Frightened and persecuted believers say removal of Saddam Hussein will not
secure their future
Iraq’s Christians believe U.S. military intervention may only make their situation worse, anonymous sources have told Charisma. Frightened to speak out, and targeted by the authorities as well as the majority Muslim communities in which they live, Iraqi believers say they are caught between a rock and a hard place.

They feel as exposed and vulnerable as any other Iraqi to impending attacks by Western forces, which is a likely next-step action if weapons inspections fail to appease a determined Bush administration from either disarming or removing Saddam Hussein.

If Iraqi Christians criticize Hussein’s government, they invite arrest, torture and death, yet by remaining silent the world judges them to be compliant with a repressive and unjust regime, they say. Sources in Iraq say there are many silent witnesses who would be happy to speak against Hussein’s tyranny if they were living outside the country.

Whether Hussein remains in power or is replaced, Christians fear internal forces almost more than the threat of war. They cannot see anything but a bleak future for the church in this land that is so often mentioned in the Old Testament.

Nineveh was the biblical city God told the prophet Jonah to visit and warn of impending judgment. According to the prophet’s account, the people in those days repented. Today, ancient Ninevah’s ruins lie next to the city of Mosul in northern Iraq. Christians there are praying that God will again visit the city.

“They are rebuilding Babylon, and we feel that evil spirits have long been in control over large areas of Iraq,” one Christian leader told Charisma. “We are organizing special prayers–spiritual warfare–to come against the spirits and their strongholds–from Nebuchadnezzar to Saddam Hussein. We would be encouraged to know that other Christians around the world were praying for the same things.”

Sources differ on exact figures, but most estimate there are more than 1 million Christians in Iraq, which is about 5 percent of the population. Not all of these Christians are active believers. In fact, the churches have been so infiltrated by Hussein’s security forces that Christians dare not risk being seen doing evangelism or other Christian work.

“There are Christians who just go through the motions–they are Christians because of their background and culture,” the leader said. “If you enter a traditional church you might find all the trappings of Christianity, but there is no real growth in these churches. Some Christians obviously love God but fear to talk about the gospel openly, in case spies will report them to the authorities.”

This has forced the active evangelistic church and its work underground, especially in Muslim fundamentalist areas where churches have become house meetings that can be moved and changed at a moment’s notice. Ironically, it is the very threat of persecution that brought about a return to the style of meeting and worship that characterized the first believers.

The oldest church in Iraq is the Assyrian Church, the roots of which go back to the Assyrian nation, which adopted Christianity in A.D. 179. The language they speak is related to Aramaic, spoken in the time of Jesus.

The Chaldean Church, in union with the Vatican, numbers some 500,000 in Iraq. Its leader, Patriarch Raphael I. Bidawid, is well-respected throughout the country.

The Nestorian Assyrians follow the teachings of Bishop Nestorius, who did not accept the Virgin Mary as the “Mother of God.” Their churches are bare of any trappings or images. A simple altar on which a plain cross stands is preferred.

Formerly persecuted by the Chaldeans, the Nestorians have today drawn closer to their Chaldean cousins and even share buildings and resources. Some estimates suggest there are more than 300,000 Nestorians still in Iraq. They claim to have sent the first missionaries to Mongolia, China and Japan.

There are also small groups of Anglicans, Lutherans and evangelicals, especially in Baghdad and other more populous areas.

Saddam Hussein is reported to have destroyed hundreds of Assyrian villages. Meanwhile, in the north, Kurdish extremists have destroyed 150 churches.

Christians are frightened to wear their traditional crosses. They are being called “crusaders” and are seen by Iraqi Muslims as potential traitors and allies of the Western powers. “Go to the Americans to ask for food,” they are told.

Many have emigrated. One estimate suggests that 150,000 Christians have left Iraq since the Persian Gulf War. The largest Chaldean community outside Iraq is in Detroit.

In Baghdad, there has been an influx of fundamentalist Muslims from radical areas. Once well-known for its open secularism, Baghdad is changing today. More women are seen wearing the hijab, or face covering, and they disappear from the streets before sundown.

Iraqi Christian leaders say if another government were to replace the current one, the Christian communities would have no hope of better representation.

If a Muslim wants to become a believer, few churches would baptize him or offer him teaching and assistance. His family would do everything possible to bring him back into the fold of Islam. His life may be threatened, and his goods, property, and wife and children could be taken away.

Yet Iraqi Christians do not believe war is the answer. There is a great deal of respect for the pope for his stance against military action against Iraq.

“War is the last thing we need,” one Christian leader said. “But we don’t want to be forgotten by the international community. Tell the churches in the West to pray for us.”
David Freeman

It was an early Christmas for old friends and family at Brownsville Assembly of God in Pensacola, Fla., where pastor John Kilpatrick and associate Michael Brown once served together. The two men announced in December that they had repaired their relationship–ending a painful two-year separation that had dampened the fervor of the internationally known Pensacola revival.

The split occurred in December 2000 after Brown was fired from his position as head of the Brownsville Revival School of Ministry (BRSM). Brown took most of BRSM’s instructors and many students across town to start his own school and church–known as FIRE (Fellowship for International Revival and Evangelism). Kilpatrick, who ordered Brown’s ouster over differences in BRSM’s direction and other issues, met privately with Brown for the first time since the split on Dec. 12, in Kilpatrick’s office.

Kilpatrick said Brown had sent him an e-mail suggesting reconciliation. “I was riding in my car with my wife, Brenda, and my son called me on my cell phone and read me Dr. Brown’s e-mail,” Kilpatrick told Charisma. “When I heard the tenor of what Dr. Brown had written, I held my thumb up and told my wife ‘It’s over.’ Literally it felt just like a dam broke.”

Previous attempts to reconcile had stalled. After the December 2002 meeting, Brown and Kilpatrick issued a joint statement and scheduled a reconciliation service for Jan. 12 at Brownsville, with leaders and congregations from both sides attending.

The two asked for forgiveness from each other, and apologized for the hurt felt by many believers both in Pensacola and in the worldwide church. Kilpatrick said the two men met from 11:20 p.m. until 3 a.m. to resolve their differences. “It was like old times… absolutely wonderful,” the pastor said. “We didn’t get into issues. I’m really relieved all of this is behind us now.”

Brown agreed. “I’m sure both of us wanted reconciliation for many months now, but two years had gone by, and we still had not talked. This whole process has been painful for everyone involved, but I have no doubt it was God who birthed FIRE and that it is God’s desire to continue to bless Brownsville. We are not looking backward. We are moving forward.”
Billy Bruce

By finding the alleged killers, a praying truck driver named Ron Lantz did what the best U.S. surveillance powers couldn’t
Truck driver Ron Lantz, 62, believes an impromptu prayer meeting led to his spotting the two Washington, D.C.-area sniper suspects who allegedly had killed 10 people before Lantz saw the men at an interstate rest area in Maryland.

The arrests of suspects John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo probably saved lives. Law enforcement officials claim the pair had been plotting their next attack. But that doesn’t bring Lantz much comfort.

“I’d liked to have had it ended before that,” lamented Lantz, a committed Christian. Still, he insists that God orchestrated the men’s capture.

Lantz, a trucker for more than 30 years, would listen to talk radio during his regular haul from Kentucky to Maryland. He was horrified at the news of each sniper attack. During one of these trips he decided to do something about it.

“I was on a CB radio talking to drivers,” he told Christian men’s magazine New Man, “and I asked them if they would follow me into this rest area and have a little prayer service about our country and about the snipers.

“Lo and behold, about 50 [truckers] were there. It took about 58 minutes to have the prayer meeting. I just thought these people had to be caught some way or the other and that somebody was going to catch them.”

The next Wednesday–Oct. 23–Lantz was called in to work on his day off. Looking back, he can see God’s hand in the events that followed.

That day, he was stopped by police three separate times but was not ticketed. With each stop he was delayed a few minutes while the cops checked his paperwork. “I’ve been driving a truck for 36 years and that’s never happened before,” he noted.

The same day, Lantz heard a description of the snipers’ car.

“I got down next to Baltimore on [Interstate] 95. They described the car and the people in it and the license-plate number. I wrote it down.”

On his return trip to Kentucky he pulled into a rest area on Interstate 70 in Frederick County, Md., and immediately recognized the Chevrolet Caprice the police were looking for. Muhammad was asleep inside the car, and Malvo was resting on a park bench.

Lantz immediately placed an emergency call and waited for the police to arrive. An officer who responded told Lantz to use his rig to block the exit. Lantz then got on his citizens band radio and asked another trucker to block the entrance. He said he wasn’t worried about his own safety.

“I wasn’t scared,” Lantz said in his thick, Kentucky drawl. “I mean, the person I am, I’m not scared of nothin’ ’cause the good Lord just put me there to do what I did.”

Until 1997 Lantz had stayed away from the church. That year he promised his dying adult son that he would commit his life to serving God. According to Larry Dillon, Lantz’s pastor today at Central Church of the Nazarene in Fort Wright, Ky., Lantz has since devoted his life to God’s service: braving snowy roads to deliver food, clothing and school supplies to needy families; leading the church’s men’s ministry; and teaching Bible classes.

“He’s not afraid to get involved and, man, he’s got a heart of gold,” Dillon said. “He’s always out working and trying to build the church, trying to build the men’s ministry. He just makes himself available. He’s a servant for the Lord, and God will use a servant.”

Lantz didn’t realize that hours before he spotted the alleged snipers his home church had held a prayer meeting of their own and had prayed for the killers’ capture. “Little did we know the Lord was going to use one of the leaders of our men’s ministry to be the one to identify those snipers,” Dillon said.

Fifteen minutes after Lantz made his 911 call, the area was swarming with police. They used a flash grenade to disorient the suspects before grabbing them both.

In his column for The Wall Street Journal, Brendan Miniter wrote: “Mr. Lantz offers us a simple but powerful story, one that reveals an underlying strength in American society that the media often neglect: Religious character matters. It’s no coincidence that the best defenders of our domestic security are also turning out to be some of our most upstanding, moral citizens.”

Dillon agreed.

“God uses common people like you and me for uncommon things,” he said. “We had the Air Force, the FBI and CIA, and the best we had available. We had surveillance planes and the best and the latest technology that we had as a country. But God used Ron, a truck driver, to spot those individuals and to bring this thing to a conclusion.”

Lantz hesitates to say how Muhammad and Malvo should be punished. “What punishment?” he asked. “I’ll keep that thought to myself. It wouldn’t be very nice.”
Robert Andrescik

The Tulsa, Okla.-based ministry revoked Mark Holick’s ordination rather than risk lawsuits
A Wichita, Kan., pastor has been expelled from Rhema–a worldwide charismatic ministry renowned for its message of faith and biblical prosperity–because of his activism in the pro-life movement. The move has prompted a New Jersey minister who is trying to raise awareness of the pastor’s ousting to consider removing his congregation from the ministry organization.

Mark Holick had his ordination revoked last summer by the Tulsa, Okla.-based Rhema Ministerial Association International (RMAI), which has more than 23,000 graduates and 13 schools worldwide.

For the last two years, Holick–who with his wife, Monica, pastors 300-member Spirit One Christian Center–has joined other Wichita pastors in protesting the abortion clinic of Dr. George Tiller, a local physician called “the most infamous late-term abortionist in the world” by the Christian pro-life group Operation Save America.

“[RMAI leaders] informed me that my wife, any of our church leaders, and myself could not for any reason go to any abortion clinic ever, not even to pray,” Holick, 41, said in a letter to Barry Ross, pastor of the 100-member Word of Life Christian Church in Cologne, N.J. Ross has taken up Holick’s plight.

“They never told me specifically why…it was wrong for me if I chose to do so,” continued Holick, who was dismissed by Rhema without a hearing.

“I expressed to them that I have done nothing immoral, nothing unrighteous, nothing unbiblical, nothing unscriptural, nothing illegal, nothing sinful, but that if they felt that I had and pointed it out that I would gladly repent.

“I have made numerous requests to them for a meeting, to which they would not grant.”

Rhema’s Tulsa-based attorney, Tom Winters, told Charisma that “Rhema is not for abortion.” Winters said he advised RMAI leaders to revoke Holick’s license because his pro-life activism could cause Rhema to be “potentially sued.”

“Based on my advice, they took a safe and reasonable approach to deal with this,” Winters said. “I advised them that the best way to handle this situation was to sever the relationship.”

Ross, a 1981 Rhema graduate, told Charisma that the Holicks have been dealt “a horrible injustice.” Unsolicited by Holick, Ross said he has repeatedly tried to contact RMAI leaders about the Holicks, but his calls and letters have not generated any response.

“I’m following the biblical command–first to Rhema, second to the regional directors and third to the body of Christ,” Ross, 48, said. “I’ve been stonewalled so far. They should own up to their decision. Why try to hide and not address it? I don’t believe there is anything in our ministerial handbook or directory that tells us we can’t do [pro-life activism]. If something like abortion can’t be protested, what can be protested?”

Winters declined to comment on whether RMAI has a policy against pro-life involvement in its ministerial handbook. Holick told Charisma that he had seen several women forgo abortions at the clinic and give birth to their babies, partly through the pastor’s pro-life outreach. Some of them had also become Christians. Holick added that Rhema leaders had given him verbal and written warnings in the last year not to go to the clinic.

“This is the first time I’ve ever been disobedient to anything they asked,” the 1986 Rhema graduate said. “My feeling was, I had to do this in order to obey the Word of God. I think Scripture is clear regarding what the responsibility of the church is concerning innocent blood.”

Ross said his church board has “pretty much concluded it isn’t a healthy thing to be part of Rhema.”

“If they don’t see anything wrong with this, there is something wrong in our leadership,” he said.

RMAI evolved from the Rhema Bible Training Center, which was started by Kenneth Hagin Sr. and his son, Ken Jr., in 1974 in response to a demand for more teaching material from the Hagins’ ministry.

Eric Tiansay

Bethel Gospel Assembly reconciled in November with the white congregation that turned away its originators
Bethel Gospel Assembly, a black congregation in Harlem, N.Y., bathed its 85th anniversary service Nov. 10 with forgiveness by seeking unity with the white church whose forebears’ racist actions had inadvertently birthed the Harlem church.

Bethel’s roots date back to 1915 when two young black women attempted to join Glad Tidings Hall, a mostly white mission on West 42nd Street near Times Square. They accepted Christ as Savior during revival meetings there but were refused membership because of their race.

“Bethel was born out of rejection,” pastor Carlton T. Brown said. “Remembering our origin we are always receptive to people of all backgrounds.”

The Glad Tidings mission later evolved into Glad Tidings Tabernacle, a flagship Pentecostal church in New York City and an early member of the Assemblies of God. Robert and Marie Brown, noted Pentecostal pioneers, founded the church, which moved to its current location on West 33rd Street in 1921. Today Glad Tidings has 600 members, of whom 90 percent are black and Hispanic.

Lillian Kreager, a compassionate white member of Glad Tidings, rode uptown to Harlem on the subway to disciple the 15-year-old converts. Her fiancé broke their engagement after warning her against mixing with blacks. Weekly home meetings followed.

Bethel was born in 1917 with 12 Christians who gathered at the first service in quarters that rented for $10 a month. Today the independent Pentecostal church has more than 1,200 members and occupies a former junior high school sitting on a square block at Madison Avenue and 120th Street. The building is worth almost $20 million.

Eunice Scott, 79, a former member of Bethel, recalls how the two women had tenderhearted attitudes many years after the incident.

“It didn’t hurt their belief in Jesus,” she said. “They didn’t hold a grudge. They still talked highly of Glad Tidings.”

The same spirit of forgiveness and acceptance is embedded in Bethel’s culture. “That openness to racial reconciliation is in our DNA,” Brown said. “All are welcome.”

At a four-hour anniversary service, 1,800 members from Bethel, Glad Tidings and Crossway Christian Center Assembly of God in Bronx, N.Y., worshiped in unity, and the service seemed to snuff out any lingering hint of racial friction.

“I don’t see a black or white heaven,” shouted Darryl Doleman, worship leader. “We’re not here to celebrate big shots. We’re here to celebrate Jesus!”

Speakers from black and white churches echoed the racial reconciliation theme.

“It isn’t the Assemblies of God,” said Thomas Trask, general superintendent of the denomination. “It’s the kingdom of God. It’s right and proper that we gather together to love one another in the love of Jesus. We bless you. We commend you.”

Facing the audience, Brown bear-hugged Carl Keyes, current pastor of Glad Tidings. “Carlton Brown is my man!” Keyes exclaimed. “He’s special. He’s not a friend, he’s my brother.”

Keyes told Charisma: “The role here today is to be friends with Carlton Brown. We found we are of like mind, and we are two of the oldest Pentecostal churches in New York City. We have come to affirm and acknowledge one another and join together and see where God is going to take us in the future.”

Mark T. Gregori, pastor of Crossway Christian Center, orchestrated the reconciliation event. When he arrived in New York as a church planter in 1977, Glad Tidings’ former pastor Stanley Berg assisted him.

Bethel’s retired former pastor Bishop Ezra Williams also nourished Gregori by conducting street meetings with him in the South Bronx. Williams, 74 and recovering from cancer, served on the board of Brooklyn Teen Challenge and helped Teen Challenge workers in an urban ministry among street gangs.

Bethel, Glad Tidings and Crossway have committed to closer ties. “This is a new day and a new era, and we’ve decided to link arms and go forward together,” Keyes said.
Peter K. Johnson

Though Bob Dylan declined interviews for the book, Restless Pilgrim is an engaging defense of the songwriter’s spirituality
Bob Dylan’s conversion to Christianity in 1979 sent shock waves through the rock ‘n’ roll community as he shelved such tour classics as “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “Like a Rolling Stone” in favor of his new, Christ-centered songs. By 1982, rumors held that Dylan had renounced Christianity. Author Scott Marshall contends in his new book, Restless Pilgrim: The Spiritual Journey of Bob Dylan, that the aging troubadour still believes in Jesus.

Marshall, who wrote the book with Florida-based author Marcia Ford, wasn’t able to interview Dylan but spent more than three years researching public records and interviewing more than 70 people, many of whom know Dylan, to produce this analysis of the artist’s spirituality.

Marshall says that as a Christian Dylan was harshly criticized for preaching during his tours. Lyrics to two of his albums released around that time, Slow Train Coming and Saved, were overtly Christian.

Dylan refused to play anything but his new Christian songs during a West Coast tour immediately after he professed faith in Jesus–drawing the ire of both fans and critics. In 1983, rumors surfaced that Dylan, a Jew, had renounced Jesus to once again embrace Judaism.

Marshall points to two events that could have originated the rumors. Around that time, Dylan attended his son’s bar mitzvah and then took part in a study group with rabbis. Marshall thinks neither of these actions should be construed to mean Dylan lost faith in Jesus, particularly when the author’s research shows comments to the contrary.

“I think he really began looking into his Jewish heritage,” Marshall says of this period in Dylan’s life. News reports of Dylan’s attending a bar mitzvah and being in the company of rabbis likely snowballed into rumors that he had returned to Judaism, Marshall believes.

“I think there’s been a lot of misunderstanding,” he told Charisma. “If you really look at what’s [in the public record] you can see that Dylan has maintained his faith.”

A CD tribute to Dylan’s “Christian” period by traditional gospel artists, titled Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan, is slated for release in March. Because Dylan sings some backup and did a duet on the project, Marshall believes this is more evidence of Dylan’s keeping the faith. “If he had renounced Jesus, then why in the world would he get near this project?” he asks.

Though Marshall believes the famous songwriter’s faith is intact, he admits it may have wavered at times over the years.

“I’m not trying to hold Dylan up as some model Christian,” he says, but adds he thinks people should be understanding if they believe that the way Dylan has walked out his faith hasn’t met their expectations.

“Sometimes as believers we are hard on our brothers,” he says.

Marshall said he fell in love with Dylan’s music in 1986 when he first heard one of his greatest-hits albums but that he neglected Dylan’s Christian songs until he became a Christian in 1993. His natural curiosity about Dylan’s faith in Jesus led first to research and then to a manuscript. Both Christian and secular publishers shied away from his work–the former because Dylan didn’t connect strongly enough with his faith, the latter because they didn’t want to address his faith in a book, Marshall said.

Relevant Books, publisher of Walk On: The Spiritual Journey of U2, released Restless Pilgrim as the second book in its Spiritual Journey series.
Richard Daigle

Ethiopians are being trained to evangelize their own country amid a belief that they stand in the way of an Islamic takeover
Revival is sweeping Ethiopia as missionaries carry the gospel to a people devastated by drought, famine and war. Evangelical church leaders in Ethiopia report that the gospel has been preached to at least 1.2 million people in the last six years, resulting in 50,000 conversions to Christianity and 500 new churches.

This move is primarily the work of national missionaries who have been trained and sent out through a partnership of the Evangelical Churches Fellowship of Ethiopia (ECFE)–which represents 97 percent of Protestant churches in the country–and Accelerating International Mission Strategies (AIMS), a Virginia-based organization.

“It’s been encouraging to see the Ethiopian leaders mobilizing their churches and owning the missionary task,” said Howard Foltz, founder and president of AIMS.

ECFE, which was forged in 1974 when Ethiopia first came under communist rule, represents 17 denominations. The churches have remained together with a commitment to reach Ethiopians with the gospel.

“It’s the greatest unity I’ve seen anywhere in the world,” Foltz told Charisma. “There’s a price to pay for that unity, but they are paying it.”

The foundation for the Ethiopian partnership was laid in 1989, when Calvary Temple in Denver opened its doors to a congregation of Ethiopian believers that had come to the United States to escape persecution by the communist regime in their homeland.

When the socialist government of the country fell in 1991, Calvary Temple pastor Charles Blair was invited to Ethiopia to help local church leaders make the transition from underground cell groups to thriving, visible congregations.

Foltz accompanied Blair in 1996, helping to train Ethiopian church leaders, pastors and missionaries. Today, the ongoing partnership continues to yield a harvest of new believers and churches.

According to Pamella Foster, AIMS director of operations, the evangelical church in Ethiopia faces many challenges. In addition to persecution from Muslims, Ethiopia’s Orthodox church leaders have joined forces with the Islamic movement to persecute evangelical Christians.

“Leaders from the evangelical church in Ethiopia believe they alone stand between their government and a total Islamic takeover,” Foster reported.

In spite of these obstacles, more than 8,000 Muslims in one region alone have come to Christ during an 11-month period.

“A Muslim man who converts to Christianity will have his wife taken from him and given to another Muslim man. In addition, he may be disinherited and even stoned.”

National woes present yet another crisis for the Ethiopian church. Ethiopia has the third largest HIV-positive population in the world. There are 1.2 million AIDS orphans in the country.

During a recent AIMS training conference in Awasa, in southern Ethiopia, Christian leaders repented for the Ethiopian church’s silence on this issue and vowed to take action.

“The AIDS pandemic gives us an opportunity for a redemptive turnaround,” Foltz insisted. “The compassion ministry [of the church] can be a way of reaching families and communities with the gospel.”

Foster reported that in 2001 the alliance trained more than 100 top Ethiopian leaders, giving them tools to further mobilize Ethiopian churches.

The alliance expects its work to have an impact on some 8,400 congregations–70 percent of Ethiopia’s churches–through this training program. It also expects to dispatch and support 6,000 new missionaries over the next two years.

“Our motto has always been, ‘Don’t just give a fish; don’t just teach how to fish; but train teachers of fisherman,'” Foltz said.
Sandra K. Chambers

Nasir Siddiki prayed to Allah on his deathbed, but became a Christian after Jesus answered his prayer and healed him
Burning up with a fever of 107.6, Nasir Siddiki was close to death. His immune system had shut down. He was in agonizing pain and terrified.

Even if he did survive, doctors expected him to suffer brain damage. The prominent Muslim businessman had been diagnosed with an incurable case of shingles, which one doctor called the worst he had ever seen.

As a Muslim, Siddiki said he did not know about a loving God who heals. All he knew was Allah, whom he described as “a distant God offear.” One night, paralyzed by fear, Siddiki said that he “called out the word ‘God,’ fully expecting that it would be Allah.”

“Like a drowning man…with nowhere else to turn, I cried out, ‘God help me!'” he said.

His answer, however, came from Jesus, not Allah, he told Charisma.

“When His presence entered the room I was fully aware of who He was. The next thing I knew I was awake, and the blisters went into remission. There was no explanation because they had left me to die the night before. It is still unexplained on the case. But I know His name is Jesus.”

Being Muslim, Siddiki believed in Jesus as a prophet but not as the Son of God. When he left the hospital, he knew he had to find out whether Jesus was the Son of God or just a prophet as he had been taught all his life.

Arriving home and turning on the television, Siddiki found his answer.

“The same question was on my screen, ‘Is Jesus the Son of God?’ At the end of the program, they had answered every question, and I accepted Jesus,” he said.

Siddiki bought a Bible and read it from cover to cover. He quickly realized that Jesus is a God of restoration and healing.

“I asked Him to make me look normal again and not 75 years old or deformed,” Siddiki said. “I stood under the shower praying for 1-1/2 hours, and every single blister fell off. The skin was red like raw meat, and I prayed I would have no white blotches. There are none, and everything is normal, and I have no brain damage. Jesus the Healer is alive and well!”

After the miraculous healing from shingles in 1987, the then-successful businessman converted to Christianity, and today he is a full-time teacher in the body of Christ. From his headquarters in Tulsa, Okla., he broadcasts on TV and radio, teaching what he calls “principles of wisdom” on topics such as financial success, healing and how Christians can have their money work for them. His overseas crusades have resulted in thousands of conversions.

Healing continues to be a byproduct of Siddiki’s ministry. Tom Sweeney, a Michigan businessman, said before meeting Siddiki he suffered back pain, damaged discs in his back and a number of other ailments.

Sweeney went to see Siddiki, who told him he “couldn’t heal a fly” but that Jesus could, if Sweeney believed. “Within one month I no longer wore the brace, took no more pain pills, and I was playing basketball!”

Ted Mole, a Tulsa businessman, said he has been blessed financially through Siddiki’s teachings on biblical stewardship, increasing net profits above an initial management challenge of 15 percent to an amazing 1,800 percent.

Siddiki was born in Pakistan to an Indian mother and an Egyptian father who traced his ancestry to a close friend of the Muslim prophet Mohammed. Siddiki was raised in London and went to Toronto at age 19.

In addition to teaching believers the principles of financial success, Siddiki has a message for Muslims: “I would like to tell [them] that Jesus is a God of love and that if we will accept Him He will take care of us and give us eternal life.”
Jeremy Reynalds

The former showgirl and protégée of Frank Sinatra’s is part
of a relief agency that is helping African children
Lola Falana’s 59th birthday is one she will never forget. She was awakened around 6 a.m. when her mother called, telling her to turn on the television. Two planes had hit the towers of the World Trade Center, and the terrorist attack that came to be known as 9/11 had changed America.

On the first anniversary of the attack, Falana, a Las Vegas entertainer-turned- evangelist, told Charisma she believed 9/11 was a wake-up call to the nation but that, as a country, “we still don’t get it.”

“Something changed America, but America has not changed,” Falana said. “That’s what worries me–we have to do the changing.”

Since 9/11, Falana has become the spokeswoman for Save Sub-Saharan Orphans (SSSO), a nonprofit organization working to build orphanages and provide food and medicine for the 13 million African children orphaned by AIDS.

“There’s so much to be done, and you would think that all the nations of the world would help do this,” Falana said. “God is looking at America, [which] He’s allowed to be this great power, [to] see what we give in return to the weakest.”

SSSO President Nelson Miruka, a 32-year-old graduate student at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln (UNL), said the number of AIDS orphans has doubled in many African countries in just the last two years. He plans to build an orphanage dedicated to Falana in his native Kenya.

Personal experience is part of his motivation. Miruka has buried several of his own relatives, including two sisters who together left behind seven children. He returned to his village to find most of his peers dead. Many of them had left small children orphaned.

“Africa is going back to the pre-Industrial period,” he said. “Most African nations are losing skilled labor.

“Imagine the child,” he added, referring to nations where adults cannot find food. “I don’t really know what to do. I’ve cried before boards. I prayed yesterday, ‘God, can you drop me hope?'”

Hope has come, at least in part, in the form of a former showgirl who grew weary of the business at the height of her career. A protégée of Sammy Davis Jr.’s and Frank Sinatra’s, Falana was the undisputed “Queen of Las Vegas” in the 1970s and 1980s and a leading black sex-symbol. But by 1975 she had told God she had made a mistake and felt “miserable.”

For four years she endured multiple abdominal surgeries, then was diagnosed with pancreatitis, which doctors believed would kill her.

“I prayed, and I asked God…if You let me live one more day…I will live the rest of my life to Your glory, and I will serve You all my days,” she said.

Falana said she awoke the next morning and knew she had to keep her word to God. “My heart wanted to do that anyway,” she added.

Since then, she has fought multiple sclerosis, and although she believes God healed her, she still experiences fatigue, which limits her ability to travel and speak. A Roman Catholic who considers herself an evangelist, Falana spends much of her time in Las Vegas seeking ways to minister by radio or via the Internet. And she lends her voice to millions of African children who can’t speak for themselves.

“They [SSSO] just do what they can, and all [Miruka] had was $6,000 to build a school,” she said. “They built that so at least the ones who did not have AIDS could get an education. They could grow up and defend their country.”

SSSO board member Michael Combs, a UNL political science professor and pastor of Mt. Zion Baptist Church in Lincoln, said Christians have a responsibility to help Africa’s orphans. He said many African Americans in particular have been hesitant to get involved because they haven’t known of an organized effort that they could partner with.

“By the creation of the organization, Nelson has given us an organization that we can lend money to…and help give Africa a voice,” Combs said. He added that SSSO has a track record–building an orphanage in Uganda, providing uniforms in Zimbabwe and beds and bedding in Cameroon, and supplying food in Sudan, Sierra Leone and Ghana.

“You can’t save the world…but you can save a child,” adds SSSO board member Norman Leach. “You can ask yourself, ‘What one thing can I do?'”
-Adrienne S. Gaines

BOOKS

Power-Packed Devotionals

30-Day Devotional Treasury
Compiled by Lance Wubbels,
Emerald Books, 31 pages each,
hardcover, $9.99.

Like a packet of potent multivitamins, this six-book set of 30-day devotionals from well-known Christian writers and spokesmen will help bring vigor to any Christian’s spiritual life. Each book features a prominent figure in Christendom writing about a targeted topic. Missionary Hudson Taylor writes about spiritual secrets; evangelist R.A. Torrey focuses on the Holy Spirit; pastor Andrew Murray explores holiness; preacher Charles Spurgeon delves into prayer; George Müller, known as the “apostle of faith,” surveys faith; and revivalist Charles Finney addresses spiritual power.

Series editor Lance Wubbels distilled the most compelling points of each personality into concise passages that take only five minutes to read. Though each writes in a distinctive and sometimes formal style, all six manage to develop a personal rapport with the reader. Hudson Taylor uses questions liberally in his writings, making the words personal and penetrating. Discussing spiritual priorities, George Müller uses a first-person approach and shows his own steps toward faith.

The devotionals’ meaty spiritual content best invites Christians who are ardent in their desire to grow spiritually. These aren’t simply inspirational thoughts to start the day, but wallops of real truth about living a life that reflects the King. Like nutrient-filled vitamins, this assortment of devotionals can’t help but stimulate growth and health in devoted believers.
Karen Schmidt

Facing Persecution

Daughter of China
By C. Hope Flinchbaugh,
Bethany House, 278 pages,
paperback, $11.99.

Journalist C. Hope Flinchbaugh opens readers’ eyes to the persecution of Christians in China in her debut novel, Daughter of China. The book recounts the plight of a young Christian girl named Mei Lin, who grows up in China. Recovering from an awkward beginning, Flinchbaugh moves beyond the Christian posturing and fashions a tale of heartwarming grace.

Mei Lin’s innocent defiance, born of watching family members and friends suffer, grows into patience and love as she bears the abuse herself. She is taken from her home and sent to prison without any hope of leaving unless she renounces Christ. While there, she completely surrenders her heart to God.

Under His leadership she begins a ministry in prison. Her undaunted faith carries her through nearly a year of starvation and beatings. Miracles happen, and she is finally released. As she makes her way home she leaves a wake of new Christians in the path behind her.

Daughter of China is a heartfelt and moving story that is easily read. (And better read with a box of tissues handy!) A journalist who has written extensively about the persecuted church, Flinchbaugh includes interesting anecdotes in her acknowledgements, with more facts about persecution that is happening in the world today.
Laura Joseph

MUSIC

Chapman Sings All About Love

All About Love
By Steven Curtis Chapman, Sparrow Records.

After 12 albums, more than 40 Dove Awards and a plethora of other commendations, Steven Curtis Chapman has produced a release dedicated to “the girl of my dreams, my best friend, and the love of my life (who incidentally happen to be the same person).” In All About Love, Chapman records a series of songs dedicated to February’s theme of love and the relationship that has been most important to him, next to his relationship with Christ.

Filled mostly with original songs, Chapman celebrates his wife, Mary Beth, writing heartfelt, honest tunes that ask “How Do I Love Her,” and muse about what life looks like on “Your Side of the World.” Couples young and old will relate to the intimate lyrics that explore one of life’s most trying and rewarding gifts.

Using the same musical excellence that brought Chapman past acclaim, songs such as “Echoes of Eden” and “We Will Dance” are deeply sincere, setting to music emotions that are often difficult to express. At his wife’s request, Chapman borrows two tunes, “500 Miles” and “I Will Take Care of You.” He also includes his classic, “I Will Be Here.”

The Chapmans will release a companion book discussing the highs and lows of marriage, a relationship that Chapman says brings out the best and worst in a couple. He says: “Ultimately, this recording is a celebration of what I still believe to be one of the most important, mysterious, wonderful, exciting, challenging and beautiful of all the good gifts God created for us to enjoy and experience: true love.”
Adrienne S. Gaines

Making Music That Speaks Life

Speak Those Things
By Fred Hammond, Verity Records.

Fred Hammond opens another chapter in his musical journey with the release of Speak Those Things, Pages of Life, Chapter 3. Although this album is a solo effort, Hammond has the same Radical for Christ and F. Hammond Music crew that backed him on the platinum-selling Pages of Life, Chapters 1 and 2. Therefore, it is no departure from his unique mix of soul and urban gospel that has drawn such critical acclaim.

Speak Those Things is filled with music that ministers to the soul and spirit by focusing on God’s greatness and ability to heal, encourage and deliver. The album starts with two power-praise tracks, “You Are My Daily Bread” and “Lord of the Harvest.” Hammond also gets a little help from Mary Mary on the funky jam “Great.”

Hammond focuses on the importance of worship on such compelling songs as “Show Me Your Face,” “When It Gets Down to It” and “He Is Not Just a Man”–a reverent piece in which Hammond lyrically explains the essence of the Lord (“The Lion of Judah / Savior and ruler of all”).

Speak Those Things also includes messages of encouragement and healing on such soulful tracks as “Praise Him Through the Night” and “A Song of Strength,” which features Joann Rosario. The album’s theme is reiterated in the smooth, mid-tempo groove “I Will Say” that simply sends a message to speak life instead of death. It closes out on a high note with the hard-hitting groove “That Ain’t Nothin’.”

Hammond uses his music in Speak Those Things to serve as a reminder to look to God regardless of the situations life may bring.
Twanna Powell-Crenshaw

NEWS

Marriage Ministry On the High Seas

Love is said to be a many splendored thing. But for gospel recording artists Phil and Brenda Nicholas, who made the theme the bedrock of their music ministry, it proved to be the glue that kept them together through their most trying circumstance. Today through their Love Cruises, they teach couples about a love that bears all things.

In the 1980s, Nicholas, as the pair was called, was well-known for their romantic ballads written from a Christian perspective. Songs such as “Dedicated” and “A Love Like This” were wedding staples and garnered the couple professional acclaim. Though some churchgoers considered the romantic themes too secular, Nicholas discovered Christians were hungry for this type of ministry.

But behind the scenes the couple endured much private pain. In an effort to have a second child, Brenda suffered a string of miscarriages. Then good news arrived: A baby was on the way. But after Phil Jr. was born in 1991, the couple was devastated to learn their long-awaited son P.J. had Down’s syndrome, as well as two holes in his heart and a debilitating eye disorder.

When the doctor called with the news, Phil and Brenda both cried. Then, Phil says, he began to play a melody and wrote these words: “Nobody ever said there wouldn’t be dents in your armor / But He promised the armor would always hold / Nobody ever said the road would be easy / But He promised the strength to make it through / God will see you through.”

They were touring the country, singing hits such as “Got to Tell Somebody (God’s Been Good to Me)” but thinking God hadn’t been so good. “I remember Satan saying to me: ‘How can you sing that song? How can you say that God’s been good?'” Brenda says.

Taking a break from the music scene, the couple saw God perform several miracles that helped build their faith. When they took P.J. to prepare for a surgery to close the holes in his heart, doctors told them one hole had disappeared and the other was closing. And the disorder that caused his eyes to dart back and forth had ceased. Says Phil: “We believe God has the power to heal him. He started it, and we’re just believing God on that.”

After nearly a 10-year hiatus, Nicholas has re-emerged to again minister to couples via their five- and seven-day Love Cruises, which tour the Caribbean (www.NicholasMinistries.com). Past cruises have featured guests such as Myles Munroe and Rev. A.R. Bernard, and they offer marriage-enrichment seminars to help couples strengthen their relationships both practically and spiritually. Their recent musical release is filled with songs that focus on the truths that keep marriages strong, such as good communication, forgiveness and intimacy.

Celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary this year, Nicholas now communicates the depth of a love that has learned to endure all things. “Trials really come to make you stronger if you use them right,” Phil Nicholas says. “The fire refines pure gold. Going through that tough stuff really strengthened our relationship.”
Adrienne S. Gaines

Sitting in her driveway in May 2000, prophetic minister Juanita Bynum had an encounter with God that transformed her way of thinking. She had been “burdened” about a conference that didn’t draw the crowd she expected. And a subsequent summit was beginning to experience logistical difficulties.

“[God] started showing me that my ‘burden’ was not for the people and what they would receive,” Bynum writes in her new book, Matters of the Heart (Charisma House). “I was more concerned for my image, what I would project and what others were going to ‘read it’ to be.”

She describes this as a watershed moment in her spiritual life, one that led her on a journey to walk after God’s Spirit and not after her flesh. Using scientific metaphors, she writes that her answer was in receiving a “new heart”–one that is fully submitted to God’s will over her own. She says she had learned to “act” saved without fully submitting to God’s process of sanctification. “Every time I think about it, I am amazed how I could help others find the way to Christ while I was lost in the church! I shake when I think that I could have gone to hell from major platforms.”

Though Bynum is well-known for her teaching on sexual purity, she believes this “new heart” message is her most important. “In all of Scripture, that with which God is most concerned is this vital truth–the matters of the heart.”
Adrienne S. Gaines

CHARISMA RECOMMENDS

Ancient Wells Living Water
By Rod Parsley,
Charisma House,
224 pages, hardcover, $19.99.

Many Christians seem to replace that old-time religion with doctrines that claim to be “new” and “improved.” In Ancient Wells Living Water, best-selling author and speaker Rod Parsley explains how believers today are drinking from polluted wells that were once built by the faith of our spiritual fathers. Drawing from the story of Abraham and Isaac, Parsley communicates the need for the church to tap into its past in order to pave a new way for its future by using examples of “wells” as analogies to biblical truths. His message rings loud and clear: We must recapture the tried-and-true faith of our forefathers.

The Compulsive Woman
By Sandra LeSourd,
Creation House Press,
301 pages, paperback, $14.99.

Addressing compulsive behaviors such as food addiction, smoking, drug and alcohol abuse, compulsive shopping, and more, author Sandra LeSourd shows women how to beat compulsive behaviors. A frequent conference speaker and former Miss Vermont, LeSourd teaches women how to diffuse anger, conquer addiction, end male dependency, restore their self-worth and lead constructive lives.

Total Health and Restoration
By Terry Dorian, Ph.D.,
Siloam Press,
234 pages, paperback, $13.99.

Health researcher Terry Dorian, Ph.D., unlocks a six-month strategy to renew and restore physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health in her book Total Health and Restoration. She explains the paradigm shift that must occur in the way
individuals approach medical and scientific issues in order for them to achieve optimum health. She also includes information on the role of whole foods, exercise and the spiritual nourishment that comes from Scripture.

The Breaking Free Series
By Linda S. Mintle, Ph.D.,
Charisma House, 96 pages each,
paperback, $5.99.

Covering issues such as anorexia and bulimia, stress, anger and unforgiveness, depression, negative self-image, and compulsive overeating, author Linda S. Mintle, Ph.D., shows readers the pathway to freedom through this new Breaking Free booklet series. Mintle, a Virginia-based licensed clinical social worker and Charisma columnist, offers biblically based advice with practical action steps that can help break the chains of common disorders that bind Christians and non-Christians alike.

Dancing in the Wilderness
By Samanthia Cassidy,
Creation House Press, 208 pages,
paperback, $12.99.

Gospel singer and songwriter Samanthia Cassidy shares her autobiographical account of life in the Deep South as a young girl in the 1960s. At that time a member of a dysfunctional family and part of a pseudo-Christian cult, Cassidy seemed to face insurmountable challenges. Yet her tale is a vivid account of God’s provision and deliverance after her years of spiritual and emotional abuse, and His ability to transcend every obstacle.

To order these books call (800) 599-5750 or go to www.charismahouse.com.