Persecution

Today we visited the First Baptist Church of Ndu... this is our 3rd Sunday and our 3rd Baptist church so far. The practice of most of these churches is to invite any newcomers to a room to be greeted. We tried getting out of it today since we wanted to get to market but being the only white people in the place it was hard to slip out. Once in the room they will ask for prayer requests. Today there was a man from Nigeria asking for prayer for his family. Before coming to Cameroon I had noticed in the media that Christian churches in Nigeria had been bombed, and there is growing unrest with the Muslims. This was of interest to me since Cameroon borders Nigeria. This man told of many Christians dying at the hand of these Muslim groups. Apparently the President of Nigeria is a Christian and the Muslims would like to have this country under a Muslim authority. This man told how Muslim children sit in front of Christian churches selling oranges. This is not unusual for people to sell food near or in front of the church. These Muslim children have poison laced in their oranges and have been successful in killing many Christians. Obviously this makes it difficult for people who are just selling fruit to provide for their families. Children seem so innocent but they are just doing what they have been told. According to this man, another strategy to win the country for the Muslims is to win favor with the young Christian women and marry them into their families. If they do not convert to Islam then they will kill them - and this is okay under the laws of the Koran. We have seen a number of Muslim men in this area (one of them proposed to my daughter), and we have heard their call to prayer. None of the people I have come in contact with seem "radical" and some of the local people I talked to say that most of the Muslims in this area are not that devoted. Pray for Christians living in this area of the world. They would love to live peacefully doing what they have always done, instead many of them are fleeing for their lives or burying their dead.