Indonesia: Story
"At 2:00 one morning in Jakarta, Indonesia, a mob of approximately 400 Muslims surrounded the house church of one of our church planters. When he peered out the window and saw threatening sticks and stones, machetes and torches, he knew why the unwelcome company was there. He and his wife got on their knees and began to pray. The mob attempted to burn down the house, but the fire would not light. Frustrated, the crowd began to stone the house. As the men rushed through the front door, the church planter jumped to his feet and was cut in the fore- head. Falling to his knees, and convinced that he would die that night, he continued to pray, "God, I am ready for you to take me home to- night, but I pray that where my blood falls here, you will establish a great church for your kingdom and glory! "
After he finished praying, neither he or his wife felt the blows, which began to bounce off of them. Again, growing frustrated, the mob proceeded to destroy everything in the house church and to pile it into a great heap in the living room to burn it. Again, the fire didn't light. Finally they threw the rubble into the street to destroy it, and it burned. This apparently satisfied the angry mob, and they left.
After this incident, the church planter lost half of his congregation. In the years that followed, persecution in Indonesia grew from isolated incidents, such as this, to mass attacks where, for example, all the churches in the town of Tasikmalaya, or 16 churches in the city of Situbondo, were ravaged by fire. Hundreds of churches have been burned in the last decade."
(Persecution Prelude to Revival, Kevin Humble EMQ april 2000)
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