Pope Francis called on the world to give tangible help to persecuted Christians on Monday, highlighting the plight of people he described as modern “martyrs” after nearly 150 people were killed by Islamist militants in Kenya.

The Bible App by YouVersion recorded a 248 percent increase in Easter story reading in countries around the world this week. The U.S., South Africa, Brazil, Great Britain and South Korea were the top five countries reading the Bible during Holy Week. The countries that experienced the largest growth in readership from Easter 2014 to Easter 2015 included South Sudan, Lithuania, Palestine and Niger.

Dr. David Cooper, senior pastor of Mount Paran Central and a member of the International Executive Council, has written, How to Live Spiritually in the 21st Century, in conjunction with the Church of God Division of Education.

Sevierville, TN — Members from the Valley Station Church of God in Louisville, Kentucky recently visited Smoky Mountain Children’s Home bearing a most unique gift—a five-gallon galvanized bucket full of pennies, approximately twenty nine thousand (29,000), worth two hundred ninety dollars ($290).

NBC-TV’s Sunday night launch of the new series ‘A.D. The Bible Continues’ is “just the latest in a long line of movie and television productions about Jesus Christ going back 118 years,” says Christian media scholar Dr. Ted Baehr, founder and publisher of Movieguide®: The Family Guide to Movies and Entertainment.

Every two years, North Coast Church shuts down services for the weekend to go out into the community and show God’s love by being the hands and feet of Jesus. The 2015 Weekend of Service will take place April 25-26 with 10,000 volunteers. The goal is to complete over 400 site improvement projects worth more than $2 million in billable labor and materials across Vista, Oceanside, Carlsbad/La Costa, San Marcos, Escondido and Fallbrook.

Interest in Aramaic has soared over the past decade, notably after the release of Mel Gibson’s blockbuster movie The Passion of The Christ, which was filmed in Aramaic and brought Aramaic to the attention of an international Christian audience.

Clark Beckham had already enrolled in grad school at Lee University and was set to be the student director of Lee’s Campus Choir when he auditioned for “American Idol” in Nashville last summer.

First Baptist Church (FBC) in Marshalltown IA, along with 17 other area churches is about to embark on something big… something that quite possibly has never been done before.