We Are All Nazarenes

With every martyr, ISIS dooms itself. The Muslim world will kneel to Messiah Jesus; the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.

Through the present persecutions we are becoming one.

That was the prayer of Jesus before his Passion, that we would be one and that the world would know by our love that God had sent him.

When ISIS/ISIL — now known as the so-called “Islamic State” or the “Caliphate” — overran the city of Mosul in Iraq, the terrrorists daubed the Arabic letter nûn, or “n,” on Christian homes  in blood-like red paint, as a sign to kill them or drive them out of the city.  Their property was confiscated for the Islamic State.

Immediately, Christians and supporters of Christians in the Mideast began to display the Arabic nûn on their clothes and as profile photos on social media, in solidarity with the persecuted.

The Arabic letter “N” in this case stands is for “Nazarene,” followers of Jesus of Nazareth.

Recently we held a solidiarity meeting with believers in Nazareth, Jesus’s home town, where Christians are free in the Jewish state to worship as they please. However, even in Nazareth, the Islamic menace is present with anti-Christian, anti-Trinity, anti-God’s Son oppression such as this sign posted next to the largest church  in the Middle East:

Our Lord is a Nazarene and solidarity with all “Nazarenes” worldwide is the global response to ISIS.

Although Jesus existed with the Father before the world was created, nevertheless, when he was incarnated as Redeemer, from then on, he became identified for time and eternity with the tribe of Judah, and God’s sovereign choice of a hometown, Nazareth. (However, due to providential circumstances, Jesus was born in the little town of Bethehem).

Jesus lived in Nazareth, so that the prophecy might be fulfilled: “He shall be called a Nazarene.” (Matthew 2:23) The famous Gospel quote, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” is because Nazareth was the back of beyond in Jesus’s day. Hailing from Nazareth was a sign of the Suffering Servant’s humility, and if we belong to him, the New Testament teaches that he is our head, and we are part of his mystical body. So in a real sense, Jesus’s Jewish family is our family, and his hometown is our hometown. All believers are Nazarenes. We have a very real affinity with Jesus of Nazareth.

ISIS continues to murder our fellow Nazarenes… and the West watches in stunned (?) silence.

In yet another sickening atrocity, the so-called Islamic State brutally murdered 30 Ethiopian Christians captured in Libya, and described their victims as “followers of the cross from the enemy Ethiopian Church.” These poor migrants couldn’t pay the Islamic tax, so they were murdered in cold blood for no other reason than they were Christians. In barbaric style, ISIS videotaped and bragged about the murders.  ISIS are masked cowards. A masked fighter in black brandished a pistol as hevowed to kill Christians if they do not convert.

On the same day the video of the murdered Ethiopian Christians was released, the despicable Boko Haram in Nigeria adopted ISIS’s goal to wipe out Christians worldwide. 

At a conference this past weekend convened by CitizenGO, appropriately named “We Are All Nazarenes,” Monsignor Doeme of Nigeria stated that when he became bishop, “I knew I had signed my death sentence.”

Now we must also support the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, to express our solidarity in this time of persecution and crisis.

It is true that God brings good out of Satan’s evil. Before all of the recent Islamic atrocities against the ancient churches in the Mideast, Christian communities around the world were fractured and divisive. 

But the hateful persecutions bring us together and force us to recognize our brothers and sisters in Christ!

Many wonder how they can help persecuted Christians?”

1. First of all, we must fast and pray, asking God to extend His mighty hand of protection over his people. We conduct the Every Friday Fast, to pray on the Muslim day of prayer that God will overcome the radicals in their mosques with his revelatory truth about Messiah Jesus and that they will see the light, that their hatred and bloodshed is inspired by Satan and not by the true God. To sign up for the Every Friday fast, click here. Pray that God will raise up a standard of prayer and flood ISIS with his power and stop them in their tracks. Pray for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit of God on the worst of the terrorists to confront them supernaturally and to change them, as the Lord confronted Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus. God knocked Saul off his horse and converted him into the Aposle Paul. He will do the same with these terrorists as we continue to pray.  Intercede continually for the outpouring of deams and visions upon the Muslim world, as documented in my book, “Miracles Among Muslims: the Jesus Visions.”

2. We must speak up and break the complicit and cowardly silence with which our countries are hiding this genocide of Christians.

Sign this petition to express your solidarity with our brothers the Ethiopian Christians:

Dear Patriarch Mathias, Archbishop Zekarias, and Archbishop Fanuel,

We are appalled by the barbaric murder of Ethiopian Christians by terrorists of the Islamic State. Our hearts ache with you, the families of the victims, and our Orthodox Christian brothers and sisters all over the world. Count on my support, my solidarity and prayer.

http://citizengo.org/en/21623-solidarity-ethiopian-christians-wearen2015

3. Economic support. Persecuted Christians are in an emergency situation. They are our brothers! We must not abandon them.

My son David Darg is vice-president of Operation Blessing which is supporting persecuted Christians in refugee camps. Operation Blessing for sure gives humanitarian aid to those Christians in need who are being persecuted by ISIS and Boko Haram. Jay Sekulow’s American Center for Law and Justice also helps in many ways to rescue persecuted Christians.

These Christians are risking everything. They deserve our prayers, fastings, solidarity and financial aid.