UPSIDE DOWN KINGDOM Week 6: If The World Didn’t Give It...

Look around you and find seven other people. Including yourself, that makes 8 Christians, right? Open Doors just released their World Watch List for 2020 that shines a light on the level of persecution believers face in this world today, and in that report they tell us that the number is now over 260 million Christians – one of every eight believers – experience high levels of persecution. Almost 3000 followers of Christ were killed this past year for faith-related reasons. Folks, that's eight Christians a day.

SO...your group little group of eight? You can see that group in two ways: 1) ONE of you would have died last year for being a Christian; or 2) ALL EIGHT of you would have died in just one day last year because of your faith. 

Why do I bring this up? This isn’t the kind of inspiration you want when you come to church, is it? It completely blows my mind that I rarely think about that kind of persecution when I go to church each week, TAKING FOR GRANTED THAT WE STILL HAVE THE FREEDOM TO COME TO CHURCH without threat of repercussions from the Government.

But again - why bring it up? First, because today is actually the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church and Persecuted Christians. And secondly, because of the last Beatitude we come to as Jesus begins his Sermon on the Mount is about persecution. BTW - this timing was NOT my intention. I had NO IDEA that this sermon would “coincide” with the Day of Prayer. It just came up as I spoke with Ann Andrews about this sermon.

In the beatitudes, we’ve been studying what it means to live in God’s Upside Down Kingdom and  about God’s favor extending to those who experience true life-change. But here’s the truth. When people’s lives change, apparently not everyone stands up and applauds that change. (Not sure why...except for the fact that Satan sets himself in opposition of anything good and godly.) And just as Satan opposes life-change, it’s clear that transferring your citizenship from the World to God’s Kingdom makes some people very angry. Operating under the influence of our great enemy, the Devil, these folks aren’t just content to “agree to disagree;” they actually are in full-force engagement in a war against God and His Church.