Massive Prayer Effort Focuses on New York City

The Call New York City will cap a national effort to recruit thousands to intercede for the city
A three-day prayer blitz in Cranford, N.J., in March drew more than 800 revival-hungry Christians and challenged attendees to create a 24-hour “house of prayer” in New York City for training intercessors and bathing the city in prayer.

The event, organized by Eagles’ Wings Ministries (EWM) of Clarence, N.Y., also helped prepare local believers for a potentially huge event late this month that could have thousands fasting and praying for “The City That Never Sleeps.”

Representatives from the Israeli Consulate and New York Jewish community attended the opening session in response to EWM’s work in Israel. Appearing unfamiliar with Pentecostal worship, they glanced at one another wide-eyed as evangelicals and Pentecostals from 14 states and diverse denominational backgrounds worshiped, prayed side by side, and jumped, shouted and cried for revival in the metropolitan New York region.

“Pour out your Spirit, Lord,” pleaded Robert Stearns, executive director of EWM. “We repent. There needs to be a refreshing. We hold up the blood of Jesus over these churches. We are calling for churches to operate as one in the body of Christ.”

Orthodox Rabbi Gerald Meister told Stearns: “I’ve had a lot of experiences in different churches. Tonight I had an awakening.”

Stearns, 33, has been leading weekly interdenominational praise and prayer events in northeastern New Jersey since 1996. More than 400,000 people have attended these gatherings, he reported.

“We’ve been praying for many years for the metro New York area, believing that God wants to really do something extraordinary in this region,” he said. “And we know that God doesn’t do
anything except in response to prayer.”

Stearns believes “The Big Apple” is ripe for revival. He yearns to bring unity among Christians to achieve that goal. “Our heart is not so much to relate by institution or by denomination, as much as it is friend to friend,” he said.

He networks with 250 churches in New Jersey, New York and Connecticut and is launching a new ministry called Metro New York House of Prayer.

“It isn’t about a certain denomination. It’s not about our ministry,” Stearns said. “It’s about releasing the body of Christ to be a house of prayer.”

He envisions a 24-hour prayer facility in New Jersey similar to others found in Jerusalem, Colorado Springs, Colo., and Kansas City, Mo. He sees the house of prayer training prayer specialists and church teams, teaching prayer interns, mobilizing intercessory events, as well as flooding the Eastern seaboard and beyond with a call to prayer.

Phil Coenraad started an all-night prayer meeting in his home in Hillsborough, N.J., one year ago. About 12 people meet Mondays from midnight to 7 a.m.

“We invite the Holy Spirit to give us His agenda,” he said. “There have been amazing answers to prayer. Eagles’ Wings has been an inspiration. They have pushed us to higher ground.”

EWM cooperates with other groups such as Greater New York Concerts of Prayer, Ground Zero Clergy Task Force, and The Call, based in California. The Call president Lou Engle delivered a passionate challenge to participants at the March prayer conference.

“We need to fight the war together!” he shouted. “We’re believing for atmospheric change.”

Engle is spearheading a week of prayer and fasting and evangelizing in New York City June 22-29. He anticipates 50,000-100,000 Christians jamming Flushing Meadows Park on June 29 for a 12-hour prayer and consecration assembly.

The event coincides with the 40th anniversary of Engel vs. Vitale, the U.S. Supreme Court case that removed voluntary prayer from public schools.

“We’re seeking to mobilize daily prayer in schools across America,” he said. “Our challenge is calling for one praying student from every junior high, high school and college.”

Greater New York Concerts of Prayer, led by Baptist minister McKenzie Pier, strongly backs The Call New York City.

“We are not going to allow secondary doctrine or differences in worship style to create disunity,” Pier said. “As a Baptist I am very appreciative for what the Pentecostal church means in New York.

“It’s probably doing the most effective evangelism in the city. So many people are becoming Christians as a result of the presence of the Pentecostal church.”

As executive director of The Call New York City, Stearns anticipates a stirring move of God in June.

“New York is a microcosm of the world,” he said. “This city has the capacity to influence the globe.”
Peter K. Johnson in New York City

Chaplain’s Innovative Approach To Bible Spurs Inmates’ Interest

Pleased with Steve Walker’s success with state prisoners, Alabama now requires chaplains to teach Bible-based programs
A judge’s court order in Alabama last year sent county inmates to state prisons causing widespread overcrowding at state correctional facilities. One state prison chaplain, however, saw the dilemma as an opportunity to harvest a larger field of souls with a unique discipleship program that already had seen hundreds come to Christ since 2000.

Alabama currently has 18 prisons and 13 work-release centers, most of which are dealing with overcrowding problems as a result of the state court directive. Chaplain Steve Walker, chaplaincy coordinator for the state of Alabama, understands the implications of this all too well. As chaplain at the Bullock County Correctional Facility in Union Springs, Ala., he and his wife, Esther, a volunteer chaplain, supervise the Protestant Bible Institute College Program, which teaches prisoners biblical principles for everyday life.

The program began in 1990 as a pilot and is considered a great success, so much so that it now has become policy for all Alabama chaplains to have Bible-based programs as part of their religious initiatives.

Enrollment in the program is at an all-time high of 175-200 inmates, and 40 more inmates are on a waiting list. The skills taught in the program range from learning how to live like Christian members of a family to budgeting money, and include biblical principles that address substance abuse, using a 12-step program that looks to Jesus Christ as the higher power, and helping prisoners learn to deal with sexual problems.

Revival has erupted in the prison as a result of the program’s success, Walker said. In October 2000, during a crusade lasting 4-1/2 days, 469 inmates made decisions of faith. Walker estimates there have been at least 1,000 decisions during the last three to four years.

“I believe this is the visitation of God. I believe it’s here,” Walker said.

The chaplain describes prisons as holding units where the inmates develop a “survival” mentality.

“They’ve got to survive, so they either run to something else that’s wicked, or they get with one of the religious groups, and prison is a marketplace for religions,” he said. “We do reach some people with our an hour of Sunday school is not going to be enough to change lives.”

Walker said successful rehabilitation is also dependent on aftercare, and local churches and ministries can participate in this critical stage to help released prisoners transition back into society.

“I’ve had 56 men leave, and only six have come back. We’ve got a high success rate, and they’re all graduates of our school and program,” he said.

Walker said corrections has become one of the fastest growing industries in the country. He attributes the increasing number of prisoners to an epidemic of sin in America. Drugs, pornography and alcoholism are among the problems that he believes send many people to prison.

“You count all of these things, and I think you are using the Christian definition of sin, and sin is the reason people commit crimes,” he said.

Recent estimates suggest that there may be between 5 million and 7 million people in the United States under some type of judicial supervision, whether prison, parole, probation or work release.

“When those people mess up, they come back to prison,” he said.

Because prison overcrowding is a national problem and not isolated to Alabama, Walker believes inmate ministries already in place need to become more intense if they are to be effective.

“We need your prayers out there,” Walker said. “We have got to have the materials, volunteers and intercessory prayer. If we’re going to change people’s lives, this is what we’re going to have to do.”
J. Gary Walker

New Zealand Minister Calls Church To Embrace ‘Father’s Heart’ Message

James Jordan joins American Bible teachers Jack Frost and Jack Winter in pointing Christians to rediscover God’s love
The influential move of God known most commonly as “The Toronto Blessing” was known by a different name in 1994 during the days of its origin at the Toronto Airport Vineyard Church. John Arnott, the church’s pastor, described God’s work then as the “Father’s Blessing”–a work that has since touched hundreds of thousands of lives around the globe.

James Jordan, a New Zealand minister, partners with the since-renamed Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship and trumpets the Father’s Blessing in his world travels. He spoke at the May 2002 The Father Loves You conference in Toronto, where he emphasized to Charisma that in order for multitudes of “lost sons”–exemplified in Jesus’ parable about the prodigal son–to find their way home the church has to become truly “the Father’s house.”

The key to revival, Jordan said, is the restoration of a “spirit of sonship” to church leaders. In agreement with other leading ministers such as Jack Winter and Jack Frost who teach “Father’s heart-style” messages, Jordan suggests that many pastors have not through experience received a revelation of God as Father.

They live and serve in an “orphan spirit,” he said. They strive to earn a heavenly reward, not realizing that they are sons entitled to the full inheritance. The “orphan spirit,” Jordan explained, fosters performance orientation, insecurity and competition, and often leads to stress and burnout.

“Grace and rest come to our spirits when we are walking as sons to the Father, rather than walking with the Holy Spirit as instruments of power or with Jesus Christ as servants,” Jordan said. Referring again to Jesus’ prodigal parable, he explained that “a son works his father’s fields, but not for wages, and in the evening he sits down by the fire [next to his father]. Many Christians never sit by the fire!”

Jordan’s life was changed by a four-word question whispered into his heart some 20 years ago. “Whose son are you?” God asked, and in a flash Jordan realized that whereas the Bible introduces everybody as “somebody’s son,” he himself was “nobody’s son.”

His father, Jordan relates, had been “deeply damaged” by World War II and sought comfort in alcohol and unceasing work. There was no father-son relationship. “My very first conversation with my dad was at 29. Before that there was nothing but arguments.”

From the age of 12 Jordan avoided human company.

“I slid into depression, was moody and sullen, and if I happened to look at a baby in those years, it always started crying. But in the mountains that I loved, and hunting on my own, there was no sadness.”

At 22, Jordan met Jesus, and six years later God asked him whose son he was. The consequences were radical. For many years now Jordan has been traveling the world with Denise, his wife, to impart the Father’s love, and since the late 1990s the relationship with the Toronto Airport church and Arnott’s Partners in Harvest church network has been growing.

“You cannot receive the Father’s love and give it away, nor can you be a father in the natural, or in the spiritual, without being somebody’s son first,” Jordan concluded. “God prompted me to apologize to my father for rejecting him. Our relationship is still not perfect, but my heart is no longer orphaned.

“The foundation of Jesus’ ministry was simply to watch the Father. There was an understanding of the Father’s love in the church , just as there were charismatics before Azusa Street. But today’s revelation is on a new level and is touching much wider circles. It is the answer to the world’s deepest need.”
Tomas Dixon in Toronto

News Briefs

The following reports were released during the last month by Charisma News Service. Go to our Web site at to subscribe to the free weekday service or to access full-length versions of each day’s stories. The site also includes a search engine so you can access archived news.

KEVIN PROSCH ‘RELEASED FOR PUBLIC MINISTRY’

Worship leader Kevin Prosch has been restored to public ministry three years after admitting to a string of affairs. Prosch is being “released for public ministry without reservations” by the church that oversaw his restoration process. Kit Buschman, president of the Trinity Fellowship Association of Churches based in Amarillo, Texas, said that Prosch, now remarried, served on staff with a member congregation for more than a year, during which time leaders saw his “passion for righteousness [and] godly character.” Buschman said in a statement that he and others believe “God has fully restored Kevin, and the church should also.”

CHURCH GIVING RISES SLIGHTLY
Although the proportion of adults who donated to churches went up only slightly–by one percentage point to 62 percent–their average annual contribution rose 18 percent, from $646 in 2000 to $769 in 2001. The findings were from a survey by the Barna Research Group, which quizzed more than 1,000 adults on their giving habits. Those researchers identified as “evangelicals” contributed four times as much as other church givers. And there was a slight increase in the number of people tithing, rising from 6 percent the previous year to 8 percent.

GOVERNMENT COMPENSATES U.S. MISSIONARIES

The U.S. government is to compensate the missionaries shot down over the Peruvian jungle in a case of mistaken identity. While not admitting responsibility for the April 2001 incident, the Bush administration expressed “regret” for the downing of the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism plane. A Peruvian fighter shot the aircraft down after it had been tagged as a drug-runner by a CIA-operated surveillance plane. Veronica Bowers, 35, and her 7-month-old daughter, Charity, died. Jim Bowers and his son, Cory, survived, along with pilot Kevin Donaldson. Details of the settlement have not been disclosed, though the sum is less than the $35 million originally sought, the Associated Press reported.

CHRISTIANS PERSECUTED THE MOST, REPORT SAYS
Christians comprise the largest group in the world to suffer for their beliefs, according to the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA). In its annual report to the United Nations, where it is a recognized nongovernmental organization, the WEA said more than 200 million people are denied human rights “simply because they are Christians.” The WEA called on the United Nation to press for reforms. The report said Christians in some countries faced persecution because they were seen to threaten national identity and stood up for the disadvantaged. The report added that some Christian groups lacked wisdom and cultural understanding, using words such as “crusade” and “claiming the territory,” which were interpreted as military terms.

RON KENOLY PRAYS FOR TRINIDAD LEADER
The biblical admonition to pray for kings and those in authority took on literal meaning for worship leader Ron Kenoly April 7 when Trinidad Prime Minister Patrick Manning came backstage asking for prayer before Kenoly’s praise and worship concert in Trinidad’s capital, Port Au Spain. Noting that Manning and his wife are Christians, Kenoly, 57, said he was humbled by the gesture. The prayer came on the heels of Manning’s decision to hold fresh elections–the third in three years, the Associated Press reported.

CHRISTIAN GROUP GIVES ‘ROTTEN’ MOVIE AWARDS
In addition to lauding what it considers to be the best movies of last year, the Christian film review Movieguide has also announced the 20 Most Unbearable Movies of 2001. Disney’s Bubble Boy, about a sick teen kept in a plastic bubble, heads the list as The Most Bigoted, Hedonistic, Anti-Christian Satire. Also listed are: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, The Others and A.I.

EX-GAY MINISTRY RELOCATES TO FLORIDA
In March, Exodus International-North America relocated from its longtime Seattle base to the Orlando, Fla., suburb of Winter Park, the Associated Press (AP) reported. Some observers claimed that Exodus relocated in order to be more politically involved in gay rights battles brewing in the state. But Exodus executive director Alan Chambers said the ministry won’t play an active role in any of those fights.

If you have a news tip for Charisma News Service, e-mail us at charisma@.

Not Your Average Action Hero

Willie Aames, once famous for his role on Eight Is Enough, now dons a cape and mask to play the Christian superhero known as Bibleman. Here’s how he found faith while in Hollywood.
There once was a time not long ago in churches across America when children clad in rubber masks and flowing capes wielded colorful swords, swinging them back and forth through stage fog while chanting, “Bibleman, Bibleman.”

Offstage, outfitted in purple spandex and foam-rubber muscles, the star kids were yearning to see–Willie “Bibleman” Aames–would gather with fellow cast members before the show started and pray for lives to be transformed and for people to make decisions for Christ.

For at least a night in those churches, pyrotechnics, stunts, sword battles, superheroes and villains replaced sermons, fellowship and worship.

“Whatever is good, whatever is righteous, we will stand strong against the evil of our adversary the devil!” Bibleman’s voice would boom, jumpstarting the show.

The children, worked into a frenzy, would whoop and holler until Bibleman’s evil nemesis, Spawndroth, ripped through one of the set’s gigantic TV screens and unleashed a verbal assault against the pro-Bibleman audience. With the hero and the villain established, a classic battle between good and evil ensued.

“This show is all about obeying God,” Aames has said. “But all of the elements that make the show so exciting are only a springboard for pointing the audience toward Christ.”

Indeed. But no longer.

In 2000, more than 16,000 children and adults had made commitments to Christ at Bibleman’s Conquering the Wrath of Rage show. But last year the Breaking the Bonds of Disobedience live tour was postponed in the summer after Aames was injured. He had expected a half million people to see it.

Soon after, Bibleman’s entire fall promotional tour and his remaining concerts were canceled–according to Aames because of death threats. And now Bibleman’s official Web site states that the live shows have been dealt a financial–and potentially lethal–blow.

“It is with deep sadness that I must announce that the funding that has supported ‘Bibleman Live’ each year has come to an end,” writes Aames in a letter that begins, “A special now.”

He goes on to note that financial backing for the live shows came from one source, and the production had been allowed to incur losses each year because the show was very good at spreading Christ’s message of hope and love. But, his letter continues: “In short, there cannot be a ‘Bibleman Live’ tour this year.”

Though Aames promises in the letter to keep making Bibleman videos–10 have been made, and the latest, Lead Us Not Into Temptation, was released last December–it is questionable if the Christian action hero will ever return.

But, then again, Aames has seen and overcome greater obstacles in his life and career, a sign that Bibleman may again emerge from the swirling fog to herald good and terrorize evil.

Good vs. Evil

Aames, 41, has been entertaining people for more than 30 years. When he was 8 he landed his first role on a Phillips 66 TV commercial. Before that he was, in his own words, a short, unexceptional kid growing up in Southern California.

But when he discovered acting he also found the warmth of Hollywood’s spotlight, which provided some of the attention and affirmation he desired. Soon after the commercial, guest appearances followed on several TV shows including The Courtship of Eddie’s Father and Gunsmoke.

Although his childhood seems like it would have been the envy of every kid in America, Aames’ formative years left him with memories he would rather forget.

“I was raised in a home that was very big into the occult,” says Aames, who today attends a nondenominational church in Portland, Oregon, with his wife and daughter. “We were big on séances, Ouija boards, palmists and tarot cards. My family saw it as harmless.”

Aames was fast becoming a steadily employed actor, yet he could not find happiness. “The only reason I became an actor is because I wanted to be accepted,” Aames says. “I wanted to prove to the world that they had to deal with me.”

That resolve fueled his career and addictions. Aames started abusing alcohol and drugs when he was 13.

From 1977-1981, he was a household name when he played Tommy Bradford, the troubled curly-haired teen on the nighttime TV drama Eight Is Enough. As the years wore on, he continued to be a familiar face on television, in the movies, and at parties in Hollywood and at the Playboy mansion.

His drugs of choice were Quaaludes, cocaine, psychedelic mushrooms and marijuana. His career kept chugging along, even though he had lost weight and became estranged from his parents. He joined a 12-step alcohol- and drug-rehabilitation program in the early 1980s, during the time when he was playing Buddy Lembeck on Charles in Charge.

In 1983, during his rehab, he met actress Maylo McCaslin on the set of a cable-TV show in which he was guest starring. McCaslin also was an addict.

As a child she had been sexually abused, and when she was 13 she had run away from home and lived among the prostitutes and drug abusers of Hollywood. Desperate to escape the streets, she had auditioned at a dance school and had been awarded a scholarship.

The pairing of Aames and McCaslin was destructive at first. “One week we were sober,” Aames says. “The next, we were getting high.”

But the alliance ultimately proved providential, as–sometimes for entertainment–Aames and McCaslin would cruise the streets of Los Angeles at night while listening to a pastor preach on the radio. They eventually decided to attend the pastor’s church.

Aames wore black leather and sunglasses to the church and, at the request of one of the church’s ushers, reluctantly extinguished a cigarette dangling from his mouth before he entered the sanctuary. As they walked to their seats Aames says the couple “could feel that the people were just happy we were there.”

During the service several people shared their testimonies. “These people had done all the things I had done, but they had hope,” Aames says. “I had had everything this world could offer, but I had never had hope.”

That day, Aames and McCaslin allowed Jesus to become their Savior. They began attending the church frequently and met with the pastor.

“He assured us we were new creatures in Christ. We both wept because we realized God was giving us a clean slate,” Aames says. “But we realized there was a lot of physical, spiritual and emotional healing that was needed.”

For Aames, part of that healing meant reconciling with his parents.

“After I got saved I realized my parents were not my problem,” he says. “My problem was a spiritual problem. There was a spiritual battle being waged for my soul.”

Many of those battles stemmed from his childhood memories.

“There is real power in the occult,” he says. “The memories it left me with could be dangerous because Satan tries to use those as a distraction with my walk with God. But Jesus Christ corrects all things and has nullified the sins of my past.”

Aames says overcoming the power of memories and drug addictions also is the work of the Holy Spirit: “I am Spirit-filled, and I believe in speaking in tongues. It’s scriptural. Sometimes our words are too clumsy to communicate with God.”

A Battle for Souls

It has been more than 15 years since Aames and McCaslin committed their lives to Christ. They married in 1986, and in 1990 they moved to Kansas City, Kansas, where Aames worked as a writer, producer and director.

There the Aameses attended a tiny church where they were “grounded in the Word,” he says. It also was there that Pamplin Entertainment, now based in Portland, Oregon, broached the idea of Bibleman.

“I thought Bibleman was the worst idea I had ever heard,” Aames says. “But after praying about it and seeking counsel from my pastor and Christian friends, I began to like the idea.”

Since its inception, Bibleman Live and Bibleman videos have evolved into high-energy productions with state-of-the-art special effects, but other hallmarks are the use of campy humor and sometimes corny dialogue. Yet couched in it all are serious matters.

“Bibleman has always been geared to presenting real-life dilemmas and real-life scenarios that kids can relate to,” Aames said. “We then offer real answers by presenting God’s Word, supported with chapter and verse.”

Evangelist Franklin Graham has used Bibleman as part of several evangelistic outreaches. Steve Peterson, who works with Graham, says Bibleman is the alternative of choice for children and parents weary of secular superheroes.

“The show is pretty much all Scripture wrapped around special effects and a story line,” he says. “Bibleman has been one of the most successful children’s outreaches we have had.”

Kids and parents seem to agree.

“Bibleman is cool, and he’s also a Christian,” says Natasha Turnure, 11, who has seen the Bibleman show at her church in Rocklin, California. “I learned that the bad guy never wins and that God will always help kids when they are going through hard times.”

“We went to the Bibleman show to be entertained, but we knew it was going to be God-centered,” says Chuck Hepola of Willard, Missouri. “The show opened doors for us to talk to our kids about spiritual things.”

Although Aames’ live show was effective at spreading the gospel, it was never financially practical. Each year it cost more than $1 million to produce, and in 5-1/2 years of touring it never broke even.

One reason for this, Aames says, is that churches were charged a little more than $5,000 for each show, and the price of Bibleman merchandise was never ratcheted up at the shows.

“We were born of the church, and we will remain of the church,” Aames says. “I want to remain accessible to the church because this is about ministry. As long as we can pay our bills and get the message out, then I think we are doing what God wants us to do.”

Whatever the reason for the funding being pulled from the live shows (Aames did not comment on the specifics and repeated calls by Charisma to Pamplin Entertainment were not returned), Bibleman fans will be left to wonder why their superhero has vanished and when and if he is ever coming back.

“I am not worthy of this kind of responsibility, but that’s the effect Bibleman has on kids,” Aames said last year about the number of children committing their lives to Christ at the shows. “I realize that it has nothing to do with me. It just makes me realize how good Jesus really is.”

Kirk Noonan is news editor for The Pentecostal Evangel in Springfield,
Missouri. He currently is working on a report for Charisma about evangelism efforts in the U.S. military.

Sight & Sound

BOOKS

A ‘Messy’ Christian Life

Messy Spirituality: God’s Annoying Love For Imperfect People
By Michael Yaconelli, Zondervan,
141 pages, hardcover, $.

For all the Christians who feel like they don’t pray enough, study the Scriptures enough, share their faith enough or aren’t spiritual enough, author Michael Yaconelli has good news. The owner and co-founder of Youth Specialties and a lay pastor, Yaconelli, in his latest book, Messy Spirituality, encourages and affirms Christians who still do not fully have their acts together.

In other words, this is for all of us.

Messy Spirituality helps to bring the church–and even God–out of the ivory tower and back into the incarnational streets of early first century Israel, where Christ touched, loved and rejoiced with imperfect people. It offers a new doorway to those people of faith disillusioned over their perceived incompetence and blemishes. He tells readers that the kind of spirituality Jesus honored in the Gospels is for imperfect people who allow God to turn their messes into His masterpieces.

As Yaconelli exclaims, “Spirituality is not about being fixed; it is about God’s being present in the mess of our unfixedness.” He writes, “What landed Jesus on the cross was the preposterous idea that common, ordinary, broken, screwed-up people could be godly!” Unbiblical behavior, Yaconelli asserts, is not to be condemned by Christians but redeemed.

Yaconelli does a commendable job of offering anecdotes and illustrations from his own journey and from the lives of others–stories of shame and brokenness often exacerbated by the response of well-meaning, if often legalistic, Christians and church leaders. His text offers freedom to those feeling the weight of needing to look and act a certain way in order to be accepted by the body of Christ, and gives each Christian permission to let down his or her guard and dare to live by grace.

“The essence of messy spirituality,” Yaconelli writes, “is the refusal to pretend, to lie, or allow others to believe we are something we are not.” This is counter cultural, even–or perhaps especially–in the context of the church. The battle that authentic Christians wage for permission to be real is similar to the hard-fought victory secured by Jesus against the religious power elite, and we are called to be equally as steadfast as we abide in Him.
John M. De Marco

Islam and Peace

Islam and Terrorism
By Mark A. Gabriel, Ph.D., Charisma House,
234 pages, paperback, $.

Is the radical Muslim terrorist movement an anomaly in an otherwise peaceful religion? Author Mark Gabriel, Ph.D., once a professor of Islamic history in Cairo, Egypt, and a former Muslim, wants the West to know the true answer: a resounding no. His book Islam and Terrorism is a personal testimony, history lesson, Quran study and political exposition all in one.

He speaks as one with authority: one who has thoroughly studied the Quran, has lived in a predominantly Islamic culture and has been an eyewitness to many terrorist activities. Most important he speaks as one who has been persecuted for his conversion to Christianity.

He writes that while many moderate Muslims disapprove of the radical mission of jihad and prefer to view it as a personal struggle against immorality, Gabriel contends that one cannot accurately interpret the Quran in this way. He writes that in these cases Islam has been “Christianized” or influenced by the surrounding Christian culture.

He also insists that the modern terrorists reflect the true nature of Islam as practiced by Muhammad himself. Having made this clear, the author pleads with the Christian reader to have compassion on the Muslim who is in bondage to a false religion of hatred, repression and murder. Most Muslims have a twisted view of Christianity and are in great need of hearing the true gospel. He shares several effective tips for reaching out to Muslims and introducing them to the true Jesus. He also offers suggestions for discipling former Muslims.

This book is an invaluable tool for understanding the spiritual and physical battles going on in our world today. It is a must-read for those who want to respond correctly to the threat of jihad.
Deborah L. Delk

Avoiding Seduction

When Godly People Do Ungodly Things
By Beth Moore, Broadman & Holman,
320 pages, hardcover, $.

Who is the prime target of Satan’s anger? A person of godly influence, suggests Beth Moore in her latest release, When Godly People Do Ungodly Things. Moore sheds light on the enemy’s campaign to seduce God’s chosen and shows readers how to fortify their lives to become seduction-proof.

In When Godly People Do Ungodly Things, Moore helps readers understand how people who are wholeheartedly devoted to God can be seduced by the powers of darkness. She explains that Satan has a twofold objective: to exact revenge on God by wreaking havoc on His children and to immobilize the believer’s ability to overcome the enemy. Moore offers 16 characteristics of godly believers who have been seduced to do ungodly things, including experiencing periods of spiritual numbness and being caught off guard and mentally bombarded. She also gives a scripturally based answer to why God would allow His chosen to be caught in a web of seduction.

Moore shows readers that they are not alone by offering her own and others’ experiences, and revealing specific ways to seduce-proof one’s life. When Godly People Do Ungodly Things provides a road map to restoration and wholeness in Christ and gives biblical steps for maintaining a clear conscience.
Jessica Mastrapa

MUSIC

Worship to Take Listeners ‘Deeper’

A Deeper Faith
By John Tesh, Garden City Music.

A Deeper Faith isn’t your everyday John Tesh album. For a start, the entertainment news-anchor-turned-pianist is singing, which only makes one wonder why he hasn’t tried it before. His strong tenor voice is joined by a worship team on songs such as the opening “Open the Eyes of My Heart” and the gospel funk rendition of “You’re Worthy of My Praise,” featuring Nicole C. Mullen. Tesh seems at home on this release as he aims to duplicate the worship that he leads each Sunday at his Messianic church, Beth Ariel in California.

Tesh’s tenor seems hidden on most numbers by the symphony of voices, but his presence is clearly felt during his audible recitations of Scripture. It’s not until the fourth track, “God Is My Rock,” that Tesh’s voice is actually identifiable.

The majority of the 17 tracks are upbeat with rock, funk and gospel-R&B elements with the exceptions of a few songs such as the ballad “I Am Not Alone,” with vocals by Natalie Grant, and a children’s song titled “Anjus Wav-Um.” Popular praise and worship songs such as “Trading My Sorrows,” “Heart of Worship” and “Shout to the Lord” also are included.

Of course it wouldn’t be a John Tesh album without a solo piano piece, and listeners will be more than satisfied with the title track, a catchy tune that seems to summarize the album’s light-hearted spirit. Bringing listeners back to reality at the end of the CD is a prayer by President Bush asking for peace for America following the events of Sept. 11. It seems fitting that during that time Tesh was putting the final touches on this CD of hope and inspiration.
Rhonda Sholar

More of Jesus

More, More, More
By Joann Rosario, F. Hammond
Music/Verity Records.

Joann Rosario presents a collection of songs that will minister to the hearts of
listeners as well as to the heart of God on her debut release More, More, More. Rosario emerges as the first solo artist to release a project on Fred Hammond’s new label, F. Hammond Music, but she is no newcomer to the gospel music scene. She has been a featured vocalist with Fred Hammond’s ensemble Radical for Christ for several years, and her title track was featured on Hammond’s In Case You Missed It and Then Some, released last year.

A preacher’s kid from Chicago, Rosario blends her Latin roots with gospel influences to create a unique and youthful sound. Rosario co-wrote nine of the 13 songs. More, More, More includes such energetic tracks as “Serve You Only,” the Latin-flavored “Your Consuming Fire” and the happy “Since You Came My Way.” The album also includes soulful ballads, such as the heartfelt “Think of Me,” “If It’s Not You” and the moving “Follow Me / Sígueme,” which is sung partly in Spanish and is backed by beautiful Spanish guitar.

One of the standout tracks is the stirring “As We Overcame,” written by Hammond and Yolanda Adams. Rosario ministers with conviction the message that in God there is power to be victorious. More, More, More expresses Rosario’s diversity and shares a simple testimony of God’s goodness.
Twanna Powell Crenshaw

‘Thriving’ on Jesus

Thrive
By Newsboys, Sparrow Records.

For a while, there was a bit of uncertainty about where the Newsboys were heading. Their crazy experimental album, Love Liberty Disco, left some fans wondering where this multimillion-album-selling band was going to end up. Fortunately, the group rebounded with their “best of” compilation album, Shine: The Hits. With their new album, Thrive, the Newsboys are coming back to their roots: pop-rock sounds combined with brilliantly clever lyrics, edgy guitars and a punchy beat.

Despite widespread success, there is no compromise in the quality of the lyrics. Songs continue to be overtly Christian and engage numerous references to pop culture. Some of the cuts carry a synthetic 1980s flavor while others take a more modern twist.

The title cut, “Thrive,” is a tender cry for redemption and healing. The God-centered, worshipful “It Is You” will likely seep into church service as a congregational favorite. “Cornelius” carries an anthem-like quality that is reminiscent of Newsboys-famed wahoo “Breakfast” song. “Million Pieces” is an absolute standout. Producer Steve Taylor’s talents run rampant on this recording.

Listeners, longtime fans and the band will “thrive” on this release. It’s one you don’t want to miss.
Margaret Feinberg

AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT

Building Wealth That Will Last an Eternity

Though the author of a book on finances, Robert Katz is hoping to help people get their focus off of money. “I’m trying to free people up by getting their financial house in order, so they can do what God’s really called them to do,” says Katz, a certified public accountant and investment adviser based in New Orleans. “And I don’t think it’s to accumulate a whole bunch of wealth here on earth.”

Having appeared on Benny Hinn’s This Is Your Day and The 700 Club talking about his book Money Came by the House the Other Day (InSync Press), Katz says his message is resonating among many believers. He teaches simple financial organization techniques, including information on tithing, investing, insurance needs and home purchasing.

Not one to condemn the prosperity message, Katz doesn’t promote it either. He says evangelist Oral Roberts, who wrote the forward to Katz’s book, did a great service to the body of Christ by teaching people that God didn’t call Christians to be impoverished. But subsequent generations have taken “a truism and stretched it to its extreme, to where God never intended it to be.”

Katz says financial prosperity includes having all your needs met and experiencing peace. Maintaining that material wealth is good, Katz encourages Christians to be wise stewards on earth while storing up treasure in heaven. He fears that those who don’t will become “paupers in paradise” because they misplaced their priorities, causing them to experience “a different, eternal tragedy.”
Adrienne S. Gaines

How Not to Lose Your Focus

While it’s easy to list the many external diversions, our most fatal distraction lives within.

A frustrated New York attorney sits across from the “other woman,” pleading for peace. He attempts to make restitution, to justify his one-night stand, to say something–anything–that will get this obsessed woman to leave him, his possessions and his family alone. But with cool deliberation, she simply replies, “I will not be ignored.”

Though secular, this scene from a 1987 film contains spiritual significance. The woman, obsessed in the pursuit of someone else’s husband, is completely focused on her immoral mission.

How much more focused should we be in pursuing our divine destinies? For this character, only death was able to stop her. What is stopping you? While this woman had a fatal attraction, many Christians today suffer from fatal distractions.

Fatal distractions detour us from growing spiritually and fulfilling our purpose in life. And while it is easy to list the many external diversions that cause us to lose focus–busy schedules, difficult church people, lack of money, anthrax and bioterrorism–the disturbing reality is simply this: Our most fatal distraction lives within.

It’s the person you see as you brush your teeth, the one who stares at you in the mirrored glass of corporate America, and the one who goes with you to pick the kids up after school. It’s even the person who accompanies you to the office to prepare weekly sermons, and the one who intercedes in times of intense warfare.

As the 1950s political cartoon character Pogo stated: “We have met the enemy, and it is us.”

The apostle Paul expressed the same sentiment as he closed Romans 7, lamenting: “I love to do God’s will so far as my new nature is concerned; but there is something else deep within me, in my lower nature, that is at war with my mind and wins the fight and makes me a slave to the sin that is still within will free me from my slavery to this deadly lower nature? Thank God! It has been done by Jesus Christ our Lord. He has set me free” ( vv. 22-25, The Living Bible, emphasis added).

Often our fatal distractions are rooted in our minds. What else would explain King Saul’s fatal distraction, the jealousy of his armor bearer, David? When the two returned from battling Goliath, women praised the war effort in song, saying, “‘Saul has slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands'” (1 Sam. 18:7, NKJV).

It was at that moment that Saul allowed the seed of distraction to awaken in his mind. “Then Saul was very angry, and the saying displeased him; and he said, ‘They have ascribed to David ten thousands, and to me they have ascribed only thousands. Now what more can he have but the kingdom? So Saul [jealously] eyed David from that day forward” (1 Sam. 18:8-9).

Like so many of us, Saul’s fatal distraction did not come from external forces. It wasn’t the women, David or even the lyrics of the song. Saul’s jealousy was his fatal distraction, and it caused him to disqualify himself from serving as king.

Saul is the only one who could have changed this negative thought process, and the same is true of us. If we do not truly believe what God has said about us, fatal distractions will come to weed out our faith.

What is distracting you from seeing yourself in the reflection and image of Christ? Is it doubt, a poor self-concept or lack of intimacy with Christ?

What do you really believe about yourself? What do you believe about your potential? Beyond your scripted, pat, religious response to friends or family, what do you truly believe about your service? As Proverbs 23:7 declares, “For as he thinks in his heart, so is he.”

If you’ve been fatally distracted, there is hope. God wants you to regain your focus and pursue His original plan for your life. To do that, you must stay faithful to the things of God and obey His Word. Stay committed to the call of God on your life, be unshaken in your faith and remain steadfast in your Christian walk.

Like the woman with the fatal attraction, doggedly pursue your destiny. Instead of being fatally distracted, stay eternally focused on fulfilling His will.

Joyce Rodgers is founder of Primary Purpose Ministries in Denton, Texas. She is the youth department chairwoman for the Church of God in Christ.

Let’s Support Israel

The bottom line is this: There is no such thing as “good terrorism.”
In 1979 when I climbed Mount Sinai, then controlled by Israel, I was accompanied by an armed guard. When I went into Southern Lebanon in 1983, an Israeli soldier with an Uzi machine gun went along, just in case.

That was before the current rash of suicide bombers began blowing themselves up in order to kill Israelis. The violence has escalated to a new level. But in some ways, it’s just more of the same.

The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 allowed us to experience what the Jewish people have been living with for more than 50 years. Yet in spite of the fact that Americans are in favor of fighting terrorism in America, many seem almost sympathetic to Palestinian terrorists in Israel who often are portrayed in the media as “freedom fighters.”

Because of terrorism, tourism in Israel has nearly dried up. So it’s little wonder the Israeli government is putting inserts promoting the Holy Land in Charisma. Selected issues contain a preprinted insert that was ordered long ago and originally scheduled for the May issue.

When the violence escalated, we questioned whether it would be wise to include the advertisement. But we felt we needed to show our support of Israel by encouraging people to visit the country as soon as it is safe to do so.

The Israelis need our support more now than ever! My friend Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, founder and president of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, based in Chicago and Jerusalem, suggests we show our support by:

* Writing letters to editors when there are distortions and prejudices in the media

* Writing congressmen and other leaders to urge them to stand by Israel

**Helping Israel by traveling in the country and purchasing Israeli products

* Aiding the poor in Israel through ministries that bring Jews to Israel from the former Soviet Union, fund soup kitchens in Jerusalem and support other worthwhile projects in the troubled country.

Robert Stearns, a friend and respected Christian leader, is rallying Christians to pray for Israel. He has encouraged me to remind my readers to know what the Bible says about Israel and about God’s purpose for His people.

Romans 11 ensures that Israel is not cut off and that a glorious awakening awaits many Jewish people. Both Genesis 12:3 and Zechariah 12:2-9 contain dire warnings for those who directly or passively come against Israel, and Genesis 12:3 has a related blessing for nations that stand with her.

Stearns also urges Christians to talk with their pastors, churches, neighbors and friends about supporting Israel, though the tide of world opinion is clearly turning against this tiny nation.

The bottom line is this: There is no such thing as “good terrorism.” No cause can ever rationalize taking a 14-year-old boy, strapping dynamite on him and telling him that if he blows himself up, he will live in eternal bliss. This is nothing more than the Molech worship practiced by the Amorites, which God abhorred.

The most important thing believers can do is pray. Our prayers can effectively release God’s purpose in a seemingly hopeless situation. We should pray not only for the peace of Jerusalem, but also against the spirit of anti-Semitism rising up in the earth.

We are living in times in which biblical prophecy is being fulfilled. Zechariah 12:2, in which the Lord declares, “I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that sends all the surrounding peoples reeling” (NIV), is as current as today’s headlines.

This magazine has long reported on Israel and the Jewish people. We know the destiny of the church and of Israel are intertwined. And we regret that too few evangelical and charismatic Christians have spoken out in support of Israel.

Let us be those who see beyond the headlines and who, with our voices, with our influence, and most of all with our prayers, stand as the Lord has called us to stand. May we say, as Isaiah did, “For Jerusalem’s sake I will not remain quiet, till her righteousness shines forth like the dawn, her salvation like a blazing torch” (Is. 62:1).

Stephen Strang is founder and publisher of Charisma. He invites readers to attend our Preparing for the Harvest conference in Orlando, Florida, Oct. 31-Nov. 2.

God Is in Control

An ‘I have to fix it myself mentality’ leads to a plethora of physical and emotional troubles.
Undoubtedly, while driving around town you have spotted the familiar bumper sticker, ” is in control.” Wouldn’t it be great if everyone knew that a Supreme Being is in control of his life? “Don’t sweat the small stuff” would be the slogan of the day if everyone truly gave up his control issues and relied on God.

So many people are trying to “fix” every aspect of their lives! The development of numerous ways to control the ravages of time on our physical bodies–chemical peels, eye lifts, tummy tucks, liposuction and botox, for example–is proof that we are pressured to seek perfection in our outward appearance.
Add in trying to fix our marriages, our children, our careers, our finances, our co-workers, our mothers and anything else we perceive to be wrong, and you can see that we have a sure-fire recipe for stress.

Along with this “I have to fix it myself” mentality comes a plethora of physical and emotional troubles, including anxiety, full-blown panic attacks, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorders, insomnia, tense muscles and more. Considering that more than 80 percent of all doctor visits are due to stress-related illness, I think we need to examine our lives and ourselves.

I was forced to do this when stress took a serious toll on my health. Panic attacks, hormonal imbalance, chronic fatigue syndrome and more sidelined me to the point of almost giving up. I had worn myself out trying to be a human fix-o-matic.

For the first time in my life, I had to face the reality that I alone could not fix or control anything. But I discovered that someone else could.

During my low period, I delved deeply into the Word of God. I had an incredible revelation: Not only is God in control of our lives, but He carried us even when we were in our mothers’ wombs. As little infants, we relaxed because He was in control.

When I realized that someone was in control who could fix my life with much more expertise than I had and who always has my best interests at heart, I was able to let go, step back and live my life from a changed perspective. I now am able to honor the people in my life for who they are and not try to make them into who I think they should be.

To help curb your desire to control you must first understand why you behave this way. Many times we become controllers when we experience situations in our lives that leave us feeling hurt, vulnerable or rejected.

A childhood that was filled with a lack of praise and approval, the divorce of parents, death, an unstable upbringing, the responsibility of raising other siblings, a strict religious environment, or a family history of alcoholism and low self-esteem can be a contributing factor. Because of such a background, people develop controlling personality traits that include high expectations, extremely analytical or perfectionist tendencies, obsessive thinking and more.

The real root of the problem of control, however, is fear. Fear paralyzes your life and your health. Fear plays a part in many diseases we face in these times.

The good news is that your healing can begin with the realization of how great a part fear has played in turning you into a control freak. You must face your fear head-on.

Yes, it took years of hurt and trauma to bring you to this point, but you must deal if you are going to heal! God has not given us a spirit of fear (see 2 Tim. 1:7).

Here are some steps to take to turn your situation around:

Pray and ask God to forgive you for anything you may have done that has harmed another individual.
Forgive anyone who has harmed you.
Let God take past hurt from you. Take it to the altar and leave it there.
Consciously reject every fear that comes into your mind and tries to take you captive. Rebuke it and ask for the peace of God to surround you.

It’s worth the effort. Just think of all the anxiety, depression, heartache and medical bills that will be avoided as you relax, knowing “God is in control.”

What Will You Risk to Be a Pioneer for God?

Until the church–the people of God–have explored all the ideas that are in the divine mind for the propagation of His kingdom in the earth, somebody must always be receiving new light and making new departures, and there has never been a single instance in the history of the church in which this has been done without nearly the whole of that generation raising a hue and cry against it.

Yet how would it be possible for God to bring about a revolution–a true revival–a grand aggressive movement of Christianity, without giving new light and calling somebody to some path in advance of all that has gone before?

And what does it matter who? Whether it is Peter or John or Martin Luther or George Fox or John Wesley or William Booth? What does it matter, as long as God does it?

But this requires that somebody lead the way–go on in advance. Will you be content to go in advance? Will you endure the hardness of a pioneer? Can you bear the ridicule and gibes of your fellowman? Dare you go where the Holy Spirit leads and leave Him to look after the consequences?

If so, you will have a harvest of precious souls; you will shine as the stars forever; but if you draw back, His soul will have no pleasure in you. The Lord help you! Step out onto the divine love that alone is able among the waves to bear up your little boat–able to make you more than a conqueror. Oh, step out–follow, follow, follow–do not be afraid!

WALKING ALONE The only thing you must do is count the cost, for the possession of divine love often necessitates walking in a lonely path. Not merely in opposition and persecution, but alone in it. Jesus, who was the personification of divine love, stands out as our great example.

He was emphatically alone, and of the people there was none with Him. Even the disciples whom He had drawn nearest to Him and to whom He had tried to communicate most of His thought and spirit, were so behind that He often had to reprove them and to lament their obtuseness and lack of sympathy.

In the greatness of His love, Jesus had to go forward into the darkness of Gethsemane. He was alone while the disciples slept, and then He went all alone to the Judgment Hall. He stood alone before Pilate. On the cross He hung unaccompanied–alone!

As it was with the Master, so it has been with all those whom God has called to go in advance of their race. It was so with Paul, and it has commonly been so with those whom God has called to extraordinary paths. For John to have a revelation of things shortly to come to pass, he had to go alone to the Isle of Patmos. For Paul to hear unspeakable words, he had to go alone into the third heaven and not be allowed even to communicate what he saw and heard when he came down. In advance of other saints, he of necessity had to go alone.

Similarly, when God has called some of His other followers to an out-of-the-way path, they have had to go alone. Superior love necessitates a lonely walk.

You shrink and say, “That seems hard.” Yes, I know. The fact remains that superior love necessitates, in some measure, a lonely walk, because it is only they who thus love to whom the Lord tells His secrets. If you want to ask a confidential question and get a confidential answer, you must be on the bosom of your Master. You won’t be able to do it at a distance.

Then when He gives to any soul superior light to its fellows, and that soul follows the light, it necessarily entails a path in advance of its fellows. Unless he can inspire and encourage them to follow, he must go on alone.

FACING OPPOSITION Peter faced this dilemma when God gave him the vision of the sheet with all its unclean contents and told him, “‘Rise, Peter; kill and eat'” (Acts 10:13, NKJV). Peter understood from the vision that his own plan to reach the Jews with the gospel was not the fullness of God’s plan for the extension of His kingdom and that God wanted him to go to the Gentiles. He determined that his business was to follow the Lord’s directions in spite of his own “ifs” and “buts,” and he went on to carry out the divine direction.

The church, aghast, as usual, at anything new, was down on it. This new church–which had only just itself been brought to God by a new Savior, a new revelation, a new call and a new faith–was down on Peter and summoned him before a council to answer for his conduct (see Acts 11:1-3).

He told them about his vision in the truthful simplicity of a man of God, and thank God, they had sense enough–yes, and love enough–to accept his explanations and to glorify God (vv. 4-18). Would to God we could get as much sense and charity these days!

You see, the church tends to be down on all the Peters who dare to do anything out of the jog-trot line. You may reason ever so urgently and show them that the old measures are not enough for everybody, that there is a great mass of outlying population that they do not reach; you may show them that these new measures of yours are quite as lawful as their old measures, and that, probably, they would be a great deal more useful, and moreover, that they have been borne in upon you by the Holy Spirit and that you feel as if there is a fire in your bones urging you to go and try them; yet they will not hold their peace and glorify God but will loose their tongues and vilify you.

I wish people would stop and think that the path they are now standing in–the well-beaten track on which they are now walking with such slow dignity–was once quite as new and unconventional and outrageous to their forefathers’ colleagues as the path that any new departure by the Holy Spirit may set before them now. They should read Neale’s History of the Puritans and see amid what a hurricane of excitement, opposition, contempt and persecution their forefathers fought for the very paths they are now standing still in and holding so sacred that they cannot have them disturbed.

If their forefathers had acted on the principles they are acting on, they would have stood still in old paths, and we would never have been in the new ones. These people stand in the paths of traditionalism and routinism, just where their forefathers left them, occupying all their time in admiring the wisdom and benevolence and devotion of their forefathers, instead of imitating their aggressive faith and marching on to the conquest of the world.

Will you throw yourself in with them? Or will you step out in front of the crowd and lead them down the path of true righteousness? For which is better: to let men be damned conventionally or to save them unconventionally?

Which is the most God-honoring? Which has the most common sense in it?

But it is now as it was in the days of the Son of Man–the church is full of those who “‘build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, “If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets”‘” (Matt. 23:29-30). Jesus called such religious folk “hypocrites” (v. 29) and “serpents, brood of vipers” (v. 33) and said that they are “‘witnesses against [them]selves that [they] are sons of those who murdered the prophets'” (Matt. 23:29-31).

MOTIVATED BY LOVE How is this pharisaical attitude played out in the church today? Let’s take an illustration. Suppose we have a church that is going comfortably along and is just where it was 10 or 15 years ago, making up for deaths and departures, but not really growing.

We will suppose that a member of this church gets converted. He has the sense of his transgressions and unfaithfulness being taken away, and the joy of God’s salvation is restored to his soul.

Now, in a moment–almost immediately, as in the case of Peter–as soon as the internal work is done, comes the external path opened up. The Spirit of God lays before him some new work, something strikes him that has been long forgotten or that never seems to have been recognized in his church.

He sees what a grand thing it would be for the conversion of souls and the extension of the kingdom of Jesus Christ, and he feels it beginning to burn like a fire in his bones to enter this path of usefulness. He prays much over it and waits until he is fully satisfied that it is not a vain impulse but is of the Spirit of God.

Full of love, faith and zeal, he goes to talk to the leadership. He expects they will sympathize with his feelings and enter into his project; but alas, they begin by raising objections: “Well, but you see, that would be a little out of our order”; or “That is not exactly our way of doing things”; or “I am afraid the deacons would object.” And if he has the misfortune to be young–or a woman–they will completely suppress him with the dictate, “You must never presume to do anything of which we do not approve.”

Alas! The thousands of urgings of the Holy Spirit; the thousands of heavenly voices that have been as clear to human souls as ever Peter’s sheet was to him; the thousands of glorious aspirations and schemes for the spread of the kingdom that have been thus squashed!

But not all souls will be so easily put off. The possessor of divine love holds out, in spite of opposition, ingratitude and persecution. He seeks the good of all men, not merely because he ought but because he cannot help it. His heart is on the side of God and truth. He loves righteousness and therefore cannot desist from seeking to bring all beings to love it, too, although they hate and despise him for so doing.

Jesus held out in this glorious love, even in the agonies of crucifixion. “‘Father, forgive them,'” He said, “‘for they do not know what they do'” (Luke 23:34). His heart was set on bringing man back to God, and He went through with it. His soul did not draw back, and His divine love constrained Him even unto death.

Do you have this divine love? Do you have enough of it to take you beyond your petty, selfish interests and your concerns about what other people will think to a place in front of the pack? Will you step out, all alone, and become a forerunner in your generation? If you do–if you will–you may be surprised at the revival God begins through you.

Read a companion devotional.

Catherine Booth (1829-1890) was co-founder with her husband, William, of The Salvation Army, as well as the mother of nine children and a much-sought-after, powerful preacher.