Excerpts from 

 

Extreme Devotion

A few special messages from Voice of the Martyrs:

"If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.... If they persecuted Me they will persecute you... for they do not know the One who sent Me." John 15:19-21

On October 24, 1931, Amy Carmichael prayed, “God, please do with me whatever you want. Do anything that will help me to serve you better.” As a missionary to India and a mother to the many Indian children she had rescued from prostitution at pagan temples, Amy was accustomed to praying and trusting God for the outcome.

Later that same day, she fell, dislocating an ankle and breaking her leg. Because of complications, Amy was hopelessly crippled and spent most of the next twenty years confined to her room.
 

But Amy didn’t waste time brooding over her condition. She refocused her energies towards writing and encouraging the saints around the world. She sent thousands of letters from her bed, authored thirteen books, and wrote beautiful poetry.

        See NO SCAR?  and My Prayer

Amy became crippled, yet her wounds brought her closer to God. She walked in sweet fellowship with a Savior she had come to understand better because of her scar. People who have gone through a particular tragedy relate to one another and feel an instant bond. Those who come from a divorced family relate to each other in a way others cannot. The same is true of Christ. When we suffer, we begin to relate to Jesus on a whole different level. We feel he knows our hurts, and we somehow have a greater sense of his. What are your wounds teaching you about Jesus? Are you allowing them to draw you into a more intimate relationship?

 

"What happened?” asked the North Korean mother as her son walked through the front door with a look of shock.
     “I was with my friend today when two police officers stopped us. They knocked my friend down and accused him of being a Christian. My friend did not try to defend himself. Even with a gun pointed directly at him, his face remained peaceful.

     “He looked straight into my eyes and without speaking a word, I knew what he was saying. He wanted me to believe the same thing he did. And then he just said ‘Bless them.’ He was executed right in front of me because he was a Christian. I do not even know what a Christian is. I don’t understand any of this.

     After he shared his story, his mother held his head in her hands and simply said, “I understand.” She then began to share with him the truth about Christ her Savior. She taught her son about Jesus’ miraculous birth, and the opportunity for salvation that came through his death on a cross. Though it pained her that she had never dared to tell her son because she worried for his safety, she was thankful that God was giving them a second chance. “As those bullets hit your friend’s heart, God planted a seed of hope in yours.”

     Today this young man is active smuggling Bibles into North Korea and planting house churches.

 

The next testimony shows the deceptive use of children to accomplish Communist purposes is not unlike the strategies now used to train "politically correct" children in Western schools:  

 

“One day the teacher told us that we would play a special game. She whispered to us about a special book that our parents may have hidden in our homes. We were to wait until our parents went to sleep, search for this book, and secretly bring it to school the following day for a special surprise. I went home and immediately began searching for the book.
     “The next day I was one of fourteen children who brought the black book, a Bible, to class. We were awarded bright red scarves, and the other students clapped as the teacher paraded us around the room.

     “I ran home that afternoon because I was so excited to tell my mother how I had won the red scarf. She wasn’t in the house or the barn. I waited, but neither she nor my father came home, and I began to get scared. I was hungry and it was becoming dark. I began to feel sick inside, and I fell asleep in a chair.

     “The next day police officers came and informed me that I was now in the care of the government. I never saw my parents again.”
     An elderly woman from North Korea relayed this story. She never heard from her parents and is still struggling to find forgiveness. She is only one of many who have gone through such trials.

 

“You may destroy my body, but not my soul,” the brave Korean pastor responded to the invading Communist army of North Korea. “I will not put Marxist propaganda in my sermons. I know you have taken other pastors at night from their homes and tortured them for not obeying your orders, but I do not care what you do to my body.”
     The officer’s anger grew as Pastor Im spoke. Then he said with disgust, “If you do not care for yourself, then think of your family. They will be killed also.” Pastor Im hesitated. He expected to be hurt but had not considered his family. He knew the choice he must make. He calmly replied to the Communist officer, “I would rather have my wife and babies die by your gun, knowing that they and I stood faithful, than to betray my Lord and save them.”
     “Take him away,” the officer commanded. Pastor Im was kept in a dark prison cell for two years where he was not allowed to shave or change clothes. He kept up his courage by reciting a Bible verse that was precious to him. Every day from his small isolated cell, others could hear Pastor Im recite in a loving, calm voice John 13:7, where Jesus promised, “You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.”

Ann-marie, a young Slovak Christian, had been in prison for months because of her involvement with the underground church. She was regularly brought to a room where a guard would beat her in order to get information about other Christians in her church.
    By God’s grace she was able to resist. She even used these times to tell the guard about the love of Jesus. The guard mocked, “If you don’t tell me secrets of the underground church, I will beat out of you all your loves.”
    Annmarie responded, “I have a boyFriend, the sweetest of all. He is love. His love does not seek pleasure but seeks to fill others with joy. Since knowing this boyfriend, I, too, can only love. You love hatred now. I beg you to love Love.”
    The guard was so angry that he slapped her until she passed out. When she came to, she saw him sitting quietly as if in deep thought. Finally he asked, “Who is this boyfriend of yours?” Annmarie told him all about Jesus and why he came.
    When he asked how to make Jesus his friend too, she told him that he must repent and be baptized. “Then baptize me immediately or I will shoot you,” he demanded.
    Annmarie did baptize him, and he later became a prisoner with the very ones he used to beat.

"But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God." Acts 20:24

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