Canadians to pray for persecuted

Canadian churches will join Christians in 130 countries to pray for the suffering church on November 12.

“Plead My Cause” is the theme for International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP) this year. IDOP Canada, a partnership of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, Voice of the Martyrs and Open Doors with Brother Andrew, has kits available to help churches focus their prayers and become more informed.

Last year, more than 800 Canadian churches marked the day.

About 165,000 Christians will die because of their faith in Jesus this year, says statistician David B. Barrett. His conclusions were released in a new book titled Today’s Martyrs. According to Barrett, more than 43 million Christians have been martyred since the crucifixion of Jesus 2,000 years ago.

Testimonies from the persecuted church abound. In Vietnam, for example, Nguyen Huu Cau was imprisoned for organizing a summer Bible school for children in his home. During nine days in prison, he says, he and two colleagues “continued to praise the Lord out loud to encourage one another.”

Pastor Wuille Marcelino Ruiz spent over five years at a maximum security prison in Cuba, where he was in solitary confinement up to 23 and a half hours a day. All that time, he says, “I can truly say that the Lord never abandoned me, and I’ve honestly told him, ‘Lord, here I am. Do with me as you please.”

In southern Sudan, Brother Mark began preaching in 1991 with only eight people. Despite much opposition, including beatings, the congregation grew to 100 members within a year. Civil war scattered the congregation, and in 1995 the whole congregation was captured and forced by the army to carry weapons.

Despite hardship, torture and imprisonment, churches in restricted countries continue to grow. As Sister Yuan of China says, “increased raids on house churches are driving Chinese Christians deeper underground. Stopping us meeting is like forbidding us to breathe.”

“We have never felt that God has forgotten us,” adds a pastor in the Nuba mountains of Sudan. “But we have wondered about the church in the West.”

IDOP is an effort to address that feeling that the western church has forgotten those who suffer. The idea is not just to pray on one day, says Janet Epp Buckingham, director of the EFC’s Religious Liberty Commission. “We hope that the event will encourage your church or group to continue in prayer and concern for the persecuted church throughout the year.”

IDOP Canada kits are available through the EFC at 905-479-5885.