Missions
“In this world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world.”
Jesus Christ, John 16:33b,NKJV
Meet Darcie Gill. Over the last few years she has stared the truth of Jesus' words right in the eye, up close and personal. Cuba, Sudan, Columbia, Korea, China and many other countries are not friendly to Christians. As a representative of Voice of the Martyrs Gill has seen people who, because of their faith in Christ, live in extreme poverty and under almost unbearable persecution. Yet in those pressing circumstances these people who love and trust Him have "overcome the world".
Voice of the Martyrs is a ministry which focuses on helping the persecuted church in other nations. It was founded in 1971 by Richard Wurmbrand who was arrested and imprisoned for more than fourteen years in a Romanian prison camp for no other reason than that he boldly proclaimed the name of Jesus. After getting out of prison and going to Ontario,Canada, his
heart's cry became to make others aware of these courageous Christians who share the word of God, risking persecution for it every day. Gill and her husband, Tim, share the same heart cry.
Gill and her husband have been associated with VOM for the last ten years. They are not considered missionaries, but rather are representatives of VOM and the persecuted church to Christians here in America.
"So, that's what I do", Gill said, "I travel throughout the United States and I share the stories of the people I've been with or people that the ministry has met, because you won't hear about them on the evening news. I share their stories and I raise support and bring help back to them. I go into restricted nations to meet those people. Sometimes very dangerous areas."
According to The World Evangelical Alliance's written report presented to the United Nations Human Rights Commission last year, Christians are "the largest single group in the world which is being denied human rights on the basis of their faith." Most people have no idea of that fact.
Gill and the team she works with, visited Sudan in the midst of a violent civil war. The Muslim north apparently learned of the route they were traveling, tracked them and bombed the route.
"Looking back at my journal to that time was a real eye-opener." Gill said, "One of the things God laid on my heart before that trip was to memorize Psalm 91:3. We had just crossed the Blue Nile and came out on the other side when the big truck carrying supplies and aid had a flat tire. We all felt like we were under a spiritual attack. The enemy was trying to stop us from reaching our destination. Yet God kept bringing back Psalm 91:3 to me: 'I will deliver you from the snare of the fowler.'"
Because of that flat tire, they had to go back to base to get it repaired. After they reached their base, Russian Antonov 26s indiscriminately dropped clusters of bombs on the place they left their truck, as well as the village where they had been headed. God had sent them back to base with a flat tire, to insure their safety.
A literal flood of people, many of them Christians, fleeing the Muslims made their way to a place near the front named Juba. It was a place of great suffering. Women and children came there because their husbands were on the front lines. While there Gill and her team interviewed widows whose husbands had been killed by the Muslims, women who had been kidnapped by Muslim soldiers, and young women who were carrying the babies of Muslim soldiers who had raped them.
"I've never seen anything like it," said Gill. "You know how when you go to some places you can look around and see all the different colors? All I could see there was brown. Nothing but brown. The people were brown, their clothes were dust covered and brown (the ones who had clothes on), the earth was brown, everything was brown. There was no shelter. We slept outside.
An enclosure was made by bundling grass up and putting it around the borders. We slept on the ground in the center of it. We were surrounded by foxholes where men lay with their guns guarding us. The Muslims were only about four miles away."
"In another village we met a young girl who had scars all over her body. She shared with us how she was captured by Muslim soldiers when she was fourteen years old. They gave her an opportunity to convert to Islam. She told them again and again that she was a Christian. They raped her repeatedly. Then they heated their knives and began to torture her, and left her for dead. She lived," said Gill. This girl shared how she had been running from the Muslim soldiers with a group of people from her village. An Anglican man in that group shared the Gospel with her. She accepted the Lord and she was willing to die for Him. This girl had never seen a Bible, never been to a Youth Group meeting, yet the power of the gospel had changed her heart. What a remarkable young girl!
Columbia is one of the world's most violent nations and Medellin, its second largest city is the world's most violent city. Gill went to Bellavista Prison in Medellin. There she met people who were contract killers, para-military soldiers, and drug cartel members who had given their lives to Christ while they were in prison. Some of them when released made a commitment that they were going to show by their works that they indeed had experienced a new life in Christ. One man committed himself to help widows and orphans. He went to an area where many flee to escape the guerillas and drug cartel members. Many of them end up outside major cities or in the hill country in massive slums. This one man, an individual who was not a part of any organization raises money wherever he can and goes into these areas to feed the widows and the orphans.
Gill said, "He wanted us to come and see this place. As we prepared to go, we were advised it was a very dangerous area. We said, 'Every place we work is a dangerous area. That tends to be the way persecution works.' We prayed about it and decided we were supposed to go. We went with a driver into this area known as a Red Zone. At the time we had no idea what that meant. Later, we found out a Red Zone is a place so dangerous that the police and the military will not even go. We finally got to the top. However, on the way down there were many times a bus going in the opposite direction would meet us. We would have to get out and back up to get around them. When we got out of there is when we found out how really dangerous it was. We were told if someone is not from there you are either killed, robbed, or kidnapped and held for ransom. You don't go in there and come out. And yet we did. That was God's plan. We were able to get in there, take that man some money to help him to feed those widows and orphans. God can use one bold person willing to help in a place where it could cost him his life."
In Columbia, Gill also met a young pastor and his family who went up into a guerilla held area to pastor a church of eighteen people. Within a year, that church exploded into almost two hundred members. The guerillas were not happy. They came and as they made him watch, took his wife, raped her all day and night and did other horrible things to her. The young pastor sobbed his heart out as he shared, "They did awful things to her, man after man." They held a gun to his head, then to his wife's head pulling the trigger repeatedly. They mocked him, "You think your God can save you?" Tiring of their sport, they left the family tied in a room and went off for a while. A short time later one of the guerillas came back and said, "I want to know this God who keeps the bullets from coming out of the gun." This remarkable young pastor who had just witnessed the guerilla rape his wife, now prayed with him to receive Christ as his Savior. The pastor and his family were finally released and went back home. They later began receiving threats that their children were going to be kidnapped, so they left the area. Pray for their safety, at this time, their whereabouts are unknown.
China is a Communist nation and there are still faithful Communists there. However, the majority of the people are not. There are more Christians in China than there are Communists. The underground church has absolutely exploded. They are a thorn in the flesh to the Communist government of China. The underground church is illegal, but it continues to grow at an amazing rate. What the government wants is for them to be part of the "Three Self Patriot Movement" which is the government state sponsored church. In the "Three Self Patriot Movement" there are some true believers, but they have to make certain agreements such as what the pastor may or may not preach. He cannot preach about the return of Christ. He cannot preach that Jesus is the "only way" or that your allegiance must lie with Christ even above government. There are multitudes of scriptures that cannot be preached or taught in the government church. You cannot evangelize anyone under the age of eighteen, not even your own children. It is illegal to raise your children with an understanding of God or His word. All these people have to decide what's more important: their safety and financial stability or their obedience to scripture and their love for God. Many people that used to be part of the "Three Self Patriot Movement" say, "If you want to grow spiritually, you can't stay there, you just can't." They had to make their decision and they left.
God is now calling the Chinese church to a new movement named the Back to Jerusalem Movement. This movement is comprised of 100,000 missionaries to the world who have committed themselves to walk down the Silk Roads (One of the world's oldest and most historically important trade routes running between China and the Mediterranean Sea). Some will go to Buddhist lands, some to Hindu lands, and some to Muslim lands. One of the pastors involved in this movement said, "We've made a decision to write our testimony in our own blood." They are determined to reach the world, especially those lands that are hostile to the gospel. According to them one of the sweetest gifts they have been given is the persecution under the hands of the Chinese Communists.
The church in America has never experienced the type of persecution about which you have just read. Is that a blessing? The pastors in Cuba pray for the American church because they say it is harder to be a Christian in America than it is in Cuba. The Christians in China pray for the church in America that persecution will come. Why do the Christians that suffer persecution feel this way? Remember, the Chinese Christians consider the persecution they endure to be a sweet gift. Through the centuries, persecution has caused the church to flourish rather than to wane. Where persecution exists, the church is forced into a position to examine and then stand for what it truly believes. The cost of believing is so great those who are just playing games do not stick around. The church becomes stronger because those who stay are quite literally willing to lay down their lives for Christ and their fellow believers.
Many believers in America have never really had to decide if their faith in Christ is worth losing their lives for. Many find it hard living for Him so how will they die for Him if it comes to that. What? You don't think it will ever come to that. Think again. It is becoming increasingly unpopular to be a Christian in America. There is an outcry over any public observance or accommodation towards Christianity. Everything from Nativity scenes outside of city halls to the Ten Commandments hanging in county courthouses is forbidden. Graduates in high schools and universities have been forbidden to mention the name of Jesus in speeches to classmates. Teachers are fired for hanging copies of founding documents on their classroom walls because God is mentioned in them. Talk show hosts and news broadcasters had better think twice before saying anything that could be taken as condescending or deprecating about any group or type of people without losing their jobs, or at the very least being suspended, unless, of course, it is about Christians. Christians are fair game. How could this be in America, one nation under God?
Thirty or forty years ago no one would believe the intolerance towards Christians that exists here today. More than likely, it will get worse. How much worse? Only the Lord knows. Ask yourself this question: "Am I ready to stand?"
Gill said that being involved with the persecuted church has really changed her perspective on life and faith. It has helped her to see the true value of "things" in contrast to faith and love. It has caused her to ask herself, "What is a soul worth?" Seeing believers who were tortured and suffered the loss of everything turn to their persecutors and not only forgive them, but also pray with them to know Christ, has caused her to examine her own faith.
"The things that used to be so incredibly important to me have had a different light shed on them." Gill said, "I don't think it's wrong to have a nice home, a decent car, and all those things. I have them and I'm thankful for them. They make life easier, more comfortable. But, they're just things. I've been with people that have been burned out four or five times, who have lost everything they had. They have seen their wives raped, their husbands shot or mutilated, their children killed, yet, they haven't lost what's most important: their faith and trust in Jesus Christ.
If you would like Darcie Gill to come and share about the persecuted church with your organization, you can email her at: [email protected].
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