This week in persecuted church history (June 28-July 4)

Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.
Hebrews 13:7b (ESV)

June 28, 2006: A Muslim mob in the town of Izom in the Nigerian state of Niger overwhelms police and clubs an unidentified Christian woman to death for participating in street evangelism.

June 30, 1315: Lay missionary, mystic, and philosopher Ramon Lull, who was persuaded by a vision to seek the conversion of the Muslims, is reportedly stoned to death in Bougie, North Africa.

July 2, 1489: English reformer Thomas Cranmer is born at Aslockton, Nottinghamshire. The archbishop of Canterbury wrote the Book of Common Prayer and was burned at the stake in 1556.

June 30, 2003: Seventeen-year-old Nermine is kidnapped in front of the Isis Secondary School in Alexandria, Egypt. Shortly afterwards, her father, Samaan Sadek Stephanos, receives a phone call, saying that his daughter has been kidnapped and is being forced to change her religion to Islam. Her abductors then plan to have her married to a Muslim man.

July 1, 2005: Approximately seventy believers are arrested in Zhaolou Village, Henan Province, China during a baptism service.  Ten of them, including Pastor Wang Baode, are sentenced to fifteen days' detention.  The rest are released after paying fines of 300 RMB ($45 CDN) each.

July 3, 2004: The office of the National Christian Evangelical Alliance of Sri Lanka (NCEASL) was vandalized in what appeared to be a systematic search for records related to their campaign against proposed anti-conversion laws.

(sources: Christianity Today, The Voice of the Martyrs)

Prayer: “Grant that we, who now remember these before thee, may likewise so bear witness unto thee in this world, that we may receive with them the crown of glory that fadeth not away; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.” – taken from The Book of Common Prayer, Canada (1962)