Breaking Christian News on The Gospel Herald

U.S. first lady, Melania Trump, opened up Donald Trump's Saturday campaign-style rally near Orlando by reading The Lord's Prayer.

Country music star Tim Graw's latest single "Humble and Kind" is prompting Christians to revisit the same, simple heartfelt instructions shared in a 19th century Methodist magazine.

A Richland, Wash., florist who, due to her religious beliefs, refused to provide services for a same-sex wedding was found to have broken the state's antidiscrimination law.

Veteran gospel singer-songwriter CeCe Winans said the role of religion is not "as big as it should be" in America's climate.

Mark Driscoll, pastor of Trinity Church in Scottsdale, Ariz., highlighted the spiritual roots of Valentine's Day, disapproving of modern observations, in a Wednesday blog post.

Singer and 2007 American Idol winner Jordin Sparks shared her Christian testimony today at Rock Church in San Diego, Calif.

For 75,000 "queen and king" teens with special needs, the annual Tim Tebow Foundation "Night to Shine" prom was the place to be Friday evening, across 375 host churches in 50 states, 11 countries and six continents. Making it even better in Haiti and in Jacksonville, Fla. was that Christian athlete and former Florida Gator quarterback Tim Tebow attended those events to add his personal, special blessings.

Wednesday night on The Late Show, host Stephen Colbert and his guest, actor and comedian Ricky Gervais, proved it's possible to have a civil, yet robust, discussion about different viewpoints regarding religion. Colbert, a devout Catholic, started off by asking Gervais, an outspoken atheist, "Why is there something instead of nothing? Why does the universe exist at all?"

President Donald Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and a few family members prayed with Judge Neil Gorsuch before his nomination this week to the nation's highest court, along with Maureen Scalia, and Fr. Paul Scalia, the wife and son of the deceased conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Gorsuch attends an Episcopal church and cited his faith in his nomination speech.

Church choirs sang, a half-dozen religious leaders prayed and Donald Trump, as U.S. presidents before him, mentioned God in his inauguration speech. "There should be no fear. We are protected and we will always be protected. We will be protected by the great men and women of our military and law enforcement. And most importantly, we will be protected by God," he said.

A group of Christian leaders prayed over the doorway through which U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will walk at the Capitol Building for Friday's inauguration. They reportedly asked for direction, leadership, protection and blessings for the incoming Trump Administration.

Christian ministers went to Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to appeal to Congressional members about Comcast Corporation's recent actions to decrease or cease distribution of The Word Network, the largest African-American religious network in the world that was reaching 3 billion people around the globe. On Nov. 11, 2016, Comcast executives sent a two-sentence letter to The Word Network, stating it will no longer offer the channel to millions of subscribers on 456 Comcast systems.

Fuller Theological Seminary received a new $50,000 grant from the Henry Luce Foundation to assist evangelical communities in fostering peaceful, respectful engagement with Muslims neighbors. Fuller is the largest multi-denominational seminary in the world.

Rev. John Schlicher said he lay on the ground praying, thinking he and his family would die at the hands of a gunman who killed five people around him in Florida at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on Jan. 6. "Even in the midst of evil, there was peace - a peace I can only attribute to God," the United Methodist pastor said, his voice shaking.

According to Pastor Doug Logan, author of On the Block: Developing a Biblical Picture for Missional Engagement, far too many Christians today don't have a proper picture of missional engagement; they are unsure of how to truly step out of their comfort zones, enter their local communities, and share the Gospel with cultural sensitivity.

One of the most generous 2016 Christmas gifts bestowed actually started by church members donating one dollar at a time! A Coral Springs church in Margate, Fla., surprised a mother of two children with a new car after she thought her 1992 vehicle was being towed. Church by the Glades in Coral Springs staffers and members executed a convincing prank on one of its members, Nicole Rollins, as she watched her car being pulled away.

David Grisham, an evangelical street preacher from Anchorage, Alaska, decided to inform a line full of unsuspecting children at a mall in Texas they were being lied to about Santa Claus. "Kids, I want to tell you today that there is no such thing as Santa Claus," Grisham told people waiting in line for Christmas photos at the Westgate Mall in Amarillo, Tex. "Santa Claus does not exist. The Christmas season is about Jesus."

Christmas day for this year will be celebrated on Sunday. This leads to some of the churches asking whether they would hold services for December 25 since most of the people will celebrate Christmas with their families. Most of them, however, were looking into adjusting the services schedules to make up for the celebration of Christmas.

Air Force Academy Falcon's football tight end coach Steed Lobotzke's tweets involve promoting Christianity. Because the tweets were sent on a Twitter account that identifies Lobotzke as being with the academy's football program, Mikey Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation is strenuously objecting to the coach's lack of separation of church and state, and wants accountability to be established.

Tennessee wildfires caused a lot of destruction, but one Dollywood employee who was cleaning up debris at the theme park discovered a burnt but surviving page of the Bible that he said left him speechless. Isaac McCord said a torn piece of paper, charred around the edges, caught his eye. It was a page from the Book of Joel from the King James Bible, a part of which references how a fire would devour the wilderness.

Not only did Sundance Head revive a cherished and soulful country song called "Me and Jesus" on Tuesday evening's singing competition of NBC's The Voice, he created an ambiance like being at a religious revival. The Texas singer also made it to the No. 2 spot on iTunes at the time of this writing. Americans are voting for their favorite singers on the show, with eliminations happening each week toward The Top 10.

Protestant churches in Germany have decided to stop any attempt to convert the Jews to the Christian faith and abandon their “Mission to the Jews.”

Evangelist Franklin Graham visited Myanmar and spoke at the Love Joy Peace Festival, held from Nov. 18 to 20, which drew a crowd of more than 50,000 people at the Myanmar Convention Center in Yangon.

"The only explanation for everything God has done at NCC over the past 20 years is five words that Jesus declared 2,000 years ago - I will build my church," declared Mark Batterson, lead pastor of National Community Church in Washington, D.C., as congregants celebrate two decades of existence this year. NCC, referred to as "the theater church, is one creative church in eight unique locations in the DC metro area; it started from three people on the first Sunday service in 1996 to now a large group of Christians who supported 34 mission trips this year.

Because the Nov. 8, 2016, election is the most important of our lifetime, Franklin Graham, president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and of Samaritan's Purse, an international Christian relief organization said, "We need to pray, and we need to vote." To that end, he hosted a live stream prayer Monday evening on Facebook.