In recent years there has been widespread persecution of Christians. I had the privilege of moderating a symposium in Washington on the persecution of Christians in the Sudan and North Korea. Among the presenters were representatives of those who have themselves suffered terrible torture and persecution.

My heart just ached listening to the stories. Approximately 2.1 million people have died in Sudan, most of them simply because of their Christian faith. Their own government shoots them from helicopter gun ships and withholds food supplies so they have starved to death by the hundreds of thousands.

In North Korea, the treatment of Christians is so abominable that many have tried to escape by crossing the border into China. But the North Korean government has made an arrangement with the Chinese government to have Chinese soldiers capture the escaping Christians. They put wires through their noses and pull them back across the border into North Korea to be sentenced to a minimum of seven years in concentration camps where many of them die.

The Bible tells of a coming judgment day when God will judge everyone, both the living and the dead. God isn’t going to let the persecutors get away with their evil. On that day those who have died because of their faith in Jesus Christ will be rewarded by God and the persecutors will be punished. Every one of us will be held accountable for what we have done.