Paul said, everyone who leads a godly life in Messiah Jesus will suffer persecution. Jesus said, if we were of the world, the world would love us as its own, but because we are not of the world and he's called us out of the world, therefore the world will hate us the way it hated him. even in the Beatitudes. right in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus said, blessed.
are those who are persecuted for righteousness. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. And then speaking directly to his disciples, Blessed are you when people persecute you and insult you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be glad. Great is your reward in heaven.
That's how they persecuted the prophets before you. Paul Roche that we will share in the Lord's glory as we also share in his suffering in this world. Persecution for the faith is a given in the New Testament. It's mentioned in virtually every single book of the New Testament. Almost everywhere you find it referenced, you find it spoken against.
Jesus said that the great return that we get of blessing in this world, in Mark 10, he said, it comes with persecution. This is reality. John wrote and said in the book of Revelation that I'm your companion in the tribulation and suffering and kingdom. It's all hand in hand as we follow Jesus. Often in America, We don't experience it in the same way.
Maybe there's some verbal attack. And maybe here and there some assault on our freedoms and rights by the government or different individuals. But we can get on a street corner and preach Jesus. We can get on our podcast. We can get on social media.
We can talk about the Lord. We have incredible freedom. We're not being thrown in jail left and right. It happens in some cases, but overall, we're not being thrown in jail. We're not being tortured for our faith here.
We're not being killed for our faith here in America with rare, rare exception. But in other parts of the world, This is the norm. When you read the New Testament and the story of the persecuted church in the early church, As recorded on the pages of the New Testament, friends, that's reality for believers around the world today. And in a moment, I'm going to introduce a guest. And global Christian relief Brian Orm.
He will talk to you not just about what's happening. in the world today. where persecution is taking place. but how we can work together to empower believers, to help believers who are suffering all around the world. Multiplied tens of thousands of Nigerian Christians have been slaughtered.
Multiplied tens of thousands in recent years. Hardship, tragedy, on a basis of if it happened here in America, One fraction of it in one day, we'd be completely outraged all over America. How could this be happening? Other parts of the world, North Korea. different Muslim parts of the world, the persecution is intense.
all the time. It is risky to be a believer. When you sign up to follow Jesus, you understand you're putting your life on the line. Even every year in India, my friend Yesu Padam, as he baptizes people, believers who are making a public commitment, public profession of faith, when he baptizes them, he asks them at the end of them saying that what they believe, yes, they believe in Jesus, he died, rose from the dead. Yes, they believe that.
He asked them, are you willing to follow Jesus? to your last breath, to your last drop of blood. That's just water baptism. One of my colleagues in the Middle East says before they baptize a former Muslim, this person's professing faith, they asked them, Are you willing to suffer for Jesus? Are you willing to die for Jesus?
That's just public profession entry level. A colleague of mine said to me once, He said, What would happen to our church membership in America?
Someone wants to join your congregation, and maybe you have a new membership class, and maybe one of the pastors is talking with the new members and saying, Oh, you know, we just went through our little checklist, and we always love to see why people are connecting with us and why they feel drawn here. Many, yeah, you love the pastor's preaching really, and you find him funny too. That's great. Yeah, he's great, he's funny, and he's a good preacher. And oh, good, you love the children's program, terrific.
Some actually complimented the parking that we get you in and out and things like that. It's true. In the lobby, our coffee stand is great. I mean, it's as good as you get anywhere in the city here.
So we're glad you feel good about joining the church and committing yourself. We just have one question for you. Just one question b be before Before you sign up to become a member, are you willing to suffer and die for Jesus? This colleague said, I wonder what would happen to our church membership if that was the case. Friends, that is reality.
around the world, as has been the case through much of church history. Before we just transition over, and I bring my guest on with us today. I want to give you a great opportunity to partner with us and get some healthy supplements in your own body. This is part of my daily routine along with my healthy diet.
So these are not substitutes, but supplements.
So our friends at Tri Vita really bent over backwards to see what they could do to be a blessing to you. And help you support the line of fire at one and the same time.
So 100%. of your first order is donated for the line of fire and more than a tithe of all subsequent orders and you get The best discount available, 25% discount straight from triveted use.
So check this out. Great way to get behind our ministry, get some healthy supplements in your own body. And then we'll go right back. with our guest. I'm Dr.
Paul Burnett, a board certified doctor of holistic health, and I've got some exciting news for you today about an amino acid formula scientifically shown to build lean muscle, improve strength, and reduce recovery time at any age. Dr. Robert Wolf was a researcher of muscle health who raised $20 million to fund 30 years of research, and now this formula is available in Trivita's MyoHealth. Here is what Trivita members have to say. James H.
says, I'm 60 and have experienced more solid definition of muscle, more energy, more stamina, and enhanced recovery after my workout.
Now begin to imagine what you could do with more muscle, increased strength, and faster recovery.
Now is the time to revitalize and rebuild the muscle, strength, and recovery of your youthful years with MyoHealth. Build lean muscle, improve your strength with With MyoHealth. Order today and use promo code BROWN25 to receive 25% off your order. As a new customer, 100% of the proceeds from your first order will go to support the Line of Fire broadcast.
So call now 1-800-771-5584. 1-800-771-5584. or online at TRI VITA TRIVEDA.com. The persecuted church has been important to me really for decades. I started reading stories of persecuted believers.
In the 80s. And then early in the mid-80s, then as I started traveling, ministering overseas. working with believers in different parts of the world I've been to. India 31 times now and people that we've prayed for were sent out to preach have been martyred there. One of our grads from our ministry school working in the Middle East and Muslim world was assassinated by al-Qaeda over 10 years ago.
You know, a spiritual son.
So I had the privilege of spending time with Pastor Richard Wornbrand and the around 1993-94 and he was maybe the most well-known persecuted Christian of the last century. And then we had grads working in China. communist China for well over 20 years so firsthand experience with the suffering church there and on and on it goes. One of our colleagues was a missionary in Nigeria, had to leave a few years ago. Things were just getting too intense.
But you're focused on this, Brian. This is your life. This is... You were on the field for years before being the CEO of Global Christian Relief.
So you you are day and night. with a finger on the pulse of what's happening with persecuted Christians around the world. Try to paint a picture. We'll get specific and talk about certain countries and hotspots. And then what uniquely you're doing at GCR.
But just paint a picture for me of what you've seen, what you've heard, what you're hearing on a regular basis. Yeah, thanks, Michael, and thanks for having me. And it's definitely our passion, too, to serve. The persecuted. And I think, like you had mentioned, many people like you are steeped in the stories and know what's happening.
The level of cross-the Christian church in America, the awareness is so low. And so we're trying to get those stories into the hearts. And the minds of the body of Christ here to really uniquely connect us as a global church, how we can pray for one another, connect with one another. And we know it deeply just enriches our own faith, like I'm sure it has you to be connected to those who are suffering for the name of Jesus. But what we see across the world is.
Kind of, it's intensifying.
So it's definitely every year over year, it's scaling up in intensity for those who are persecuted for their faith. Open Doors World Watch List releases their research. And there's, I think, 388 million Christians who suffer. high levels of persecution for their follow for following Christ. And if we them all into one country that would be the third large largest country in the world today all right so that's more more people than live in america yes and and what does that look like when you put have that category of of persecution obviously they're not all being killed or thrown in prison but what does that actually look like yeah so across the world it's really unique in different countries different regions but many times it's like high levels of pressure in places like egypt where you're discriminated against because of your faith you're a very small minority or in pakistan i mean you you know two less than two percent of the population is christian but 60 of that population is impoverished Often taken advantage of, put into bonded slavery, not getting the same jobs, oftentimes unjustly imprisoned.
There's land grabs. There's also ostracization between families. If you're coming from the Muslim faith in a really highly Muslim country, you can often be cut off from your family, often suffering arrest and imprisonment because of that as well.
So, and then again, in places like India, where you've been many times in some of the rural areas, you have mob violence when someone's coming to faith. And we could get into those details of why that happens and what that looks like. But it's just across the world, it's again, high pressure at times. Like you said, it's a lot of the times when it's just like the whole system is built around suppressing Christians in minority religions. In other places, it's violent.
It's kind of like you cannot come above, I mean, in public and share your faith in places like Iran and places like North Korea or Libya or Eritrea. And it just becomes really difficult that if you share that, you are going to be in the. Target zone and could again be beaten, could be imprisoned, or could also be killed.
Now you you were sharing with me right before we went on the air that you've been to South Korea. And you've met with persecuted Christians that were able to make their way out of North Korea, which is obviously only a tiny amount, are able to To get out. What what kind of picture do they paint of North Korea? Yeah, it's. I mean, it's fascinating and almost really hard to wrap our minds around, but it's a.
A whole totalitarian regime that is bent around telling lies about what Christians are about, like and about missionaries and about staying away from them. But it's also a culture that's built around giving allegiance to their dictator and turning one another in as a great favor to the North Korean kingdom.
So there's just this level of vulnerability, of suffering, of discrimination. And again, anyone who actually shares their faith out loud, who's caught with a Bible, their whole family can be sent to a hard labor camp. And again, I've met personally with many who've been in that situation. But again, we know that God doesn't just leave us alone with that. Many times he uses that persecution, like in the book of Acts, which we still believe is happening today, to expand the kingdom.
So you have stories of young widows in prison in North Korea who are sharing the gospel quietly, leading small churches, like of two to three other people, and revolutionary what can still happen in some of the darkest and most difficult places.
So here in America, a lot of our Western culture we may be reluctant to speak on a controversial issue on social media for fear that someone might unfriend us. Whereas you have You say widow.
So maybe her husband killed because of the gospel. She's in prison. rotting in some slave labor camp. hard labor camp. Sharing her faith.
Why are these people still sharing their faith when it could cost them everything? Is they have a different experience with God than we do in the West? Yeah, I will explain it this way. The way that I see it, I think there's so much we can learn. from our suffering brothers and sisters, from the body of Christ in these places, because they are willing to give up everything and they find that pearl of great price.
They again, like oftentimes, do like there's this kind of Sentiment in the US where, like, we just put more knowledge, we want to give more information, like grow, but they have a heart change.
Some of them, some of the most bravest believers I've met, are illiterate. They can't actually read the Bible. They listen to it, hear it, but their heart has been stirred and they would give their lives for the name of Jesus. And I think it's one of those things where, you know, throughout scripture, that the Bible talks about the fact that, you know, those who endure to the end will be saved. There's this sense of like enduring endurance, resistance, making it to the end, like finishing well in the faith.
And I think these believers, so many that I've met with, and I will say this, there's caveats like, Persecution Yeah, the persecuted church aren't all, they're not heroes. Jesus is still the hero of the story, and there's still stumbles and challenges and really tough parts that they go through. And some, again, turn away from their faith too. But many will, again, double down to say they'll do whatever. And again, like you said, the woman that I met with in North Korea, her husband was killed for evangelizing others in the prison, but that didn't stop her.
And she kept doing that, kept sharing verses, just a few that she had memorized, would write down. And then again, when she was released, she escapes. And you know, too, like the long trail in North Korea to get. To South Korea, which is where they can find citizenships, often goes through Thailand, Vietnam, very difficult in China to start, very difficult journey that very few can make. Yeah, I saw a documentary recently of a brother that spends all this time trying to get Christians out.
of North Korea and the story's just Absolutely heartbreaking. And so I'm just trying to get. people out of North Korea that, you know, one woman was trying to get out for so many years, then her son decided to just try to make a break and he got caught. And then they're basically saying, You're never going to see him again. He's being beaten.
And she's getting the news. I mean, it's a documentary they agreed to film. And you know what? I try to remember. When I'm in a rare situation of Extreme pressure.
I used to do it in a dentist's office if there was pain with a root canal. That was a reminder to pray for persecuted believers. But just try, when there's some pressure, to think there's somebody right now right on the edge. There's someone ready to lose their mind. There's someone ready to cave in.
And our prayers could make a difference because they are, as much as they're heroes to us, they're just frail human beings. That face the same pressures and tests that we do, but can speak so loudly to us. We hear a lot about thousands of Christians being killed in Nigeria. Again, the numbers are such It's very difficult to wrap our minds around. radical Muslims in the it's mainly in northern Nigeria But what do you know first hand?
What are you hearing about what's happening there? Yeah, and I would say it's it's one of the things we've been talking a lot about this year, but it's been going on for decades. And I've been in Nigeria multiple times. I've met with believers in these human conflict zones, heard their stories. And I think the struggle is the fact that, like, oftentimes, I mean, it's kind of, you know, you hear talk of climate change or, you know, socioeconomic pieces and all those different pieces might play a part in it.
But when you hear the stories of extremists coming through a village, abducting the women, forcing them to pray the Muslim prayers, forcing them to be married to Boko Haram fighters, and then escaping to share that story of the fact that they, I mean, when they came through, it was the extremists and they had killed the men, took the children and women and turned them into Muslims, if not by just by name. And again, many of them who were still praying to Jesus during that time of abduction. But again. Boko Haram, Falani extremists, we see it across in the middle belt in the northern region, and it's an epidemic today. And I think the infrastructure within Nigeria and the protection for Christians is so minimal.
And again, we're trying to raise that up to say we pray that God will work and the leaders work in NGOs to provide that structure, protection, and a change in the direction for this because it's devastating. And some of the hardest stories that I've ever heard to sit next to and listen to someone tell have come from Nigeria. Yeah, one of my colleagues works there. very regularly and and One of our grads served as a missionary there mentioned before she had to leave just because things were too intense and they didn't feel she could be safe there. She was an older woman and they were concerned.
She wanted to stay, but they said, you've got to get out. One of my colleagues said that. He learned of a ministry school. in Nigeria that exclusively trained widows of martyrs.
So you think of that like the woman in the North Korean prison with her husband martyred, the widows, that's the school exclusively existed for them. But you'll read Falani Herdsmen, land conflict. with local tribe. And it really, like you said, that's just the sugarcoating of it because it's absolutely persecution for the faith. Uh recently President Trump has addressed some of these things.
One of my colleagues was part of a delegation that went to him with these concerns. Is that making any difference when the President of the United States draws attention to this? Yeah, that's a great question, Michael. I think we're hoping to see it. I think what it does right now is it's definitely drawing the attention of the American people and people in the West to see.
Nigerians clearly and not so distant to know that it's real. It's happened to Christian minorities.
So I think that awareness piece already is a great movement to see: like, how do we raise more prayer, which is our greatest weapon of more support to help these displaced and I think that's critical. As far as like legislature and pressure on the government of Nigeria, I think that's going to take some time and probably a lot more harder conversations to put, I mean, make it a part of every talk that we have with their government leaders to talk about how to build the infrastructure and protection. For Christians, that's what we really want to see. And for them to acknowledge it more and more, that they recognize it and they're not just going to give it lip service, but actually are going to take some action behind that too to provide that protection and see the issue. But that piece, I think that's always the slowest piece to go.
And praying that that works, but yet, you know, yet to see profound impact on it. It's a big country. And there's government corruption, different things like that, which you often have with the rapid growth.
So we can Yeah. I appreciate the sober assessment. And I want to talk in a moment about the unique things that Global Christian Relief Are you doing and how people can be a part of that? Just a little bit more about. what's happening.
Obviously, all eyes are on Iran right now. Yes. the growing church, the underground church there. I just interviewed a woman whose dad was an underground pastor 30 years and they finally... Had to get out of the country, went to Turkey then.
They were going to be sent back to Iran finally. There was an international outcry that came out, but she was talking about some of what they went through, what life was like. But you never know. The full extent of what's happening. When the bamboo curtain came down, the Christian world were shocked to find out about the growth of the underground church in China.
What's happening in Iran and what level of persecution I believers suffered there? Yeah, and I've spoken with many believers who've been in prison in Iran, and it's. I would say this: like, it's again, hard to know all the numbers, but from different organizations, we see one of the fastest growing churches. And I believe it's because. The Iranian people are hungry for answers.
They know the regime has not given it.
So they are some of the most open people to hear the gospel that we know of. And when that gospel does sink in, there's also this desire of like they care so deeply for their people, for their country that they want to share the gospel. And that's often where that risk and danger happens because you can't, I mean, legally even have a Farsi Bible. In Iran. It would be illegal to have that.
So, all these different things, the way that the secret police watches anyone, tries to infiltrate small house churches, it's just a very dangerous place. And again, we've heard the stories of secret police pretending to be a convert, coming into a church, then exposing the whole group, which is incredibly dangerous. But again, many of the people that I've met with, one in specific, You know, he was, you know, he heard the gospel because they were praying for healing and they were like looking towards Islam to do that. Met with the leaders, nothing happened. And a Christian friend that they knew quietly said, Hey, can I pray for you?
And they said, Okay, why not? Nothing else has worked. Then they invited him to a prayer meeting. And it was there that they first heard the gospel, gave their lives to Jesus, and became part of this small house church network. They were distributing C Ds of the Bible to others, and the secret police got wind of it, called him at work, came home, ransacked the house, put all the family together in the room, blindfolded him, and took him away for four weeks of interrogations, psychological, physical interrogations, and just hearing him, even when we talk.
He just broke down into tears when he talked about the prison because it still had such an impact on his life. But things like this, that he would. Steal a pencil and on the prison walls, write down him in John 14 for the person who would come next to him to remind them. We weren't alone. And I think what it does for us to send the message to believers in Iran is that Satan wants to divide the church.
He wants to isolate the church. And we have the opportunity to come in again to say, hey, we haven't forgotten you. We're praying for you. We're getting support in and outside to the diaspora in any ways that we can to let you know that we care deeply for the body of Christ and what you're going through. But I think right now, talking to Christians there, too, it's really.
Difficult because it's so uncertain. Many of them were celebrating the fall of the supreme leader, but knowing that, hey, it doesn't end with him. He was guilty of so many atrocities. They're glad that that period is over. But again, who will lead next?
We've got different leaders who've been propped up. It seems like they have endless leaders to. Pull into, but the military still reigns.
So there's uncertainty for what the future of the church really looks like. And when you talked about people knowing that Christians are praying for them, we're standing with them. When I would read many decades ago, when I started getting literature from Voice of the Martyrs. And I remember when the way it was printed, they'd use different fonts and different sentences to squeeze things in on a paper. I mean, it was just the most basic imaginable thing.
And it really reflected to me kind of the spirit of the suffering church way back then. But they would have campaigns and they'll write letters and the letters would actually get to people or someone would. where the government would have to do something about it.
So d do people know Do persecuted Christians know that believers in other parts of the world are standing with them? They do. They do. So again, it will vary by Region, I can't speak to the totality or the total kind of expanse of the country, but I know the ones that we're working with. Again, it means a lot.
And we're working with others who are also getting Bibles into the country. And I've seen the photos of these, you know, underground house churches that are receiving Bibles. Yeah. And it's like that alone, you know, and they're saying, please send more, please send more.
So there's a sense of that. That alone kind of like It makes such a big impact. And I could even tell stories of like postcards, like you said, that get into prisons where that little postcard with just a verse from somebody from a state in the US is like, that's enough for them to know that they're, again, not alone and they can continue on and make it through whatever God intends to them in the future. And those types of messages, it's like hard to. Overstate how critical those messages can be for the body of Christ.
One of my missionary friends brought back from Vietnam. A copy of one of my books that had been translated into Vietnamese, but it had multiple. bookmarkers in it. And that's because they passed the book around. You know, this is that each one would mark what they were reading.
It's very humbling to get that. But you hear the stories, they're true. You know, when a Bible would come in. In the early days where you couldn't get Bibles, and everyone would tear a page, read it, and then pass the pages around. You think, and we have endless Bibles and translations available.
Again, it's not to make us feel guilty, but to think, wow, if we could treasure the word like that. One last question, and then I want to focus on what you're doing and how people can join with you. Uh so This will air probably about a week after the Supreme Court decision. The Supreme Court just decided 9-0. In favor of a street preacher who was banned from preaching in front of a public building.
So 9-0. based on religious freedoms. But otherwise, he was arrested. You know, this commonly happens in the UK. And it's alleged hate speech.
Well, just a few days before this, there was a major case I've been following in Finland for years. We're a woman, medical doctor, mother, I think grandmother of maybe 12. Member of Parliament. was found guilty of hate speech because she published a brochure years ago. and explained that homosexuality was an unnatural development.
and then it posted a tweet in response to I think something that was said on TV. And she was found guilty of hate speech.
So there's... I know on the one hand that we must be conscious of the church in Nigeria and the church in Iran, the church in Libya, and these other countries where. The suffering is so intense. But there's this other type of pressure. which is in many parts of Europe.
which was increasing in America. There's a bit of a pushback against it. But it's still there. And it's it's a It's a different type of persecution. Could you speak to that?
Yeah, it's always interesting to talk about the persecution here or in the West in general, as we look at this. But I would say this. There's definitely, I mean, levels of persecution, and there'll always be a sense that, like, Jesus said it himself, that if you A desire to live a guyly life, you're gonna be persecuted. If they persecuted me, they're gonna persecute you.
So, I think one thing we always say is we shouldn't be surprised by these things whatsoever. And I also think there's a bigger picture for us. We obviously care about the flourishing of our communities, our cities, and our states, and our nations. But there's also the sense that the most critical part of that is to live as a light for Christ, as the church, as the body of Christ here. And as we see in other countries, these persecutions, these challenges, these trials often put a light on the church and really, again, give the church an opportunity to live out their faith in a powerful way.
So I know it's happening. The way that I approach it is to say that that's why we need the persecuted church today, so that we can see what courage, what resilience, what forgiveness, what love looks like in these types of contexts, and we can be prepared ourselves for what. whatever might face us ahead as persecution kind of unfolds here in the West. Yeah, and that I've seen consistently. Being in India when there was heavy persecution a couple different times in Orissa.
and we were doing leaders meetings pouring into people that had come from there One had been terribly beaten to the Point of Virtually to the point of death, he was hospitalized in a coma. They found out that one of the doctors in the hospital was a radical Hindu that had been bribed to kill him.
So this family smuggled him out in a coma. He recovered, ends up the man that first beat him. He baptized and they were seeing God moving and he couldn't wait to go back. I remember. him breaking into song.
As he talked with all that he had suffered. And these believers that knew they could be going back, certainly to persecution and beating. That was fairly certain, possibly imprisonment, possibly death. And when we preached about the honor and joy of being persecuted, they literally danced with joy.
So, in the midst of the suffering, there's great victory, and there is. that supernatural resiliency that speaks to us. What I'm intrigued about With Global Christian Relief is the idea of empowering Persecuted Christians. It's a phrase I normally don't hear. What does that mean?
What do you actually do to empower the persecuted church? Yeah, and I would say it this way: it's one of those things where our goal, many nonprofits who work in maybe clean water or hunger, they're kind of envisioning an end to the problem.
So it's like, help us solve this problem by 2030 or whatever it might be. For us, we know persecution is not going to end. And so solving persecution is not, we look to alleviate it, look to advocate for better laws and better flourishing. But our goal is to empower those who are persecuted to continue to be a light for Jesus. And I think in many of these places around the world that we see, like India and Pakistan and Syria, Nigeria, I mean, there's a risk that the church will be squashed.
Quieted, isolated, broken apart, and extinguished in some parts that we look like in Syria and Iraq and know what's happened in the last number of years. And our goal is to come alongside them to empower them with whatever they need to stand strong in the faith and to continue to grow as a church, to continue to be a light in whatever way possible. And again, that's different in different regions.
So, again, it might take place with emergency relief where there's a tax, you know, right away, like in support just to help them survive that moment, safe housing, medical relief as well. And then moving beyond that, we're looking at how do we lift up these Christian communities to be stable where they're impoverished, to give them income-generating projects and discipleship and training on how to live as a Christian amongst these laws, like anti-conversion laws in India or blasphemy laws in Pakistan. How do we prepare them to withstand that as well? How do we get women and children to flourish and education?
So it's all of those things, all the way, until. How do we get them to be independent and have a voice in their own community, their own country, so that the light of Christ can continue? And again, in places like Syria and Iraq. It might be just trying to stand alongside them to give them opportunities so they can remain.
So that we don't have Christians continue to flee and leave because it's too difficult, but they're gonna remain. And again, being in Syria this past summer. meeting with You know what I mean? Pastor Boutros, who's at Mar Elliott's church, who withstood the bombing that killed 22 people in their church during a service, the suicide bombing, and so many stories from that. But the fear, the vulnerability, the lack of protection that's there, we're coming alongside them to say, what is needed right now for your church to stay strong, for your church to remain, to continue as a light for Christ.
And so again, it looks different in different regions depending on what the church needs, but it's direct access to the field. It's quick and it's also visionary to say we're not just looking to say what projects can we do now that will help them, but it's what will two to three years, five years, 10 years look like in Pakistan? If we could totally demolish the bonded slavery amongst Christians in Pakistan in the next decade, what would that look like to lift up the Christian community and give them a voice in a place where they are just completely discriminated against and pressured to stay quiet? Yeah, and to make it personal. What did Pastor Brutro say to you?
How did your visit and your actions? Help him? What did it mean to his community? Yeah, so when I met with him, the bombing happened in June. I was the first.
Like outside, I mean, a leader from the West to talk with him specifically. And again, there was a level of just Still, trauma of what he's doing to pick up the pieces. Of his congregation, even as he's supposed to be a shepherd and now becoming someone who's gone through the trauma himself and seen the direct and wicked attacks on a church to kill. The church and to painfully kill in the name of Jesus and to pick that back up. But his words still stick with me as we sat kind of right by there's a crater in the middle of the church where the suicide vest went off, and two brave members tackled him, two brothers tackled him to the ground, saved countless other lives.
But the blast was so strong, it sent like a crater three feet deep. We sat there in front of that. And talked and prayed, and he was just kind of saying, Hey, we're not. Going to leave Syria. And as long as there's one candle that we can light, one person here, we're gonna remain and we're gonna rally around and make the body of Christ to continue to grow.
And they're not going to, through fear, through violence, through pressure, kick us out of our home. And that to me, again, stood as powerful to remember: like, how these are the believers that we're standing with, those who have seen great violence, great attacks, and yet they're resilient because of the power of God in their lives.
So basically if folks support what you're doing monthly or with a one-time gift. It's going to touch somebody. In other words, this is not abstract. We've got an action plan we're thinking about. This is every day there's another need.
and there would be more people that you could help. Right, we're never going to eradicate suffering, poverty, any of these things, but think here's another person that got Fed, here's another baby that got cared for when you're doing that. Here's another believer. Here's another family. Here's another group.
So it's something tangible. Again, I've been on the ground, not in the places that you have and not to the degree that you have. But I've been on the ground enough to know. It's just like here's a plant that's withering in the heat and no water, and then you pour water on it and it grows and flourishes. The encouragement and life that it brings is so tangible.
So tell our viewers and listeners where they can go and what they can do to make a difference. Yeah, and you're completely right, Michael. And I would say this: we look at it. That it's in the DNA of every single Christian to care for the suffering body of Jesus. We see it throughout scripture.
So it's one of those things that we're called to do, but when we do it, what is surprising, it's our own faith. That's enriched and empowered and grows through that. And I firmly believe that God is going to use the persecuted church around the world to stir revival here in the US, too. But I think that the key thing for anyone is to say, step into their stories. And we do ask people to become a monthly giver, which we call frontline partners.
It's the best way to contribute on a regular basis to the needs across the world for a suffering body. And like you said, these are. You know, connected into tangible stories that we try to tell well and connect our supporters and those who are praying with it so they can see the difference, see the impact, their faith can grow. And then again, we can see that John 17 passage just fulfilled that we would all be one in Christ. But they could go, anyone could go to gcrelief.org.
That's our homepage. You'll see some videos. You'll see information. You can give right there on the front button and you can find out how to become a frontline partner, which again, I would challenge you to do, even for a year, to do it and see what God does in your own life as you step into the stories of the global suffering church and see God work not only in your own life, but in lives across the world in the name of Him. Yeah, and you just think in the light of eternity.
The joy of standing together. And rather than feeling guilty that we're not persecuted here. Let's stand with those who are. And let's re-examine our own lives to make sure that we're not walking in fear. Fear of man.
That we ourselves are willing to take up the cross and follow him.
So GC, that's global Christian, GC. relief Go there, watch the videos, and see how you can make a difference. Brian, keep up the good work. Stay safe. And may the Lord be with you.
Thanks so much, Michael. Really appreciate it. God bless. God bless.
