Pray for the Persecutors 

I was honored to sit next to Vice President Mike Pence in the White House with a small group of religious freedom leaders on August 5th.

We handed a 'prisoners of conscience' and a 'top persecutors' list to the VP and asked him to help advocate for the freedom of those on the former list and sanction those on the latter, according to current U.S. laws.

To me, this is part of the biblical mandate of “remembering.” We are familiar with Hebrews 13:3 “Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.”

As ONE body of Christ, we are reminded to remember the persecuted body. But often, I’ve found Chris-tians are less inclined to remember the persecutors. Why? Aren’t we supposed to forgive, forget, and love our enemies? Surely. But before we love our enemies, we are supposed to know who they are.

Before we forgive spiritually, evildoers like those responsible for sending millions to concentration camps in western China still need to be held accountable by the law. In the Bible we see records of those who suffer and the names of persecutors, such as King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon, the Egyptian pharaohs and Pilate.

So this month, besides prayers for our persecuted brothers and sisters in China such as Pastor John Cao and lawyer Gao Zhisheng, I would like to encourage y’all to pray for China’s persecutors, particularly for President Xi Jinping and Party Secretary Chen Quanguo of Xinjiang.

Pray that God’s common grace can restrain them from doing further evil and that their lives can be enlightened by our awesome Creator.

"Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people he chose for his inheritance.” (Psalm 33:12)

A little state secret: I actually noticed the first part of Psalms 33:12 is imprinted at the inner edge of the mug that Vice President Pence uses.