Monday, February 7, 2011

Standing with the Copts in Egypt

Love your enemies, and pray for those who utterly persecute you
This morning while showing the image to the right to a co-worker I explained how these Egyptian Christians were protecting the Muslims during one of their times of prayer. His response, like many other uninformed American Christians, was, "Now are these a sect or actual Christians?" I find it funny and rather ridiculous how most Americans just assume that Christianity in Europe, Africa, or Asia is automatically flawed because they don't have "5th Sunday Gospel Sings", and it looks all "old and stuff" because they don't have strobe lights and the preachers still wears robes.

Nonetheless, beyond enlightening him that these people received the faith centuries before it was carried over by Puritans and Jesuit missionaries to America (try 48 A.D. or so), I brought him up to speed on the civil unrest occurring in Cairo. As the Egyptian government is on the heels of transferring power I believe it's crucial for us whether we have 5th Sunday Gospel Sings or not to pray for our Egyptian brethren. Life as a Christian in the middle east in hard enough, and now it appears to becoming even tougher.

(photo courtesy of Nevine Zaki)
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1 comment:

  1. The Christian Conservative MomFebruary 23, 2011 at 11:19 PM

    I think people don't know whether "copts" are Christians or not because they don't understand the word Copt. When I think Christian, I don't think "baptist Christian" or "Assembly of God Christian". I feel like adding those words cheapens the true meaning of Christian, by making it more about they TYPE of Christian. I too was puzzled by whether a Coptic Christian was a follower of Christ or some weird break off of Christianity so I looked it up as soon as they stated talking about it on the news. I was also wondering about them because some coptic lady was saying that she supported the Muslim Brotherhood and that seemed odd to me considering the MB would outlaw Christianity under Sharia Law.

    As for Christianity in other countries-especially in the Middle East, Asia, and Parts of Africa-I actually think their Christianity is far superior to ours. Why? B/c your life is on the line for your faith. And you aren't doing it for the frills that come with modern worship in America. They don't do it for the fancy buildings or programs-they follow Christ b/c they truly understand what it means to pick up their cross and follow him at all costs.
    When this country gets to the point of Christian persecution-then we will finally see who was really sold out to Jesus and who is just along for the ride. Sadly, even children in Egypt, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, etc-they understand even as children-the cost of following Christ.

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