Persecuted Christians Tell Horrors of Starvation

[Garland-Green]

Persecuted Christians Tell Horrors of Starvation, Brutal Electric Shock Torture for Refusing to Deny Jesus Christ  

[cristobela]

That their persecutors find Christmas lights acceptable, but not Christ, is very telling (it says that the festivity has nothing inherently to do with Jesus Christ). I remember the Harry Potter books I use to own always had their characters celebrating Christmas in a school of witchcraft and wizardry (paganism, occultism), lol. Sorcery and witchcraft are not Christian either.

• Acts 19:19 (NIV)
  
  19 A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly. When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to fifty thousand drachmas.[a]
  
  Footnotes:
  
  a. Acts 19:19 A drachma was a silver coin worth about a day’s wages.

I like the way the KJV translates Deuteronomy 18:10-12 in particular...

• Deuteronomy 18:10-12 (KJV)
  
  10 There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch.
  
  11 Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer.
  
  12 For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord: and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee.

These martyrs are attaining a better resurrection, God bless them.

• Hebrews 11:35 (NIV)
  
  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.
  
  
  
• Revelation 6:9-11 (NIV)
  
  9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. 10 They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?” 11 Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the full number of their fellow servants, their brothers and sisters,[a] were killed just as they had been.
  
  Footnotes:
  
  a. Revelation 6:11 The Greek word for brothers and sisters (adelphoi) refers here to believers, both men and women, as part of God’s family; also in 12:10; 19:10.
  
  
  
• Revelation 20:4-6 (NIV)
  
  4 I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They[a] had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years. 5 (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. 6 Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years.
  
  Footnotes:
  
  a. Revelation 20:4 Or God; I also saw those who

Though I pray that they turn away from thinking that Peter is the rock upon whom the church is built (which is why they have that giant statue of Peter in the back). Jesus/God is the Rock, not Peter, when all scripture is compared.

• Matthew 16:18 (NIV)
  
  18 And I tell you that you are Peter,[a] and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades[b] will not overcome it.
  
  Footnotes:
  
  a. Matthew 16:18 The Greek word for Peter means rock.
  b. Matthew 16:18 That is, the realm of the dead
  
  
• Ephesians 2:19-21 (NIV)
  
  19 Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. 21 In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord.
  
  
• Psalm 92:15 (NIV)
  
  15 proclaiming, “The Lord is upright;
  he is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in him.”

There's no reason for them to draw special attention to Peter since all the prophets and apostles are a part of the foundation too. The cornerstone, however, is Jesus, upon whom the whole thing is built upon. And all of us are rocks / individual stones in the holy temple of God (the spiritual one, not the literal one to come in Jerusalem). It's strange that they pick Peter of all people when it was Paul who was the Roman citizen and the one who went to Rome. :P