The hatred for Christianity is being ratcheted up.  What we saw on a large scale in Norway has taken root and is increasing in America.  We see it in the hate-filled slander of Pastor Falwell upon his death.  We see it magnifying within the halls of our college campuses.  And we see it as we lift up the Name of Jesus in the streets of our cities all across America.   

The devil wants to shut us up by scaring us to death.  He is good at it – I know.  When I was in Norway last week I had this repeated dream of having my throat cut by a raging Islamic Muslim.  We were involved in a battle in Norway quite unlike anything I have ever experienced.  Norwegians hate God, hate America, hate George Bush, and therefore hated us.  We encapsulated everything they hate.  We were ambassadors for Christ lifting up his wonderful Gospel, showing the pictures of aborted babies, and making clear biblical distinctions (judgments) between right and wrong.

I was afraid, terribly afraid.  After three days of street ministry in Oslo, I was ready to quit.  I woke up from a fitful sleep on Saturday morning praying for rain so we wouldn’t have to go back into the streets, only to find bright sunshiny skies.  I felt like a tired boxer looking into the corner of my opponent hoping he would throw in the towel so I would not have to go another round.  I then prayed for God to make the butterflies in my stomach fly in formation.  Our team went out and we gave ‘em heaven as the Holy Spirit led us and spoke through us.  Don’t let the spirit of fear keep you from fulfilling your call to honor God!

This brand of manly Christianity shocked them.  It even shocked the Muslims who are used to sheepishly docile Christians who bow to their every wild assertion about Allah and Mohammed.  For them to hear from a human mouth that Islam is a lie, is a jaw dropping experience that strikes them dumb.  Needless to say, the battle over the Gospel of Christ in Norway was fierce.  We came with four signs of aborted babies – we left with none.  They were stolen or ripped out of our hands.  There were several tussles with wild-eyed feminists (these were by far the worst), raging anarchists (these were actually the most reasonable), violent Muslims (these were the most arrogant), and people with no purpose and nothing to live for (these were the vast majority).

Indeed, Jesus was correct when he said that it is hard for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.  Norway is the richest country per capita on the face of this earth.  The Norwegians discovered oil in the North Sea about thirty years ago and it has produced for them incredible wealth.  Yet they have nothing.  They are dead from the inside out. 

Norwegian women rule the home and the country - a sure recipe for disaster.  They are independent (no need for God), pro-choice, pro-homosexual, pro-any religion but Christianity.  Mostly however, they are sad and very angry.  Many Norwegian men go to other parts of the world to find wives because the women in Norway are too busy trying to be men.  Of course, when women rule, it is a very clear indication that men are not fulfilling their calling.  But how can one overcome this rebellion on the part of women, and sloth on the part of men, when there is no fear of God in the land.  Norway is godless!  It has no perceived need for the Gospel of Christ in the slightest.
Like most of Europe, Norway is a secular socialistic country that despises America because it perceives America to be an intolerant, imperialistic nation that wants to push the God of the Bible down the throat of everyone else.  You see, it is not America they hate, but the God that made America great, that they hate.  They simply don’t comprehend this truth, nor do they desire to.

What is most startling is the visceral hatred for God, visibly worked out as hatred towards America or George Bush.  It is demonic.  There is a spirit that has totally captivated these precious human beings created in God’s image.  They look for happiness but it eludes them.  They can’t buy it.  Education can’t discover it.  Technology can’t invent it.  Industry can’t fabricate it.  So they just go on in a sad, hopeless meandering believing in nothing but themselves and finding that, though they have everything – they really have nothing.  All they know is that they hate George Bush – we heard this over and over again.  Hate is what drives them.

How did Norway become so empty?  One only need look at the pitiful estate of the Norwegian Church.  As the Church goes, so goes the state.  The church is financed by the state and therefore run by the state.  It is Lutheran in name, but an abomination before Almighty God in truth.  Many church buildings have become restaurants or museums.  Few Norwegians attend church because there is nothing different from the church and from the world.  There is no power, no hope, and no point.  The Jesus of the Scripture is not allowed in!

The hope for Norway is the “Church in Exile.”  These are the men of God who have been thrown out of the State Church because of their love for Christ and are meeting in small congregations across the land.  These are the ones who invited us to their land to help bring the theology of the church house into the streets of Norway.  It is time for the Church of Jesus Christ to come out of the closet!