Greetings to all,
I have included three postings below:
· Post-Election Prayer Points from Sandy Grady via Chuck Pierce
· At the Mall, Mixing Popcorn and Religion from the Washington Post
· November 21 Elections in Ukraine from Pastors Yuri and Olga Sabinin
Although the Post-Election Prayer Points are focused on the US election, please pray the same for governmental officials in your area of the world. Please also pray for the election in the Ukraine that will be held Nov. 21. Pastors Yuri and Olga Sabinin state: “We are sure about the calling of the Ukraine to become a spiritual breadbasket for the nations of the former Soviet Union and beyond as it used to be in the natural.” This is an important election for them as they seek to fulfill their destiny as a nation.
The article from the Washington Post gives more understanding of how the Islamic infiltrate society.
Blessings,
Dana Millar
PS I pray that everyone will have a happy, safe, and blessed Thanksgiving in the US. For all, I pray for protection and that your thankfulness of God’s mercy and grace will rise to a new level.
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I have been preaching that it is time for our “further request” to be made to the Lord. We pressed through in seeing our nation take its stand for righteousness. However, we cannot let up now. Read Esther 9 and then pray through these 10 prayer points that were sent to us from Sandy Grady, our USSPN Coordinator in Washington DC.
Blessings,
Chuck D. Pierce
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POST-ELECTION PRAYER POINTS
Your faithful prayers have brought about a tremendous victory in Godly representation for our nation. The prayers were focused on the elections and for a strong citizen turnout that would vote for those candidates and issues representing God’s justice and righteousness. Now we have moved into phase two. A great spiritual battle has been won, but it is only one of a series of battles necessary to overcome and then to maintain the ultimate goal of seeing all the branches of government have a continued majority representation of those leaders who will seek and follow the will and Word of God. Here are a few of the prayer requests expressed by those involved in the governmental arena:
1. Pray for healing between individuals and groups within the different political parties. Pray for the spirit of hate and anger to be removed and replaced by God’s forgiveness and love. (Psalm 133)
2. Pray for our President to have wisdom and knowledge concerning policy and appointments. (Isaiah 9:7)
3. Pray for the committee chairmen appointments that are to be made by the senate—especially the judicial chairman to be made in early January. (Deut. 16: 19-20)
4. Pray for the hiring and repositioning of staffers at all levels. Pray for those with the mind, attitude, and actions of Christ to be hired. (Proverbs 11:14)
5. Pray for the perseverance of Christians to effectively influence the government for righteous judges to be approved and seated. (Galatians 6:9)
6. Pray for the salvation of the media and for truth and fairness in reporting to prevail. (Proverbs 4:23-25)
7. Pray for Biblical stands and policy concerning Israel and the Middle East from our government. (Psalm 122:6-9)
8. Pray for continued appropriate decisions and actions concerning our armed forces abroad and homeland security. Pray for more intercession and encouragement from our citizens for our troops. (Psalm 121:5-8)
9. Pray for issues such as stem-cell research, abortion, and marriage to be righteously resolved. Pray for aggressive winning strategies on behalf of the states seeking to take a Biblical stand. (Psalm 89:14-18)
10. Pray for those citizens and leaders who voted against right moral values to know and embrace the Truth. (John 8:32)
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At the Mall,
Mixing Popcorn and Religion
By Jose
Antonio Vargas
"On
the third floor?" asks a woman in stonewashed jeans with an off-white
hajib on her head, holding her daughter's arm. She's standing on the
first floor of Ballston Common Mall in
Arlington, in view of a towering Christmas tree.
"Yes,
in Theater 12," answers a man in a fitted gray suit, pointing to the
escalator.
They
nod.
Up they
go. Past the Tropik Sun, the Radio Shack, the T-Mobile kiosk, families
rush to their seats in the Regal theater, bags of popcorn and sodas in
hand. It's Eid al-Fitr (pronounced EED-al-FITTER) -- the Festival of
Fast-Breaking, marking the end of the month-long Ramadan -- and, for the
first time, a very exciting time, a very important time, there's a film
to help celebrate it.
"Muhammad: The Last Prophet" -- a lush, solemn, 90-minute animated film
directed by Disney veteran Richard Rich ("The Fox and the Hound" and
"The Black Cauldron") -- made its U.S. debut yesterday, showing in about
40 cities in 86 theaters nationwide, four of them in Northern Virginia.
The English-language film has been released in a handful of countries,
including
Lebanon, Jordan, Malaysia and Turkey, with subtitles. But 9/11 came, and
the $10 million film -- produced by Badr International and financed by
Saudi investors -- was shelved in the United States.
Then
Fine Media Group, a small, independent film distributor in
Chicago, picked it up.
Oussama
Jammal, the distributing company's owner and a Muslim, has spent nearly
$1 million, renting relatively small theaters and placing ads on Arab
satellite TV. Loews and
AMC, two of the biggest theater chains in the country, opted to not show
it, to Jammal's dismay. But he wanted to get the film out at any cost.
"There
was 9/11, then the war in Afghanistan, then the war in Iraq," says
Jammal, 50, a father of four, born and raised in Lebanon, who immigrated
to Salt Lake City in 1982. "Too much has happened, and it didn't give
Americans the chance to be able to differentiate between the good and
the bad and the ugly. What is Islam to non-Muslims?"
The
film is not a big
Hollywood production, he says, certainly nothing like "The Passion of
the Christ." Still, word of mouth among the estimated 150,000 Muslims,
Arab and non-Arab, in the Washington area, paying $12 a ticket, is
expected to fill theaters until Thursday, when the run ends. For the
past week, volunteers like Yahya Fouz, a 23-year-old law student, and
24-year-old Sajjad Ahmad, a software tester, have been helping sell
tickets; their cell phone numbers are posted on Fine Media Group's Web
site.
"Islam
has been hijacked by the media, hijacked by Osama bin Laden," says Fouz,
out of breath as he stops by Ballston Common on his way to the
Washington Convention Center, where thousands of Muslims were gathering
for Eid-al-Fitr. He's selling tickets there. Out of 50 tickets mailed to
him last week by Jammal, about 20 are left. "Muhammad, you have to
understand, is part of the Abrahamian tradition of prophets. Of Moses
and Jesus. Unfortunately, not many people know that."
"Muhammad: The Last Prophet" traces the rise of Islam in 7th century
Mecca, when the now-holy place was a corrupt city of slave owners and
wooden and stone gods. The message is sacrosanct, the god is Allah.
Since Islamic law prohibits any images of the prophet (or his close
relatives) to be seen, the action is shown, as needed, from Muhammad's
point of view -- you don't see him, you see what he sees -- and follows
him through his preaching, his words directly out of the Koran.
The
audience meets the prophet about 10 minutes into the film, climbing
toward a cave outside
Mecca, alone, to pray. It is there, at the age of 40, where Muhammad
receives a vision from the archangel Gabriel.
In that
scene, the film's most visually stunning, Gabriel is depicted by a
glowing sphere.
"What I
think is very unique about it is you have a film dealing with Muhammad
that seeks to tell the development of Islam in a medium -- an animated
film -- that can widely be seen. Especially by children, Muslim or
non-Muslim," says John Esposito, professor of Islamic studies at
Georgetown University and editor in chief of the Oxford Encyclopedia of
the Modern Islamic World. He is the author of more than 40 books on
Islam, and got involved in the film in 1998, as one of four Islamic
scholars. He was asked to review it for authenticity.
Though
Islam -- with 6 million to 8 million followers in the
United States, Esposito estimates -- is the country's third largest
religion behind Christianity and Judaism, "it's still . . . the least
understood of the three religions."
The
D.C.-based Council on American-Islamic Relations released a poll of more
than 1,000 respondents Oct. 4 showing that one in four Americans holds
anti-Muslim views such as "Muslims teach their children to hate" and
"Muslims value life less than other people."
Those
are familiar stereotypes to Sally Abdelhafiz, 34, a
Reston human resources worker.
She
brought her family -- husband Taha, daughters Nadine, 9, and May, 5 --
to the
noon showing at Ballston Common after hearing about the movie on ART,
the Arab satellite channel. She liked what she saw, especially a scene
halfway through the film.
Muhammad's followers have left
Mecca, and a Christian king in Abyssinia offers them asylum. In an
exchange, the Muslims try to explain how their beliefs are not far from
Christianity.
The
king stands, looks up at the ceiling, throws his hands high, and says:
"What
we believe and what you believe are like these two beams of light --
separate yet coming from the same source."
"That
message, simple as it sounds, needs to be understood by everyone," says
Abdelhafiz. "It is the same source. You call your god, God. We call our
god, Allah."
She
pauses. "What's so different about that?"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/admin/emailfriend?contentId=A50304-2004Nov14&sent=no&referrer=emailarticle
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Elections in Ukraine
Dear friends,
Now when the results of the elections in the US in known, we think that they are positive for American Christians as many of them supported President Bush and so we can congratulate you with the victory. Looking from outside, we could have some mixed feelings concerning the US foreign policy but we can not but support Bush’s pro-family and pro-life stand. Gay rights are not so much a problem in the Ukraine but it could become soon as a result of globalization. We pray for a revival in America so that it could become a land of righteousness and an example for other nations to follow.
Now we would like to propose to you to pray for the second round of the president elections in the Ukraine which is to take place on November 21st. During the first round two candidates got almost the same number of votes-about 39 per cent each and according to the law, the second round is to decide who will rule for the next five years. We would like to describe our perspective on the political situation in the country and we have not met a pastor whose opinion would differ much from ours.
The Ukraine became an independent state thirteen years ago and since then has been moving forward from a Soviet republic to a European state. Most foreigners witness that the church movement is still most powerful here in comparison with the rest of Europe. Just compare one per cent of the population in protestant churches in Russia to five per cent in the Ukraine, and eighty per cent of pastors in Russia are Ukrainians. We are sure about the calling of the Ukraine to become a spiritual breadbasket for the nations of the former Soviet Union and beyond as it used to be in the natural. So we believe that the role of our country is vital for many surrounding nations, for Europe and Asia. The Ukraine is growing economically with at least ten per cent annual growth of the national product. Unfortunately, people’s income does not grow as rapidly because of bad government but still the life rate is improving noticeably.
At the moment our country is standing on the crossroads. Before the choice was to be made between a communist and a democrat as it was five years ago. But we are glad that the ghost of communism is fading in the past. Now the choice is whether the country will follow the European democratical way or cling to Russia with its totalitarian spirit. The Ukraine has been pushed away a bit by Europe and the US and the authorities began to change the direction towards Russia. The main problem in the Ukraine is corruption. Everything is corrupt-government, courts, police, business and of course, we understand that only God can change the system. But we would also like to see a president who at least would try to be honest and to fulfill his obligations. We understand that it could take several years to change people’s mentality but we trust it can be done.
We have never seen before that churches would pray and fast so earnestly for the elections as they do now and we believe they will go on in the future.
So here are the candidates for the second round. Victor Yanukovich is a present prime minister and is supported by the present political system. He is a representative of the eastern Donetsk region of the Ukraine, which is known for its criminal atmosphere and where he used to be a governor. In his young years he was convicted two times for a robbery and a fight and is alleged to escape a conviction for a rape. Both his convictions were cancelled later. His main points are stability in the country which is to be understood that the corrupt system will go on existing, and moving towards Russia including political and economical dependence and double citizenship. President Putin showed his support of Yanukovich during his visit to the Ukraine several days before the first round of the elections and during his second visit after the first round. He is supported in the eastern part of the Ukraine and in the Crimea where pro-Russian moods are evident. His electorate also consists of elderly people who do not need that anything would be changed before they die and folks who aspire the Soviet Union to be restored in one form or the other. Before and during the first round there was a lot of pressure in the media and from the authorities to promote this candidate. He is supported by a part of the Orthodox Church. The pressure from the authorities can be illustrated by the fact that the present president Kuchma fired ten heads of administration in the regions where the other candidate won. The sum of money spent for his electoral company is 600 million dollars which is ten per cent of the national annual budget and more than President Bush did at his elections.
The second man is Victor Yuschenko. He received 0.5 per cent more votes than his rival did at the first round though the real results could show a larger gap. He is considered to be a reformer and is supported by the western and central areas of the country including Kiev region which aspire independence for their nation and by the intellectual elite. His electorate is much younger. He used to be a banker and a prime minister. His wife used to be an American citizen and there is some information that she comes from the emigrant Pentecostal background. He is west-oriented and desires political and economical reforms. Some people from his team do not look very trustworthy but their overall mood is to oppose the system. He is supported by the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and by Protestants. We understand that the man is not ideal though some allege that he was born again, but still consider him to be a better choice for the Ukraine. At least he promotes freedom of public gatherings and demonstrations which include street evangelism as at the moment it is impossible in our city to have a Christian gathering in the open air though we have such a right according to the law. Also there are some problems with protestant churches renting facilities and coming to educational institutions. The total atmosphere felt is like that before peaceful democratic revolutions in the Eastern Europe. We can not say that he is a God’s chosen and in such case for us to pray for his victory is like praying for the victory of your favorite soccer team but we propose you to pray for the following points if you wish.
1. Pray for God’s choice in this situation.
2. Pray for honest elections against falsifications.
3. Pray for peace in the country after the elections and unity of the nation.
4. Pray for the ongoing integrity of the future president.
5. Pray for God to manifest Himself as the Lord of the Ukraine.
Thank you greatly for your support and may God bless richly you and your country.
Yours,
Pastors Yuri and Olga Sabinin
Christian outreach center
Simferopol, the Crimea, the Ukraine