As promised...the photos of the Womens' World Day of Prayer 2014

The empty tomb

Discussing the eyewitness testimony at the Empty Tomb

Question: Why does the Bible say that Mary Magdalene and another Mary discovered the empty tomb, while another Gospel says that only Mary did, while another says that Simon joined them? This to me seems like inaccuracies in the Bible.

Lee’s answer: It’s important to clarify between a biblical inaccuracy (what others often call a contradiction) and what a Gospel writer simply chose to include or emphasize in his account. A contradiction is to affirm and deny the same thing, at the same time, in the same respect. A contradiction regarding the eyewitness testimony cited would be, for instance, that “only Mary Magdalene went to the empty tomb” – something no Gospel writers say – and “Mary and the other Mary” (Matthew 28:1) went to the empty tomb.

To shed a bit more light on the biblical passage you cited, John mentions only Mary Magdalene explicitly at the tomb in his Gospel (John 20:1). But if we read carefully we see in the next verse (20:2) that Mary tells Peter, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb but we don’t know where they have put him!” This supports the other Gospels when they say that other women went to the tomb with Mary, perhaps following closely behind. As the NIV Study Bible says, the we “indicates that there were others with Mary (see Matthew 28:1, Mark 16:1,Luke 24:10) though John does not identify them.” So when John wrote his Gospel, he only mentions one woman by name but uses the plural pronoun “we” to indicate that others were with her.

Further, if the Gospel writers, two of whom were among the Twelve disciples of Jesus, wanted to fabricate a story about the resurrected Christ, it is unthinkable that they would have put women at the tomb first. It is well established that a woman’s testimony in the ancient world was generally not considered to be credible and that they were for the most part not allowed to testify in a court of law. 

See, for instance, Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics, by William Lane Craig.

This essay was written by Lee Strobel and originally appeared in his Investigating Faith newsletter about faith.
Source

Women's world day of prayer..

Today the women's world day of prayer is prepared by Christian women of Egypt. In the Mid-trent team, we will celebrate it in Stowe-by-Chartley. Egypt is one of the oldest civilisations in the world and it was populated soon after the flood by Mizraim, grandson of Noah. His name gives the Arabic for Egypt, Misr.

The literacy rate in 2010 was 72% 80% for males but only 63% for females. Many rural adolescent girls are discouraged from completing school, facing lives of early marriage, illiteracy and domestic abuse.The church in Egypt is doing all it can to counteract this. 

International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that at least eight Egyptian Christians from the Minya province have been abducted since January 25, 2014. The abductions, thought to be carried out by members of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), are just a handful among the hundreds of similar cases in the last few years.
On January 25, a “Muslim mob” abducted a 17-year-old Christian boy named Marcos Zakaria, Ezzat Ibrahim, the director of the World Center for Human Rights in Minya and Assiut, told ICC. Zakaria lived in Upper Egypt in Dier Mawas city in Minya province and is a student in his final year of secondary school. The kidnappers“contacted his family demanding a ransom of million Egyptian pounds for his return,”said Ibrahim.

To find out more, click on the link above (International Christian Concern).

Please join us tonight in prayers so that the persecution of our Christian brothers, sisters and leaders stop.

The Degradation of Christian Women under Islam

The Degradation of Christian Women under Islam
Muslim Persecution of Christians: June, 2013

by Raymond Ibrahim at the Gatestone Institute

A church in the Syrian village of al-Duwayr, after an attack by Islamist militiamen. (Image credit: Syria Report)

Meanwhile, in Egypt, U.S. ambassador Anne Patterson was urging Christian Copts not to protest Muslim Brotherhood rule, even though they would suffer under it most. According to Al Azhar, the world's oldest Islamic university, Islam is a religion of peace.

The degradation of Christian women living in the Islamic world continued in the month of June. In Syria, after the al-Qaeda linked rebel group conquered Qusair, a city of the governate of Homs, 15-year-old Mariam was kidnapped, repeatedly gang raped according to a fatwa legitimizing the rape of non-Sunni women by any Muslim waging jihad against Syria's government, and then executed.

According to Agenzia Fides, "The commander of the battalion 'Jabhat al-Nusra' in Qusair took Mariam, married and raped her. Then he repudiated her. The next day the young woman was forced to marry another Islamic militant. He also raped her and then repudiated her. The same trend was repeated for 15 days, and Mariam was raped by 15 different men. This psychologically destabilized her and made her insane. Mariam became mentally unstable and was eventually killed."

In Pakistan, Muslim men stormed the home of three Christian women, beat them, stripped them naked and tortured them, and then paraded them in the nude in a village in the Kasur district. Days earlier, it seems the goats of the Christian family had accidentally trespassed onto Muslim land; Muslims sought to make an example of the Christian family, who, as third-class citizens, must know their place at all times.

Iraq: During the middle of the night, armed men attacked St. Mary's Assyrian Catholic Church in Baghdad; they wounded two Christian guards, one seriously. Later the same day, bombs were set off at two Christian-owned businesses, both near the church; they killed one Christian shop owner, a parishioner at St. Mary's. Since the U.S. "liberation" of Iraq in 2003, 73 churches have been attacked or bombed, and more than half of the country's Christian population has either fled or been killed.
Continue reading, click here
Father, we thank you that we have the freedom of faith and worship in our countries. We ask you in the name of Jesus-Christ our Saviour and King to stop those conflicts, to give wisdom to the leaders of those countries, to strengthen all our Christian brothers and sisters who live in such countries where those atrocities prevail, to help them rebuild their lives and guide us to do our utmost in our lives to spread your message of love, forgiveness and peace. May your will be done in Jesus'name. Amen

Pick of the week: Woman wakes from coma, finds out she’s 12 weeks pregnant

Photo credit: Newsy/ITV

A woman awoke from a coma after a horrific crash to find that she was four months pregnant.
Last September, Gemma Holmes was on her moped in Hilperton, England when she crashed into a parked car. Holmes suffered severe head injuries and a broken back. When she arrived to the hospital doctors did not think the 26-year-old would make it.
About three months after the crash Holmes awoke from the coma and was told she was four months pregnant. Holmes suffered amnesia as a result of the accident and she could not remember what had happened going back several years including who the father might be. "I was just in shock," she said of hearing the surprising news.
Doctors advised her that keeping the baby could pose a risk to her health and that the surgery she required to fix her broken back could to be done while she was pregnant. Doctors apparently suggested terminating the pregnancy while Holmes was still unconscious, but her mother, Julie, wanted to wait for her daughter to wake up before making any decisions. Gemma decided that she would carry pregnancy to term, according to the Wiltshire Times "I just thought that if this little baby inside me had managed to survive the awful crash, then he was meant to be," she told ITV.
In May, she gave birth to a healthy baby boy named Rueben Miracle Holmes via cesarean section.
"I couldn't stop crying when they first showed him to me, because he is my little miracle baby. I was just so happy to see him after everything we've been through," she told SWNS.com.
Holmes is preparing for surgery that will correct her back and hopefully lean to walk again.
"Rueben is the best thing to ever happen to me. I may not remember how he came to me but I've got the rest of our lives to make up for that," Holmes told Reveal.co.uk in May.

I found this story wonderful, Gemma was so brave to take the decision to go ahead with the pregnancy, It is also said that she suffered excruciating pain, since she was unable to take the usual high doses of painkillers. as these might have harmed her baby.  Doctors told Gemma that she couldn’t have a natural birth because it would likely cause her death. Her broken back would not be able to cope with the contractions.
But Gemma’s pain and sacrifice paid off when in May she met Ruben Miracle Holmes for the first time, delivered by caesarian section.
To read more, click here!  

All of you is more than enough

Tonight  I 've discovered one singer called Misty Edwards (my previous post)  and a band Barlow Girl I did not know while I was browsing my friends' blogs and  I am so grateful they mentioned them. I had to search for Barlow girl and here they are: an  American Christian rock–CCM all-female band from Chicago, Illinois. The band was composed of sisters Alyssa (lead vocals, bass, keyboard), Rebecca (backing vocals, guitar), and Lauren Barlow (co-lead vocals, drums). The band has won several awards in their genre; their song "Never Alone" was the longest-running No. 1 song in 2004 on Radio and Records Christian Hit Radio (CHR) and Christian Rock charts, and was the "Song of the Year" on both charts. BarlowGirl became the best selling new Christian artist of 2004.

I chose Enough as the lyrics mean a lot to me.

All of You is more than enough for
All of me for every thirst and every need
You satisfy me with Your love
And all I have in You
Is more than enough

You are my supply
My breath of life
Still more awesome than I know
You are my reward
Worth living for
Still more awesome than I know

Cuz All of you is more than enough for all of me
for every thirst and every need
you satisfy me with your love
and all I have in you is more than enough

You're my sacrifice of greatest price
Still more awesome than I know
You're my coming King You're everything
Still more awesome than I know

All of you is more than enough for all of me
for every thirst and every need
you satisfy me with your love
and all I have in you

All of you is more than enough for all of me
for every thirst and every need
you satisfy me with your love
and all I have in you is more than enough

Your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me
your enough, your enough, your enough for me

Have a blessed evening and may the Lord bless you in abundance and wrap his love round you. N.

On the road to Emmaus

Of all the accounts made by  the different witness who met Jesus after he resurrected, this passage is my favorite. Both Mark and Luke mention this emotional scene. 

Luke 24:13 Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem.14 They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. 15 As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16 but they were kept from recognizing him.

17 He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”
They stood still, their faces downcast. 18 One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”
19 “What things?” he asked. “About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. 20 The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; 21 but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. 22 In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning 23 but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. 24 Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”
25 He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?”27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.
28 As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. 29 But they urged him strongly, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.
30 When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him,and he disappeared from their sight. 32 They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?” 33 They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together 34 and saying, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” 35 Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread.

If you are interested to have this passage reenacted for a school assembly or a youth club, you can download an excellent script on Nige's Christian drama. Have a blessed day, your sister in Christ. N.

I hated life and wanted to die...

Mercy Ministries Awareness DVD from Mercy Ministries on Vimeo.


We exist to provide opportunities for young women to experience God's unconditional love, forgiveness and life transforming power in partnership with their local church.

Mercy Ministries is a national charity dedicated to providing a six-month residential Christian discipleship programme for young women suffering from life controlling issues, such as eating disorders, self-harm, depression, and the effects of abuse in all its forms.

Read more, click here