Hey, podcast listeners! Thanks for streaming today's podcast, From Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory is a nonprofit ministry featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Robert Jeffress. Our mission is to pierce the darkness with the light of God's word through the most effective media available, like this podcast. To support Pathway to Victory, go to ptv.org slash donate or follow the link in our show notes. Now, here's today's podcast, From Pathway to Victory.
God's word with you every day on this Bible teaching program. On today's edition of Pathway to Victory, admittedly, we're not suffering like Christians in the Middle East yet, but the groundwork is being laid for that to happen. There is a moral revolution occurring in our country that is proceeding at warp speed. And with that moral revolution will come a cultural revulsion and rejection of Christians and what they believe. Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor Dr. Robert Jeffress. For over 2,000 years, Christians have faced religious persecution. But Jesus predicted that there would be a drastic increase in violence and oppression before His return.
Could we be witnessing the signs? Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress examines the intense persecution Christians are facing around the world in light of biblical prophecy. Now, here's today's podcast, From Pathway to Victory. Here's our Bible teacher to introduce today's message.
Dr. Jeffress. Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. Do you ever watch the news and feel like I do? Sometimes I look over at Amy and say, wow, those folks really don't like us, do they? The truth is, as Christians, we have a target on our backs. Well, in a moment, I'm going to share a message that's called Christians in the Crosshairs, in which I give biblical direction on how to live under persecution.
But first, I'm offering a creative means for our counteracting the persecution you and I feel sometimes. I can think of no better way to respond to our adversaries than by shining the bright light of the Gospel through Pathway to Victory. Because of this statement, Pathway to Victory has activated the Beacon of Hope matching challenge. Friends of Pathway to Victory have set aside $750,000 for this very purpose. And because of their generosity, every dollar you're able to give before the deadline on July 5th is automatically doubled in size and impact. Plus, as a way of saying thank you for your generous gift, I'm going to send you a special book to bless your family.
It's called Miracles in American History, 32 Amazing Stories of Answered Prayer. We'll give more pertinent details later in today's program. But right now, let's continue the message we began yesterday. The Bible says we know that in the beginning, there was persecution against believers. We've seen that persecution right now is the norm around the world, the greatest level it's been in history. We also know that in the future, there is going to be persecution against believers. There's going to be a worldwide persecution of Christians. There's no guarantee of exemption from persecution.
There is every guarantee of it, and we need to be prepared for it. Well, what should we be doing in order to prepare for this coming persecution? I want you to turn in your Bibles to 1 Peter 4.
Most scholars believe that Peter wrote this letter while Nero was the emperor of Rome. Christians were sporadically being targeted. The worldwide ban had not yet begun. In many ways, the situation then mirrors our situation here in America. People aren't being beheaded yet in America for their faith.
They're not going to prison yet, but things are starting to heat up. That's the direction things are going, and so Peter has a strong word for us today as well. Look at verses 12 and 13.
I want you to look at that phrase, don't be surprised. Ladies and gentlemen, being a Christian doesn't eliminate problems. In many ways, it creates new problems you would never have if you weren't a Christian, at least in the short term. Now, in the end, it all works out, and Christ rewards us, but in the short time, there is a price to pay for being a Christian.
Don't think of it as unusual. Look at 1 Peter chapter 2. Turn back two chapters to verses 21 and 23. If we're following Christ, we're going to have the same experience that Christ experienced.
And what was that experience? Look at verse 21. For you have been called for this purpose.
What purpose? For suffering. Since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in his steps. And who was this Christ? Look at verse 22. Who committed no sin.
Nor was any deceit found in his mouth. That is, he suffered for no reason. He did nothing that merited his suffering. Jesus was treated unfairly.
The call to be a Christian is the call to suffer for Christ. In the middle of Indonesia, the Christians in that village escaped into the surrounding jungle. Methu, the father of this family, had led his family deep into the jungle to escape the jihadist. After two exhausting days of running in the jungle, Methu's family stopped to rest and pray. They knew real danger approached ever nearer the more time they spent to rest, but they were starving.
The family had to eat. Methu's eight-year-old son was crying for food, so Methu went to find food for his family nearby. Suddenly, out of nowhere, the jihadist appeared. Methu saw them capture his 10-year-old daughter as she screamed out, Father, help us!
Father, help us! But one of the jihad troops threw a grenade at Methu, and he had to turn to escape. He tripped and fell down a ravine, becoming unconscious. When he awoke, he went back to the place where his family had been captured.
His words are sufficient to sum up the scene he found. To my horror, I discovered the bodies of my mother and mother-in-law. A few feet away, I found the body of my eight-year-old son, Christiano, lying in a pool of blood. I found their Bibles, three of them near their bodies.
All but one had been ripped into pieces, and the pages scattered over their bodies. And then Methu added, I remembered the scripture verse that said, if we become followers of Christ, we not only gain salvation and joy, but also the gift of suffering. I think it's important for us in the West to hear those stories over and over again to remind us that suffering, persecution, is coming.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer once remarked, when Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. Admittedly, we're not suffering like Christians in the Middle East yet, but the groundwork is being laid for that to happen in our own country, and let me tell you exactly how it is going to happen. Right now, there is a moral revolution occurring in our country that is proceeding at warp speed, and with that moral revolution will come a cultural revulsion and rejection of Christians and what they believe.
And that is what we're happening right now. We are having a moral revolution that will lead to the marginalization and ultimately the criminalization of Christianity. My friend Al Mohler has a three-stage process of how a moral revolution occurs in a culture, and I want you to write down these three stages. Stage one, what was condemned is now celebrated. Stage two, what was celebrated is now condemned. And stage three, those refusing to celebrate are condemned.
And once that revolution is complete, what happens is the marginalization of Christians. The Germans did not take the Jews to the crematorium immediately. If they had tried to do that and exterminate the Jews immediately, the German people would have risen up and objected.
No, they were too smart to do that. Instead, they first of all marginalized the Jews in the culture. They made the Jewish people objects of disdain, contempt, hatred.
Well, they're different than we are. They're hurting our society, and only after they had marginalized the Jewish people then were they able to take away their rights, even their right to live in the final solution. That is what is happening with Christianity. Right now, there is an effort to marginalize Christians. Those Christians are backwards in their thinking. They're bigoted.
They're not good for society. And once they have marginalized Christians, then it leads to the criminalization of Christians. And you see that, especially in what is happening around this debate over homosexual marriage.
I want you to think about that three-stage process I just gave you. First of all, it begins when what was condemned is now celebrated. Do you realize that homosexual marriage has not been with us for thousands of years or hundreds of years? It didn't even appear on the scene until 2001 in the Netherlands. That was the first place it was ever heard of. Until then, it was routinely condemned.
This is a new phenomenon. Everybody, everybody understood that marriage was between a man and a woman, not just evangelical Christians, but Jews and Muslims, not only conservatives, but liberals. Do you realize up until a couple of years ago, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton opposed homosexual marriage?
They said, oh, no, that is between a man and a woman. And yet, suddenly, overnight, what was condemned is now celebrated. Step number two, what is being celebrated right now was once condemned.
What was celebrated is now condemned. The idea that marriage is between a man and a woman, why? That idea is being condemned routinely, and you see that everywhere. Anybody who stands up for the belief that marriage should be reserved for a man and a woman, they are marginalized as homophobes, bigots, and hate mongers. You see that going on right now as state after state is trying to attempt to protect the religious freedoms of Christians by passing these religious freedom bills that simply say people ought to be able to hold onto the traditional view of marriage without being ostracized, without losing their businesses, without losing their livelihoods.
You know what's happening? Those bills are being defeated in state after state. Right now, there is a religious freedom bill here in Texas that is stuck in the Senate right now, and they won't vote it out of the Senate. I've written a letter to the Senate. I've written a letter to the Congress.
Other has as well, and they won't let it out. It's simply a bill that protects religious freedom, and you know why it won't be voted out? You know why these bills are being defeated? If you read the Dallas Morning News this week, you know the reason. On the front page of the business section, there was a spokesman, the CEO of the Texas Business Association, and he said, we can't have these kind of bills, religious freedoms bills, because if we pass these bills, they will be seen as being anti-gay, and no businesses will move through our state. We can't have these kind of bills because they hurt the bottom line.
Let me say this as clearly as I can. The single greatest threat to Christian liberty in America today is not ISIS. It's the Chamber of Commerce. It is big business that worships the almighty dollar. They're the ones that are coming after Christians, and we've got to say enough is enough. You know that argument? It's bad for business. That argument is 2,000 years old. The business leaders in the city of Ephesus, remember them? Rose up against the teaching of the apostles because it was hurting their...
