Pray for those in violent relationships

We know her. She goes to our church or cell group with a big smile on her face. She lifts her hands up in the sky and worship our Lord Jesus together with us every Sunday morning. She seems to have a perfect life, and she might even be a minister of the gospel, but still there is something which isn’t all right. She is being beaten up by her husband. This is an issue which is very common but still hidden and almost forgotten. Many women live under physical abuse or control in their relationships, and they don’t know how to get out of it. I was looking around on the Internet and found some stories by women who are being abused by their Christian husbands. Listen to their stories and remember to stand in the gap, intercede and pray for these vulnerable, but so precious women.

“Dear Sir, my husband is a leader in a popular church in the Bahamas. We have been married for more than fifteen years and for the past five years he has become very abusive. He was first emotionally abusive, then physically abusive after he was chosen to serve in an outstanding church position. The church members do not believe that he is abusive because he is so “nice” and popular. The members often make me feel that I am the problem. Why do Christian men abuse their wives? Need help. “

“He began attending church and became a wonderful christian, joined the worship team and everything, He seemed to love the Lord and everything about Church. About 5 yrs ago I got laid off from a job and spent 6 months unemployed,(something he could not control) that is when the abuse began again and has been happening ever since, getting worse actually. The really scarry part is he still goes to church every sunday, reads his bible each day (studies it) but seems to not even get it. “

“Here is a real shocker for you all. Iam a very conserveitive Christian women. To most people my husband and I are looked at as legicalist and redicals. We have strong Bapsit beliefs. My husband is verbaly abusive. He puts me down, naggs me etc. He puts his fists in my face when he is angery at me. He uses subbmission in the bible as meaning you obey me. Not for the true meaning of submission really is. He wants to not seek help. Iam seeking help. Iam currently praying for God’s will if I should leave him. We have three little children so this makes it realy hard. I don’t think I could put up with 12 or 30 years of this. He has been this way for the last couple years or I have only come to realize how he treats me. We have been married 61/2 years. He acts a differant way in publci than he does at home. Also I want to a pastor and his wife about this and I was looked at as the one in fault and the pastor told my husband to hit me. How can you call yourself a godly man when your tell others to hit their wifes? I feel only by God’s great love and protection upon me is why I have not been physical abused. I pray that the Lord will lead us into the right dircetion. “

My heart breaks for these precious ladies, and we need to pray for, and help them.

Are you, or a friend of yours stuck in a violent relationship? Don’t be afraid to ask for help, because the problem is not you. Check out http://www.womenslaw.org/ to know your rights and to be encouraged to receive or give help. If you have a friend in this situation, don’t give up on her until she is totally free. Ask a pastor to contact her, and support her with your prayers and friendship.

Those who endures are like Mount Zion

I heard Joyce Meyer recently mentioning a picture about driving a car. When you change the gear there is always a few seconds when it feels like the car is slowing down or even going backwards. It is just for a very short time, and then the car speeds up again to an even higher level. That is how it can be in our life’s sometimes.

We think that we are good Christians, living fully and wholeheartedly for God, we have reached our heights and there is just glory in our life’s. Suddenly we find ourselves doing something we thought we would never do, or we feel that our prayer life has just become very dry, and we think that we have lost the glory of God.

The fact is that these periods only last for a short period of time, just like the gear in the car, but we think it will last forever, therefore many people give up just before they get their miracle.

What is important to understand is that God is using those times for a purpose. You are in a shifting period in your life, and the little tiny step backwards that you are experiencing will only last for a very short time, and then you will begin to speed up again to an even higher level!

It is often in our hardest challenges and the driest desert that we get to know God the best. If we endure through it and exercise our spiritual muscles we will come out stronger on the other side.
It was not at all fun for me to go through the testing time which I had some time ago. It was horrible and I felt it was gonna last forever. But I thank God that I went through, survived and endured the challenges this early, and not later on in life.

I think that if we really hold on to God when He is the only thing we have, then we will see Him move in such a greater and mightier way when we are through it all! But if we don’t understand why we are going through the testing times we risk to fall or give up. Too many Christians have just given up before the breakthrough which was just around the corner…

Psalm 125:1

Those who trust in the LORD are like Mount Zion, which cannot be shaken but endures forever.

Not only in Church

I want to encourage everyone reading this to let your gifts flow in your daily life and be open to what God wants us to do, not only in the church or your cell group but also wherever you go. Jesus used his gifts wherever he went, and he never said no to people.

Yesterday night when I was about to go to work and waited at the bus stop, I noticed a young homeless man, maybe around 25 years of age. He was speaking to another guy who sat down at the bench, and kept announcing how miserable he was. He was drunk and spoke very loud so that everyone around could hear him. He had nowhere to stay and he couldn’t even find food a normal Sunday evening.

When I heard him I felt the still voice of the Lord asking me to share a word with this man. I asked the Lord: “What do I say?” and He answered me: “Tell him that I have not forgotten him, and that I am with him, and everything will be alright”.  “I cannot say that” I thought, because I had experienced before how people get angry before you even mention the name of Jesus and repudiate it as nonsense. People want concrete help, they don’t like to hear about the Savior who loves them, when it’s -20 degrees and they don’t even know where to spend the night. I didn’t even have any money to give to him.

So I sat there and struggled with the Lord for some time. My bus was soon about to go, when I suddenly heard the man mention something about God, and then I understood that this must be the Lord’s sign that I should not be afraid to obey him, and I also understood that if I’m not obeying now, I’m never gonna get any further than this in my life. I took a step towards the young man, and told him gently that I had a word from God. He took my hand and asked “Are you a Christian?”, I said yes. I gave him the word and his staring drunk eyes became soft, he was evidently touched and let me know that God had told him exactly the same thing before, in another place.

One little word, and one step in faith, can mean something to another person that you never thought of. I had to leave for the bus, but I knew that he had been encouraged and refreshed in his hope, that God will never leave him, nor forsake him.

Blessings

Christmastime

Im not that much of a frequent blogger, but now I finally realized it’s time to add a new post. After all, I have gone throught both christmas and new year without saying anything in this part of the cyberspace.

If I take the christmas, because that’s when most of the things happened.
Me and my friends were arranging together with pastor Janne, one of the pastors in our church, a special christmas party for the refugees in our city. Even though the time of preparation was a challenge, it was such a joy to do it, and a greater joy on the Christmas evening itself! 250 people showed up and we had an awesome evening together with a lot of food and music.

Many many nations were represented there, and among them some Palestinians! It was a joy to be together with them all. I realised how blessed we all are to have each other, and what a grace it is to be able to serve the most most needy people. I just posted some of the pictures under, which I have borrowed from a brother. Take a look.

People enjoying the food

A big smile of mine

A lot of children gathered at the front

Three different languages were spoken; swedish, farsi and english

Kurdish dance at the end. People really enjoyed!

Me and the church-fathers

 

This is how I spend my time right now. “Eastern theology after 1453″ is one part of the course I’m taking. I just prepared this “study-evening” with my favorite brownies, so I can stay focused! My advise to you is never to study without tea and chocolate

 

Be blessed!!

Reasons to praise God

Unthankfulness is having it’s place in our lives way too much. It makes us having a difficult relation to life. Gods will for you is to enjoy your everyday walk with him, but while holding on to unthankfulness you will never see that come to pass.

1 thess 5:18
Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

Thankfulness brings us in line with the will of God for your life. We don’t have much that we can give to God, but one thing we actually can give is our thankfulness. By giving him our thanks we get a sound focus and a thinking in the right direction. It will open up for many blessings to be released over our life’s according to Gods will.

What happens when we let unthankfulness abide in us?

Rom 1:21
For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Unthankfulness causes blindness to take over our hearts. Blindness is not to stop seeing, but it’s to see other things than God wants us to see. We get a wrong perspective of ourselves, God, and other people. We will have wrong understanding of life and become unhappy.

One unthankful person can never enjoy life. We can be rich in material things, cars, money, even friends, but if we are not thankful we are the poorest people on the earth.

 

Some people complain that the devil has sent so high electricity bills. But a revealing truth is that the devil has not used the electricity in your home. You need to thank God for that bill. Think about all the good things you could use it for. And think about all those people on the earth that can’t even receive a bill because they don’t even have a home to stay in. Praise God for your bills!

Some people complain that they have too much to study while others around the world barely survive because they never had a chance to go to school. Praise God for being busy with studies!

Some complain that they have to get up of the bed too early in the morning. Even that is something you can praise God for, because that means you have a job to go to in the morning! It also tells me that you have a warm bed in your home. Others have to sleep on the street because they have no bed at all. Praise God for the few hours of sleep you got in a warm bed!

 

Maybe your husband is just sitting in front of the television all day, but you should praise God for him! That he has patience enough to be your husband

Praise God for life! Maybe it could have been better, but it could also be worse. At least you live, and that alone is worth praising God for.

 

Im sure there is much more to praise God for, and if we open our eyes to if, (maybe it sounds like a slogan, but) our life’s will be changed!!

Listen to the soft voice, in faith

A thought just hit me, that when we have experiences in this world which teaches us something about the kingdom of God, they are not only for ourselves, but they are for others! We should never withhold the blessings to people, and therefore I want to tell you just a small testimony of what God did one day in my life.

I was a bibleschoolstudent in my precious wonderful homechurch in this city, and was flooded by faith-teaching and encouragement, and it was just natural for me to be in that “faith-atmosphere”.
Suddenly one day as I and a friend were on a shopping tour in the center to find a pair of glasses for me (I had gotten bad sight) and my bike disappeared, somebody stole it from the place where we parked it. It wasn’t a very precious or expensive bike (actually I had received it for free) but for me it was very valuable since it was my only means of transportation at that time. It was the time before cars even existed…
So at first came my “how-could-it-happen-attack” and then the precious “If-I-only-had-done this-attack”. And that is the way in which we most times react when something unexpected happens. But I realized that attitude wasn’t gonna help me so I did what should be our first reaction always; I prayed to the Lord!…. And then I reported it to the police.

The very next day as I’m biking on a borrowed bike towards my apartment I hear a small still voice of the Holy Spirit speaking inside of me saying “take the way through this school, and you will find your bike“.
We need to take the soft voice of the Lord seriously always. If we are ever gonna get to know him closer and recognize his voice we need to dare to believe, and step out in faith. I did, and I’m excited to tell you what happened!

This is not a big deal, I mean a bike with no financial worth at all! But the very issue in itself, that the Lord cares about the even smallest things, is worth mentioning. That is the least we can do in return is to exalt him, giving thanks and to declare before people that he is a good God.

When I took the road through that school I turned my eyes towards a certain spot, and there it was! My bike! The police came and released my bike, and I went home in total spiritual victory!!

We should never forget to believe God for small things! When the enemy attacks us remember to; Submit under God, stand against the devil, and he will flee from you!!!

Blessings and love

Trust

Hi there!
Do you know how it feels when you have done something wrong towards a friend (all of us have, right?) and the trust between you and that friend has been damaged or broken?
It hurts to know that someone has hard time to trust you…
How then do you think it feels for God when he is looking upon our unbelief? To doubt means not to trust in God, and it hurts in him too. Jesus clearly expresses his feelings in Matt 17:17

“O unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.”

God wants you to trust in him!

Swedes playing chess in the space

We are proud to present our own Christer Fuglesang who is a swedish guy in the space He is working a lot, but has even time to play chess against the readers of the swedish newspaper “Dagens Nyheter”…
Good luck.

Even more powerful music

This song draws such an attention to God and his holiness! When I listened to it the first time Gods presence just filled my room, and made me think of his greatness and beauty! It is true that he is so much more than we can comprehend or understand with our mind. God is not to be understood with the mind! He is to be loved, adored and we should have fellowship with him in the spirit, not in the mind. Just listen to the song and love him!