‘All Souls to the Polls’ engages churches to make voting fun and accessible

All Souls to the Polls

Contentious, high-stakes elections are nothing new to Darryl Warren Aaron or his members at Providence Baptist Church in Greensboro, N.C.

But there is a different feel surrounding the 2020 general election, said the pastor of the city’s oldest Black congregation. “It takes me back to when (President Barack) Obama ran the first time. There’s an energy. There’s a drive. It feels existential, as if people are recognizing that there’s power in the vote.”

In an effort to share that passion, Providence Baptist and other congregations in North Carolina and additional battleground states have partnered with civic and social justice groups to drive transportation-challenged voters to the polls during early voting periods and on Election Day.

And with guidance and funding from the New Moral Majority, food trucks are being parked at or near some voting sites to feed and encourage voters waiting in long lines, said Ryan Eller, co-founder and executive director of the progressive faith-based political action committee.

Darryl Warren Aaron

Ministers are being encouraged to serve as chaplains to encourage voters waiting in long lines, he said. “Hundreds of clergy are participating in that.”

 The overarching goal of the New Moral Majority’s “All Souls to the Polls” initiative is to help Americans connect the dots of faith and voter participation, Eller explained. “A food truck feeding people for free and giving out drinks and water to people standing in line communicates that people of faith can participate in democracy as a spiritual act.”

While long lines at polling sites are inspiring to see, they can cause some voters to abandon the process. Voter suppression efforts also keep some from voting. So it’s vital to make the experience as enjoyable as possible, he said.

“We want to create an uplifting atmosphere in which folks in long lines see groups of people having fun and good food and water … and listening to music. We are convinced that will help some folks to consider voting.”

The New Moral Majority is working with Baptist and other churches mainly in North Carolina because it is considered a key battleground state. But similar events also are being planned in Georgia and Pennsylvania, Eller said.

The effort stems from the organization’s wider mission to recapture the Christian faith coopted by conservative political and religious movements, he said. The network was founded in the spring, its publicity says, “to utilize this moment to change the moral narrative and try to reclaim Christian identity from the former Moral Majority, which was never moral and never a majority.”

“All Souls to the Polls,” Eller added, is designed to provide people of faith an opportunity to impact that discussion and “to be a public and moral witness in the world.”

Faith is the central motivation for Providence Baptist Church members who already have driven hundreds of people to voting stations and will continue doing so until polls close the night of Nov. 3, Aaron said. “Our faith teaches us that the church can never be closed off in the building.”

On Oct. 31, the last day of early voting in North Carolina, Providence will have a food truck stationed at a housing development from which its volunteers will transport voters to and from the polls.

Ryan M. Eller

“People of faith can participate in democracy as a spiritual act.”

Many of these residents have no other way to get there, he explained. “Some could take the bus but standing in line for three hours then catching a bus for three hours can become a deterrent.”

These and many others live in what Aaron called “opportunity deserts where there is not enough food, not enough transportation and not enough education.”

Taking these citizens to vote, therefore, is a way of living out the gospel, he believes. “We are forced to go out and assist those who are left behind. In this case, picking them up and taking them to the polls is acknowledging their condition.”

The process has been a success so far because many who would not have voted have — and will — cast ballots to create the improvements needed in their lives and communities.

“You can hear Dr. King in that wonderful speech in which he said give us the ballot and we’ll put people in leadership that have, as he said, ‘felt not only the tang of the human, but the glow of the divine.’”

France: Knife attack at church in Nice leaves three dead

French officials said an investigation was underway into a terrorist attack

Authorities are investigating a deadly knife attack in the French city of Nice as a terrorist incident. Following the third attack in two months attributed to Muslim extremists, France raised its alert level to urgent.

Evangelicals pray for peace after three were killed at a Catholic church in Nice, the third incident in recent months attributed to Muslim extremists.

What do we know about the attack?

• The attack took place Thursday morning at the Notre Dame Basilica in the heart of the Mediterranean city.
• Terrorism investigators said the suspect entered the church and waited a half-hour before cutting the throat of the custodian, then nearly decapitating an elderly woman and stabbing a third woman, who escaped the church and died at a nearby cafe. 
• The suspect was shot and seriously injured by police and is currently being medically treated in custody.
• Authorities said that the suspect is a 21-year-old Tunisian man named Brahim Aouissaoui, who recently entered France from Italy. He arrived in Nice by train.
• While being detained, the suspect began shouting "Allahu Akbar" (God is great)
• The attacker is believed to have acted alone.

French evangelicals are mourning along with the Catholic church and the rest of the nation after an attacker armed with a knife killed three people Thursday at a basilica in the Mediterranean city of Nice.

“Let us be peacemakers in a French society that lacks it. Pray for our fellow citizens, whatever their religion. Let us love our neighbors, as Jesus ordered us to do,” stated the National Council of Evangelicals of France (CNEF), citing Matthew 5:9.

Police in Nice have closed all places of worship in the city, and the evangelical group advised pastors across the country to heed government recommendations to heighten security due to the threat of further violence.

The incident at Notre Dame Basilica in Nice was the third attack in two months in France that authorities have attributed to Muslim extremists, including the beheading of a teacher.

It comes amid a growing furor over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad that were republished by the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo—renewing vociferous debate in France and the Muslim world over the depictions that Muslims consider offensive but are protected by French free speech laws.

Other confrontations and attacks were reported Thursday in the southern French city of Avignon and in the Saudi city of Jiddah, but it was not immediately clear if they were linked to the attack in Nice.

“He cried ‘Allah Akbar!’ over and over, even after he was injured,” said Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi, who told BFM television that two women and a man had died, two inside the church and a third who fled to a nearby bar but was mortally wounded. “The meaning of his gesture left no doubt.”

Christian leaders across France responded by crying out to God in prayer and calling for peace in their country. “May God console the hearts of bereaved families,” said Thierry Le Gall, a pastoral director with CNEF. “Let us pray for our nation, the forces of order and unite against barbarism, for freedom of religion and expression.”

The assailant in Nice was wounded by police and hospitalized after the killings at the basilica, less than a half-mile from the site in 2016 where another attacker plowed a truck into a Bastille Day crowd, killing dozens of people.

Shots punctuated the air and witnesses screamed as police stationed at the grandiose doors to the church appeared to fire at the attacker inside, according to videos obtained by the Associated Press. Hours later, AP reporters at the scene saw emergency vehicles and police tape lining the wide Notre Dame Avenue leading toward the plaza in front of the basilica. For a time after the attack, sounds of explosions could be heard as sappers exploded suspicious objects.

France’s anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office opened an investigation into the attack, the third one since a trial opened in September for people linked to the 2015 attacks at Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket by gunmen who claimed allegiance to the Islamic State group and al-Qaida. The trial is nearing its end, with a verdict planned for November 13, the fifth anniversary of another series of deadly Islamic State attacks in Paris.

The Protestant Federation of France stated, “Religious fanaticism is a scourge that we are all called to fight against and we call on the authorities to be extremely firm with regard to such terrorist acts.” The group called on Christians to stand together around gospel hope while recognizing the tragedy of the situation in France.

French Roman Catholic sites have been ferociously and repeatedly targeted by extremists in recent years, including the killing of Jaqcues Hamel, who had his throat slit while celebrating Mass in his Normandy church by Islamic militants and a plot to bomb Paris’s Notre Dame cathedral.

Those attacks were claimed by the Islamic State group, which also is believed to have recruited a man now on trial who plotted unsuccessfully to attack a church on the outskirts of Paris.

Moody Bible Institute promises investigation of abuse complaints

Students outside Moody Bible Institute

The review follows a student petition that claimed the Chicago school mishandled reports of sexual misconduct, abuse, and stalking

Moody Bible Institute in Chicago has promised a third-party investigation and other steps in response to a petition claiming the school mishandled complaints of sexual assault, harassment, and abuse for decades.

The petition, launched Oct. 16 on Change.org, has more than 3,100 signatures and several comments from MBI students and alumni. They claim that after they reported abuse or harassment, school leaders did not inform them of their rights, discouraged them from filing Title IX claims, or disciplined them. Title IX, a civil rights law, requires schools to investigate and respond to sexual misconduct.

Most of the petition complaints concern Timothy Arens, dean of students and Title IX decision-maker, and Rachel Puente, assistant dean of student life and part-time Title IX coordinator. School administrators said in a press release they have removed both employees from their disciplinary and Title IX roles. However, they continue to work at MBI. A school representative declined to discuss the student petition or comment further.

Arens has worked at MBI since 1984 and plans to retire next year. School President Mark Jobe and Provost Dwight Perry stressed during a chapel service on Oct. 20 that the school has not determined whether Arens or Puente did anything wrong.

“I would encourage you to abstain from judgment or conclusions,” Jobe said. “I’ve always known [Arens] to be a man of character.”

Anna Heyward, 2017 MBI alumna, wrote in an account accompanying the petition that in 2016 her then-boyfriend, an MBI graduate student and employee, coerced her into getting drunk and forced her to perform oral sex. He later raped her and hit her in the face, she said.

Heyward said that when she told Arens, he asked her what she had done to deserve being hit and told her if she repeated her story publicly she might not be allowed to graduate. She said Arens placed her on academic probation for violating student conduct rules against drinking and sex.

MBI’s Title IX policy says the school will not discipline students for conduct violations if they are not egregious and are disclosed as part of a good-faith report of sex-based misconduct.

Heyward said she lost a scholarship because of the academic probation. She claimed Arens forbade her from dating until she graduated and required her to email him regular updates about her behavior. Heyward said she also told Puente about being hit, and that Puente expressed sympathy but did not inform her of her rights to a Title IX investigation and university protection.

“To this day I don’t even know how a Title IX case is filed because I was never told the process,” Heyward told me.

Heyward began organizing the petition this summer after she mentioned her experience in a social media post and received comments and messages from students and alumni with similar stories. The petition includes 11 accounts in an accompanying online document. The dates of the incidents described in the accounts range from 1995 to 2019.

“I don’t think that Rachel Puente or Dean Arens are evil people,” Heyward said. “I think Dean Arens probably has done a lot of good things. Has he done good things in this part of his employment? I don’t think so.”

According to former students, Arens in yearly speeches invited female MBI students to view him as a father figure at school. Bethany Timm, an MBI student from 2014 to 2016, wrote that after a male student began stalking her on campus, she reported the matter to Arens. She said he did not inform her of her right to file a Title IX report and dismissed her safety concerns. Megan Wohlers, a 2019 graduate, wrote that Arens and the Title IX office directed her to sign a nondisclosure agreement and drop charges of sexual assault, stalking, and sexual harassment in exchange for the accused student agreeing to leave campus.

Attorney Adele Kimmel, director of Public Justice’s Students’ Civil Rights Project, said that if the stories are accurate, the school is “doing everything wrong.”

“If those things are true, then Dean Arens has no business handling student complaints,” Kimmel said. “It’s clear that if these allegations are true, that he approaches these in a biased way, based on sex stereotypes, and it’s hard to imagine any training that would rehabilitate him sufficiently to handle this.”

Kimmel said Title IX process violations like the ones reported in the petition are more common at small schools with insufficient Title IX training and only part-time coordinators. MBI’s policy requires Title IX personnel to receive 8-10 hours of training each year in addition to the trauma-informed response training the school provides yearly to all employees.

The petition asks MBI to include student and alumni voices in replacing Arens, to replace Puente and let students and alumni help choose a successor, to remove Title IX decision-makers with disciplinary powers, and to publish annually the number of Title IX complaints made and MBI’s response to them.

Heyward said she and eight others met on Oct. 22 with MBI leaders, including Jobe and Perry, who told them the petition demands were realistic. The school had previously announced it would allow students to give input in replacing Arens after his retirement, and Heyward said the leaders agreed during their meeting to include alumni as well.

The school said in a press release it was searching for an appropriate third-party firm to investigate the complaints in the petition, evaluate the school’s handling of the complaints, and review its Title IX practices. It also promised to integrate counseling into its Title IX processes and provide regular updates. Heyward said MBI has taken helpful first steps.

“My goal isn’t to burn [MBI] down,” Heyward said. “My goal is to make it a safer environment for future students.”

Today's Prayer Requests

We Are Praying With You

 "Now I urge you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me in your prayers to God for me." Romans 15:30 

Ross | Hi I would like to request that you keep me in your prayers I requested that you pray for me a week or so ago I’d appreciate it if you carry on praying for me to meet my life partner a beautiful loyal woman who makes me want to be my best version I ask that you add in the prayer that I have the confidence to take action when the time is right, I’m praying also thank you.

Migharo | Please join me in prayer that I should have peace and favour in my place of work. I pray for the fruit of the womb and for every woman who desires children in Jesus Christ name.

Jonathan Ugiagbe | Please I like you to join me in praying for God's guidance, protection, favour and wisdom in making decisions in my life endeavours in Jesus name, AMEN. From

John Ochola Gerald | Hello Dear the Lord fellows I need your help to pray for me and my family so that we get a House of our own we are tied of renting and transport so the we will be able to get in time to the church because we are leaving very fear from our church may thanks

Reuben | Hi everyone, please pray for me im in pain , im sick for almost a week,have high fever and flu. cant go to hospital coz i dont have money and dont have work since the covid pandemic started. just taking meds without prescription..please please pray for my fast recovery ,so i can find work , im scared.. i have a family that depends on me.. a wife and 4 children.. i thank God because of giving us goodneighbors whos always there to give food.. thank you

Joseva | Hi can you all pray for my mother and cousins who is really poorly sick back home in Fiji. Thanks

Roy Swapan | Dear Pastor, please pray for my wife, Chandana who is suffering from a stone in her right kidney, often suffering from Urinary Tract Infection. Pray, that Lord's miraculous power may crash the stone and it may come out without any problem. Also, a wicked family is trying to capture my land by force which I purchased on 2005. Dipali Das, the wife of Jiten Das, a wicked lady, along with her whole family are giving us much trouble everyday, throwing bad words at my family members and making dirty on the path which our grandfathers used since last 108 years, and often tried to beat us and threatening. Police is not helping us as one of their son is working in police department, and police is ignoring our petition. May the Lord His bring justice, and may His powerful hand subdue that family. Let the Lord attack that family and send them away from that land. Pray for Lord’s mighty angels will guard us and our land. I am claiming the the Lord to fulfill Jeremiah 17:18. Please join hand with me.

Georgia Johnson-daley | Good morning please for a break through on my life, pray for me to have good health I need some healing right now on my health please. Am in school and need some prayer on my education so I maybe successful. Prayer for my kids and my relatives. In the mighty name of Jesus Thank you. Thank you

Sarah | I asked for a prayer yesterday but I am asking again for a prayer to help me through my struggle right now. I ask for prayer for me to see that I will be happy, be loved and that I will make it through my time of worry and darkness. Thank you.

Mark | pray for me as I pray for you and your family have a blessed day.

Jo | Please can you pray about me for my family ,debt ,generation curse ,family members not having babies,marriage .Thank You

NOVIE JAMES LIGUE | GOOD MORNING SISTERS AND BROTHERS IN CHRIST. PLEASE PRAY FOR THE MINISTRY THAT GOD HAD ENTRUSTED WITH ME AS A YOUNG WORKER. BY HIS GRACE AND MERCY THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE WHO ACCEPTED HIM HAS GROWN IN NUMBER IN THE REMOTE AREA IN THE PHILIPPINES. WE HAVE DECIDED TO BUILD A PERMANENT WORSHIP PLACE TO CATER THE BAPTIZED BELIEVERS. PLEASE HELP US PRAY THAT WE CAN SUSTAIN BUILDING THE EDIFICE SINCE WE COULD HARDLY GENERATE SUFFICIENT FUNDINGS TO FINISH THE BUILDING WE HAD STARTED SINCE, WE ARE WORKING WITH THE MINORITY GROUP HERE IN THE REMOTE AREA OF DAVAO REGION. MAY OUR GOOD LORD GIVE US STRENGTH PHYSICALLY AND SO MUCH THE MORE SPIRITUALLY.

Samuel | I have a mass at neck since two years, doctor said need to examine mass. I'm so much worried about mass, I hope that is not be a tb mass or cancerous mass. plz pray for me to get free from the mass at neck.

Sarah | I'm asking for a prayer that my 41st year of life will be the best one. My birthday is October 7th. I have struggled with addiction and I am coming up on 4 years sober this January. I am dealing with some issues at the moment and need faith and strength to help me. Thank you.

Chris | I am asking prayer request for my wife, she is sick for long time i am asking that Holy spirit come and heal her in Jesus 

LP | Hi. My name is Lorena . I'm from Brazil and really apreciate your work, your devotionals are amazing, and the prayer's requests are giving me the chance to pray for others. Congrats. God Bless you and your team. Pray for Brazil and our president Jair Bolsonaro. Please. We are living a hard moment. The people can't respect the others opinions. Very sad, most youth living a promiscuous live. I am 29 years old and i'm scare about it.Thanks.

Laura | please pray for me, my husband and our furbabies. We are being attacked by the devil. Going through alot of bad things.

ST | Good morning I am requesting for some prayers on my life as I am going through some health issues, I pray for healing. I am in university and am asking for some prayer for success please I thank you in advance. Amen  

Stephanie | Pastor am asking prayer of healing over my body. Am going through some health issues, high blood pressure. Please I need your help. Pray for me

Keyason | DearPlease can you help me praying for orphans support for food and fees as well widows and church support as well visiting of church people to receive

Mary | I have a small dog her name is Selena she has a cough and acts like she wants to gag. Also I am sick the doctors said that I have acute bronchitis and my COPD is getting worse. Please pray for us. Thank you

Keolebojile | Good day my Pastor pray for me, is for 3 yrs invited for interviews but nothing come out of any of my interviews. I will be sitting for interview from tomorrow, I applied for many posts. My main problem I need a financial breakthrough it is hard.

cornelious mungwala | Bibles for Church Members

Keyavson | I would like to ask you help in praying for agent help Food for the orphans Shelter for the orphans this time of covid 19 Support for church Widows and old aged people

SH | Can you pray for me please am getting alot of time anxiety and pannick attacks.And sometimes a weird feeling in my throat i have been to doctor and they said its nothing,but still all this is happening to me. I also get chest pain and left arm pain and negative thoughts all the time.

Richard | Pray for my marriage. So that we keep believing in and trusting in Jesus.

SC | God should speak Peace in my country and continue to protect over Soldiers in Northeast Operation.

Matthew | Please am facing spiritual marriage. I have suffered a lot please help me

Vijay | Worried about debts heart squeezes plz pray for a financial miracle in my life immediately

Keyawson | for orphans support for food and fees as well widows and church support as well visiting of church people to receive words of God as well strength for us to reach more people.

If you have a prayer request, feel free to reach via the contact form or send an email: businessofchrist@gmail.com 

4 Benefits of Bible Trivia Questions in Youth Ministry

Benefits of Bible Trivia Questions

The aim of the bible trivia questions is to have fun and challenge participants to know, study, and apply the Word of God to their hearts and lives. Competition is a way to motivate members of a Bible study group. 

Group and team study immensely improve friendships, fellowship, discipleship, and accountability among members, the church, and the community in general. 

The Bible Trivia Questions in Youth ministry is not only competition focus but as good as the realistic, actual, and helpfulness in life ministry improvement that is the result of knowing and applying the Living Word of God.

“How can a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed according to Your word.” Psalm 119:9

“Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You.” Psalm 119:11

“Your word is a lamp to my feet, And a light to my path.” Psalm 119:105

 

When you join the different types of Bible Trivia Questions, it is the group and team sole wish that you at all times the center of attention should always be your personal relationship with Christ Jesus our Savior and heavenly Father our God. 

The prayer to God is that every participant in the Youth Bible Trivia Questions will know and experience the joy of a deep personal walk with Jesus Christ. This is an exceptional opportunity to help young individuals in discipleship and evangelism. 

Below are the 4 benefits

1. Bible Trivia Questions in Youth Ministry gives leaders a chance and opportunity to develop and improve close relationships with the young people in the church. 

This developed and improved relationship when encouraged and nurtured is essential to using aBible Trivia Questions group and the team as a ministry, rather than a mere form of

competition. The leader's impact and guidance could be tremendous as the leader models the Christian life before the group or team.

2. Bible Trivia Questions in Youth Ministry encourages and motivates young people to comprehensively study the Bible.

In today’s world of negative social influences, How many young people systematically and consistently have Bible study either as an individual or a group/team? Many do not, this is the reality. Bible Trivia Questions is used as a way of developing a consistent daily Bible study time that even allows an adult ( either a leader or a coach) to assess and evaluate the progress and growth in studying the Bible.

3. Bible Trivia Questions in Youth Ministry allows and enables an atmosphere for in-depth Bible study.

By studying the Word of God in this manner for a period of time, the Spirit of God has the opportunity to help persons with guidance to see the meaning of the passage in everyday lives. 

“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.” John 14:26

4. Bible Trivia Questions in Youth Ministry forces and encourage young people to work as a  group/team.

In the preparation meetings, youth are positioned or placed in spots or situations that urge complete teamwork. With this, they learn the importance of dependency upon God and each other.

“And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” Hebrews 10:24-25