MOLOCH AND THE DEBT - As I looked at the four horned sacrificial alter where children were murdered to make the family "prosperous" I thought of the four gilded edges of the bonds issued by the US Treasury. At a rate of $1.2 million per minute our government borrows money which our children and grandchildren will have to pay back "someday." At the same time children are being aborted for the sake of family prosperity, the government is borrowing money it expects today's children to pay back in the future. Killing those who we assume will pay back our loans for us does not sound like smart economic policy. The last five Administrations, both Democrat and Republican, have raised the national debt from less than $1 trillion to over $13 trillion. Barack Obama, in just his first year in office, accounted for $3 trillion. Who pays the bill, kids that will never be born?

AN UNCHANGING P.A. - On our second night in Samaria a Messianic Jewish friend and I sat in a car outside a Palestinian village waiting for a believer to sneak out of the village to join us. He came for prayer because this Sunday the Palestinian Authority will formally charge him with leaving Islam unless he denies his faith in Jesus. If charged, he will be jailed. He was told by Palestinian policemen that he would be convicted of something, even other criminal offenses, unless he returned to Islam. He sat in our car crying as he told us that he had told his wife not to wait for his return. I have met other Palestinian believers in the past who were hung by their arms from the walls of Palestinian jails for weeks to force them to denounce the Lord. Note: Palestinian police can be paid to ignore the order of a judge, but in this believer's case he was told "no exceptions," (meaning no bribes would work). Please pray for this young man. After we prayed for him we watched him walk back to his village to face certain imprisonment for publicly proclaiming Christ.

This is the government of "President Abbas," the man trusted by Barack Obama, the man to whom Obama just recently gave $400 million dollars to support police and other activities. The Palestinian Muslim community is as corrupt as ever. Since taking over authority over parts of the West Bank from Israel, the corruption has gotten worse and the persecution of Christians has just continued.

AFGHAN CRACKDOWN ON CHRISTIANS - Just before leaving for the Middle East, I received a call from a representative of an aid group that works in Afghanistan. He was seeking help because of my connections to congressmen and Senators on Capitol Hill. The contact told me of a new crackdown on Christians and Christian aid groups in Afghanistan promoted by President Karzai. I already knew that the Norwegian Church Aid (NCA) and the U.S. based Church World Service (CWS) had been accused of "proselytism" which under the Afghan constitution that the US approved under President Bush, carries the death penalty. Individual Christians and church groups are also being purged by the Afghan government. While news of these events has appeared in the European and even Asian press, there has been virtually no mention in the American media.