40acts: Ready to ActSample

Act 39: We Are Family

On National Siblings Day, our focus turns to the persecuted church worldwide: our brothers and sisters in Christ who risk everything to worship and serve him. At the time of writing, countries in the spotlight include India, Bangladesh, China and Nigeria. Our first reaction might be that we are powerless to help, but by partnering with one of the excellent organisations that work in these areas, we can add another voice to the campaigns and another pair of hands to the tasks.

We are promised hard times, but we are also promised hope. No one is this truer for than the persecuted church. ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven’ (Matthew 5:10). ‘The one who stands firm to the end will be saved’ (Matthew 10:22). 

For people in the West, we need imagination to feel what it’s like to live these verses. We haven’t experienced the depth of struggle with an angry world that our brothers and sisters have in Bangladesh, Nigeria, and beyond. But we get the incredible privilege of being the ones to help our persecuted church family. We get to partner with them and offer them hope, strength, and an impartation of faith. We can become the hope that helps them stand firm. 

Maybe you’ve been in a situation where you’ve felt like the last flicker of hope has gone out in your soul, when an unexpected person has come through and stood with you. What a feeling!

Persecution is promised in the Bible. ‘Mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days’ (2 Timothy 3:1). Jesus takes a direct line with us: there is no version of the future that doesn’t involve the body of Christ going through tough times. In the middle of it, different parts of the body of Christ take on different roles. Those of us in parts of the world with more freedom can help those who are persecuted, and for many of us, it may be the first time we ‘feel’ the reality that we are family with those strangers on the other side of the earth. This is a gift, for us and for them, that will last into eternity.