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'Advent' is derived from the Latin word adventus, which is a translation of the Greek word parousia which means 'coming'.
ADVENT IN ALGERIA: PERSECUTION, PROTESTS AND PROMISE
plus Urgent Update on Burkina Faso
By Elizabeth Kendal
'Something is happening,' writes researcher David Garrison, 'something unprecedented. A wind [the Holy Spirit] is blowing through the House of Islam.' [A Wind in the House of Islam, by David Garrison (WIGTake Resources, Monument, CO, USA, 2014) p18.] Indeed, as Garrison notes, more Muslims have chosen to follow Christ in the past two to three decades than in all previous 1400 years of Muslim-Christian interaction. God is doing something new!
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Algeria's Kabylie region |
In February 2006 the Algerian government passed President Bouteflika's Charter for Peace and National Reconciliation, which saw more than 10,000 Islamic jihadists imprisoned during Algeria's civil war granted amnesty in exchange for peace. Weeks later, in March 2006, the government enacted Presidential Order 06/03 which 'fixed the conditions and rules for the exercise of religious worship other than Muslim'. Not only did Ordinance 06/03 increase the penalties for 'proselytising', it mandated that all churches had to be registered to be legal. Presumably one of the jihadists' conditions for peace was that the government act to halt the growth of Christianity. [For more details see Religious Liberty Monitoring, 24 March 2006].
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Pastor Salah Challah, the President of the Protestant Church of Algeria (EPA) and senior pastor of the Full Gospel Church of Tizi Ouzou, leads prayer on the staircase outside the locked church. (SAT-7, 4 Nov 2019) |
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Algerian woman raises a placard, 'No to the military regime,' at protest in Algiers, Friday 10 May 2019. (AFP) |
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Civil rights lawyer and head of the 'Union for Change and Progress' party Zoubida Assoul brandishes a 'No to the Vote' placard at protest in Algiers, Friday 22 November 2019 (AFP Photo/RYAD KRAMDI) |
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'[They] can seal our churches but not our hearts.' Come Lord Jesus! (SAT-7, 4 Nov 2019) |
PLEASE PRAY THAT OUR ALMIGHTY GOD WILL
* pour out his Holy Spirit on Algeria's growing Church, so that wisdom, courage, grace and unity will abound despite escalating repression and social turmoil; may the Lord give all pastors, evangelists and Christian leaders great wisdom as they navigate these difficult days. 'My grace is sufficient for you ...' (the promise of 2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
* bless Algerian families with awakening, insight and revelation so that they come to know, love and follow Jesus Christ. (Genesis 12:3)
* bless and supply the needs of Arab-language Gospel ministry, multiplying and magnifying its witness. 'And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus (the promised of Philippians 4:19 ESV).
* redeem the turmoil in Algerian society to bring about awakening this Advent season as Christians, churches and various Gospel ministries testify to the birth of the Saviour, Christ the Lord. (Luke 2:1-14).
SUMMARY FOR BULLETINS UNABLE TO RUN THE WHOLE ARTICLE
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ADVENT IN ALGERIA: PERSECUTION, PROTESTS AND PROMISE
Algerians were supposed to go to the polls in April, but protests erupted after the ruling military-backed regime announced that President Bouteflika (82 and disabled by stroke) would run for a fifth term. Bouteflika resigned, but the protests continued with the protesters insisting the entire corrupt military regime (in power since 1962) be dismantled. Though scheduled to go ahead on 12 December, the polls will be boycotted by people demanding systemic change. The regime has spent the last two years escalating its persecution of Protestant Christianity, presumably to establish its Islamic credentials and appease the Islamists ahead of the elections. Not to be deterred, the Spirit of God is on the move, 'blowing through the House of Islam' and building his Algerian Church. Please pray for Algeria and her Church.
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URGENT UPDATE: CHURCH MASSACRE IN EASTERN BURKINA FASO
On Sunday 1 December unidentified gunmen stormed a Protestant church worship service in the village of Hantoukoura near the border with Niger in Burkina Faso's volatile Eastern region. They targeted the men, killing 14 of the 15 men present in a congregation of 80 mostly women and children. Most of eastern Burkina Faso has fallen under the control of armed Islamic groups; as in Central African Republic, they fight each other for control of mineral resources, in particular, gold. Schools are closed; in some places armed groups enforce strict Islamic observance. Churches in the north were targeted in the months after Easter, but this is the first attack to target the Church in Eastern Province. Please pray for the Church in Burkina Faso.
[For more on the crisis looming over Burkina Faso, see Religious Liberty Monitoring, 23 May 2019.]
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Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate. She serves as Director of Advocacy at Canberra-based Christian Faith and Freedom (CFF) and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.
She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).
See www.ElizabethKendal.com