syrian believer from a Muslim background living in Aleppo. In February this year a church in Damascus, Alliance Church, planted a new church close to Homs; a city once dubbed the “capital of the revolution”. While the recorded number of Christians in Syria has fallen – from 1.9 million before the war to between 600,000-900,000 now, the number of Christians secretly worshipping is unknown. New converts from Islam can face serious consequences for leaving their religion. “We [my wife and I] both became Christians,” a Syrian refugee in Lebanon told Open Doors. “My wife took her veil off, but people started to threaten us.” There are glimmers of hope on the ground in Syria. A church in Homs, alongside Open Doors, opened a furniture factory in February, which is now providing work for over thirty people and has already received orders internationally. The charity has also financed the opening of a new pharmacy, which enables people to buy medicines at a reasonable price and offers discounts for those who cannot afford them. “One of the needy women who received medicine for free burst into tears,” an Open Doors contact said. “We continue to live in Syria with hope that our country will heal from its painful outcomes. It will heal from its wounds and will regain peace soon,” said one Syrian church leader. “We, under the Lord’s grace and through his strength, have decided to stay and carry on.”