Religious Freedom

We hear the term "religious freedom" used so much these days and I felt that I understood what that term really meant and that I also understood feeling grateful for what "religious freedom" we have in the United States.  This past Saturday evening, my husband and I watched a video, A Cry from Iran, that I had happened to come across at our local library.  Now mind you, we do not spend our evenings in front of the TV, and we have reduced our screen time to almost nothing, working towards removing the TV from our home completely.  Even when there is a good program on i.e. an educational cooking program etc., the trashy commercials ruin it, but that issue is for another post.  The reason I picked up this video was because it caught my eye being about Christianity in Iran.  I highly recommend
watching this documentary because unless we can get a glimpse of the persecution of Christians in other countries, we cannot truly understand our "religious freedom" that we enjoy in the United States.  I understand that we are experiencing our own persecution as Christians in this country, but nothing compared to what I witnessed on the video and if we aren't careful, the slippery slope we are on will continue to get worse.

Standing in our church service this past Sunday morning, I had a deeper knowledge of what "religious freedom" I was grateful for.  To stand and sing in worship without fear that I might be shot in my bed that evening, overwhelmed me with such a powerful sense of thankfulness to God.  To know that as Christians, we are able to gather freely to worship, to homeschool our children and to live our lives in accordance to God's law, without fear of being imprisoned or killed, in today's world is a rarity that we need to be vigil of and grateful for because we are slowly but surely losing these rights.  One only has to look at HSLDA to see where these rights have been revoked and where families are fighting for their children or are in hiding due to the persecution.  There has been a mass exodus from California by homeschoolers already.

All of this to say, we are very blessed to worship and to stand tall as Christians in this country and that we need to remain vigil for this right.  If you get a chance........watch A Cry from Iran and look at the website The Other Side of Iran .  It just may give you a deeper sense of thankfulness too!