The situation in Iraq needs our prayers. Let us boldly go to God’s throne of grace for Iraq to be helped at the right time. (Heb.4:16)

(International prayer Council)

Background:

Pastors and leaders from all over Iraq recently came together and agreed to have a National Day of Prayer for their country. They are asking for churches around the world to join them in praying for Iraq on the 2nd of December.

There has been a growing prayer movement in Iraq over the last few years. In 2005, the first National Prayer Conference in Iraqs history was held around 640 Iraqis from 17 different churches attended from across the country. This was a significant event, as it brought together believers from almost every existing church and denomination in Iraq. 670 Iraqis from 23 churches attended the 2nd National Prayer Conference in 2006, followed by the 3rd conference this past September 2007, which 604 Iraqis attended from 24 churches and a number of house churches, despite the many challenges involved in traveling across the country.

We praise God for the awesome work He is doing in and through His Church in this country. Still, our brothers and sisters need our prayers and to see a breakthrough in their nation on every level. Please join with us and the Iraqi Church December 2nd to pray for the Lord to build His Kingdom in Iraq!

Prayer Requests:

* Pray protection over individual and ministry relationships – that the Holy Spirit will rule with wisdom and love in each situation and the efforts of the enemy to bring fear, disunity, distrust and separation will be confounded and turned against them.

* Pray that God will give the shepherds / Pastors words of encouragement and comfort for their congregations and their communities.

* Pray that the pastors will receive divine sources of comfort and encouragement so they can be a blessing in their spheres of influence.

* Pray that the believers will be encouraged to share their faith even more boldly and not be bound by fear or anxiety.

* Pray that evil will be blinded and thwarted in every situation.

* Pray that the church will have a good relationship with their communities. Pray they will be able to love their enemies as Christ commanded. Pray that the real enemy will be unmasked/ exposed and the different groups will unite and defeat his effort to bring fear, hatred, violence and strife.

* Pray protection and wisdom for the MBB’s to stand strong and to continue being a light on a lamp stand, not under a basket.

* Pray that those outside of the family of God will have visions of Jesus that will draw them to salvation.

* Pray that the work being done – prayer conferences, workshops, discipleship and leadership trainings, etc. will have great effect in the lives of the people who attend.

* Pray that the believers will experience a fresh vision, divine strategy and renewed passion for God’s Kingdom and fresh motivation for their call. May they be like an antivirus of light, life and love that will infect everyone.

* Pray for Church planting all over the nation and that all Church’s needs will be fulfilled.

* A number of people in church leadership in Iraq are experiencing health concerns. Please pray that they will experience the Healer in their specific situation and that as they set their minds and hearts on him, they will experience his perfect peace, regardless of the physical circumstance.

* Pray that materials – whether written, electronic, music – will be widely distributed/ available for teaching and drawing lost souls to the truth.

* Pray for God to impart his strategy to the Pastors and other Ministry Partners so they will experience increased effectiveness in their calling and ministry.

* Pray that the Pastors we will be diligent in seeking God’s heart.

* Pray for the country to have peace. Civil war must stop. Pray that the Shia will have a division and finally lose control on the government.

* Pray for new laws to be established in the parliament that will bring democracy, peace and prosperity to the nation.

* Pray the leaders – government, police, military, etc. – will rule responsibly and fairly, helping to build the necessary infrastructure and order. Pray that the desperate and unemployed will turn from darkness to light; helping to build, protect and restore order, instead of turning to violence or criminal activity.

Thank you all so much for your prayers and intercession.

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What is the Arabian Peninsula ???

Click on the country name at the web site link below to find out general information on the country

and its people. These pages include facts on geography, religion, economy,

politics and internet links for more in depth information.

Facts about AP(All the Nations)

More info. about KUWAIT

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2-Pray for the Anointing that motivated Zwemer to commit his life to the
Arabian Peninsula to be over the Arabs Believers.

3-Zwemer lost his two daughters in Bahrain, Pray the blood of those murders and others to cry with the salvation message at the hearts of the Muslims.

4-Pray that the Church will stand Firm against all the obstacles that limits the spreading of the good news at
Kuwait.as Zwemer was kicked many times from Kuwait Prince , but he kept trying and never give up.

5-Pray that the desire at Arabic Church leaders is to recapture the passion of Samuel Zwemer who had this to say in 1911: ‘If the Churches of Christendom are to reach the Moslem World with the Gospel, they must know of it, and know it.’ He called for ‘deeper study of the problem [Islam], as well as more thorough preparation of its missionaries and a bolder faith in God, in order to solve it.’”

View the video about Zwemer.

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2002 is the 50th anniversary of the death, in April 1952, of Samuel Marinus Zwemer. Though unknown outside specialist missionary circles, he was widely acknowledged in his lifetime as the world’s foremost authority on all matters relating to Christian witness to Islam.This reputation emerged from a 50-year career involving pioneer missionary work, literature propagation and advocacy work on behalf of mission to Muslims and finally a career in teaching and writing on missionary theology and practice.

Samuel Zwemer was born to Dutch immigrant parents in Vriesland, Michigan on April. Samuel was the 13th of 15 children! The family’s extremely strong Christian home environment was testimony to the French Huguenot extraction of their forebears who had settled in Holland. Four of the five brothers entered the Christian ministry as pastors or missionaries. One sister, Nellie, spent 40 years as a missionary in Amoy, China. Samuel himself could not recall having any other ambition than being a Christian missionary.

Arab interest

After education in the Dutch immigrants’ Christian school, Zwemer went on to study theology and mission at New Brunswick College, New York. There he met James Cantine. Both men soon discovered that the Lord had given each a passionate interest in the Arab world and its Muslim peoples. From then on their unswerving purpose was to give their lives in this cause. With the blessing of the college’s head of Hebrew and Arabic studies, Dr. John Lansing, Zwemer and Cantine founded the Arabian Mission in about November 1888. Plans were laid for a new missionary work on the Arabian Peninsula and Zwemer made it his business to know everything there was to know about missions to Muslims. This included the pioneer work of the 13th century missionary, Raymond Lull, right through to the work of Canon Gairdner in
Cairo. Fired also by the example of Scottish missionary, James Falconer, who had died of fever in
Aden in May 1887, the initial objective was to establish a mission base in Aden. After stop-offs in Scotland to meet Falconer’s family and then in Beirut to hone their Arabic skills, this is where they found themselves in early 1891.

Permanent base

Zwemer undertook extensive surveys of the coastal areas as well as making a number of pioneering journeys inland seeking an appropriate location for the work. It was on the
Persian Gulf coast in Basra, southern Iraq, where the first real opportunity emerged for a permanent base. Leaving Cantine to operate from here, Zwemer spent a number of years in itinerant evangelism and exploration of the Arabian mainland before establishing a second base in
Bahrain. Mean-while Samuel’s brother Peter had arrived from the USA and established a third base at Muscat, Oman.Early on at Basra, the young men were asked (rashly it transpired!) if they would meet and escort to Baghdad two arrivals from Australia for another mission. One was a Miss Amy Wilkes. Samuel developed an immediate affection for her after being the cause of her dropping a laden tea tray at his feet on her first day ashore! To cut a long story short, on May Amy and Samuel were married in the British Consulate in Baghdad. Zwemer took Amy to Bahrain, their base for the next ten years.Zwemer used the time in Bahrain for further detailed study of Islam. Always striving to see the religion through the eyes of its best advocates, he read the Koran and its orthodox commentators, Beidawi and Zamakhshari in the original Arabic. This led to his first and probably most enduring book: The Moslem Doctrine of God.

In it, Zwemer highlights the fundamental differences between Muslim and biblical theologies. He noticed especially that Islam wholly underestimates both the holiness of God and the offensiveness of sin. Regarding divine holiness Zwemer comments that ‘everything put forward [in the Quran] concerning the unapproachable purity and holiness of him who is represented as thrice holy in the Bible could be applied to any re-spectable man’. On sin, he notes (quoting Melancthon’s introduction to a Latin translation of the book) that the Quran’s failure to diagnose the seriousness of sin, or offer any effective remedy for it, is sure evidence of the hand of Satan.This radical analysis of the theological inadequacies of Islam’s doctrines of God and of sin proved foundational to all Zwemer’s subsequent writings.

Return to USA

In March 1905 the family returned to the USA for what became a very extended furlough. Partly because of a serious eye complaint that almost ended his overseas service and also his denomination’s request for him to spend time in deputation work in the US and Europe, it was 1911 before they left again for Arabia. Yet this interlude saw the emergence both in Zwemer’s own heart, and in the minds of many missionary leaders, of a world-wide vision for mission to Muslims. It was actually en route back to the field that a call was made for him to join the Nile Mission Press in Cairo. The job enabled him to continue a certain amount of work with the Arabian Mission but his primary attention turned to literature production and a world-wide brief to promote missionary work among Muslims.This period was by far the most active in Zwemer’s life. The story is told in full in J. Christy Wilson’s official biography, Apostle to Islam: a biography of Samuel Marinus Zwemer. It involved travel to literally every country in the world with a significant Muslim population. As well as attending and often chairing missionary conferences on Islam for the next 20 years, Zwemer was also instrumental in the formation of many literary ventures as well as institutions for the support of mission to Islam. For example, towards the end of his ‘furlough’ in 1910, Samuel had founded the Moslem World journal. He edited this influential missionary paper until his death in 1952.

Fellowship of faith

Following his address to the 1915 Keswick Convention Zwemer was approached to join and lead a new missionary prayer initiative which became known as the Fellowship of Faith for the Muslims. FFM (UK) is still very active and held its most recent prayer convention in Swanwick in June. More books emerged, and foremost was The Muslim Christ which draws out the stark contrast between the emasculated portrayal in Islamic sources and the divine Messiah of the Bible. Despite his adversarial critique of Islam, Samuel invariably commanded respect from his opponents and would frequently attend lectures at Al Ahzar University in Cairo, questioning the professors closely. On one trip to South Africa he was instrumental in defusing tensions between Christians and Muslims simply by taking afternoon tea with the local Muslim leader and engaging him in animated conversation in Arabic. The whole incident was reported favourably in the press with the result that the Muslim community felt satisfied that due respect had now been shown to them.This long period of extraordinary, world-wide ministry eventually wore down even a man of Zwemer’s great energy. Having turned down a professorship at Princeton in 1918 Samuel responded positively when, ten years later, the offer was renewed. By this time (1928) he was 61 and he and Amy agreed that a period of greater stability would be useful to allow him time for more reflection and more books!Thus began his third major period of service, until 1938. Of this time his biographer states that Zwemer had the reputation of being a ‘conservative Calvinist’ but one whose sense of humour would invariably disarm his critics. For example, he once quipped that the Popes could never have introduced the doctrine of infallibility had they allowed themselves to marry!

The glory of God

More books did appear; indeed he was responsible for over 50 books in total, a good number available in London’s Evangelical Library. Thinking Missions with Christ was typical of his output in this period. It contains an enlightening section on missionary motives in which Zwemer considers, in turn, the plight of the lost, the ‘Great Commission’, and the constraint of Christ’s love. After noting the proper role of each of these, he comes to the conclusion that God’s own ultimate motive, His own glory, is the one that sustains all others. To Zwemer it was the view presented in Scripture of the essential glory of God that provides the ultimate raison d’etre for mission. As he puts it, this is the ‘only motive that can comprehend within the same eternal purpose both the great success attending Peter’s preaching at Pentecost and the stoning to death of a Stephen’. Noting the frequency of references to God’s glory in John 17 Zwemer draws attention to the context, namely the imminent crucifixion, and notes what it was that sustained the Lord Jesus in his ultimate ‘missionary’ act.In attempting to assess the significance of a man like Zwemer one could relate more of his missionary exploits, review more books or list the religious societies that emerged from his work. But if a person is best measured by their view of God then it is Zwemer’s exalted view of the holiness and glory of God and his radical view of the fallenness of man that hold one’s attention. His combination of a theologically incisive critique of Islam with deep personal compassion for individual Muslims is the true legacy of this great man of God.Note: For a similar perspective on Christian mission, see Eifion Evans’s recent piece in the BEC’s Foundations magazine (No. 48, Spring 2002): ‘Calvin’s Influence on missions

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Kuwait was a part of the various Arabian empires for thousands of years. Modern Kuwait was gradually formed during the course of the sixteenth century (AD). It was un-officially established in the eighteenth century (AD), after being recognized by some European navigators. The country was formed when several clans from different Middle Eastern tribes settled near the area now known as the “Kuwait Bay”. Tribes came mainly from Central Arabia (specifically the Al-Najd province), Northern Arabia and Persia. Today, Central Arabia mainly constitutes of Saudi Arabia, as Northern Arabia mainly constitutes of Syria and Iraq. Persia is now known as the Islamic Republic of Iran. However, some clans also came from other parts of the world including India, Lebanon and Egypt (just to name a few).

Current Rulers

The current rulers of the country (the Al-Sabah family) are descended from Sabah I, who was chosen by the community, which was composed mainly of traders. The duties of the rulers include administering the affairs of the State, including foreign affairs and taxation/duties. However, the ruler/Emir has little political role in modern governments due to the influence of State Prime ministers. The method of appointing a ruler in Kuwait was unlike most other Arab emirates of the Persian Gulf, where the rulers seized and maintained their authority by force.

The Al-Sabah family was chosen by the people of Kuwait. This process is known as “mubaya’a”, which means “to give one’s self” in Arabic. Before the Kuwaiti constitution was drafted, the Al-Sabah family ruled Kuwait in practice (de facto). Anyone else had the ability to be appointed as ruler of Kuwait, as long as the majority of citizens wanted him/her.

The area that is now Kuwait was occupied by tribes and used for spice trading from India. By the eighteenth century, most of the local people made a living selling pearls. But as pearl farming developed in Japan during the 1930s, the Kuwaiti market diminished.

In the Anglo-Ottoman Convention of 1913, the British concurred with the Ottoman Empire in defining Kuwait as an “autonomous caza” of the Ottoman Empire. The Sheikhs of Kuwait were no longer defined as independent leaders, but rather qaimmaqams (provincial sub-governors) of the Ottoman government. After World War I, the Ottoman Empire was financially crippled and the invading British forces declared Kuwait to be an “independent sheikhdom under British protectorate.”

The Oil Equation

Oil later transformed Kuwait into one of the richest countries in the Arab peninsula and in 1953 the country became the largest exporter of oil in the Persian Gulf. This massive growth attracted many immigrant labourers and foreign workers. Having amassed great wealth, Kuwait was the first of the Persian Gulf Arab states to declare independence, on June 19, 1961.

New Independence Day

Kuwait now celebrates Independence day on 25th. February since Sheikh Abdullah Al-Salem Al-Sabah liberated Kuwait during his period of ruling on this day.

This declaration was challenged by Iraq which claimed that Kuwait was an integral part of Iraqi territory. It threatened to invade Kuwait but was deterred by the British, who flew in troops.

Stock Market Crash

An important period in Kuwait’s political, social and economic development was the Souk Al-Manakh stock market crash of 1982. This was a major crash that had widespread consequences and has endured in the public memory even decades later.

The Iraq Invasion

After being allied with Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War until its end in 1988 (Kuwait paid Iraq to protect it from what it perceived as a threat posed by Iran), Kuwait was invaded and annexed by Iraq (under Saddam Hussein) on August 2, 1990. Hussein’s primary justifications included a charge that Kuwaiti territory was in fact an Iraqi province, and that annexation was retaliation for the “economic warfare” that Kuwait (with the help of the United States of America) had waged through slant drilling into oil supplies on Iraqi territories. Hussein deposed the monarchy after the annexation and installed a new Kuwaiti governor.

Authorized by the UN Security Council, an American-led coalition of thirty-four nations fought the Persian Gulf War to remove Saddam’s control from Kuwait. After six weeks of fierce fighting in early 1991, the coalition forced Iraq to withdraw its troops from Kuwait on February 26, 1991 (Liberation day of Kuwait ). During their retreat, the Iraqi armed forces exacted a scorched earth policy by setting fire to Kuwaiti oil wells. The fires took more than nine months to extinguish fully and the cost of repairs to the oil infrastructure exceeded $5.12 billion. Certain buildings and infrastructural facilities (including Kuwait International Airport) were also severely damaged during the war. Kuwait remains under the governance of the Emir, Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jabir Al-Sabah (since 29 January 2006) as an independent state and is of strategic importance to the United States.

Points of Prayers

1- The feeling of Betrayal : after the Betrayal of Iraq Kuwaitis were hurt deeply and they changed their attitude towards others. They almost expect betrayal and they feel that all the non Kuwaitis in Kuwait are there to steal their wealth and misuse them and their country. Pray that God will restore their good hearts and heal them.

2- Hearts Wall : Due to the invasion of Iraq, Kuwaitis do not believe that any one can love them. Pray that the wall that the devil built in their hearts be broken in order to be reached by the Love of the Lord.

3- Fatherless Children : During the invasion, the Iraqis raped many Kuwaiti women and girls. There is a huge generation of kids now aged 16 from this without fathers whose mothers were raped. Pray that their hearts will be healed to see the true Father, Jesus Christ.

4- Aggressiveness: the Kuwaitis become aggressive and angry, especially the youth and the 40’s generation. This attitude is supported by the sudden wealth. Pray that the Lord will soften their hearts and break the pride of wealth so they can be humble and reachable with the Gospel of Christ.

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