AP

CELEBRATING 20 YEARS OF EQUIPPING GAP YEAR SCHOOL LEAVERS FOR LIFE

“Year 13” is celebrating 20 years of helping gap year school leavers to be equipped for life with strong spiritual foundations. Since beginning with 16 students in 2006, more than 1200 young people have been through the Youthworks program. It has grown from one close-knit class to streams of students with cohort numbers sometimes hitting triple digits, Sydneyanglican.net reports. Gap years are common, but Youthworks wanted to provide practical ministry training, with guidance and support as young people stepped out of school into adulthood.
It’s a year ‘on’, not a year ‘off’! Rev Steve Carlisle Year 13 director says it’s a way of supercharging young people’s faith. The program includes a trip to Fiji where participants live in villages and serve in practical ways, gaining insight into God’s work in a different context. Year 13 is on track this year to serve the highest number of young people since its inception. [Source: Sydneyanglicans.net]

POTENTIAL TO USE SO-CALLED “HATE SPEECH” LAWS AGAINST CHRISTIANS
There is alarm among those concerned with Australians having the democratic right to free speech and Christian beliefs, that the vague ‘hate speech’ laws empower elites, erode free speech, freedom of worship and threaten Australia’s democratic trust in ordinary citizens. Australians are being asked to  trust politicians or judges to determine and judge what people are allowed to say and believe – to believe that these politicians have the wisdom to make laws that clearly distinguish between whether what you said was valid criticism or whether it was “hate speech” that lands you in jail.
Those experienced in Law claim that ‘hate speech’ is a term that is much too broad, and that it will be used to persecute Australians who want to criticise government policies and groups of people who the government regards as ‘untouchables’ because of their voting power. However as past history has revealed, Christians are fair targets. Section 18C was used to persecute two pastors who had simply quoted from the Quran. They refused to retract as requested by the tribunal and were nearly impoverished by the cost of legal challenges, while the tribunal was funded from the deep pockets of government. Fortunately, the Victorian Appeals Court held that the tribunal had wrongly interpreted the Act and the need to retract was dropped.
Free citizens of a free country should never be subjected to laws that prohibit reasonable criticism of any group or person, even if the criticism offends someone. It is outrageous that Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act already allows Australians to be dragged before a politically staffed tribunal, not an impartial court, simply because someone claims you have offended them. It is naïve to think that politicians who reject Christianity and take pride in their atheistic beliefs, will not use so-called hate speech laws against Christians.
These people adhere to the Humanist Manifesto, which makes no bones about its ultimate objective of controlling churches: “Humanism maintains that all associations and institutions exist for the fulfillment of human life…. Certain religious institutions, their ritualistic forms, their ecclesiastical methods and communal activities must be reconstituted as rapidly as experience allows in order to function effectively in the modern world.” The Humanist Magazine once contained an article that said: “The battle for mankind’s future must be waged and won in the public school class room by teachers who correctly perceive their role as proselytisers of a new faith.  The class room must and will become an arena of conflict between the old and the new; between the rotting corpse of Christianity on the one hand, and the new faith of humanism on the other.”  (Humanist Magazine, January/February 1983) The attack on Christian worship, on the right to share the gospel and the right to believe and teach the truths of the Bible, will not only continue but increase, on the basis of these hate speech laws.  [Source: Daily Declaration]

BIBLE PODCAST RANKED IN THE TOP FIVE APPLE PODCASTS
A daily Bible reading podcast has jumped into Apple Podcasts’ Top 10 for the third year in a row. ‘The Bible Recap’ is a 10-minute daily program that takes listeners through Bible readings along with some commentary. Tara Leigh Cobble, host of the ‘The Bible Recap’ says her original goal was to reach 300 listeners to help them understand and love the Bible.
The podcast has catapulted to a global community, reaching over 500 million downloads. In January, ‘The Bible Recap’ ranked in the top five Apple podcasts across all categories. Ms Cobble told CBN News that the Bible isn’t about me. It’s for me. It’s not about me. It’s about God. It’s about who He is, she says. The podcast has now expanded to children 12 and under with ‘The Bible Recap Kids’. [Source: CBN News]

DEVELOPMENTS IN COLOMBIA
From a tiny minority in 1960 (0.6% of the population), evangelicals and charismatics now number about 28% of the population. Such growth is particularly remarkable considering that Christians have often been targets of drug cartels, guerrillas, paramilitaries and other unfriendly groups. Much of the growth has been within indigenous communities.
These indigenous churches, however, face particular problems. In 1991, Amerindian groups, who had been victims of oppression and discrimination, received wide-ranging support from government legislation. But some people used this religious freedom to try to force Amerindian Christians to revert to traditional religious beliefs. The persecution that resulted caused believers from different tribal groups to band together in mutual support.
These believers are mostly poor, under-educated and vulnerable to community violence. The challenge is for strong, well-led churches, grounded in the authority of the Bible,  culturally rooted and able to cope with drug traffickers and resist the push to make the Church ‘popular’ instead of being ‘Biblical’. [Source: Operation World]

CHINA DETAINS NINE UNDERGROUND CHURCH MEMBERS IN LATEST PERSECUTION
China’s crackdown on the underground church movement continues with the recent arrest of nine Christians while hundreds of armed police and special forces surrounded another church, causing members to flee. Numerous reports detail that prominent leaders of the Early Rain Covenant Church in Sichuan province were arrested. The church’s leader, Li Yingqiang, was among the nine individuals taken into custody. His home and the church’s office were also raided during a coordinated sweep. According to information released by China Aid, a persecution watchdog group, several church elders, preachers, deacons, and their family members were taken away. Although there is no indication as to why those members were detained or if they were charged, five of them were released the next day.
Early Rain Covenant Church was established in 2008 and has grown to about 500 members, becoming one of the larger house churches in China. This is not the first time Chinese officials have cracked down on the church. In 2018, founder Wang Yi and more than 100 pastors were detained, Reuters reports. Yi was later sentenced to nine years in prison on subversion charges.
Meanwhile,1,000 miles away in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, authorities began demolishing Yayang Christian Church, according to ChinaAid. Witnesses told the group that Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities sent hundreds of armed police and special police forces to the church, and completely encircled the building. Christian residents living near the church were forcibly driven away, and individuals at the scene were ordered not to take photographs or record video. Cranes and bulldozers were reportedly on site, which raised concerns that the church’s cross would be removed or the church would be demolished.
Dr. Bob Fu, President of ChinaAid, said in a statement that believers are facing “intimidation, isolation, and the imminent threat of violent enforcement.” He posted a video on X showing scaffolding erected around the church’s cross. “The mobilization of hundreds of armed police and heavy demolition equipment against a peaceful Christian church is not law enforcement—it is state-sponsored religious persecution,” he said. “Wenzhou, long known as ‘China’s Jerusalem’, is once again under siege. History has shown repeatedly that no regime can extinguish faith through force. If the world remains silent at this critical moment, it will only embolden the CCP to destroy more churches and trample fundamental human dignity,” he added. “Chinese believers are paying a tremendous price for their faith, yet their courage continues to inspire the global Church. At this critical moment, prayer must be matched with principled action. The United States should not reward repression with diplomatic normalcy. Any consideration of a presidential visit to Beijing must be conditioned on a demonstrable halt to religious persecution and the release of prisoners of conscience. Silence or symbolic engagement only deepens the suffering of the faithful,” Fu added.  [Source: CBN News.]

NEPAL’S CHRISTIAN GROWTH
The continued growth of the church in Nepal increases the hostility of the majority Hindu population, including the government, whose anti-conversion laws have been unable to stifle the church. Christians may be the victims of discrimination in their communities and opposition from extremists, but they remain strong in the Lord.

2 MILLION PEOPLE IN KENYA ARE FACING DROUGHT AND ACUTE FOOD INSECURITY
More than 2 million people in Kenya are facing drought and acute food insecurity after the rainy season ended far below average in December. The need is growing faster than relief efforts can keep up. One ministry working on the ground is Kenya Hope. In each of its centres they provide clean drinking water, meals and other community resources. Bryan Haley, executive director of Kenya Hope says they have increased their water supply and removed the small fee they charge for ongoing maintenance.
He told Mission Network News their water supply is now free and accessible to everybody. The country is reeling as, without water, a lot of sources of income have dried up. Mr Haley says that as they respond to physical needs their ministry means people are also receiving the hope of the Gospel. The mission is asking Christians to pray for rain. [Source: Mission Network News]

– compiled by Guido Kettniss