The persecuted church
Johnnie Moore speaks to TRBC about oppressed Middle Eastern Christians
“Christianity is bleeding in the Middle East, and I believe we should care more about it.”
Liberty’s former Vice President for Executive Projects and Media Relations and Campus Pastor Johnnie Moore spoke these words as he returned to preach on behalf of the persecuted church at Thomas Road Baptist Church Sunday, Sept. 6.
Care — Johnnie Moore spoke on recent Christian oppression in the Middle East. Photo credit: Ruth Bibby
Moore pleaded for the congregation to join him in the fight to stand up for the Christians in the Middle East who Islamic extremists have been attempting
to eradicate.
Moore, who now works as chief of staff for television producers Mark Burnett and Roma Downey in Hollywood, California after leaving Liberty over a year ago, has been to the Middle East several times and has seen the suffering of Christians in countries such as Iraq and Jordan.
Moore recently published a book called “Defying ISIS: Preserving Christianity in the Place of Its Birth and in Your Own Backyard,” in which he describes the current plight Middle Eastern Christians are facing for their faith in God. He spoke about how their churches have been destroyed, their homes have been turned to rubble and people have been tortured solely for their faith in Jesus Christ.
However, Moore shared in his sermon how committed Middle Eastern Christians are to preaching the gospel in the heart of the Islamic world.
Moore shared a story of an Iraqi nun who was run out of the city of Mosul and then run out of another city by the Islamic extremists. All the while, she was still taking care of and showing Christ’s love to thousands of different people with no discrimination. He said that this nun told him that she loves America but that she also said, “You take care of your pets so well. When will you care for your bothers and sisters in Christ?”
He also shared story after story of how Christians in North America cannot be silent anymore about a hurting part of the body of Christ.
“We have to have the same commitment to Jesus Christ as our persecuted brothers and sisters have,” Moore said. “That’s the only way to serve them the way they need to be served. …(W)e will love them the way that God calls us to love them. This is our responsibility.”
Moore emphasized how boldly the persecuted Christians are living out their faith even to the point of death. They are not ashamed to die for their belief in Jesus Christ, while many Americans who are not persecuted struggle to stand up for their faith.
“They live for and die for (the faith that) we so struggle to live for,” Moore said. “And I believe that we ought to help them more.
Moore, who also recently began a consulting and public relations agency called the KAIROS Company, stressed the fact that the Jesus the Middle Eastern Christians are serving is the same God Americans are serving.
Moore said specifically to Liberty students that he wants them to rise up and act on this Christian genocide.
“I would just like every single Liberty University student to take personally the needs of the persecuted church,” Moore said. “I want them to pray for the persecuted church and provide for the persecuted church and put unrelenting pressure on people of power and influence in the political arena and outside of it to do more on behalf of these people.”
Moore said he has worked to stand up for persecuted believers for a long time, but more recently, after an important meeting in Jordan, he decided to take more action.
“I can see how, over a decade, God prepared me for this,” Moore said. “I attended a meeting in Jordan one year before anybody was talking about ISIS. … (Everyone was) talking about what we have now seen. They were predicting it, but the world didn’t respond. Because I knew that, I felt like I had a particular obligation to be more involved.”
When Moore is not in Hollywood working for Burnett and Downey or running his public relations agency or helping with the Museum of the Bible in Washington D.C., he is doing all he can to rally support and awareness for Christians in the Middle East who are being brutally persecuted for their faith in Jesus Christ.
Rodriguez is the news editor.