Hidden Treasures Assembly

Information shared by Open Doors

Do you see me? - Video
1 Corinthians 12:26 We are one body. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.
According to The Pew Research Center, over 75% of the world’s population lives in areas with severe religious restrictions (and many of these people are Christians). Also, according to the United States Department of State, Christians in more than 60 countries face persecution from their governments or surrounding neighbors simply because of their belief in Jesus Christ.
Looking in from the outside, we often want to pray for the trials of the persecuted church to cease. We hear about the decisions parents are forced to make to protect their children, or the prison sentences so many serve because of their beliefs. It’s only normal and seemingly right that we would want to pray for the persecution to end.
Yet the reality is that believers in the persecuted church around the world often don’t wish or pray for their trials to end.

The No. 1 request Open Doors receives from persecuted believers is prayer, but they don’t ask us to pray they will be removed from persecution. Time and again, persecuted believers tell us that persecution builds the church and their witness.
In the midst of persecution, they still live out their calling to glorify God.

2 Cor. 4:17 “For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all”
Open Doors North Korea Thank you Video
After ISIS attacks this summer in Egypt, a field leader shared, “It has never been so clear and so open for the church to share the gospel. God is revealing His love to the people of Egypt.. God is using this persecution—that Satan meant for destruction—as the greatest gospel platform in
While we pray against violent attacks like the ones ISIS waged against Christians and other religious minorities, we know our God is mighty and big and can use the plots of evil men for His glory and our good. A few real-life examples:
· In Tanzania, Eva’s Muslim parents rejected her when she converted to Christianity at the age of 14. At age 18, she was sentenced to two years in prison for her faith. “If we acknowledge Him,” she shares, “He too will acknowledge us before our Father in Heaven. Do not be afraid to testify before people, even if they are hostile. God fights for His own.”

Mark 8:36-38 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? 37 Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? 38 For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

Psalm 27:10 When my father and my mother forsake me, Then the Lord will take care of me.
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In China, Gulnur is a part of the Uyghur ethnic group in Western China, which reportedly experiences the worst persecution in the country. She is a Muslim-background believer, and her husband, Alimijan was imprisoned for his faith in 2009.
Gulnur now raises their two boys alone. She shares how she gets through these hard days: “We have joy, real joy, in this difficult situation. It must be joy from the Lord! Otherwise, how could we endure the hardship?”
PRAYING FOR CONTINUED HOPE

Around the globe, our brothers and sisters are praying to stay strong. And they ask you to join them. Pray that believers, who are living out and dying for their faith, will stand firm in light of their salvation.
I want to share this story with you…
Christ followers in this Muslim country are rare. Out of 2 million people, only an estimated 100 are believers who have no other alternative but to live their faith underground and worship in secrecy. None of these believers wanted to risk meeting me. Except one, a young lady, Allina*, who lived nearby. Vashka had arranged for us to meet the next day.
I couldn’t wait to spend some time with this sister in Christ and learn about her life as a Christian in Chechnya.
“I BELONG TO CHRIST.”
The next day, Vashka picked me up and we were on our way to meet Allina. At one point, he dropped me off at a local business where he knew I would be safe while he drove to her village to check if it was okay to meet her there, Two hours later, he returned, telling me that the president was in Allina’s village.
“I’m glad we didn’t go there,” he said. “The bad news is that you can’t meet her there.”
I was really disappointed. I had come all this way and wouldn’t meet even one brother or sister?
My discouragement quickly turned to joy with his next words. “I picked her up,” Vashka said. “She is in the car right now. You can meet her and ask her questions. But only for thirty minutes.”
I got in the car as fast as I could. Allina’s face looked pale and drawn, making it difficult to guess her age. Like most women in her country, she wore a headscarf. Almost immediately, she started to cry.
I’m the first to admit that I’m not always tactful when I talk to women, but I usually don’t make them cry when I meet them. I asked Vashka to pray for her in her own language. He did, and she visibly brightened up.
“I belong to Christ,” Allina suddenly said. “He protects me and takes care of me. When my husband was murdered during the war, I was left behind with four children. I have just come from the court. They have convicted me … .”
Vashka explained that as a widow from the war, Allina was supposed to receive benefits. “She signed for it, but she never got the money,” he said. “Now she is being accused of theft.”
Allina continued, “The judges sentenced me to several years in prison … But I don’t have to go to prison. It’s a suspended sentence. I still have children under the age of fourteen, so the judge had mercy on me.”
She switched to another subject: “When I was seventeen and on the playground with a lot of children and young people, an old man suddenly came up to me. He said, ‘You belong to Christ. When He comes back, you will be there, too.’ At the time, I didn’t understand what he was saying, but I never forgot it. Whenever I’m sad now, I remember those words. When I pray, I have the sense that someone in white clothing is standing next to me, and I have a feeling of peace.”
“I ONLY KNEW JESUS FROM THE KORAN.”
In the past, Allina had never before experienced this kind of peace that comes from knowing Christ. She recalled a time when, in a bomb shelter, one of her sons found and showed her “a book about God.”
It was the New Testament.
“Mummy, you’ll certainly like this book,” he said. Allina started to read it, and one verse from Revelation really touched her heart: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with Me” (Rev. 3:20).
“I only knew Jesus from the Koran,” Allina explained. “I always felt drawn to Him. After I had read the Bible, I often looked up into the sky, and I knew that there was someone who loved me. Actually, of course, I already knew this when the man came to me in the schoolyard. And now when I’m sad, I think back on the times when the Lord Jesus has helped me.
Clearly, Allina has been traumatized by all she has endured. Falteringly, she told me what had happened to her husband. In 2002, when both the Russians and the Chechen rebels were sowing death and destruction, a group of men surrounded her husband. No one knows who they were, but evidently, they wanted to know if he had become a “believer.” According to Allina, he had not. At the time, they were both still “seeking.” Still, the men shot and killed Allina’s husband.
“I NOW KNOW ONE OTHER CHRISTIAN.”
Allina shared about her decision to become a believer and how it has changed her life in good and bad ways. Following her husband’s death, Christians abroad reached out to her to help and encourage her. Through their example and testimony, she became a follower of Christ. Then she did something few Chechen Christians do. She told her family and friends about her decision to turn away from Islam to follow Christ.
“In the past, I had lots of friends,” she said. “Now they’ve all left me. My best friend would always support me. But even she betrayed me. Fortunately, I now know one other Christian.”
One Christian friend in a country with 2 million Muslims … one person you can be yourself with … one person with whom you can read the Bible or pray.
Despite being rejected by her friends, Allina continues to share her faith: “God leads me to people, and He tells me who I should talk to about Him.”
This doesn’t mean that everyone is willing to accept what she says. People at work, she said, threatened to “stab her children in front of her eyes,” and hurled horrific comments like, “We will crucify you.”
Still, Allina does not hate her persecutors.
“No, I pray for them: ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.’ The more they insulted and threatened me, the more I loved them. I even said, ‘I love you. In your hearts, you are very kind.’ I pray for my colleagues every day. My boss eventually fired my persecutors at work.”
“You must round it off,” Vashka suddenly said, bringing our time together to an end.
“Do you have any specific prayer requests?” I quickly asked Allina.
“Please pray that I really won’t have to go to prison. And pray that I can find a new flat. Someone else has offered more money for my flat, and now I have to get out. I’m praying, ‘Lord God, it doesn’t matter to me if I have to sleep in the street as long as my children have a roof over their heads!’ I don’t have enough money to buy winter clothes for my children either.”
“I THANK HIM FOR YOU ALL.”
Vashka started the car and drove us toward the station in Grozny. As we rode, my mind flashed to a strange thought I had just before I had gotten in the car in Grozny.
“As a foreigner, you can’t go out in the streets in Grozny,” Vashka had told me. “I’ll get the meals. Leave your money at home.”
But I had been stubborn. If I am abducted, I thought, it might be better to have some money with me.
We arrived at the station. While Allina prepared to get out of the car, I took out my wallet and gave her 5,600 rubles, about $170. “This is not my money, I told her. “This is from the body of Christ in my country.”
“I knew that God would send someone to help me,” Allina said, her voice quivering. She gently squeezed my hand. “I thank Him for you all.”
At that moment, I knew why God had laid on my heart this desire to go to Chechnya; why I was so stubborn about taking money with me; and why He had guided things in such a way that precisely today, I could have this meeting with Allina–not yesterday, not a day later. Today. From the beginning, it had been His intention to show Allina and me how great and mighty He is.
Here, in the back seat of a Soviet car so old, it was a miracle it still drove, in the midst of ruins, destruction and military checkpoints, we met. She, a widowed mother of four from Chechnya, and me a Dutch, married man and father of a one-year-old daughter. I gave her the money that God had promised her.
It wasn’t my money. It was yours and anyone who supports the persecuted church around the world through Open Doors. And it happened not only through my prayers but through the prayers of believers like you.

Chechen believers like Allina are enduring numerous trials as they live out their faith in Christ. Please pray that:
· Believers who are persecuted and ostracized for their faith would find other Christians with whom to pray, fellowship and read the Bible.
· These believers could stand strong in their faith and sense God’s presence amid the adversity they encounter.
· The children of these believers would see the love of God and the strength of their parents as they hold fast to their beliefs both in their homes and in public.
· These new converts would have Bibles and like Allina, be comforted and encouraged when they read the Word of God.
· God will reveal Himself to Muslims in Chechnya and that we will see more and more people discover the freedom and assurance the gospel offers.


Gal. 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

Psalm 39:4 “Lord, make me to know my end,
And what is the measure of my days,
That I may know how frail I am

When we realize how short this life is….
1. We need to make every moment count – by being obedient
2. We need to live on purpose so we don’t have regrets from this moment forward.

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