Kris Vallotton this Friday! Fan the Flame DC, 7pm, Embassy Church
PRAYER CALL WEDS! 9PM EST. Conference call number: 805-399-1200 access code 552-690. Use *6 to mute/unmute. Invite your friends to join us!
Guess who’s coming to breakfast?
The Dalai Lama will join President Obama, congressional leaders and spiritual leaders from across the nation Thursday for the annual National Prayer Breakfast. President Obama is scheduled to address the group on freedom of religion.
We are asking you to cover this event in prayer. At the end of this posting are a few prayer points. But first let me address a basic concern.
Whose Voice Should Be Heard?
The Dalai Lama’s attendance at the gathering is meant to showcase the universal need for freedom of religion. And I appreciate this. But why not focus on the abhorrent travesties against religious freedom just this year, whose victims are currently THUNDERING to our collective conscience?
Not that the persecution faced by the Dalai Lama and his monks isn’t still relevant. And it’s more politically correct than directly addressing victims of atrocities of Islamist extremism etc. But Christians this year have suffered horrific, unimaginable persecution at the hands of ISIS and other Islamist jihadists in Iraq, Syria, and Iran. Survivors have seen their fathers and mothers crucified, their sons and daughters raped and beheaded. They have been plundered, tortured, and driven from their homes. Especially after ISIS ran unchecked through the gates of Iraq.
So have Yazidis, Kurds, and even Muslims who do not adhere to the extremist views of these Islamist jihadists.
Their devotion to Christ in the midst of extraordinary suffering has penetrated my heart and awakened my resolve. It is their presence that should be showcased in this lit-up window to conscience called the National Prayer Breakfast.
And it is their voices that are now resounding in the earth, bearing witness of the unalienable right of freedom to worship.
Voices from the Holocaust
Perhaps we should also consider the soon-fading voices of the few remaining Auschwitz survivors, who seventy years ago this very hour were liberated from the Nazis. In the face of the rising tide of intolerance and extremism in the Western world, these Holocaust survivors remain existential witnesses before God and man to the enduring sacrament of freedom to worship.
Same with the survivors of the recent slaughter in Paris. Je suis Charlie, Je suis Juif. Remember?
US Chaplains, Business Owners
Should we not also hear from US military chaplains—whose careers have been threatened if they continue to evangelize in the name of Jesus? Or believers within our own government who have all-too recently been marginalized due to their beliefs?
Why not showcase the many Christian business owners who have suffered loss and even lawsuits for refusing to acquiesce their First Amendment freedoms in the name of government-imposed political correctness?
Some, such as Hobby Lobby’s Steve Green, have even seen their cause upheld by the US Supreme Court. Mr. Green would certainly be an excellent witness at the National Prayer Breakfast to the unalienable, Constitutional right of freedom of religion.
You get my point. Simply stated, upholding the freedom of religion within our own nation, let alone promoting this sacred tenet globally, has not seemed to be a top priority of the man who will soon address the world on this issue.
I pray things change.
Security Issues and Strategic Prayer Points
The National Prayer Breakfast will mark the first time where President Obama and the Dalai Lama will appear publicly together, though they have met privately before. The Chinese government vehemently opposes this meeting, saying that it signals US support for Tibetan independence.
Protesters on both sides of this issue will probably make a stand. Security will seriously be an issue, and we need to pray.
And it goes without saying that, as we progress towards the National Prayer Breakfast, we need to contend for our spiritual security as well. A friend sent me a few strategic prayer points. The leader must remain anonymous because of serving in a nation still apparently hostile to freedom of religion.
This prayer event has become a solemn national event. Pray to secure it. Note that the timings of these events are never accidental, they are deliberate. This date will be the next full moon. Spiritually knowledgeable people secure futures, transact agreements and other advantages either for good or bad in these seasons.
It’s time to be a watchman! From sundown on 4th, through midnight into 5th and at the start of the event. Psalm 81:3-9. Get rid of foreign gods at a time God’s public square visibility is next to nil.
He went on to admonish us:
“Foreign gods are being imported into the nation through (many) meetings and invitations into the inner seat of state. Meanwhile the true God is chased out of the public square.
Stand against it. Let the voice of God thunder during this event!
