The family is in trouble
Suffering for Christ is not just in the past tense. We tend to have a blinkered view as we live lives of relative ease, but there are many faithful believers around the world who are suffering loss of livelihood, separation from family, imprisonment, torture and death for the cause of the gospel.
Nina Shea, an international human rights lawyer, sums up the huge need:
“Millions of Christians pray in their churches each week, oblivious to the fact that Christians in many parts of the world suffer brutal torture, arrest, imprisonment and even death—their homes and communities laid waste—for no other reason than that they are Christians. The shocking, untold story of our time is that more Christians have died this century simply for being Christians than in the first nineteen centuries after the birth of Christ. They have been persecuted and martyred before an unknowing, indifferent world and a largely silent Christian community."
Jesus remembered the plight of the seven little churches of Asia – and we must not forget the members of our Christian family who cannot speak out for themselves.