It Wasn't A Murder Scene...It Was a Bible Study

As we always do on Monday, I like to share with you all an inspiring devotion taken from the best selling book Extreme Devotion.  My prayer is that reading this devotion will inspire you to pray for the persecuted church.

Local newspapers described the scene as “savage.” It wasn’t a murder scene or car wreck; it was a Bible study.

    The story appeared in a Communist Russian newspaper around 1960. It read in part, “Young boys and girls sing spiritual hymns. They receive the ritual baptism and keep the evil, treacherous teaching of love toward the enemy.” The story went on to disclose the shocking reality that many young people in the Communist Youth Organization were secretly Christians.
    “We must believe our Savior as the first Christians did,” Pastor Serebrennikov told his youth group. “For us, the principal law is the Bible. We recognize nothing else. We must hurry to save men from sin, especially the youth.”
    The pastor was thrown in prison when the Communists discovered a letter written by one of his converts. The teenage girl had written, “I send you blessings from our beloved Lord. How much he loves me!”
    Newspaper editorials wondered how Communist students could choose to follow Christ and accused the Communist school of being “powerless” and “deprived of light.” They said that Christianity could “snatch away its disciples from under the nose of their indifferent teachers.”
    It wasn’t the teachers’ indifference. It was the call of Christ’s love as presented by Pastor Serebrennikov and the members of his youth group—Christians who let their light shine in a darkened land.

“This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine . . .” This familiar childhood song has a simple melody with not too many words to remember—it can stick in one’s mind for days after it’s sung. Young children find the song easy to learn, but it’s much more difficult to live, especially as we get older. How many chances do we have in a day to let our lights shine and honor God? One or two? Ten? Twenty? The exact count doesn’t matter. What does matter is our response to the events we face everyday. Who knows? Your light may be just what others need to find their way home.

Source: Extreme Devotion - Buy a copy today at www.vombooks.com