A new experience awaited many as they headed to church on this day to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, where they must first pass heavily armed police so to enter into a house of worship.
A new phenomenon exists on Resurrection Sunday as Christians around the world must be protected so that they can celebrate Jesus Christ.
In New York police were posted at the doors of churches, and in Egypt people entered past heavily armed police into church services where recently dozens where killed by Jihadi bombers while worshiping. Even the U.S. embassy there has now advised its citizens to avoid “identifiable places of worship.”
In Iraq, Christian villages outside Mosul freed from militants remain abandoned, residents unwilling to return for fear they will be killed. In Syria and Jordan, armed guards patrol outside churches where pews sit empty as fearful worshipers stay home.
This is a sign of prophecy were Jesus foretold there would come a time of persecution for followers of Jesus. For He said in Matthew 24:9 that “then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name’s sake.”
This tells us we live in the Last Days nearer the event when the resurrected Lord Jesus will catch away His Church into the clouds to meet the Lord as the world transitions into the wrath of the Great Tribulation.