bestcurrentnews Ramadan Prayer

Ramadan 2013 – Day 23 – The Plight of Islam’s Children

2013 Ramadan PrayerThe words of the “adhan” or the Muslim call to prayer are first words a newborn Muslim baby hears. His or her father whispers into the child’s right ear, “God is great, there is no god but Allah. Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. Come to prayer.”  This is the crux is Islam, acknowledging Allah and Muhammad as the perfect example.

By the time a Muslim reaches the age of 50, he has heard this repeated nearly 90,000 times. That is roughly 1,800 times per year every year since the day he was born.

In some nations, the call to prayer is not the only tenet of Islam that children learn at an early age. A 2011, report regarding school textbooks in the Middle East revealed the Egyptian school children are taught Christians and Jews are infidels. And for many years textbooks in Palestinian schools have rejected Israel’s right to exist, and have portrayed a Middle East in maps and through text without the nation of Israel on them. For instance, the following is from a 12th grade Palestinian textbook: “Palestine’s war ended with a catastrophe that is unprecedented in history, when the Zionist gangs stole Palestine and expelled its people from their cities, their villages, their lands and their houses, and established the State of Israel.”

Palestinian Media Watch released a video of a young girl reciting a poem about Jerusalem on Palestinian Authority TV that calls Jews the most evil among creations, barbaric monkeys and wretched pigs. It ends with the lines:

 As long as my heart is my Qur’an and my city

As long as I have my arm and my stones

As long as I am free and do not barter my cause

I will not fear your throngs

I will not fear the rifle.

In April of 2013, The Guardian reported approximately 37,000 teenagers between the ages of 15 to 17 were receiving weekly military training classes in the Palestinian area of Gaza. The boys learn about assault rifles and other weapons, first aid and firefighting. During school breaks, voluntary camps are offered where students can learn how to handle guns and explosives. The armed wing of Hamas, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam brigades assists in the training. They deny the use of real weapons, however a video that was filmed at a school near Gaza City shows students carrying assault rifles and one boy firing an artillery shell at a replica of an Israeli watchtower, complete with an Israeli flag. About 5,000 boys have participated since the program began in September 2012, and the Palestinian government is considering adapting the course for teenaged girls next year.

Another video, filmed in Deir ez-Zor, Syria was posted to the Internet in June which shows children training at an Al-Qaeda. Save the Children estimated that two million children were innocent victims of the war in Syria. Many children struggled to find enough food to eat, girls were being forced into early marriages to protect them from the threat of sexual violence, and armed groups were recruiting other children. Children as young as eight have been used as human shields in the fighting.

The Taliban in Afghanistan recruits orphans to act as decoys and to be suicide bombers against western forces in Afghanistan. According to Britain’s Channel 4, Taliban fighters promised an eight-year-old orphan boy named Neaz a handful of coins worth 91 cents to go with them. They gave him sweets and taught him to use a gun and build IEDs. After gaining the child’s trust they tried to convince him to use a suicide vest and blow himself up at a checkpoint. After questioning how he could spend the coins he was promised if he blew himself up, he eventually escaped and turned himself into police. He now lives in an orphanage.

Prayer Points:

In Matthew 19:14, Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them…”  Pray for the children of Islam who have become orphans because of war in their nation. Ask God to watch out for them, enabling them to be cared for by people who will not use them as weapons or decoys.

Many Muslim children are taught to hate non-Muslims from the time they are small children. Pray that God will break through the years of indoctrination with His love and reveal His heart for all people.

Pray the Spirit of Truth will be revealed to these children, causing the stronghold of deception to be broken over the minds of Muslim children and that they will be introduced to salvation through Jesus Christ.

bestcurrentnews Ramadan Prayer

Ramadan 2013 – Day 1 – An Overview

2013 Ramadan PrayerMany western Christians once considered Islam a distant religion having little influence on our culture and society. Following the discovery of oil in the Islamic world and massive immigration from Islamic nations after World War II the fabric of Judeo-Christian society began to unravel.

Ramadan, translated as scorching heat or dryness, is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar, which began in 622 AD, the year Muhammad and a small group of followers migrated from Mecca to Medina. This migration, known as the Hijra, marked an important shift in the teachings of Muhammad. Because the Islamic calendar is a lunar calendar the dates of Ramadan change each year by approximately 11 days. This year Ramadan should begin on Tuesday, July 9 with the sighting of the new moon.

Muslims believe that it was during the month of Ramadan when Muhammad first began to receive his revelations so it is considered the holiest month in Islam. The Ramadan fast (sawm) is the fourth pillar of the Islamic faith. The other pillars are reciting the Islamic creed (shahada), required daily prayers (salah), almsgiving (zakat) and the pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj). These five basic acts in Islam are the foundation of Muslim life.

During the month of Ramadan, most Muslims will observe a fast from sunup to sundown for each of the 29 to 30 days of the month. They are to abstain from smoking, drinking, eating and sexual pleasure during the daylight hours. It is to be a time of spiritual reflection and increased devotion to Allah, and Muslims believe the rewards for fasting during this time are multiplied. All Muslims are required to fast when they reach puberty as long as they are sane and have no illnesses such as diabetes. Exceptions to the fast are travel, menstruation, severe illness, pregnancy and breast-feeding. Those who are unable to fast because of illness or travel are required to make up the days they missed later.

In addition to fasting, Muslims are encouraged to read the entire Qur’an. Juz’, which is 1/30 of the Qur’an is recited sometimes through voluntary prayers that are held in mosques every night of the month. Charity is important during Ramadan, and because Muslims believe all good deeds are more handsomely rewarded in Ramadan many Muslims may give a larger portion or even all of their required zakat (alms of 2.5%) during the month.

As the Muslim population has increased in traditionally western nations so has Islam’s influence. In an act described by a British broadcaster as “‘deliberate provocation’ aimed at viewers who might associate Islam with extremism,” Britain’s Channel 4 announced the television station would air the Muslim call to prayer live every morning during the month of Ramadan. The broadcast of the call to prayer known as the adhan is three-minutes long and will be aired at about 3 am each day. Additional prayer times throughout the day will be broadcast on the station’s website.

The adhan is recited in Arabic and each line is repeated for emphasis. Removing the repetition and translating it into English, the following words will be broadcast over the United Kingdom for the next 30 days:

Allah is the greatest, Allah is the greatest.
I bear witness that there is none worthy of worship but Allah.
I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.
Hasten to the Prayer, hasten to the Prayer
Hasten to real success, hasten to real success
Allah is the greatest, Allah is the greatest.
There is none worthy of worship but Allah.

In addition, Channel 4 available across the United Kingdom will also be featuring “4Ramadan” described as a season of programs “reflecting what life is like for Britain’s Muslim population who observe this religious festival.”

A spokesman from the Muslim Council of Britain in support of the station said, “This is a very special month for Muslims and its recognition on a mainstream channel is not only symbolic for belonging and solidarity but will hopefully help to portray a more realistic account of Islam and Muslims.”

During the next 30 days as we pray for Muslims during this time of heightened spiritual awareness for them, we ask that God will open the eyes and hearts of each of us to truly grasp a “realistic account of Islam and Muslims.”

Prayer Points:

Pray that any words spoken over the nations of the world that are not from the true and living God will fall null and void.

Pray as Muslims quench their physical thirst from the Ramadan fast each day, that God will quench their spiritual thirst with the living water of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The Muslim people have been created by God to have a personal relationship with Him. Pray that Muslims will receive God’s love and have divine encounters with Jesus Christ as the Son of God during this time.