December 11, 2014

“Will These Hands Never Be Clean?” The CIA Torture Report and Futile Apologies

by Jesse Wheeler “Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.” – Lady Macbeth In response to the release of the Executive Summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s Torture Report (click to read in full), all I can say is […]
December 4, 2014

How ISIS Should Shape Our View of the Church and Its Mission Globally

By Martin Accad I’ve been blogging and speaking much about ISIS in recent months. Last July, as we were beginning to get to grips with the savagery of the group, I tried to call us all, as people who claim to love God, to face and fight our own demons […]
November 26, 2014

There Are Happy Stories, Too!

By Kathryn Kraft* I love a good story. Stories can make me laugh or cry, burn in anger or melt in love. I tell stories when I’m trying to make myself understood, and I understand other people so much better when they tell me stories. So I am always on […]
November 20, 2014

Middle East Consultation 2015 – Discipleship Today: Identity and Belonging in the Middle East & North Africa

15 – 19 June 2015 Beirut, Lebanon The Institute of Middle East Studies at the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary is pleased to announce 2015’s Middle East Consultation [MEC 2015]. Last year’s MEC was an enriching and edifying consultation that identified a number of significant challenges related to discipleship in the […]
November 13, 2014

Resisting ISIS! Beyond Secularism and Religious Fanaticism

by Martin Accad The Middle East is in turmoil! That’s a bit of an understatement. Are you feeling frustrated and helpless about it? This has been an ongoing feeling for me since ISIS (the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria) hit the headlines and invaded our private imaginations relentlessly through […]
November 6, 2014

Video: MRel Students Share about the Program’s Impact on their Ministries

The Master of Religion in Middle Eastern and North African Studies (MRel in MENA Studies) program is a unique and innovative multidisciplinary program of IMES based at the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary (ABTS) in Beirut, Lebanon. In the videos below, four MRel students living and ministering in the Middle East – […]
October 30, 2014

A Kingdom Reality-Check in the Middle East Crisis

Jesus was all about his kingdom. The first declaration of his public ministry was “Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand.” He communicated the nature of it in parable and story. His miracles demonstrated its authority over every sphere of life and he called his disciples to abandon […]
October 23, 2014

The Local Church: A Place of Compassion in the Syrian Crisis

By Rupen Das The Syrian conflict has now become a slow meat grinder with hundreds being killed every month, while families and communities across Syria are being systematically destroyed. There are no good guys in this conflict and there are no visible and viable solutions being considered. In the “fog […]