Talk about Persecution

November 8 is the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church. It’s a needed reminder both that Christians continue to be persecuted (and martyred) for believing in Jesus—and that our students can do something about it. Prayer is action.

The Bible talks way more about persecution than we tend to. That’s because most of us in the West don’t see it happening in real time. Some of your students may have struggled to apply passages about suffering for Christ without ever having the opportunity to do so in such an obvious way.

But real persecution of believers is happening right now. According to Christian Freedom International, somewhere on the globe a Christian is martyred for his or her faith every five minutes. These are men, women and children killed simply for trusting in Christ for their salvation.

A group called Open Doors publishes a global map detailing where and to what extent Christians are being persecuted for their faith. Both groups offer downloadable PDFs and other tools to help Christians better understand, empathize with and pray for persecuted believers around the world.

Consider making some time to use these tools to talk with your students about the persecuted church—or better yet, ask a few of your students to research the persecuted church and report on their finding to your group—or better yet, ask them to report on their findings to another group in the church (e.g., an adult Sunday School class).

Let’s find a way to help our students personalize global persecution and pray for our siblings in Christ who are caught in it right now.