Dr Paul Allen

Down the valley from Kathmandu, the ancient capital of Nepal , rests an even older city. In Bhaktapur , the timeworn traditions of Hinduism sink as deep into the dry soil as the white-capped Himalayan Mountains rise in the background. Bhaktapur looks like it was built one brick at a time. Narrow, brick-paved city streets are lined on both sides by three-story brick buildings built into each other over time to become a continuous wall of homes and stores. An occasional small tractor or motorcycle putters slowly by, joined for a few steps by a wandering goat or chicken or dog. Delivery men on bicycles snake through the streets, weaving past groups of children walking in school uniforms, past women washing clothes in a street gutter , around bent laborers carrying huge bundles of straw on one shoulder or men crouching and forming spinning clay into a bowl, past groups of unemployed young men with nothing better to do than stand around, past tranquil street merchants waiting for

Icon depicting the First Council of Nicaea. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Persecution is the reality for much of the Christian world . There are many places in the world where churches are not legal, evangelism is banned, and Christians are regularly beaten by their governments . In Egypt, Christians are martyred for their faith, probably even today. In Bhutan , Nepal , Afghanistan, and elsewhere, if the police show up at a church, they are there to shut it down—and arresting and/or beating everyone in attendance is likely as well. China probably has more Christians than any other nation. Many of these believers suffer imprisonment and significant pressure from the government; they are evidence of the fact that 2,000 years after the Great Commission , it is still not legal for Christians to worship together in much of the world. This is why western believers really need to come to terms with the fact that persecution is on the horizon. Christians see persecution as something th