Missions Feed

Ibis Gardens

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 06:12:00 -0800

Ibis Gardens is where we finish out the 4040 program. We arrive on Monday and leave on Friday with a lot of information and the beginning of processing our experiences during 4040. During the morning we have administrative talks from our strategy leadership and Logistical leadership. Then the participants learn how to use a language learning program called PILAT. After lunch the participants are free except for the one day they have their debriefing time with leadership and member care. The kids are still with their teachers but they are not doing school work during their stay at Ibis. They play games and get to enjoy the pool.
By the way, if you have been following this journey through 40/40 I have gone back and added a few pics. along the way if you would like to go back from the beginning to make sure you see it all.

horses that were on the property

Wade Coker

David Hooten

Sky and Daniel come each time and teach PILAT to all of the participants.

Sky and Daniel

Pool time for the kids!

On the last night we have a program. The children sang a song and told a fable.

All of the staff sang and danced to the front.

Hannah and Sky

Homestays-Life for 3 days in the Village

Suzie Rodgers — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 10:24:00 -0800

During the homestay the participants are able to experience first hand what it is like to live in a village. To also experience some of the hardships that Africans do even if for just a few days. Most arrive at Ibis Gardens during the debriefing time and say that these 3 days were their favorite out of the whole program. They have the opportunity to put into practice all that they have learned over the last month.

Zoe and Levi helped wash clothes.

Robyn washing dishes at her homestay.

Nate is so tall he had to make sure he ducked before going in and out of his hut for the weekend.

Nate

Nate and Lindsey were not alone in their hut. They had a chicken staying in their hut. Although it looks like she is just sitting there, she is actually doing something very important. She is sitting on her eggs. She also enjoyed eating the spiders and bugs that came into their hut. Of course, Nate and Lindsey didn't mind that at all.

Women in the village go to the well many times throughout the day so that they can have enough water for bathing, cooking, drinking, and washing clothes. Sandra is doing her part to help out with drawing the water as well.

Very good Rachel!

Daisy Chipanga with Amber teaching her how to shell the corn off the cob.

There is a lot of hard work to be done in the village. These women are pounding ground nuts. Many of our participants were able to try this over the weekend.

This is an outdoor oven they use for baking bread and scones(muffins).

Lane with his new friends for the weekend.

Tyler with his host family.

The pic. above and below is where the Vines stayed.

Preparation for Homestay

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 23:51:00 -0800

This past Friday all the participants packed up enough clothes for 3 days, mattresses, mosquito nets, and some food to give as a gift and headed out for their homestay. For those 3 days they have been living with a Zambian family in a village. They have eaten their food, worked in their fields, helped wash clothes, cooked, and whatever else their host family did, they also joined in. Most often this is participants favorite part of 4040 because they have the opportunity to learn up close as they live together for a few days. Monday morning they will have to say good-bye and head back to camp. They will then board a bus and head west back through Lusaka and on past about another hour to a place called Ibis Gardens. It is here that they will finish out the 4040 program. Please continue to pray for them all this week as they process this whole experience.

Lindsey and Nate

Sandra, Rachel, Kym, Lindsey, and Amber

Levi waiting for his host family to come and pick them up.

Zoe laid up on top of their stuff too.

Mark, Melynda, and Madylanne heading out to their homestay.

Truitt and Cindy walking with their hosts for the weekend.

The Lowes are now all packed up and ready to go.

This is where the Turners stayed.

Daily living at camp

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 09:29:00 -0800

While at bush camp the participants still go out on their DFA's and there is some time spent each day in debriefing. Most days they are finished around 4:00pm and have a couple of hours of free time before dinner. Some play games, walk, chat or take showers. Here are some more random pics. that were taken at camp.

On our last night at camp before the homestays Kenny, Nate, and Alan decided to build a huge bonfire for the evening entertainment. This is not even the finished product. This will go down in 4040 history as the biggest bonfire! They did have a couple of buckets of water ready in case it got out of control. We roasted marshmellows and sang songs. It was a fun evening.

This is where our family stayed at camp. Kevin and I were in the tent to the left and Hannah stayed in the tent to the right.

This is a pic. of the scorpion I caught outside our tent. Yes, I said I did this. I bet some of you are thinking I'm not as prissy as you thought I was.

Most days we did not need to heat our kettles of water for a shower. However, after a late afternoon rain it cooled off quite a bit to where a cold shower would just not work.

This is where the women took their showers each day. We would go and pump our water into our buckets and kettles. Lower the bucket in the shower and pour our water in. Then hoist the bucket back up and tie it down. Then we were all ready to take a shower.

On our last night we let all of our staff go first through the line to get their food.

We had all of our staff come in on the last night and different ones of us stood up and gave words of appreciation to them. They sang us several different songs too. They are a very talented group and we are so thankful for all of them. We also gave them a small gift. In this pic. they are singing and dancing out of the dining hall.

Tyler with his nanny Jane.

A couple of afternoons were spent learning some practical things to help them as they live in Africa. The women learned how to cook several different things.

They even learned how to cook with no electricity by using a charcoal oven.

The men learned how to tie several different knots. They also learned about car maintenance. Truitt is practicing his knot tying in this pic.

Mark and Alan

During breaks or at night many would play games. This is Amber playing cards.

Matilda, Mwaka, and Estnart making some nshima for themselves.

After several days of having their DFA's in the boma the participants shifted to the nearby villages to do their assignments. The mode of transportation was their own two feet. Above is Kenny and Leslie as they head out from camp.

Amber and Rachel going out.

Amber, Kym, and Rachel hanging out in front of their tent.

Afternoon in the village

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 04:40:00 -0800

While we were in Lusaka the kids went to visit an urban Zambian home. Then while in the bush we take the kids to a village so they can see the differences in the two. This particular village is very big and the picture above just shows a portion of it. Amai Mwanza meets us at our van and then takes us to her house where she puts out a reed mat on the ground and asks us to sit. She then goes around and greets us all and shakes our hands. She allows us to see inside her one room hut. The kids each take turns taking off their shoes at the door and preceding inside to have a look. Amai Mwanza then takes us on a walk around the village. We stop and greet everyone we come upon. We also see lots of animals while we are walking-pigs, goats, cows, and chickens. This field trip helps the kids to know about village life so that during their homestay they will know what to expect.

Every time we go to this village the headman has not been at home. However, this time he was at home and invited us all in to sit and talk. As you can see from this picture we accumulated lots of other kids which followed us around. They were all invited in to his home. We introduced ourselves and told where we were serving. He asked us what was our reason for coming and one of the children told him, "to tell others about Jesus." He also taught the kids what the job of the headman was. As we were leaving we asked him if we could take a picture with him and he agreed. He is to the right of Kym. His name is Abambo Zulu and he is in his eighties. This was a real honor for us to be able to meet the headman of this village.

walking through the village

This is the mother of one of our camp staff. She was very happy we had come to visit her. She sang and danced for us after she had greeted us. She then taught us how to play a game that they play. It was like what we call Hop Scotch.

Several of the kids took a try. This is Hannah taking her turn.

In this village there is one place that the women go to pump their water. Many will go to this place at least 4-5 times a day to pump enough water for their family. As we passed by the pump there were several needing water so our kids took turns pumping it for them. Zoe, who just turned 5 even pumped some.

two of our little followers

Kym has been helping us with the school for several sessions. She has become the expert pig catcher.

Mk's go to the farm

Suzie Rodgers — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 05:20:00 -0800

One morning we went to a local farm which was close to our camp. The kids enjoyed seeing pigs, chickens, ducks, guinee fowl, rabbits, and goats. They especially liked the ones they could hold.

Corrine

Taylor loving on a baby rabbit.

Hannah

Seth holding a baby chick.

You can't see the big mama pig in this pic. but she was huge! These baby pigs were two months old.

The boys gave the goats a good workout by chasing them around.

The kids got to see a grinding meal. They saw how the Zambians would bring their maize and then have it ground into mealie meal which is their staple food. They use this to make nshima.

Taylor and Seth touching the mealie meal after it had been ground.

Visiting the Market

Suzie Rodgers — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 04:33:00 -0800

One of our field trips for the kids is to take them to the market in the boma(small rural town). We observe at this market and then buy a coke and a frita. A frita is like a donut that isn't so sweet. On a hot day a nice cold drink hits the spot. The recipe for a frita is below.

All the kids sitting out in front of some shops enjoying their coke and frita.

Hannah, Zoe, and Seth

While walking through the market the kids saw some men shelling nshawa(peanuts) so they stopped to help and try a few.

Johanna and Lane

Corrine, Kym, and Taylor

Recipe for Fritas:

2 cups flour
2 Tblsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1 egg
1 tsp. baking powder
1 cup warm milk or water
Mix together for 5 min. Drop by rounded spoonfuls into hot oil until brown. Zambians eat them plain but we sometimes will add as a topping powdered sugar, cinn. sugar, or choc.

Bush Camp

Suzie Rodgers — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 14:11:00 -0800

Bush camp is about 5 hours from Lusaka in the small rural town of Petauke. We arrived Nov. 3rd to a camp that was already set up. We found our tents and settled in. We learned our way around, had a short session, pumped water for showers, ate, and then went to sleep. It had been a long day! The bus ride that should have only taken about 5 hours ended up taking 8!

The guys playing 42.

Our Camp

While at camp the last couple of weeks the rains started. With the coming of the rains also comes some african critters such as bugs, spiders, scorpions, and snakes. I'm not sure how many snakes and scorpions were killed all together but it has got to be a record high for 40/40. This pic. above is a blue headed lizard. We saw lots of these. I think they are right pretty in their own unique way.

Tim pretending to eat a scorpion.

The women learned how to cook some new recipes.

On one of our first DFA's the men went to visit the chief. The women had a tea for the chief's wife and the District Commissioner. The DC is in the cream colored dress and the chiefs wife is two to the left of the DC. We had a great time getting to know them and learning about their different roles.

Tobias doing his school work.

Hannah doing her math.

Each morning Tim N. led us in worship before we went to our small groups. He did an excellent job. A few of our mornings our Zambian helpers led us in some Zambian choruses.

Amanda and Rachel baking some cookies for our tea.

Tobias pushing Levi during school.

On the days the participants were doing their DFA's in the boma, they rode in the back of a truck.

David checking his email, even out in the bush! Amazing!

What is the meaning of ethnocentric?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 06:08:00 -0800

Jesus was constantly trying to overcome prejudice. He was trying to help his group of twelve disciples realize that this world was not all about them (as individuals or as a group). The Jews had started thinking of themselves as God's favorites and possibly even his instruments of wrath as they awaited a Messiah to help them overthrow the Roman empire so that they could rule the world. Jesus talked about a different kind of kingdom where people loved their enemies, where there was no Jew or Gentile, where everyone was invited to the banquet, and where the peacemakers were blessed. He was trying to provide a completely different paradigm and worldview by which to live. Have we learned anything from his teachings?

Jesus, the "friend of sinners", enjoyed hanging out with people of many different ethnicities, social status, etc. He was trying to get his followers prepared for when he would tell them to go to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth. We are going to have to get past an us/them mentality if we are going to see this kingdom established that Jesus envisioned because it includes people from every people, tribe, class, education level, socio-economic status, and people group. What do you think needs to happen to see a whole kingdom of people from every nation on earth loving God and loving others?

Youth Leaders’ Meeting Downtown

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 19:12:22 -0800

Once a month there is a city-wide youth leaders meeting downtown in a bookstore. Youth workers from all over the city come to be trained and encouraged.

I had the opportunity to speak to the group Saturday morning, and the topic I chose to talk about was “The Key to Leadership Success.” We talked about being a servant, using Mark 10:35-45. I am convinced that leadership doesn’t depend much on abilities, training, connections, or even your position. It depends on your attitude of service. If you are willing to be a servant, you will be a great leader.

I hope to have challenged the youth workers who were at the event. I know it’s something that has been hitting me lately.

I had a great time meeting new friends and seeing some older friends, too.

Midnight Chase in China

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:00:00 -0800

Here's a (slightly edited) update from our good friend Denny Green, sharing some of his experiences during the last 10 days of travel and Gospel seed-sewing: Please continue to pray for Gabriel and I as we distribute Gospel literature in northwestern China. Most days include many hours of bus rides and not much sleep. Much literature is going out so pray for those who read it. All has been going well. Two nights ago, Gabriel and I were [distributing tracts in] lots of dark alleys in an area with much housing. After we had worked for approx. 2 hours, we walked toward the end of one of the alleys and a man and woman turned into the end that we were heading toward. We turned around and headed in the opposite direction. The couple followed us out to the main street. We crossed the street and [the man] began to yell at us. We ignored and after a while crossed to the other side again. They followed. We jumped in

November 2009 Ministry Update

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 09:34:23 -0800

Today is the start of the Youth Ministry International annual board meeting. They asked us to make a quick video updating about out ministry. I thought I would post it here for all to see.

It’s got an interview with one of our graduates and one of our current students. Check out what God is doing in Latin America!

If you want to download the video to show in your church or small group, here’s the download link.

If you would like to help support our ministry in Latin America, check out this page to see how you can help us financially. Also, you can support our family and ministry doing normal things you do all the time.

Ben’s First Haircut

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 18:13:21 -0800

We took Ben to get his first haircut yesterday. He was really good, and he looks so different now. Here’s the video.

On our way

Suzie Rodgers — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:04:00 -0800

Bright and early tomorrow morning everyone will board a big bus and head east of Lusaka to a small rural town called Petauke. It will take about 5 hours to get there. We will spend the afternoon unpacking and settling in to bush camp. We will be in Petauke until Nov. 16th, then we will travel to Ibis Gardens to finish out the 40/40 program. We have had a few get sick the last couple of days with a little tummy bug. It seems to be a one day sickness. Please pray for all the participants, staff, and helpers to stay healthy and that this bug will not continue to spread throughout the group. Pray for good travel tomorrow. Pray that God would continue to teach us all amazing things about Him and his people that we have come to minister to.

Trick or Treating in Mexico

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:43:39 -0800

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to go trick or treating in Mexico? Well, here’s our experience from last night.

We waited as usual until our first batch of trick or treaters arrive so we could go out. Then we gave them candy and joined with them to go around to the rest of the houses in the neighborhood. It’s one of the only chances we have to get to know our neighbors during the year, even if we have to go out even after the boys’ bedtime.

The kids go around and sing a song that they usually don’t really know. Sometimes it seems that costumes are optional. The most popular costume is probably witches. For boys, dracula or pirates are fairly common. Our kids went as super heroes.

Unfortunately, the candy we got isn’t the wonderful chocolaty candy that we love like Snickers and M&Ms. Some of it is covered in chili power, and the most popular candy option was lollipops.

Overall, though, our kids had fun and we got to meet some neighbors.

When You Need a Laugh

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 18:27:02 -0800

The boys love hamming it up for the camera. Anytime I need to smile, I can watch this video and I can’t help but laugh out loud. What do you think?

We titled it, “When the kids hijack the Macbook.”

What happens when the kids hijack the macbook on 12seconds.tv

Adventure City

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 12:45:00 -0800

Sat. we were able to take the mk's to the water park. The water was a bit cold but it didn't stop the kids from having fun. I'm sure they all slept well that night after going up and down the steps so many times to go down the slides. We had to leave a little earlier than we expected because it got so crowded.

Heather, Hannah, Hadassah, Lane, and Corrine
making a train down the slide.

Heather

Corrine

Levi, Madylanne, and Taylor having their lunch.

Can you see any of our kids? Neither could we, so we decided it was time to go around 2:00.

Tobias going down the big slide face first!

Taylor and Madylanne

Levi and Taylor(below) in Jungle Monkeys, an indoor playground.

Seth

Tobias jumping off the rock into the water.

Kym with Seth and Zoe

Day of the Dead in Mexico

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 06:28:30 -0800

A few days ago a friend of mine in the USA asked me about the day of the dead here in Mexico. I have written extensively on this before and recorded some stuff. Here are some links for you to check out if you’re interested in knowing more about the Celebration of the Day of the Dead in Mexico.

(original post - Dia de los Muertos 2007)

(Original Post: Day of the Dead in Mexico City)

Some stuff I’ve written about my observations of the Day of the Dead:
Day of the Dead
The Day of the Dead and the Catholic Church

Some past Pictures of the Day of the Dead:

Click a thumbnail to see larger version

Pumpkin Carving 2009

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:55:26 -0700

I made this quick little video on the Animoto app on my iPhone. We had a great time carving pumpkins and eating their seeds.

What Isn't Being Done for the Lost

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:00:00 -0700

What Isn't Being Done for the Lost by Christians in the West That is the question I want to try and answer in the next few paragraphs. My goal is to encourage you to examine yourself to see if there is not something more that love for God and your fellow man would constrain you to do in regards to reaching the lost around the world. 1. We are not becoming "all things to all men, that [we] may by all means save some". There are innumerable opportunities throughout the world, from London to Lhasa, for Christians to work and live and share the Gospel. There are opportunities for almost every kind of entreprenuer imaginable, and for every profession under heaven. But we rarely take advantage of these opportunities. Here in Asia's Highlands, for instance, there are hundreds of completely unreached towns and cities where it would be easy for a foreigner to come in and start up some kind of business. But it just isn't happening. The opportunity is UNDENIABLY the

Day 2 of Prayer for the National Youth Ministry Conference

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:17:57 -0700

We are praying for 30 days for specific prayer requests for our National Youth Workers Conference that takes place in November. Here’s day 2’s video prayer request. Will you join us? Check out out Facebook group for more prayer requests.

Random Pics.

Suzie Rodgers — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:38:00 -0700

Well, we are 9 days into 4040 and so far all is well. People are healthy, happy, and have great attitudes even in all of this heat. Here are just some random pics. that have been taken over the last several days. Enjoy!

Alan, Nate, Kenny, Jeff, Brent, and Micah

Corrine and Hannah

Me, Hannah, and Hadassah practicing our multiplication.

Tyler practicing his new steps.

Today we had a group come and sing for us. They were so good and it was a lot of fun!

After we eat, we each wash our own dishes. There is usually a line but I got to it at the end so it is just Kevin in line this time.

At each meal we get our plates and go through the line to get our food. We are always greeted by the happy faces of our kitchen staff. Here Brent is helping Taylor get her food.

David shared with all the participants today about T4T(Training for Trainers).

Today the participants learned Creation to Christ which is sharing the gospel by telling stories from Gen. up through Jesus. They were able to practice with their partners. In this pic. Kenny is practicing with Steve.

Hannah, Seth, Hadassah, and Heather on the monkey bars at the seminary.

Zoe

Riding on a minibus can be an adventure. Here are some of our participants and helpers as they are about to head out.

Each day the participants go out to do their daily field assignments with a Zambian helper. They have to walk a little ways before catching a minibus.

Mary is working with our two year olds. She has 3 of them-Levi, Madylanne, and Taylor. On this day they were outside singing. They sure have precious voices.

Tyler and his nanny Jane.

Jane was pulling Tyler around the block in the wagon and somehow they picked up another passenger. Aren't they cute??

Kym with Heather and Lane during school.

Corrine doing her school work.

Tobias and Levi

Zoe doing her school work.

Madylanne

Progress…

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 19:16:24 -0700

Remember that back in August we posted this picture of Nathan at school. He wouldn’t participate in anything and was having a rough time.

Well, there has been a lot of progress at school in the last few weeks. Here’s a video from yesterday’s open house.

His progress report also said…

In your language, you have very good grammar and vocabulary! Congratulations! But it is important to congratulate you, applaude you, and recognize that the progress you have had in Spanish is incredible! You are structuring and pronouncing words very well and you are now starting to take an interest in putting together phrases to communicate with others! Big congratulations!

I am so proud of my little guy. He is doing excellent and learning something new everyday.

There’s another video here: Nathan’s Preschool

Home Visit

Suzie Rodgers — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 04:04:00 -0700

Yesterday the older group of mk's went to visit in the home of a Zambian friend of ours , Abambo Mbewe. He has allowed other groups from 4040 to come before and again agreed to host this group. The mk's were able to see what a town home might look like, eat some local food, hear African stories and riddles, play African games, and learn some tricks. We are so thankful for the hospitality of Abambo Mbewe and his family. The kids learned a lot and had fun too!

Mbewe teaching a trick using string.

Hannah and Heather eating some of their local food. Yum!

Here, the children are learning a game.

Here is the whole group of mk's with Abambo Mbewe, his wife, and youngest daughter.

Market in Lusaka

Suzie Rodgers — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 04:04:00 -0700

During school this week the kids have been learning how to bargain at the market. So today they got to put their bargaining skills to the test at a real market. They got some good deals. Perhaps they will be able to help their parents later.

Zoe, Hadassah, and Hannah

Heather, Kym, and Corrine

One Month of Prayer

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:53:14 -0700

I just sent this message to The Poulette Family in Mexico, our family Facebook group. Since many of you who read this blog aren’t in that group, I thought I’d post it here, too. Will you pray with us this month?

Hi everyone. We hope you’re doing great. I just wanted to write to ask you go pray with us for a gigantic Youth Ministry Conference we are having on November 27-28. That’s in ONE MONTH!!! We’re expecting 300 or more youth workers and leaders from all over Mexico to come for this training conference.

We’re going to be posting something everyday asking you to pray for specific things. Would you commit to praying everyday this month for the conference?

If so, please go here: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=8515608890&ref=ts and write on our wall, letting us know you’ll be praying for the National Youth Ministry Conference. Thanks!!

Thanks! We appreciate it and look forward to what God is going to do at the National Youth Ministry Conference in Mexico.

What does the number 150 have to do with missions?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 07:56:00 -0700

Seth Godin recently wrote a post about Dunbar's number being the law. The "theory" is that a human can only handle 150 meaningful relationships. Obviously, you can have a lot more acquaintances than that as many of us have several hundred friends on facebook. But the truth is that we can't physically, psychologically, or emotionally handle more than 150 significant friendships. Now, this causes a problem for the missionary because it is such a relational line of work and we need real friends to accomplish our task and not just twitter followers.

Think about how many personal friendships someone on the mission field needs to keep up with:
1) Supporters: The book Friend Raising basically teaches us that raising support is a relational activity. We're not just asking for money, we're looking for partners that can be a significant part of the work and that means intentional relationships with people back home including our family, home church, financial supporters, prayer partners, etc.
2) Co-workers: Most missionaries have a network of people in their organization (both home and field staff) and peers from other agencies that they stay in touch with. In order to have a strong team, it's essential to spend a significant amount of time building trust, praying, talking strategy, etc.
3) The Church: Christians must be plugged into some local body of believers. The church is to be a community of people living life together while focused on Christ rather than a one day per week event which takes time and being intentional. Many church planters also spend significant time discipling and raising up the national leaders. Truly investing in people's lives takes time and a church truly living out community takes effort.
4) The lost: Most Christians end up having only Christian friends because their 150 quota gets filled very quickly with church activities (small groups, awanas, softball team, choir, etc.) leaving little room for significant relationships with non-believers. Missionaries should have a room in their network for several folks that don't know Christ.

These are just some very broad strokes and I'm sure that there are many other categories as well. How can missionaries manage their time and relationships better to see all peoples on earth reached with the Gospel of Christ? Is it even possible for a missionary to juggle the many relationships that are required for successful ministry? Any ideas on simplifying

Crocodile Farm Fun!

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 06:49:00 -0700

While the grown ups are out doing their daily field assignments or in class the children are in a school program. They bring their own school work for math and language arts and then we do science, bible study, and african studies and cultural learning each day. We also have several field trips planned throughout the month. In one way or another they are all educational, cultural, and fun. Sat. we had planned to take the mk's to a water park but when we got there it was just way too crowded because of it being a Zambian holiday so we changed our minds and went to the Crocodile Farm instead. The children got to learn about some different species of snakes in Africa and see crocodiles and learn about them. We enjoyed a sandwich for lunch and then the kids went swimming for the afternoon. I have heard from several parents that their kids sure did sleep well last night. Here are some pics. for you to enjoy.

Some of the kids were not happy to just see the python they also wanted to touch it and hold it.
This is Seth having his turn.

Lane is holding it around his neck but then Tobias is helping Levi touch it. The little ones all thought these snakes felt slimmy. I tend to agree!

I just had to get a pic. of Hannah holding it because as many times as we have been to the croc. farm she has never had a desire to hold this snake or any other one. She had it on her neck as long as it took me to take the pic. and then she wanted it off.

This man was our tour guide who took us around and explained about the snakes and crocs.

Madylane and Taylor touched this little harmless brown house snake.

Here are some of the medium size crocs.

We couldn't find the bigger turtles this time but we were able to take turns holding one of the smaller ones.

Here are some of the smaller crocs.

Johanna and Taylor

left to right: Hannah, Hadassah, Corinne, Zoe, and Kym

There are a lot of the larger crocs. at this farm. Here is one of them. I liked this pic. because his mouth was open.

Heather was so kind to help Zoe so she could go down the slide too.

Hadassah

Kym and Taylor

Madylanne

Taylor all wrapped up trying to get warm after swimming.

40/40

Suzie Rodgers — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 13:21:00 -0700

This past Thurs. we began another session of 40/40. It is a much smaller group than last time so it has a bit of a different feel to it. So far, everything is going well and we are enjoying this new group of participants. We have even been blessed with some unusually cool evenings for which we are very thankful for during this hot season. I will try to update regularly like I usually do but the internet where we are staying is not good. Please continue to pray for us all throughout this next month. If you look over in the side bar you can click on the one that says month long prayer guide for 4040 and it will tell you some specific prayer requests for the month.

Tyler playing out on the reed mat.

Judah playing ball with his nanny Betty.

School work is a part of every week day for the mk's.

Zoe with her little stuffed animal.

Today was the participants first day to have their pouch groups or small group bible studies. They start the day off with a few songs and then go to small group. This was also the first day they went out with their Zambian helper into Lusaka just to observe people and their surroundings. After lunch they sit in a class room setting and hear from other Zambians about African culture.

What does worship have to do with missions?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 13:44:00 -0700

John Piper writes in Let the Nations be glad that worship is both the fuel and goal of missions. What does that mean? Well, worship fuels missions because missions is essentially bringing God ultimate glory by seeing all tribes, tongues, people, and nations worshiping Him. If you remember the famous passage in Isaiah 6 where he says "Here I am, send me", the context is God in heaven being worshiped by angels. So, as we worship more we have more of a burden for those that don't know God or as Louie Giglio states, "as we get lost in wonder, we can't help but wonder about the lost". So, as we worship (attribute worth to) God, we realize that he really does deserve all praise which in turn makes us desire to proclaim his fame to the 1.7 billion people who have never heard His name.

The fact that worship is also the goal is missions is very intriguing. I love missions! I enjoy talking about strategy, networking, partnerships, contextualization, cross-cultural communication, etc. However, missions is a rather temporal thing in comparison to worship and Jesus Christ who is eternal. Once we go to heaven, evangelism, discipleship, church planting, ministry, missions, etc. will be a thing of the past. So, let's fix our eyes on Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith. Let's run the race in such a way as to get the prize (Christ). Let's do ministry with joy and excellence, but with the understanding that it is really small in comparison to God. Worship is the fuel and the goal of missions!

Dry and dusty

Suzie Rodgers — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 01:07:00 -0700

"O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water."

Psalm 63:1

As we were driving home from church a few weeks ago on one stretch of road there were a whole herd of cows coming straight for us. As we passed they moved over just so we could pass by. It was so dry and dusty on that day. The dust on our windows was incredible, it kept piling up and getting higher and higher. As I pondered this hotness and dryness I began to think how much our hearts can become like this dry land if we are not careful to stay fresh in God's Word daily. We need to also spend time in prayer and fellowship with other believers. When we were in church that day it was obvious the church had not been clean or swept out in at least 3-4 weeks. There were cobwebs in the grass roof, dust on the mud benches and the floor seemed to just be sand although there was a solid mud floor. This is very uncommon. Many churches take pride in making sure their church building is clean for Sunday. Either the women will come the day before or that morning before church begins. How did this happen? Little by little they began to neglect the church building. Just like us, little by little, we can begin to neglect the things that God wants us to do and before long we can find that our hearts are like this dry and dusty land. Pray for Zambians to cling to what they know as Truth and steer clear of things that are not. How is your heart today? Pray for Christians everywhere to get out of the desert in their lives and be among the poplar trees by flowing streams.

"For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants. They will spring up like grass in a meadow, like poplar trees by flowing streams." Isaiah 44:3-4

Faith Like Potatoes

Suzie Rodgers — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 08:25:00 -0700

We watched the movie Faith Like Potatoes last night and we really enjoyed it. It is based on a true story too. It is a must see movie especially if you live in Southern Central Africa. It starts off in Zambia and then the family moves to South Africa. We were truely challenged by this mans faith and brought to tears as we saw God answer what seemed to be impossible prayers. There is a description below.

"A farmer moves his family to South Africa and suffers a series of seemingly insurmountable losses. Through unlikely friendships and much needed divine intervention, he discovers his life's true purpose and it sustains his unwavering belief in the power of faith. A moving life journey of a man who, like his potatoes, grows his faith, unseen until the harvest."

On a Journey

Suzie Rodgers — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 07:52:00 -0700

Yesterday was my last day to teach at Kamilulu Baptist Church. I taught from Luke 4:1-13 on the temptation of Jesus. Jesus would quote scripture whenever Satan would try to tempt him. As Christians we need to do the same. I gave them little cards I made with some temptations listed and then some possible verses they could memorize to help them when they felt attacked. It was kind of sad to leave these women that I have grown so close to over the last several months. Pray for these women as they try to live in the light among dark surroundings that they would be strong in the Lord.
Something I have read recently and really liked said, "Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle!" On my way home I encountered several different people all on a different journey. Here are a few of their stories....
An older women in my bible study asked if she could have a ride to Chongwe so she could get on a bus to head towards Lusaka because her granddaughter had just had a baby girl and she wanted to go see her great granddaughter and help bring her home to the village. This woman was on a good journey.
Another woman in bible study asked if she could also ride because she was going to Lusaka as well to visit her brother in hopes that he would provide her with some money to buy fertilizer to use in her crops this year. He may have it and then he may not. She thinks her success in her fields depends on whether she gets this fertilizer or not so this is a very important journey for this woman. To her it could mean her family eating or starving for this year.
As we drove through one area my phone rang and it was a friend of mine that had seen me pass by. I turned the truck around and went back to visit with her for a few min. She was very upset because thieves had broke into her house the night before and stollen several items that were very important to her. The biggest thing they stole was her bike. See, this is one of the women that helped us that time we handed out the "Buckets of Love." She works with the home based care team there in that area and she uses her bike to go around and visit her patients. She had come to this little town which was closest to her village in case the thieves came to try to sell the bike. She was very upset so I prayed for her and tried to encourage her. She didn't ask for anything but I gave her a couple of dollars so she could get back home and gave her a bottle of water. This woman was on a journey of desperation and hope.
As we continued on we stopped to buy two bags of malasha or charcoal. As I was getting it put in the back of the truck a man came running up with a baby on his hip asking for a lift to town because he, his wife, and two little kids had just gotten word that their oldest daughter who was 18 had just died. They didn't know what happened they just knew they needed to get there. This man and his family were on a journey through the valley of the shadow of death.
As missionaries we have people come to us all the time asking for help of some kind. It is something we struggle with because we can't possibly help everyone. In fact, it can be so overwhelming at times. However, even if we have to say no we can do it in a kind way. As I was able to help several different people yesterday I thought about how our attitudes should be. Sometimes I have to admit that I get irritated that so many need so much and I just can't help everyone. It helps me to remember that each person is fighting some kind of battle and even if I have to say no I can still do it in kindness and at least point them to the one who can help them. We are all on a journey of some sort and along the way good things will happen but there will also be times that are difficult. So remember as you encounter others: "Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle!"

Mvula (rain)!

Suzie Rodgers — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 02:43:00 -0700

Sunday afternoon I stepped outside and noticed it was quite cloudy and the wind was picking up a bit. I went out to my husbands office to tell him I thought it might rain. Then almost as soon as I had said that we heard some drops on the tin roof. We came out to our back porch and watched the rain pour for about 15 min. It was so beautiful! This is our first rain we have seen since last March. Even though it was short, it cooled things down for a little while and cleared away a lot of dust. Please pray that the rainy season this year would be good so that all the farmers(which is almost every Zambian) would have good crops of maize. They depend on this one crop to feed and provide for them for the whole year. If the rain is too much or too little their crops can be ruined. Pray that the rain will be just right!

A Widow's Gift

Suzie Rodgers — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 04:56:00 -0700

Sitting across from the temple treasury, He watched how the crowd dropped money into the treasury. Many rich people were putting in large sums. And a poor widow came and dropped in two tiny coins worth very little. Summoning His disciples, He said to them, "I assure you: This poor widow has put in more than all those giving to the temple treasury. For they all gave out of their surplus, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she possessed-all she had to live on." Mark 12:41-44

This was the lesson I was supposed to teach yesterday at Kamilulu Baptist Church. However, there was a big associational meeting for all the churches in that area that will last for several days. I had all ready planned on going with two of my friends, Amai Mwachamota and Amai Chipboa. This lesson didn't really go with their theme and I was busy this week and just didn't have time to prepare anything new so I decided to just go and be a part of the group and listen to my friends teach. They taught a group of about 50 women on the importance of prayer, bible study, and witnessing. It was a very hot day but so rewarding to see so many familiar faces that I have been teaching over the last several months. As we were walking out to leave we were singing and dancing. The women brought me a live chicken and a 2 liter container of Monkoyo(a drink that they make). As we were driving home Amai Mwachamota told me she had put something in my bible so don't be surprised when I see it. When I dropped them off back in Chongwe I let them split the chicken and the drink. Actually, they split the drink and then Amai Chipboa took the chicken and promised to bring some baby chicks later to give to Amai Mwachamota. I told them that I wanted them to have those gifts because they are the ones that did the work, I had just sat. These women are so precious to me because they are both widows. I have known them now for 12 years and they have become very good friends. They never ask for anything which is quite uncommon here. They are so involved in women's ministry and people far and wide have a great deal of respect for them. Of course, they both struggle to make it day in and day out but God always provides for them. We made a plan to meet again next Thurs. As I go to my last womens meeting I will drop them off about 10 miles out of town where they will go survey the land where they will plant their groundnuts. I think it is sweet that they are such good friends and that they plant their crops together. They look out for each other. Anyway, I dropped them off and reached home at 5:30pm after being gone for 9 hours. I was tired, hot, and thirsty. As I got out of the car I decided to look at whatever she had put in my Bible. I began to cry as I saw that she had put K163,000 in between the pages of my Bible. That is about $35.00! The average income of most Zambians is about $50.00/month. This was an incredible gift for her to give me! Some might question why she did this but I know that God was speaking to me through this event. Something happened over the last several days that we had not told anyone. Through this gift God was showing me that He is in control and He will provide for all of our needs. Now, why he chose to use Amai Mwachamota I'm not sure, except that it certainly got my attention. Praise God! He is Soooooo Good!

8 Objections to Becoming a Missionary

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:00:00 -0700

One of my desires with this blog is (by the grace of God) to encourage others to become missionaries and take the Gospel to the unreached people of the world. The following article, written by John Piper in 2005, could help answer an objection that you or someone you know might have at some time offered to God as an excuse for not answering the call to be a missionary. Please read prayerfully: Answers to Objections to Going into Missions What I Said at Missions in the Main Hall By John Piper November 3, 2005 When I spoke at Missions in the Main Hall Sunday night, I tried to give a biblical response to possible obstacles that are in the way for some people that may keep them from moving forward toward missions. My prayer is that God would use these responses to call more of you to go. Here are eight objections and a biblical response. 1. "I am not smart enough." "Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age?

A Scrunch comes to visit

Suzie Rodgers — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 00:41:00 -0700

Monday and Tuesday of this week we kept Tyler while Kenny and Leslie went away for a little R&R. It was fun to have a baby in the house again. Of course it has been a long time since we had our own little one but everything just seems to come back to you on what to do. Hannah had fun learning how to change a diaper, feeding him, and she even put him down for his nap one time. She is such a little mama.

This is Tyler loving on his stuffed turtle.

Hannah feeding him.

It is so hot here so in the afternoons he got to go for a little dip in the backyard.

He really liked splashing!

Tyler loved to touch the water as I poured it from the cup.

We went for a walk.

Tyler sitting in the rocker looking at books right before bed.

Yesterday was a busy day-a baby, school, cooking, a party, and company. We made a cake and had a party for Hannah's friend, Dorcas, who was turning 9.

Dorcas' brother Mapalo eating/wearing his cake.

Carrol, Dorcas, Deborah, and Hannah

Then last night our good friends the Helgrens came for Mexican food. We enjoyed spending time with them and hearing all the exciting things going on in their ministries. We especially enjoy their precious children. This is Lily and Easton sitting with me.

The kids were shooting us and then we would fall out playing dead. Then they would give us kisses to make us get up. I got lots of kisses! Here is Easton shooting his Uncle Kevin.

Exegetical Fallacies (Bible-Study Blunders)

Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:00:00 -0700

I recently read a very helpful book called "Exegetical Fallacies" by New Testament professor, author, and Bible commentator D.A. Carson. If you aren't sure what the word "exegetical" even means, it is simply "an explanation or critical interpretation of a text", especially in regards to the Bible. So the title "Exegetical Fallacies" refers to the many ways that the Bible is commonly mis-interpreted by theologians, scholars, pastors, and Bible-teachers. This is a book that was first published in 1983 (the same year I was born!). The edition that I read, however, was the 2nd edition, published in 1996 by Baker Books. I found the book rather randomly while browsing a friend's household library last month. He said I could borrow it and I am glad I did. Many of the fallacies (mistakes) detailed in the book in regards to interpreting scripture are simple ones that almost all of us have made out of sheer ignorance and the sim

Changed Lives

Suzie Rodgers — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 02:31:00 -0700

Thursday I went to teach my ladies and for whatever reasons there were only 4 that showed up. We waited for quite a while for others to come but it just wasn't meant to be. As we were waiting we enjoyed talking about culture and language. I always enjoy learning about their culture. I told the story of the early church from Acts 2:37-48 and then we discussed it. Although this all went well, the best part of the day was when I reached home. Hannah came running out to meet me and began telling me about her bible study. A couple of days after she prayed to receive Christ she decided on her own that she was going to do a bible study with her little friends. So every afternoon after they eat lunch they come together and she tells them a bible story, they color a picture, and then they pray. Hannah was amazed that her friends didn't really know how to pray. They could thank God for their food but they said they didn't know to pray any other way. We taught our kids how to pray the moment they began speaking but evidently it is different here. Hannah has been trying to teach them the Lord's Prayer and how just to talk to God like they talk to each other. It is so exciting for me to see the changes in her just over the last couple of weeks. Pray for Hannah as she teaches her friends and as she grows in her relationship with Christ.

Going South

Suzie Rodgers — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 11:23:00 -0700

Here are a few pics. of our last few days. There is a small synopsis at the bottom.

We were celebrating Emily(7) and Taylors(8) birthdays.

These bathing beauties are Emily, Evie, Taylor,and Hannah.

Here are a few pics. of a beautiful peacock that was perched on our upstairs porch. They sure are pretty to look at but not pretty to hear at 3:00am and then again around 4:00am. When they cry out they sound like a child yelling help.

These are termite hills. Aren't they huge? There was one stretch of road where they were on both sides for a long way.

For the last 5 days we visited the Southern Province of Zambia. We started with our friends the Wilcoxes in Gwembe. We were able to go to church with them on Sun. and visit with them in their home for two days before traveling further south to Sinazongwe. Our friends the Langstons had invited us to come and help celebrate their two girls birthdays along with the Wilcoxes and the Smiths(friends from Kaoma). We had a cookout and the kids got to swim. It was fun seeing a different part of Zambia and learning more about the Tonga people. The men all went out fishing one afternoon but it was too windy to catch anything.

A Person that God Uses

Suzie Rodgers — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 03:24:00 -0700

After sharing the story of Daniel and the Lions Den we discussed what kind of person God uses by looking at Daniel as our example. Daniel was all of these things below and so should we be a:
1-Person of prayer
2-Person of praise
3-Obeys the word at all cost
4-Offers life to God daily
5-Fears God more than man
6-Seeks to multiply themselves by training others
It seems like in the past as I have taught this lesson the ones I always get questions about is #3, 4, and 5. Today was no different. It is exciting to hear these women ask me questions about deep cultural things because I know if they are asking me than they trust me. Zambians don't always share personal things or deep cultural things with outsiders. So when they do it makes you feel like you belong and are a part of them. All of the above require sacrifice but especially 3-5. It takes sacrifice to obey the Word of God when your mother comes and puts a charm on your baby and you know it is wrong. It takes sacrifice to offer your life to God daily and then when your husband beats you or your neighbor comes to accuse you of something and they slap you to continue to trust God. It takes sacrifice to fear God more than the chief or headman when they control your land and can take it away so fast if you go against them.
Please pray for these women as they continue to grow in their relationship with Christ that they too would be women that God can use. Pray that God would help them to make these sacrifices joyfully and that God would bless them for it.

October is coming!

Suzie Rodgers — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 07:34:00 -0700

For most of you who read this blog Oct. brings cooler temperatures. Leaves begin to change colors and the beauty of fall surrounds you. Here in Zambia it is quite different. October is our hottest month and it is very dry so everywhere you look things look brown. We have just recently started getting council water(from Chongwe) so we are able to water our grass. You can see that it isn't a big spread but hey, it is better than it was before-nothing. Today it is 92 degrees in the shade, by Oct. it will be up at 100 degrees or more(in the shade). The other day I went outside and our turtle was sitting right under the sprinkler cooling off. As I took the pic. she started walking away. I couldn't help but smile because come October I may be sitting under the sprinkler myself!

Sign up for your local Perspectives class

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 07:13:00 -0700

We have found that one of the most powerful missions mobilization tools is the Perspectives on the World Christian Movement course. They are offered online and all over the U.S. A number of our missionary training school students have shared during their testimonies that the Perspectives class was instrumental in whetting their appetite for getting involved with long-term missions. I highly encourage everyone to take this course or to host one if it is not offered in your area. The course can also be used for college credit. Let us know if you have any other highly effective tools for getting people involved in praying, giving, going, and mobilizing others to get involved with the unreached people groups of the earth.

Robbed by KLM!

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:00:00 -0700

(Update: Jose & his wife & son have arrived safely in China. They didn't run out of money before arriving, and they seem to be in good spirits, so thank you for those that prayed for them!) I just received an e-mail from our good friends and partners in ministry, Jose and Eloisa Mendez. They wrote from the airport in Amsterdam to tell me that they are almost broke after having to use up most of their cash to pay $821 USD for a one-way INFANT ticket for their 2 month old baby boy for their return flight from Mexico City to Shanghai. They evidently argued with the agents about the ridiculously high price for an INFANT IN LAP for a long time, but to no avail. They finally paid because they were about to miss their flight. (This pic is of me teaching Jose (on the right) how 2 swim in a Tibetan river during the Summer of 08) They arrive in Shanghai on Saturday evening at about 10 pm CST and might not even have enough cash to buy train tickets to

Reasonable Faith

John Fraser — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 07:58:00 -0700

Tonight I begin leading a small group here in Houghton, NY, called "Reasonable Faith". The name is taken from the book by William Lane Craig of the same title. Dr. Craig also has an apologetics website, www.reasonablefaith.org. I'm looking forward to a good discussion about many interesting topics related to apologetics, some of which I've already covered in previous blog entries. To kick things off, I wanted to bring an old post out from the archives titled, "What evidence were you expecting, anyways?" I'm hoping this will lead to some discussion here on the blog, but if not, at least I'll be talking about it tonight with my small group!

The atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell was famously asked what he would say if after he died he found himself standing before the God in whose existence he did not believe, and God asked him, “why didn’t you believe in me?” Russell’s reply was, “not enough evidence, God, not enough evidence!”

I was having a blog debate with an atheist not long ago. The atheist said, “after centuries of theism and all of the searching we’ve done without finding any evidence, I think we’re justified in discarding religion and moving on.”

In my response, I conceded that we can be justified in disbelieving the existence of some entity E if we expect certain kinds of evidence in the case of E’s existence, and after thorough investigation that evidence does not turn up. I then asked the atheist what evidence he was expecting to find in the case of God’s existence which had not turned up.

Being the good sport that I am, I offered a couple of suggestion for him to consider while formulating his answer. For starters, I said, if God existed we might expect to find that the universe had a beginning rather than finding that the universe had always existed. Hey, wait a minute. According to a considerable amount of evidence that cosmologists have discovered, the universe did have a beginning. That’s pretty interesting when you think about it, since according to the First Law of Thermodynamics (also known as the Law of Conservation), matter can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed into energy (and vice-versa). So if there is no God, we might well expect that the universe had always existed. In fact, that was the dominant view among cosmologists in the early part of the 20th century before the Big Bang theory became widely accepted.

Another bit of evidence that we might anticipate if God existed is evidence of design in the structure of the universe itself (as opposed to it being a haphazard jumble). Again, the evidence for design based on the fine-tuning of the universe for life is extremely well documented. The structure of the universe both in terms of the values of the fundamental constants of physics and the initial conditions at the very first moment of the universe’s existence had to be within a staggeringly small range in order for life to exist. Even the skeptic Fred Hoyle was so impressed by this cosmic fine-tuning that he remarked that it appeared that a superintellect had monkeyed with the physics, as well as with chemistry and biology. He further commented that the numbers were so overwhelming “as to put this conclusion almost beyond question.” Since Hoyle wrote that statement, the list of “anthropic coincidences” (those values that are necessary for a life-sustaining universe) has continued to grow longer.

My atheist interlocutor never did answer the question as to what evidence he expected to find in the case of God’s existence that hadn’t turned up. That seemed a little odd to me. If you’re going to conclude that there is no evidence for something, I think you should have some idea of what evidence you might expect. I wonder what Bertrand Russell would have said in answer to that question. Maybe after he died he did say to God “not enough evidence!”, I don’t know. If so, I can imagine God saying in response, “what evidence were you expecting, anyways?”

Have you ever handed out a tract?

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 17:00:00 -0700

(I first posted this a year ago, but I think it is still a relevant and helpful blog. I encourage you to re-read it if you have time, along with the comments that have been made.) I think that most Christians look at least somewhat unfavorably at the practice of handing out Gospel tracts as a means of sharing the Gospel. I am not entirely sure why this is the case. Maybe its because we are told so often in our culture not to impose anything on anybody. Maybe its because of a belief that a tract could somehow do "more harm than good". Another complaint I have heard about Gospel tracts is that they are so "impersonal" and do not allow for the Spirit to guide us in a divine appointment encounter with a lost person. Honestly, I do not think that any of the three complaints I have just mentioned stand up to scrutiny. Let me try to show why I think this: First, how hypocritical can our culture be when it tries to censor us Christians from sharing our

Does hell really exist?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 07:56:00 -0700

The church had a reputation for awhile of running around waving Bibles in the air telling everyone that they're going to hell. Jesus spent a lot of time talking about love, healing the sick, helping the poor, etc. so an overemphasis on hell and basically boiling down the Gospel to "say this simple prayer and you won't have to burn forever" was pretty simplistic. For that reason, I think there was a big pendulum swing in the last decade or so and now hell is rarely mentioned in churches anymore (with a few exceptions that still like the Bible-bashing paradigm). I think there are several reasons that hell isn't being talked about in church anymore:

1) Hell isn't very PC. In a pluralistic world where everyone is allowed to define truth, hell isn't something that people want to have as a part of their reality. So, if we choose to believe that hell doesn't exist, then it must not. Even branches of the emerging church and other groups are saying that hell was just figurative language that Jesus used to show how strongly he wanted us to live good lives here on earth. Mentioning hell is pretty offensive and Christians have been so abusive in the past that we have tried to correct the problem by doing everything that we can not offend. There must be a balance somewhere.

2) There has been a lot of emphasis in the body of Christ on the kingdom of God and everything being about His glory. This has been a very positive shift as historically there has been way to much emphasis on man in the church. Unfortunately, in swinging the pendulum away from a man-centered gospel to a completely God-centered message, there isn't much of a need to talk about hell because God has got it all under control and we don't need to worry about who is and isn't going to end up there. There must be a happy medium in there somewhere between God being completely in control while also not wanting anyone to perish.

3) This is the big one - IF hell exists, the conversations with my friends, family, and co-workers are probably going to change. IF hell exists, my priorities might have to shift a little bit. IF hell exists, I may need to get out of my comfort zone a little more. IF hell exists, I might need to tell some people about. IF hell exists, I'm probably going to be persecuted for mentioning it. IF hell exists, there should probably be more people out on the mission field. IF hell exists, it might be time for me to pull out the water hose. IF hell exists, people might have a lot of questions that I should be prepared to answer.

I think it might just be easier not to believe in hell. What do you think?

We're gaining ground...let's keep digging in!

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 08:23:00 -0700

On June 1, I posted a blog concerning Finishing the Task (FTT) which is an effort by some of the major missions organizations of the world to see church planting work started among the least reached people groups of the world. When they started promoting groups that were unengaged by missionaries or Christian work, there were 639 people groups with more than 100,000 in population numbering over 535 million people total. I want to show you their most updated statistics just three months later (as of August 1).

The FTT website states that now, of the original 639 unreached, unengaged people groups:

* 95 remain unengaged. No one is trying to reach them. (144 on June 1)
* 169 are adopted but not engaged. (146 on June 1)
* 334 are engaged with church planting. (308 on June 1)
* 339 have known believers. (299 on June 1)
* 155 have at least one known church. (69 on June 1)

Keep praying and seeing how you or your church can get involved!

Another day in Kenya

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 08:17:35 -0700

Last week Springs of Hope Kenya was presented with its largest challenge to date, a min-istry opportunity of such magnitude that it will truly require God’s provision and grace. The ini-tial plan was simply to pick up four street boys and return them to their families at Nawamu IDP camp. (For those not familiar with the term IDP, it stands for “internally displaced persons,” the sanitized euphemism for refugees. Many of you are aware of the post election violence that took place in the nation of Kenya in Dec 27th 2007 through March 2008, taking an estimated 1,600 innocent lives. At the height of the clashes an estimated 650,000 Kenyans were displaced. The government compensation for each family is the equivalent of 140 USD for the loss of their fam-ily members and property. Kenya is once again a stable democracy but there are still tens of thousands of IDP.)

When we arrived at the camp, people began to come out of their tents and greet us. We met with the chairman of the camp and gave him the food we had brought, and reunited the boys with their families. The chairman told us there were 50 tents, 205 families, and 1175 people living at this camp. Each tent was partitioned in half. The dimensions of each were approximately 8’ x 10’, and on average contained 11 people or 2 families. This community is residing on ap-proximately 2 acres out the 16 acres loaned to them.

The chairman introduced us to the people who graciously and warmly welcomed us. The chairman walked us through the camp and explained the plights of individual families. One boy whom we sponsor in school, Simon, witnessed his four siblings and father being murdered right in front of his eyes and now he lives at the IDP camp with his mother. Another child, Florence, has cerebral palsy and drags herself through dirt in the camp, which is located on a rocky hill-side. We are hoping to get her some crutches or a way for her to have greater mobility. We also met Patrick who is visually and hearing impaired. The topography makes it next to impossible for him to get around.

It goes without saying that the people of this camp have been adversely affected by the clashes, having lost their property and homes, and many have also lost family members who were brutally murdered. The day-to-day challenges and struggles are numerous and include the following:

• Acute food shortages, a catalyst for many of the boys running to the streets of the closest urban center.
• Chronic shortages of potable water, which is carried from 2 ½ miles away by women and children. (The average American uses 150-250 gallons per day, but in this community there are two 793-gallon water tanks, or approximately 1600 gal-lons for 1200 people… and that is if the tanks are even full.)
• Inadequate sanitation.
• Lack of mattresses and blankets forcing people to literally sleep on the ground.
• Many medical problems.
• They are trying to raise the 11,000 USD for the 16 acres of land.

Despite the magnitude of the suffering, we were humbled by a true sense of community and the refugees’ commitment to one another. They truly represented the body of Christ.

Notwithstanding the enormous challenges, our team of six (Joseph Molly & Elijah Bail, Victot Ombati, Daniel Kirru, and Catherine Kim) knows that we serve a God who still performs miracles. He is faithful and trustworthy. We have started to address some of the issues facing the community with the dehydrated food we received from SERV Ministries International. The community requires 267 USD as a down payment for a land survey so it can be subdivided into individual plots. For many, permanent structures would be the beginnings of their lives being restored to some semblance of normalcy. Before departing we met with the elders of the com-munity and inquired as to the most urgent needs in the community. We took this information but made no promises. We let them know that we would see what God would do.

One of our team members, Catherine Kim, is going to start a support group for those with HIV/AIDS. There are 43 community members who have identified themselves as HIV/AIDS positive and this does not include children. In a culture where shame and stigma are still associ-ated with this disease it takes tremendous courage to share one’s status.

For Springs of Hope Kenya we are looking at this as a time of action and opportunity! Being complacent is no longer acceptable. It is not only an indictment of the Christian commu-nity, but also the whole of humanity, a “humanity” that allows people in this day and age to suf-fer in such ways while turning its head in ignorance. For those of us who call or identify our-selves as Christians this should come as no surprise or epiphany. It is a mandate of our faith. We are instructed to look after the widows and the orphans and the poor (James 1:27).

So with that being said…we will tell you about Part II soon…

If you are interested in helping please let us know at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or go to http://www.SpringsofHopeKenya.org

See pics at:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2031590&id=1352196615&l=fef8b87684

What can we do about the nations coming to us?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 05:42:00 -0700

Well, I just got back from a fruitful trip to Atlanta where we plan on starting a new missionary training school in January. We found a part of town that was very multi-ethnic. I drove out of the apartment complex where we are looking at housing our students and there were three Mexican grocery stores right across the street, two Thai restaurants within walking distance, a Pakistani/Indian place right next door, and the largest Hindu temple outside of India about a three minute drive down the road. What an opportunity to reach the nations that are coming to us!

I started talking to different pastors, missionaries, and churches in the area to ask what was being done to reach out to these people and kept hearing over and over "not very much". There are a few churches that are being intentional about teaching English classes, picking up international students from the airport, and doing kid's programs in apartment complexes, but they are few and far between. Our goal as we go to Atlanta will be to expose individuals and churches to the need around the world and how reaching out locally can be a huge part of seeing the gospel taken to all nations. Then, once they are exposed to the need and begin getting a heart and burden for the people, we want to equip them to be missional as a church body and to reach out cross-culturally.

Here is a rough, general description of the types of churches that we found:
1) Uninformed - this group is ignorant about God's heart for the nations and don't know about the need both globally and locally.
2) Uninterested - these churches know about the need but are pretty happy with "letting those people be". They like the way they have always done church because that is how it has been done since they were kids. They generally don't want to think about the changing demographics in their community.
3) Unequipped - this group sees the need and wants to do something about it but don't know how to go about doing anything.

What would you do with the churches that are in these three different boats?

Bachelor Party Theology

Fri, 07 Aug 2009 17:00:00 -0700

I dozed off at about 2 am this morning on the couch at my brother's bachelor party, while most of the guys were still sitting around the dining room table finishing a friendly game of poker. I awoke at around 5:30 am to find many of these same guys still sitting around that dining room table, only this time they were talking theology. It was a friendly conversation and I wasn't awake to even know what started the whole thing. However, one question in particular caught my interest: If our sins are punished by eternal separation from God (or, eternal hell), why did Jesus only have to suffer momentary separation and punishment? Its not a new question, but one that I have often pondered over the years. In this conversation, the question was meant (among other things) to be something that would "leave everyone speechless" and to help serve to illustrate the supposed assumption that "there are a lot of Biblical things that we just can't u

What Happened to People Group Thinking?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 07:18:00 -0700

This post is a little bit more lengthy than mine usually are. However, this article from S. Kent Parks, Ph.D is very important and relevant and should be passed around in all churches and missions agencies.

A strange thing happened on the way to bringing the Gospel to every “people group.” A growing number of Christian voices around the world begin to suggest that the focus on people groups was overemphasized. These questions seemed to arise as the “AD2000 and Beyond” movement phased out. Further, the concept of “people group” began to be applied to other “groupings” which do not fit the category.

Admittedly, no universally accepted definition exists. Yet while the main terms Unreached People Group (UPG) and Least Evangelized People Group have some technical differences, they essentially define the same 25-28% of the world which has little access to the Gospel. A more popularized phrase – Least Reached Peoples – is sometimes used. One UPG-focused country network in an Asian country uses a term which places the responsibility squarely on the Church – the “Ignored” People Groups. (Note: the terms Least Evangelized and UPGs will be used interchangeable below).

So, what happened to the momentum to reach those who have little or no access to the Gospel? Some key misconceptions have emerged and seem to impede movement forward. These include:

1) Great publicity is confused with real progress: The great emphasis in many parts of the world, especially during the last 20 years, on reaching the unreached has led church leaders in many continents to believe that great progress has been made. Yes, some progress has been made. Yet, 25-28% of the world still has little access to the Gospel.

Christians still give only about 1% of our money to Christian causes. Of this money given to Christian causes, 95% is spent on the Church. Less than 1% is used to reach 28% of the world. Only 2-4% of Christian cross-cultural witnesses serve this 28%. Projections show that the percentage of the least evangelized peoples will not diminish significantly in the next several decades. The world percentage of Christians is also not projected to grow if ministry and mission continue to follow current patterns.

2) “Balance” is sought: Key “unreached peoples” advocates and mission strategists from several continents have discovered they share a common experience. Each had been challenged by key national and/or international Christian leaders to have a more “balanced” view in their advocacy by not emphasizing the “unreached” too much.

Again, emphasis on UPGs seems to have resulted in “boredom” among some church leaders – and they seem to want to find the next idea. One Asian mission leader shared that just about the time the Western Christians have succeeded in raising awareness for the UPGs around the world, some seem to have developed “attention deficit disorder” and want to move on to something new.

To answer simply, “Yes, we want balance” so that at least one-fourth of workers, money, and other resources are spent on this “one-fourth” world! When the “Body of Christ” quits spending over 90% of its resources on itself, balance might be achieved!

3) Everyone is a people group: The power of “people group” imagery to focus people’s strategic thinking began to be used to re-define all kinds of strata of society as a “people group.” So, young people, the disabled, prostitutes, or taxi drivers in certain cities (which are actually segments or a strata of society) began to be defined as a “people group.”

Factually, a “people group” is a collection of inextricably linked strata. For instance, a large ethnolinguistic/ethno-cultural people group will have youth, urban, rural, rich, poor, disabled, etc. At the end of the day, however, a young person or a taxi driver or a disabled person is in familial and societal relationships with other kinds of people from other strata of the society.

Admittedly, a variety of strategies are needed to reach the variety of strata in a people group. Different ministries are needed for the young, for the disabled, for the urban, for the poor, for the rich. Yet, when a movement begins among such a people group, it will spread more easily across “strata” lines within a people group than across ethnic lines. For example, a real movement might occur among the youth of a certain people group but may have a more difficult time “jumping” the ethnic barrier to the youth of a neighboring but hated ethnic group.

So, a “people group” may have a variety of defining factors which might include ethno-linguistic or ethnocultural/religious elements, and may legitimately have unique elements (such as caste factors in India) but it will consist of various strata.

4) Unreached people are “remote”, only “tribal,” or only “illiterate” peoples: A globally recognized Christian leader recently said that while emphasis on the Unreached was still needed, the major challenge for finishing the task of world missions was the major religious blocks. He inadvertently exposed a common mis-conception about what “unreached” or “least evangelized” means.

In fact, the majority of the UPGs are in the three major religious blocks -- and make up vast sections of major urban centers. Sometimes, they are the majority peoples of the country. In one Asian country, one-half of the Christians live in one-fourth of the country – and are mainly tribal (who are more easily reached?) while the majority people of this Buddhist country is still less than 1% Christian. In another Asian country known for very dynamic and mission minded churches, the majority people which is well over 50% of the population remains largely unserved.

5) The goal to engage each UPG is misunderstood as an end goal rather than a first step: Some have caricatured plans to make sure every people group is engaged as a simplistic plan to start a few churches so that that people group can be “checked” off the list. This simplistic goal is certainly not the intent of most UPG strategists. Most would emphasize that “engagement” is merely the first step toward the end goal of true Gospel transformation (and not just a few congregations which meet on Sunday) to the people group. Yet, how can they be transformed when few or no workers have taken those first steps?

One aspect of the debate revolves around the interpretation of Matthew 24.14. Some stress that this verse is merely a promise and prediction – not an imperative verse from which specific and detailed strategies must be developed. A clue to the intent of this verse can be found in Abram’s covenant (Genesis 12.1-3). The phrase “You will be a blessing” is not merely a prediction. It is also a command! Matthew 24.14 seems to have the same thrust. This idea does not even include the several “Great Commissions” Jesus gave which are even more specific. The fact remains that Christ-followers are commanded to speak and act out the Gospel in the whole world to all ethne. Specific strategies and specific goals are required.

6) An over-balanced “returning mission to the church” concept: A great deal has been said in recent years that the local institutional church is the supreme engine of mission. Much of this emphasis apparently emerges from large churches in both Eastern and Western countries. Some crucial problems, however, have emerged from this mindset.

• This prioritizing of only the local church organization sometimes ignores or diminishes biblical teaching on the universal Church. True, each person should be a member of a local church – but God often calls key leaders to have roles across local and organizational lines. Clearly, in Acts 13, the Holy Spirit asked the Antioch church to set apart Paul and Barnabas and to send them off. Little if any indication is found that they “maintained” local membership in Antioch after that point.

• Is the local church the one in the missionary’s sending country – or the local congregation which he/she has helped create in his/her host culture? Many expat missionaries never become a member of local congregations in their host cultures, claiming a need to maintain their membership in an organization (club?) in their sending culture. Consistency is lacking in such a call for local church membership.

• Many churches do not seem to believe the concept of “dying to self” applies not only to the individual but also to the congregation. An oft-quoted idea is that local churches are “tired of losing their best people” to mission organizations. In fact, sometimes churches do not allow some of their best leaders to go into full-time mission, arguing that the local congregation needs them more. Are local congregations not also called by our Lord to great sacrifice? What needs to be asked is not “What is best for our local church?” but “What needs to be done to reach this UPG?”

• Some local churches find “missions” as a way to help their members be discipled and be fulfilled. As a result, the main mission strategy seems to be mainly short-term workers. Yet these same churches would not try to run their church with rotating short-term teams. How then, can Christ-followers think that whole societies can be transformed from the Kingdom of darkness to the Kingdom of light through quick, easy, surface efforts?

• Many churches will only send short or long term people to “safe” places. The least evangelized of the world will not be reached in such a manner.

7) It is now time for the “Majority” World or the “Global South” to finish the job: This heresy continues to gain ground. Since when did God remove the Great Commission from any believer – North, South, East or West? When did God say, “Now you can just pay for others to go since it is more cost effective?”

Have we lost the sense of amazement that humanity’s unity, which was shattered at Babel due to pride and arrogance, is now in the process of being reunited into Christ? The greatest proof of our belief in this theology will be that Christians from various races, countries and continents intentionally collaborate as a visible witness that the Kingdom of God truly and visibly unites humanity – not in theory, but in actual work among the remaining peoples.

This last 28% of the world will only be truly reached as representatives from all “reached” peoples join together to speak and act out the Gospel among these least served peoples. The amazing thing about the Gospel is that the new believers from among these formerly unreached peoples will then join us in reaching the others who have little or no access to Gospel in all its forms – word, deed and miracle.

Steps Forward: All of these issues combined create a powerful deterrent to steps forward. A renewed energy, and call for sacrificial, long-term work among these who continue to be ignored by the global body of Christ is critical for avoiding the projections of little progress in reaching the Least Evangelized Peoples.

May Christ’s Body be truly faithful.

Honduras: The Real Story (& Why I Care)

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 17:00:00 -0700

I am not sure why the so-called Honduran "coup" has captured my attention as much as it has. I think it has something to do with the fact that the situation began just a few weeks after I confirmed my plans to visit Honduras next month on Aug 12-14. (I'm travelling there to speak to a group of churches about how they can get involved in missionary work among the T*b*t*ns of Asia. It will be my first time to visit Honduras... and what great timing!) Like most people, when I heard the "news" (think: Obamamaniamedia) that a so-called "coup" had occurred in Honduras, I was a little bit upset and worried for the Honduran people & my new friends in particular. However, it wasn't very long before I began receiving updates from our Honduran friends explaining what the REAL situation was in their country. There is definitely something to worry about, however it is not nearly in the way that I had first imagined. So without further delay, please take a moment to

A Plea for Prayer

Thu, 23 Jul 2009 17:00:00 -0700

Just a week or so ago, I posted a letter and some prayer requests from some Honduran friends that I have, in regards to the current political situation that is facing their country. I just received another e-mail update from them, and I was more touched by this one than I was the first. Please read the letter below, especially the parts that I have bolded & italicized! (BTW, the pictures you see are of peaceful rallies that are taking place in Honduras IN SUPPORT of the removal of their former president Zelaya) "For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer" 1 Peter 3:12a Hi everyone, I hope this letter finds you well, thank you so much for your patience on our prayer requests. We trust God is the only one who can perform miracles and help our country. I just wanted to share with you some photos taken yesterday during one of the many pacific walks that take place all over the country; the purpose is to let th

Heartfelt Thanks

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 17:00:00 -0700

"Diligently help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way so that nothing is lacking for them. Our people must also learn to engage in good deeds to meet pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful." Titus 3:14-15 I don't remember what exactly brought it to my mind today as I was driving home from school here in China, but I was suddenly overwhelmed by the fact that so many people (many of you!) sacrifice greatly to support myself and my family in the ministry work that we do. In all honesty, there is so much that we wouldn't be able to accomplish if it were not for the loving generosity of fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. Without a doubt, God is our Provider and the One who is intimately at work in our lives; however, God very often uses His people to be His hands and feet. Thank you for being used by God! Thank you for your sacrificial giving, whether it is for my family or any other ministry, mission, or individual believ

Who wants to join us at Urbana 09?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 16:20:00 -0700

We're getting excited about heading to Urbana in December as it is an opportunity that only comes around every three years. Urbana is a conference in St. Louis, Missouri where about 20,000 collage students from across the US and the world will be coming to worship the Lord and hear about his heart for the nations. We'll be setting up a booth and praying with students and trying to help them get oriented as they pursue a possible career in missions. I'm hoping that the unreached will be front and center at the conference. The last two Urbana conferences seemed to have a large focus on injustice and the international students that are coming to our campuses. I hope the 27% of the world's population that have never heard the name of Jesus will be represented and have a voice. Pray that many people would be mobilized to pray, give, and go to the unreached peoples of the world. Most of the major and many smaller organizations will be represented at Urbana, so we are all praying for more laborers to be sent out into the neediest harvest fields.

Prayer Request from Honduras

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 17:00:00 -0700

I don't know if you've heard about the recent events in Honduras regarding their ousted president, but what I've read online in the news is a very different story from what I've heard personally from friends in Honduras. It seems that our far-left media wants us to believe that what happened there is a very bad thing, however, the so-called "coup" was a legal action by the government of Honduras (think: checks & balances) to curb a president who had broken Honduran law again, and again, and again... Here is the latest update (along with 10 specific prayer requests) I received from some missionary contacts of ours in Honduras: We want to thank you for your prayers for Honduras. We know Honduras isn't in the news so much now, but the situation here continues to be a complex one with no clear way out. We want to explain again that Honduras is not under military rule. There are articles stateside that continue to imply

Is Michael Jackson more popular than Jesus?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 04:37:00 -0700

I know that John Lennon got in a bit of trouble for saying the same thing about the Beatles, but MJ has definitely been getting a lot of secular media attention since his death. They say that approximately one billion people tuned into his funeral on TV. That's almost one in six people on planet earth which is pretty astounding since there are approximately 2.4 billion (or one in three people in the world) that have no access to Christ. I didn't watch the procession myself but heard that Jesus was actually mentioned quite a bit during the tribute due to Jackson's Jehovah's Witness roots. At least His name is being mentioned, I guess.

I watched a sermon by Louie Giglio where he was trying to prove that we don't need to be taught to worship. He actually showed a clip of a Michael Jackson concert where people were crying, falling down, raising hands, kneeling, and doing anything to touch him. There is something inside of us that enjoys beauty and causes us to awe and wonder. No one on earth needs to learn how to attribute value to or to give worth to something. So, we are naturally worshipers. Some day, hopefully it will be to the King of Kings rather than the King of Pop.

Random thought: Internationally, why is it easier to access a Thriller album than a Bible?

Twitter, Facebook, Bulgaria, Grandma

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:00:00 -0700

I'm sorry for letting another month go by without a blog... it turns out that work, ministry, and raising three kids takes a lot of time :-) I wanted to let you know (any of you who might care!) that I am updating MUCH more regularly on Twitter than I have ever done on my blog. Now, a Twitter update is nothing like a blog, but it does let people know what is going on in our daily lives. Since I signed up for Twitter a little over a month ago, I have "tweeted" about 150 times. For those who want to check out my 150 Twitter posts or follow my tweets, my name is: "chinaadventures" Also, if you have Facebook and we are not already friends, then send me a friend request anytime. My Facebook name is "Eugene West". All of my Twitter updates are also posted directly to my Facebook account. By the way, I am writing from a (very expensive: $2.75/hr) internet cafe in Sofia, Bulgaria. Gabriel & I were blessed with cheap tickets and a few weeks off to trav

Whom would you most like to meet?

John Fraser — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:09:00 -0700

It’s interesting that a recent poll conducted in the U.K. asked respondents which dead person they would most like to meet. Princess Diana was expected to be number one. But in fact, she came in at the number two spot behind Jesus. What this shows is that even in the heart of secular Europe, interest in the historical person of Jesus is as high as it has ever been. Even in America, Jesus remains a highly popular, enigmatic, and fascinating figure. As Dr. Ben Witherington III says, we live in a Jesus-haunted culture that is biblically illiterate. Unfortunately, because of that almost anything can pass for knowledge of Jesus. Thus have we seen a slough of popular and supposedly scholarly books on Jesus in the last decade that are based on flimsy foundations, weak theories, and pseudo-scholarship.

My introduction to Ben Witherington was when I took a class from him in my last year at Asbury Seminary, the year he started teaching there. This was back in 1995, and he had already written several excellent, scholarly books on the New Testament. Within a few classes I was thinking to myself, “why have I never heard of this guy before?” Before the end of that class, I thought to myself, “this guy is going somewhere.” While I hadn’t seen his name quoted or cited as an authority up until that time, I had a strong feeling that that would happen. Sure enough, in the 14 years since that class, I have seen Ben Witherington’s name come up repeatedly in different places. He has written many more books, including the best-selling title “The Gospel Code”, which was written in response to Dan Brown’s horrible and now thoroughly discredited book, “The Da Vinci Code.” He has been interviewed by every major TV network as well as appearing on the History Channel and the Discovery Channel, and is cited as an authority by many other scholars. One of my regrets from my time in seminary was that I didn’t have opportunity to take more classes from Witherington.

So I was excited to find out that he was teaching a one-week intensive class at Houghton College at the end of June on “The Jesus of Film, Fantasy, and Faith.” The purpose of the class was to cut through all of the pseudo-scholarship and popular level works about Jesus that have become so prominent in the last decade and show the evidence for the canonical Gospel portraits of Jesus, the books developed out of the collective memory of those who were closest to Jesus and knew him the best. I’ll be blogging about some of the insights I gained from that class. But as Dr. Witherington puts it, Witherington shared in the class how he has spoken to audiences across the country and has been amazed at the number of Christians who don’t realize, for example, that the New Testament doesn’t say that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, or in fact that he was married at all! In fact, there is no historical evidence for that claim at all even though many popular writers treat it as a serious hypothesis.

The most obeyed verse in the Bible

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 06:01:00 -0700

Many people claim that they don't want to follow Christ because the church is full of hypocrites. Well, I found a verse that is obeyed by about 97% of all Christians. Not bad, huh? Mt. 16:20 says, "Then he warned his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ." Following in a close second is Mt. 10:5 which states "These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: 'Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans'." So, maybe we're not doing as bad as the world says we are. These two verses are being obeyed by almost every Christian and church that is out there! That's got to count for something.

Heading back to Kenya

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 07:06:09 -0700

I will be leaving Tuesday to head back to Kenya. I am thankful for this and know that I have purpose there. I am very happy to get started working and serving again. I know now we have more children/orphans sponsored for school. We are close to the opening of the orphanage. Please pray for the electricity situation
we are dealing with. Needing patients dealing with all the last minute preparation. Please know that building in Kenya and the place we are building (very nice) is not not like building here in the USA. ~molly

What motivates people to get involved in world missions?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 15:36:00 -0700

Obviously, the Holy Spirit is the one that puts callings on our lives, but he can do that through a lot of different methods and delivery systems. I've discovered three ways (and I'd love to hear any others that you come up with) to get people excited about praying, giving, and going. Which of the following stirs you the most to get involved in missions and makes you want to pray, give, and go to the unreached?

1) The Isaiah pathway - This is basically getting so caught up in God that you can't help but have a heart for the unreached. As we hang out with God, we become more like Him and we know that one of His characteristics is that he wants all to be saved. It was while Isaiah was in the presence of God with angels worshiping that he got to the point of saying "Here I am, send me". Louie Giglio always says that "as you get lost in wonder, you can't help but wander about the lost." His team has a huge heart for the nations and do large Passion Conferences to get people excited about God which in turn should lead to more people serving in missions.

2) The "open your eyes" pathway - This is basically making people aware of the needs around the world to spur people to involvement in missions. Jesus told the disciples to open their eyes and look at the harvest field and reminded them how few laborers are going. He told them to pray to the Lord of the harvest for more laborers and in the very next breath said "go". Hearing statistics about how many unreached people groups are left, how many missionaries are serving in those areas, and how much of our church money is sent to the unreached is a big motivator for many. Organizations like Joshua Project might be considered strong in this pathway.

3) The "the harvest is ripe" pathway - This is a little bit of a tweak on the second pathway in that this is focusing more on the positive things that are going on in the world rather than the remaining need. Don't you get excited when you hear about a supernatural healing overseas? Don't you love to hear stories about how many people are coming to know Christ in Africa each day? Hearing that God is moving in a certain area spurs many people into action. Joel News is a good example of a newsletter that tells about some of the exciting things that are going on in the missions world.

How about you? What have you found to be some of the most motivating things to make you want to go and make the name of Christ great among the nations?

Shouldn't we just support indigenous missionaries?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 09:13:00 -0700

There are lots of great missions organizations out there such as Gospel for Asia and Christian Aid whose main ministry is to teach, train, and support indigenous missionaries. Many of those agencies talk about the cost of keeping an average Western missionary (about $40000/year) on the field vs. sending an indigenous missionary (about $4000) per year. If you look at the economics of it all, people and churches are asking, "why would we send this couple from our congregation when we could send 10 local people in their place?" Some of the advantages of local missionaries are that they already speak the local language, understand the worldview/culture of the people, can live on an economic level similar to the rest of the country, etc.

On the flip side, several missiologists point out the fact that there are still only 14,000 pioneer missionaries going to the unreached people groups of the world meaning that most missionaries (98% to be exact according to World Christian Trends), both Western and indigenous are going to places that are already within reach of the gospel. When we were in India last year, we heard "we'll take anyone that is willing to come, there are 1 billion lost souls and over 3000 unreached people groups in our country. The harvest in plentiful and the laborers are few, so we don't care where they come from or how much they cost." Other people point to the fact that Western money might cause indigenous churches to be dependent on the outside world and never be able to sustain their own full-time pastors and missionaries, buildings, evangelism efforts, etc.

What do you think? What is the best way to sow financially into the mission field? And more importantly, are you doing so? Some day, we'll all have to give an account of our talents.

Does every people group need a written Bible?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 11:49:00 -0700

According to the ethnologue, there are 6912 living languages of which about 4400 have no Scripture available. About 3/4 of the world's population is considered non-literate, so how necessary is it for people to have a written Bible in their language? If you went into an unreached people group, would translating the Bible and literacy be your top priority like Wycliffe or would you use more of an oral approach to the Bible?

The International Orality Network as well as projects such as One Story focus on making sure that every people group has access to an oral Bible in their native tongue by the year 2020. An oral Bible is generally made up of 40 to 60 chronological Bible stories that are chosen based on the worldview of the people group being targeted. The stories are often recorded on audio devices and also passed around by word of mouth and oral tradition.

We read a book in our missionary training school called Making Disciples of Oral Learners which is a free download and a great introduction to orality and storytelling in the missions world. What do you think about sharing the gospel, making disciples, planting churches, and raising up leaders by telling stories from the Word rather than using a written Bible?

Finish this verse: Be still and....

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 08:37:00 -0700

Most folks would say "Be still and know that I am God". That's a pretty good answer, but there is still more to that verse. Psalms 46:10 continues by saying, "I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth". Bob Sjogren wrote a book called Unveiled at Last where he teaches what he calls the top line and bottom line concerning the promises of God. Often times in Scripture, God gives a wonderful blessing for an individual or for a whole group of people. We would call that the top line. The bottom line would be the responsibility or the command that comes along with the promise or the reason that the blessing was given in the first place.

For example, 1Kings 8:59,60 says "And may these words of mine, which I have prayed before the Lord, be near to the LORD our God day and night, that he may uphold the cause of his servant and the cause of his people Israel according to each day’s need, SO THAT all the peoples of the earth may know that the LORD is God and that there is no other." Make sure that you look out for the SO THATs in Scripture. How have you been praying and reading your Bible....for the top line or the bottom?

Can people over 40 still do missions?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 14:24:00 -0700

The American Dream is becoming less and less of a draw to many people that are questioning how they can use their life for greatest kingdom impact. There are organizations such as MissionNext who are focused on getting the 24-40 year mobilized for missions. Many mid-career people are realizing that a lot of the skills that they have learned in the secular world could actually be used to advance the cause of Christ among the nations. John Piper and many others have been writing books and preaching sermons about "Don't Waste Your Life" and people are starting to evaluate their lives based on what has been done for Christ. Maybe it's time for you to reevalute.

The Finishers Project focuses on helping the boomer generation find their niche in the mission field. Boomers are and will be the healthiest and best-educated generation of empty-nesters ever. Many of these folks would rather use the wisdom, skills, and life/ministry experience that God has given them to prepare the next generation and to pour their gifts, talents, and resources into the unreached people groups of the world. This generation still wants to make a difference and change our world.

All adult generations in North America are skilled and resourced with a multitude of talents. The question we must ask ourselves is how many of the ten talents we have been given, will we give back to Jesus and invest in the kingdom. Check out the two missions organizations mentioned above to find out more about getting involved.

College students: read The Blueprint by Jaeson Ma

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:42:00 -0700

This summer we will be taking our interns through a book called The Blueprint by Jaeson Ma. The reason that we enjoy using that resource as our discipleship manual is because the majority of them are college students and the subtitle of the book is "a revolutionary plan to plant missional communities on campus". The book starts out with a huge focus on prayer which we like because it is one of our foundational values and the first universal element of all church planting movements. The next section of the book focuses on the Holy Spirit and power evangelism. Jesus said not to leave Jerusalem but to wait and be clothed with power before going to be witnesses to the ends of the earth. So, we love giving our college interns some solid teaching about prayer and the Holy Spirit to help them be more equipped as they serve with us on the mission field, but also to have more tools in the bag as they go home to live missionally on their campuses.

The final section of the book focuses on simple church planting on college campuses. It talks about how college campuses can be divided into "people groups" since there are so many different little clusters at universities. Ma asks the question what would happen if instead of us inviting people to some of our larger campus gatherings such as Campus Crusade, Intervaristy, or Baptist Student Union group meetings, what if we Christians went out and lived incarnationally among those groups and took the church to the people. I really think that every campus minister, college/career pastor, and university student should grab a copy of this book and prayerfully read through it while applying the principles that are taught. Somehow the author was able to take the majority of the topics from our missionary training school and squeeze them into one book. Enjoy!

The role of the local church in missions?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 08:08:00 -0700

Two thousand years ago, Jesus gave the mandate to make disciples of all nations. God's people, the church, were given the responsibility to take the good news of the kingdom to every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. These days the majority of missionaries get screened, trained, and deployed by missions agencies or organizations. Most churches have been working off of a pardigm that says "send off" rather than "send out". There has been a strong trend of "outsourcing" missions work to agencies and organizations, but there is a little bit of a rumbling in the Christian world and things may be changing...

Some friends of ours at LifePoint Church had a meeting with the International Mission Board (IMB) last week to cast their vision for the "sending church model". Basically, they are asking about a fundamental switch in missions strategy. What if instead of us sending our people to the IMB (or any other missions agency) to get equipped and sent out, the IMB (and other missions agencies) came alongside of the church by providing training and resources to help congregations send out their own church planting teams to serve among the nations.

The P.E.A.C.E. Plan out of Saddleback has a very simlar vision in that they want to send out small groups of people from local churches to help fulfill the Great Commission and tackle some of the giant problems in our world without the need for a missions organization to be "the middle man". How about you? What do you think is a healthy relationship between mission agencies and local churches? Are there any models that would work for house churches, traditional churches, and megachurches alike?

Technology and Missions

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 16:41:00 -0700

The internet is changing the way we do mission work by allowing more people to be involved, even when those people aren't on the front lines. For example, our church planting leader in Mexico is updating his Twitter and Facebook statuses several times a day, allowing people back home (and around the world) to know how to pray more effectively in real time for the church planting efforts here. He also recently wrote a blog post asking for ideas on how to get power into a little community with no electricity. Within a couple of days, ten different people had responded with some great ideas on how to meet this physical need. Can you imagine what could be done for the kingdom in our generation if we got creative and made better use of the tools and technology God has given us?

The internet allows us to connect people quickly and to rally around cause -- and is there any cause greater than seeing God worshiped and getting all the glory He deserves from people of every tribe, tongue, people, and nation?

What if every person who read this blog joined a movement`of people dedicated to seeing all the nations reached in our lifetime? Next, what if each of you joined Facebook and became a fan of Global Frontier Missions? This would allow a group of thousands of people to be in the "same room" to pray, find other mission-minded people in your area, talk strategy, share ideas on how to get our churches more involved, and ultimately have major kingdom impact among the least-reached people groups of the world.

The Busiest Month of My Life

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 17:00:00 -0700

The 30 or so days between April 23rd and May 23rd were about as busy for me as I have ever been. In that short period of time, we hosted about 65 people (4 different teams), travelled thousands of miles in my little van (in 6 or 7 different trips) over countless mountains, made a quick 3 day (3000+ mile) trip to Hong Kong, and taught English on most weekends. It was not all work, however. We had more fellowship during that month than we do in a typical year. Our kids never got bored, because we had at least two South African ladies in our home almost constantly; playing, teaching, and helping entertain them. Neither was the month only work and fellowship... ministry took place in abundance. More Bibles and tracts made their way into the hands of unsaved people, and more people were witnessed to than I could even begin to describe. For lack of better adjectives, it was an amazing month! Please pray for all the seeds that were planted and

Another atheist comes back home

John Fraser — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 15:45:00 -0700

On another internet site I came across some posts by a former atheist from the U.K. who had actually served as the director of the Rationalist Press Association for almost 10 years, as well as a one-year stint as the president of the National Secular Society. He gives the following reasons for his return to Christianity after 20 years as a hardened atheist:

1. A realisation that the universe is not self-explanatory, and that - unless it is completely absurd - it needs a transcendent explanation.2. A realisation that science cannot - even in principle - even begin to explain why there is something and not nothing.3. A realisation that Hume's critique of theism is far from watertight; that Darwin's theory of evolution does not begin to explain either the emergence or the complexity of life, and that much 19th century criticism and modern scientism is founded on an untenable world-view.

My return to the Christian faith was facilitated by a recognition that much biblical criticism from the Enlightenment until quite recently was based on faulty premises, and by a recognition that - notwithstanding some legendary elements - the Gospel story of Jesus, his teaching, his death and resurrection were historically well-founded. Furthermore, the experience of worship and reconciliation was a source of inner conviction that has remained with me, and I hope always will.

There are a growing number of testimonies on the internet of atheists coming to Christ, or coming back to Christ. Some have come as a result of internet apologetics. This one appears to have come back to the fold through his own study on issues of theology and religion, and his recognition of the limitations of scientific explanations for the world as well as the ultimately incoherent worldview of scientific materialism.

Of course skeptics will point out that there are also testimonies of former Christians – even former ministers in some cases – becoming atheists. While this is true, the skeptical position is that atheism is strictly based on pure reason while religion is irrational. For a knowledgeable and highly educated atheist to turn to religion, then, should necessitate that a rational person has suddenly become irrational. However, these individuals do not give evidence of being irrational, and are able to give good rational arguments as to why they abandoned the atheistic worldview. Of course, these defectors are generally treated with the great contempt, mockery and abuse that are so typical of the atheist internet community.

Stay tuned, as there are surely more exciting conversion stories to come!

Does short term missions produce long term missionaries?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 13:26:00 -0700

I have been involved in hosting short-term teams for over twelve years. I got called to missions on a short-term mission trip with YWAM and have heard that 90% of long-term missionaries first got involved in missions because of a short-term trip. So, I have always been a big fan of short-term missions because I have seen the impact that they have had on people's lives and know that they have played a role in seeing people go long-term. Participants on our short term mission trips usually go home with a totally different worldview, gain a greater burden for the lost, see the poor in a new light, and catch a vision to live more missionally.

I have always worked on the assumption that the more people we have going on short-term mission trips, the more long-term laborers we would see going into the harvest field. However, the latest numbers in Mission Maker magazine say that the number of short-term missionaries increased from 140,000 in 1984 to over 1.6 million in 2005. MissionNext says that the number of long-term American missionaries sent out has dwindled from 55,000 in 1988 to 35,000 in 2006. So, while the short-term mission movement has multiplied almost ten times in the past twenty years, the long-term mission force has roughly been cut in half.

So, where is the long-term fruit from the short-term mission efforts. Some people say that it is coming and that it just takes awhile (average seven years) for missionaries to hit the field after getting the call. Some say that it will never happen due to the amount of debt and lack of finances to send Americans. Some say that less people are willing to go long-term now that they can see that they can get their "missions fix" on a short-term trip. What do you think?

A cold coke within walking distance by 2020

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 11:30:00 -0700

About a year ago, there was a bit of buzz about Coca-Cola and their business plan to try and have a cold coke within walking distance of every person on planet earth by the year 2020. I couldn't find many references to it on the internet except for an article in Mission Frontiers magazine. However, I would imagine that Walmart, Coca-Cola, McDonalds and any other for profit business have pretty aggressive goals when it comes to getting their products into the hands of the masses. Their motivation...money! That brings up some pretty challenging questions for us so sent ones.

Why is that Christians who should be motivated by God's glory, obedience to his commands, and lost souls have less zeal about "our product" than the corporate executives do about their carbonated beverages and fast food? If I were given $1000 for each new consumer/convert or say $100,000 for each new population segment/people group that I reached, would I be any more motivated to go out. If I'm honest with myself, I think that I would have to say that I think money would be a pretty big motivating factor for being bold and taking more risk. How about you? What do you think it would take for the church to step up and see Jesus, the living water and best beverage out there, available within walking distance to every person on planet earth?

Interesting Muslim Demographic Predictions

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 11:06:00 -0700

I was sent this link by four different people last week, so I figured that there must be some buzz around it and that people would be interested in the video. It has some fascinating figures concerning Muslim biological growth, convert growth, and immigration patterns.

Mourning one of Time magazine's 25 most influential evangelicals

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 06:22:00 -0700

We have lost a spiritual giant in the missions world. Dr. Winter has influenced thousands to live more simply, focus on the unreached and be well prepared when serving in missions.

Dr. Winter was the founder of the US Center for World Missions as well as the William Carey International University. He was editor of Missions Frontiers and International Journal of Frontier Missions. Dr. Winter was also the creator of the course “Perspectives on the World Christian Movement” which is taught around the world and has changed the direction of many from mediocre ministry to serving the Lord in areas of the world where the gospel is not known.

Can the house church movement reach the nations?

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:09:00 -0700

There are many popular simple church books that are have gained populairty in Christian circles such as Organic Church by Neil Cole, Revolution by George Barna, Reimagining Church by Frank Viola, and Simply Church by Tony and Felicity Dale. They all point to the statistics concerning the traditional church in the United States being in decline with the exception of some of the mega-churches. They claim that a lot of people are tired of church in general and looking for more organic expressions of the body of Christ meeting in homes and public places doing life together. One of the many pros of the house church model they say is its reproducbility and low cost. They point to the fact that there is no overhead for paid clergy and buildings which frees up finances to do missional kingdom work. Could the house church movement be one of the key players to seeing the nations reached in our generation?

A friend of mine, Don Davis, created a network called House2Harvest to help these house churches be more strategic in engaging unreached people groups. I think it would be awesome to see the house church networks in the U.S. adopting unreached people groups, consistently interceding for them, giving financially to the work being done among them, and hopefully sending many long-term laborers themselves.

It's time to finish the task!

noreply@blogger.com (MissionalMobilizer) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 14:42:00 -0700

Finishing the Task (FTT) is an effort by some of the major missions organizations of the world to see church planting work started among the least reached people groups of the world. When they started promoting groups that were unengaged by missionaries or Christian work, there were 639 people groups with more than 100,000.

The website states that now, of the original 639 unreached, unengaged people groups:

* 144 remain unengaged. No one is trying to reach them.
* 146 are adopted but not engaged.
* 308 are engaged with church planting.
* 299 have known believers.
* 69 have at least one known church.

Pray about how you or your church can get involved!

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 22 May 2009 03:33:15 -0700

Hello from the flatlands of northeastern Indiana!

“Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day will bring forth” (Proverbs 27:1).

That’s a good proverb for me these days. While while working through the process of arranging things for the choir trip and my Commercial Driver’s License I have found a few unexpected turns in the road, but all seems to be working out. It’s just a process that I have to keep after.

On Monday I made it through my medical physical; on Tuesday and Wednesday I finished my written exams and received my CDL permit. Now today at 2:30 (EST) I take my skills test and driving test. Once I get past those I can go back to the license branch and receive my official CDL certification. It doesn’t seem like it should involve this much preparation and red tape, but I guess that is what the process requires.

It has been great to be with my family during this time. I’ve been able to mow Mom’s grass and go to church with her on Sunday. Our son, Rick (and his faithful canine companion, Munchie), will be coming over from Ohio after church on Sunday and spend the Memorial Day holiday with us. I haven’t seem him since last year and it will be wonderful to be together again. I am able to talk daily on the phone with our daughter, Toni, and we are enjoying reunion moments

The weather started off cool at the first of the week, but now has moved into the 80 degree range and we have lots of beautiful sunshine. I’ve been walking my old three-mile running course in the mornings. It’s amazing that what I used to run in sixteen minutes now takes me nearly fifty. Such is the joy of “maturing.” Still, I am enjoying the walks and getting reaquainted with my hometown.

One week from today Mary Jane and the Shangilia Choir will be on Indiana soil. I pick them up at the airport on Thursday night and whisk them off to Shiloh Park, the Church of the Nazarene’s Northeastern Indiana Campgrounds near Marion. I know they will be tired and feeling the effects of jetlag, but I also know they are going to be so excited to begin taking in all the sights, sounds, smells, foods, and experiences of life in the USA. We have six wonderful weeks of new adventures waiting for them.

Here is our USA tour slate. By this time next week we will be into it.

May 27-28 – Leave Nairobi, Kenya and travel through Dubai and NYC to Indianapolis, Indiana
May 28 – School Convocation, tour, and lunch at Pendleton East Elementary School
May 29 – Northeastern Indiana District Missions Convention
May 30 (am) – Anderson, Indiana Southdale Church of the Nazarene
May 30 (pm) – Northeastern Indiana District Campmeeting
June 2-3 – Georgia District Missions Convention
June 6 – Nashville, Tennessee, Tour of Trevecca Nazarene University / Education Foundation Meeting / Recording session in Trevecca’s Music Studio
June 7 (am) – Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene
June 7 (pm) – Louisville, Kentucky Farmdale Church of the Nazarene
June 9 – New Albany, Indiana Christ Community Church of the Nazarene
June 10 – Hartford City, Indiana Church of the Nazarene
June 11 – Rockville, Indiana First Baptist Church
June 12 – Lunch and tour of Olivet Nazarene University / Chicago Central District Missions Convention
June 14 (am) – Kansas City, Missouri First Church of the Nazarene
June 14 (pm) – Olathe, Kansas College Church
June 15 – Lenexa, Kansas, Chapel and tours of the Global Ministry Center and Mid-America Nazarene University
June 16 – St. Louis, Missouri South County Church of the Nazarene
June 17 – Nashville, Tennessee Trevecca Community Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (am) – Leesburg, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (pm) – Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 23 – Clearwater, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 24 – July 1 – Orlando, Florida General Assembly of the Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (am) – Pompano Beach, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (pm) – Venice, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 8 – Redlands, Florida Church of the Nazarene
July 9 – Leave Miami, Florida and travel back to Nairobi, Kenya via NYC and Dubai

As you can see, it’s going to be a busy time. Though my main job is to be the bus driver and group sponser, it’s going to be an equal labor of love to show off our country to them. Thank you so much to all who are opening their churches, homes, and hearts to this wonderful group of young people. You are making the dream of their lifetime come true.

We will have music CD’s to sell as we travel along the way and the students are bringing a variety of Kenyan crafts, jewelry, and misc stuff to sell to help them have some spending money here. These will be available as supplies last.

By the way, ANU has been in Holiness Week revival services this week. God has been doing a wonderful thing in the lives of our students. Mary Jane told me that in Thursday’s service nearly 150 students went forward in response to our evangelist’s invitation for Christ. We praise God for what He is doing and will do as the week closes out today.

Well, that’s about all I have to pass along at this time. I hope to be in touch again next Friday. Have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Thu, 07 May 2009 23:26:45 -0700

Good morning from Kenya!

“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you. See, darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is over the peoples, but the Lord rises upon you and his glory appears over you” (Isaiah 60:1-2).

WORKSHOPS
These are days of training for the faculty of the school. We strive to be learning a lot and seem to be sitting a lot as we prepare for the future of the university. We are looking not only at this next trimester, but the big thing for us these days is the possibility of moving into cyberspace and developing our programs on line so that we can expand the influence of our university not only across the continent but literally around the world. The world has changed drastically since the introduction of the Internet and educational communities are scrambling to keep up. It’s a continual challenge, but one that provides some far-reaching and exciting possibilities for the days ahead.

RETURNING STUDENTS
Two days ago we opened the campus doors for returning students and they are now mixing with the 125 + new students that were already here for registration. Because of the many and varied ways of marketing the school these days we are continually increasing our enrollment. I don’t have the exact figures, but when we arrived two years ago we had around 900 students and now we are somewhere in the vicinity of 1300 students. So while we feel that is a healthy increase it continues to challenge us to keep up as faculty and administration. Certainly it challenges the department I head, Spiritual Development, to look for new ways of reaching out to our ever-growing congregation. From sharing in preaching and devotional sessions, to “Golf” games at the house, to pick-up basketball games after hours, we are striving to build bridges for future ministry. Besides staying very busy in the office getting ready for our choir trip abroad, Mary Jane continues to excel in her role as “Mama Cookie” to the delight of all who sample her wares.

COUNTDOWN
I am now in my final days before heading back for the US. I leave Nairobi at 9:40 a.m. (EST) on Wednesday of next week and will travel through Dubai, London, Cincinnati, and finally land in Nashville, Tennessee at 4:40 p.m. (EST) on Thursday. The world has gotten much smaller for me over the last few years, but any way you look at it this it is still a long trip and your prayer support for safe travel is appreciated. Mary Jane and the choir will follow a couple of weeks later and hopefully all will go well in my preparation for their coming so I can pick them up at the airport when they arrive.

My next newsletter will originate from the state of Tennessee and hopefully it will be out on time, but if not, you can expect to get it sometime Saturday night or Sunday afternoon after I reach my home in Indiana.

BLESSED RAIN
We have been having showers of blessing off and on throughout the recent days. The dry and dusty plains have turned green once again and the rains have been varied enough that we haven’t had the mud problems on the roads like we have had in the past. In fact, Maasai Lodge Road is getting more work on it than I have seen since I have been here. Some of it is so smooth that it feels like it is paved even though it is just dirt and rock. There is still a lot of work to do, but perhaps “tarmacking” is not just a far off dream after all.

REQUEST
I have a request for those we will meet over the next few weeks. Every twenty years or so the Church of the Nazarene has come out with a new hymnal and these days many churches have gone to screens and projections for the words, making the hymnals obsolete. If you would happen to have the older hymnal, “Worship in Song,” stashed in a closet somewhere and would be willing to donate them to a good cause, ANU could use them. That’s the hymnal that is most prevalent here on campus. We couldn’t bring back a lot of them because of the weight limits the airlines have placed upon travelers these days, but we could put one or two in each student’s suitcase to bring back with us. So, if you have some of these, are not using them, and would like to donate them, please let me know via e-mail and we will see what we can do to get them back to Africa.

“SHANGILIA” SCHEDULE
We are really marking off the days now until we begin our trip. We picked up one new engagement this week, which really makes us about as full as we need to be. We will be singing in and sharing with an elementary school population where Mary Jane used to be a guidance counselor. It looks like we have twenty-four opportunities to sing throughout the country, plus five times during the General Assembly days. So once again, here we go…

May 27 – Leave Nairobi for the USA (via Dubai and New York)
May 28 – Arrive in Indianapolis, Indiana
May 29 – Pendleton, Indiana East Elementary School Convocation
May 30 – Northeastern Indiana Mission Convention (Marion, Indiana)
May 31 (am) – Anderson, Indiana Southdale Church of the Nazarene
May 31 (pm) – Northeastern Indiana Camp Meeting (Marion, Indiana)
June 2-3 – Georgia District Mission Convention (Dublin, Georgia)
June 6 – Education Foundation Meeting (Nashville, Tennessee)
June 7 (am) – Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene
June 7 (pm) – Louisville, Kentucky Farmdale Church of the Nazarene
June 9 – New Albany, Indiana Christ Community Church of the Nazarene
June 10 – Hartford City, Indiana Church of the Nazarene
June 11 – Rockville, Indiana First Baptist Church
June 12 – Chicago Central District Mission Convention (Kankakee, Illinois)
June 14 (am) – Kansas City, Missouri First Church of the Nazarene
June 14 (pm) – Olathe, Kansas College Church of the Nazarene
June 15 – Church of the Nazarene Global Ministry Center (Lenexa, Kansas)
June 16 – St. Louis, Missouri South County Church of the Nazarene
June 17 – Nashville, Tennessee Trevecca Community Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (am) – Leesburg, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (pm) – Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 23 – Clearwater, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 24-July 1 – Church of the Nazarene General Assembly (Orlando, Florida)
July 5 (am) – Pompano Beach, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (pm) – Venice, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 8 – Redlands, Florida Church of the Nazarene
July 9 – Leave Miami, Florida for Nairobi, Kenya (via New York and Dubai)

Have a wonderful weekend and a blessed Lord’s Day! I hope to begin seeing some of you very soon!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

Resurrection Faith (part four)

John Fraser — Wed, 06 May 2009 17:19:00 -0700

And last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.

The appearance to Paul is one of the most controversial ones listed. Many skeptics suggest that Paul’s claimed experience was not an experience of the risen Christ in person, but was rather a vision or a “spiritual” experience. In other words, Paul made no claim to having had an physical encounter with Christ in the real world. This, they say, also means that Paul thought of these other appearances to the apostles in the same way – merely as some sort of undefined vision. The stories in the Gospels arose later, and are of a different nature altogether than the claims made in this early church creed that Paul uses. The first question, then, is what was the nature of Paul’s experience? Is it true that Paul only reported a spiritual vision rather than a physical encounter with Christ? Let’s examine the evidence.

Paul’s encounter with Christ on the way to Damascus is recorded 3 times in the book of Acts: once when it is narrated, and twice when Paul is recorded as giving speeches about it to others. In addition, Paul alludes to his experience three times in his own letters: once in Galatians and twice in 1 Corinthians. So if critics want to make a case that Paul only reported having a vision of some kind, this is the primary data.

The three descriptions of Paul’s experience in Acts are found in 9:3-9; 22:6-11; and 26:12-16. There are several important features of all three descriptions. One of the first things to note is that in every case the men who were with Saul (Paul’s pre-Christian name) also experienced something. In none of these descriptions is this simply a private experience that only Paul was privy to. Something supposedly happened in the real world. But what exactly? Each of the descriptions include a bright light described as being “from heaven” and a voice. Unlike the light, it is not said where the voice came from. In the first account, we are told that the men heard the voice but saw no one. In the second account, Paul specifies that the men saw the light but did not hear the voice. In the third account it says the light shone around them all and they all fell to the ground.

So it’s clear that what is being described here is a real-world event and not a private vision that was only taking place in Paul’s mind. But the question is raised as to whether the men heard the voice or not. Luke wrote both accounts, so it’s unlikely he would have left them this way if it was an actual contradiction. As Ben Witherington points out, in classical Greek the verb akouo (“to hear”) can be used either to hear the sound of something or someone, or to hear and understand. In the former case it’s used with the gentive form of the noun, while in the latter it’s used with the accusative.[i] This is what we find in Acts: in 9:7 the genitive of the noun is used, while 22:9 it’s in the accusative. The men with Paul heard something, but it was not intelligible to them.

But another important clue to what happened is that it specifically says in Acts 9:7 that the men with Paul saw nobody. But why say this unless Paul himself DID see somebody? It seems to imply that Paul saw somebody but the men with him did not, though they did, apparently, see a bright light (perhaps obscuring their sight temporarily). But there are other clues as well. As N.T. Wright points out, Barnabas describes Paul’s experience to the other apostles in Acts 9:27 as him having “seen the Lord on the road.”[ii] But more importantly, in 1 Cor. 9:1 Paul says, “Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?”

Perhaps the skeptics strongest argument comes from Acts 26:19, where Paul says “So, King Agrippa, I did not prove disobedient to the heavenly vision”. This should settle it, right? Paul had a vision, not an objectively real experience. Actually, it turns out not to be the case. The word Paul uses here is the Greek word optasia, which is used four times in the NT. Besides this occurrence, it is found in Luke 1:22; Luke 24:23; and 2 Cor. 12:1. In the cases in Luke it appears to refer to appearances of angels which appear to be objectively real. This is especially clear in 24:23 where it refers to the angels at the tomb which appeared to the women. 2 Cor. 12:1 is ambiguous, although Paul himself says he doesn’t know if the experience described there was “in the body” or “apart from the body.” But the important thing is this is NOT the word used to describe visions which clearly were simply spiritual or private in nature, such as the vision of Ananais in Acts 9:10 (and the parallel vision of Paul in 9:12), the vision of Cornelius in Acts 10:3, and the vision of Peter in Acts 10:17. These all use the word opama. And actually in Acts 12:9, when Peter is miraculously released from prison, we read “And he went out and continued to follow, and he did not know that what was being done by the angel was real, but thought he was seeing a vision (opama).” So here it is clear that the word opama is a vision that is not objectively real. This is not the word that Paul used to describe his vision of Jesus, which would be better described as heavenly appearance.[iii]

Thus the idea that the appearance of Jesus to Paul was just a spiritual vision of some kind is just mistaken. All of the accounts make it clear that it was experienced by Paul’s companions as well, though their experience apparently differed from his in some ways. We also have the implication that Paul saw a person, and elsewhere he says specifically that he has seen Jesus. Yes, Paul’s experience was different in many ways from the experiences of the other apostles (and he describes it with the word ektroma – “untimely born”), but still at it’s core involved seeing Jesus physically.

More importantly was the effect of this experience in changing Paul from a violent persecutor of this new sect to one of its leading proponents. Even skeptics recognize that Paul had an experience of some kind that transformed him from a violent zealot bent on destroying the Christian faith to its most famous missionary, one who endured persecution, imprisonment, and ultimately martyrdom for his proclamation that Jesus was the Messiah who had risen from the dead. A change of this magnitude and with such suddenness can only be explained by a life-changing event. Paul testifies to what that life-changing event was: “He appeared to me also.”
__________________

[i] Ben Witherington, The Acts of the Apostles: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary, (312).
[ii] Wright, 389-390.
[iii] Witherington, (746).

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 01 May 2009 00:12:16 -0700

Hello from ANU, land of zebras, giraffes, warthogs, and their friends…

“Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you’re the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust also in him and he will do this” (Psalm 37:3-5).

THANKS FOR PRAYING
I want to begin today by saying a big “THANK YOU” for your prayers concerning my sister, Rona Buttry. Her recent surgery was successful and we are hopeful she will mend quickly. As of the last report to me she was still in St. Mary’s Hospital in Knoxville, Tennessee and quite uncomfortable because of a drainage tube that remains down her throat, but thankful to be on this end of the experience. I am hoping that by this time, though I haven’t received word of it yet, that the tube has been removed and she is beginning to feel a bit more like her healthy self once again. Thanks so much for your intercession on her behalf.

“TWEEN” TRIMESTER WEEKS
The campus is as quiet now as it will be all year. In just a couple of days the new students will be coming in for orientation and then by next weekend the returning students will be back on campus for the new trimester, but for now things are quiet – and it is really nice! Like I said, it doesn’t happen very often.

We do have a group from the Friends Church (Quakers) here with us for a conference, but though they are much more lively than their American counterparts, they are still much more sedate than our students when the campus is full. They too will be gone by Sunday afternoon and then for a really short time we will be a very small ANU community.

NEW BABY
Mary Jane and I took some time to visit the home of one of our university guards yesterday. He and his wife are the proud parents of a new baby boy named “Blessing.” They shared tea with us and we had a nice time pretending to be grandparents. We have many “children” throughout the campus community, but this is one of the first times we got to “adopt” a member of a new generation of the ANU family.

CHANGE IN THE AIR
However, we have some news that we need to share with you. Our time here in Kenya and at ANU is coming to an end. There are a couple of reasons for this change in our lives. First, there are some pressing family concerns that dictate to us that we need to be back in the states, so we are feeling that we should not renew our contact for a second term. Secondly, because of the financial crunch from the world economic recession, missionaries everywhere are being asked to evaluate their status as to whether or not they plan to continue in their present work. The following is a quote from a letter that came recently from our headquarters via Dr. Louie Bustle and Dr. Jesse Middendorf:

“We are looking for some missionaries that are nearing a natural point of attrition in their service (such as retirement or the completion of their current assignment) to make the transition even sooner, if possible. We are encouraging them to contact their regional director to dialogue about such a possibility.”

Since Mary Jane and I have prayerfully decided that we will not be returning to the mission field following our current term, which ends at the end of this calendar year, and since our leaders are asking all missionaries who are considering making a change to do so as soon as possible, we are immediately beginning our search for a new place of service.

As far as a timeline, we are presently committed to the school because of the tour we are doing with the ANU Choir through the States and to the General Assembly in Orlando, Florida. We will be finished with this assignment mid-July and could be available to enter into a new ministry back in the states sometime in the month of August at the earliest.

We appreciate your prayers for guidance as we make this transition. We will continue the newsletter and keep everyone posted as to our progress toward our next assignment until we leave Africa and begin the next stage of our journey.

IN THE MEANTIME…
Our ANU choir, “The Shangilia Singers,” has just been asked to sing at the General Sunday School and Discipleship Convention in Orlando. That means, besides our twenty-four concerts commitments, we are singing five times in Orlando at the various conventions and banquets. Our students don’t have the full slate yet and probably don’t grasp all that this means, but we are highly honored by being asked to sing at these events.

We also hit another milestone today. We took a check to the travel agency to pay off the plane tickets for the choir. ANU has advanced us the money until we can get the rest of the student payments and the money we will raise in our travels, so now we have crossed another bridge. Visas are in hand, tickets are purchased, and the schedule is complete. Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene has donated a bus for us to use, Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene has provided us with the money to get from New York to Indianapolis, and the Tennessee District has given us sleeping bags to use for the nights we are not booked in a concert somewhere. God, through His people, is opening so many doors for us and we are grateful beyond words!

I am a little less than two weeks away from getting on the big bird and making the long flight westward. Mary Jane and the choir will follow and arrive in Indianapolis, Indiana on the 28th of this month. Once again, here is our concert slate for the tour:

May 30 – Northeastern Indiana Mission Convention (Marion, Indiana)
May 31 (am) – Anderson, Indiana Southdale Church of the Nazarene
May 31 (pm) – Northeastern Indiana Camp Meeting (Marion, Indiana)
June 2-3 – Georgia District Mission Convention (Dublin, Georgia)
June 6 – Education Foundation Meeting (Nashville, Tennessee)
June 7 (am) – Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene
June 7 (pm) – Louisville, Kentucky Farmdale Church of the Nazarene
June 9 – New Albany, Indiana Christ Community Church of the Nazarene
June 10 – Hartford City, Indiana Church of the Nazarene
June 11 – Rockville, Indiana First Baptist Church
June 12 – Chicago Central District Mission Convention (Kankakee, Illinois)
June 14 (am) – Kansas City, Missouri First Church of the Nazarene
June 14 (pm) – Olathe, Kansas College Church of the Nazarene
June 15 – Church of the Nazarene Global Ministry Center (Lenexa, Kansas)
June 16 – St. Louis, Missouri South County Church of the Nazarene
June 17 – Nashville, Tennessee Trevecca Community Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (am) – Leesburg, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (pm) – Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 23 – Clearwater, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 24-July 1 – Church of the Nazarene General Assembly (Orlando, Florida)
July 5 (am) – Pompano Beach, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (pm) – Venice, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 8 – Redlands, Florida Church of the Nazarene
July 9 – Leave Miami, Florida for Nairobi, Kenya (via New York and Dubai)

Blessings on you all! Thanks for praying! Have a wonderful weekend!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

The Rebel's Guide to Joy - William Cowper Bio

William Anderson — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 03:47:00 -0700

Laura Ingraham takes a "post-Christian" to task

Fri, 24 Apr 2009 17:00:00 -0700

I stumbled across this interview that Laura Ingraham did recently with "post-Christian" author Ted Dekker about a new book he has coming out. The interview was supposed to focus on the book (BoneMan's Daughters), but somehow got sidetracked into what it means to be "post-Christian" and why we should or should not use the term Christian to describe ourselves. For me it was partly comical, although somewhat saddening to hear Laura (a devout Catholic) rip Ted's argument's for "post-Christianity" to shreds with just a few simple questions and some common sense. This interview helps to reveal the weakness of the arguments used by those who want to be Christians (believe Christian doctrines) without labeling themselves as Christians. Here is where you can download the interview: http://www.teddekker.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/laura_041309.mov Here is the link to Ted Dekker's blog, where I originally came across the interview: http://www.teddekker.com/2009/04/13/ar

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 24 Apr 2009 10:09:04 -0700

Greetings from ANU! Jambo! (Hello!)

“But you beloved, building yourself up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life” (Jude 1:20-21 NKJV).

LIFE AT ANU
It is another beautiful day one degree south of the equator in central Kenya. We have even had a couple of wonderful rain showers since last week and though we still have a long way to go to get past the drought we are so grateful for the moisture we have received. The rain brings lots of things: the greening of grass, a drop in the temperature, and lots of bugs – which greatly pleases the many variety of birds that gather here. We have a small hard shell bug that continually finds its way all throughout the house, however. They crunch when we step on them and if we don’t pick them up afterwards they draw ants – and so it goes.

HOSTING GUESTS
We just finished our Africa Region Leadership Conference. Around 300 district superintendents, field strategy coordinators, and other general and regional leaders have graced our campus for a week of very busy and long days of planning, instruction, and inspiration. Most are gone by now, but though we are both about as tired as we can be, Mary Jane and I have been blessed greatly by rubbing shoulders with some of God’s special and gifted servants. We can hopefully crash for a while later today and tomorrow so we can be ready to get back to work on Monday. Mary Jane has been the campus logistics coordinator for this event and she has pushed herself about as far as she can go. If you know her you know that she always runs in first gear – and usually winds it out to about 9000 rpm. Though I am neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, I predict she will be looking at the inside of her eyelids for the next couple of days.

SAYING GOODBYE TO GUESTS
Tomorrow we lose our houseguests as well. Corey Buttry (our nephew) and Joe Ladesic have been with us since January and have completed their trimester of studies here at ANU. They have gotten to see a lot more of Africa than we have and now they are off to Europe to hike for a month before they travel back to the USA and their families. We appreciate these special young men and are grateful to have had some time with them. The house will certainly seem empty when they are gone.

SHANGILIA CHOIR TOUR
We are now about a month away from beginning our tour with our students. The schedule for our travels is as follows:

May 27 – Leave Nairobi for the USA (via Dubai and New York)
May 28 – Arrive in Indianapolis, Indiana
May 30 – Northeastern Indiana Mission Convention (Marion, Indiana)
May 31 (am) – Anderson, Indiana Southdale Church of the Nazarene
May 31 (pm) – Northeastern Indiana Camp Meeting (Marion, Indiana)
June 2-3 – Georgia District Mission Convention (Dublin, Georgia)
June 6 – Education Foundation Meeting (Nashville, Tennessee)
June 7 (am) – Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene
June 7 (pm) – Louisville, Kentucky Farmdale Church of the Nazarene
June 9 – New Albany, Indiana Christ Community Church of the Nazarene
June 10 – Hartford City, Indiana Church of the Nazarene
June 11 – Rockville, Indiana First Baptist Church
June 12 – Chicago Central District Mission Convention (Kankakee, Illinois)
June 14 (am) – Kansas City, Missouri First Church of the Nazarene
June 14 (pm) – Olathe, Kansas College Church of the Nazarene
June 15 – Church of the Nazarene Global Ministry Center (Lenexa, Kansas)
June 16 – St. Louis, Missouri South County Church of the Nazarene
June 17 – Nashville, Tennessee Trevecca Community Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (am) – Leesburg, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (pm) – Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 23 – Clearwater, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 24-July 1 – Church of the Nazarene General Assembly (Orlando, Florida)
July 5 (am) – Pompano Beach, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (pm) – Venice, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 8 – Redlands, Florida Church of the Nazarene
July 9 – Leave Miami, Florida for Nairobi, Kenya (via New York and Dubai)

I am actually getting closer than the choir to my departure date. I leave for the USA on May 13 and begin the process of getting my Commercial Driver’s License (CDL) so I will be qualified to drive the bus for the team. My main focus over the next two-week is to prepare myself for this series of tests. Whoops! I just got a text message telling me that I have to attend a faculty workshop on Monday and Tuesday from 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. I guess I’ll have to squeeze in CDL study when I can.

Well, I’d better use my time wisely and get with the program. I trust that the Internet will stay up and I will be in touch next week. Have a blessed weekend!

Kwa herini (Goodbye)!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 07:01:47 -0700

Hello from Kenya!

Here are some words of encouragement…from the Apostle Paul.

“You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, mail nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise” (Romans 8:1-2).

EASTER AT ANU
Last Sunday the University Church of the Nazarene had its first Easter service. Pastor Gift Mtukwa shared the resurrection message and led us in a communion services and we had a good number of visitors join us for the first time. The church has now passed the six-month mark in age and our hopes are high for its future. Each new “first” is a special event and it is a privilege to be in on the ground floor as these events take place.

CATCHING UP
I am finally home from teaching for the last two weeks in Machakos. All I had to do is today was administer the final exam tomorrow and then collect the papers and head back to Nairobi and ANU via a three hour traffic mess. It is good to be home again and soon hope to see Mary Jane and the guys at my house. Most of the students are gone by this time because finals are now over for the trimester on campus. I’m sure there are a lot of them very happy to get those tests behind them and get a little break.

LIFE IN MACHAKOS
The people there were very friendly and the accommodations comfortable. I got three meals a day, privacy to study, and some creature comforts like a refrigerator and a TV. Well, the TV just got a couple of stations and usually the words were in Kiswahili, but I don’t watch that much anyway. One real blessing was a fan that blew from the doorway to cool my room off. The rooms are made of metal and when the afternoon equatorial sun starts bearing down it gets a little warm. When the sun set it cooled off nicely for the night. I shared my room with a few lizards (which is not at all unusual in this part of the world), but as long as they picked up after themselves we got along just fine. I had a gray cat join me in the dining area for my meals and found that he liked French Fries. Hopefully he won’t be any worse for wear because of the American influence.

The students I have been teaching are all teachers in their own right. They are taking their holiday time to improve their educational standing and hopefully eventually gain a university degree. Elementary teachers make about 15,000 Kenya Shilling per month (about $187) and many times they are taking care of orphans as well as their own family. I talked with one lady yesterday who is caring for five AIDS orphans as well as her own three children – and on top of this she is going to school so she can to try and advance her lot in life. She is not alone in her situation. They are a pretty amazing bunch.

One neat thing about this group was that each morning they spontaneously began singing to start our class. One would lead and then the others would echo the words. Most songs were in the Akamba language, but it was harmonious and beautiful. One thing about Kenya; it is a singing and dancing country. Take away their voices and their legs and I don’t know if they could survive. Since I don’t speak the language I couldn’t join the song and since I haven’t got a dancing bone in my body I just watched and smiled, but the class has been a joy to be around.

The city of Machakos is surrounded by huge hills and in the mornings the clouds settle down on them like the Smokey Mountains of Tennessee. In that regard it felt a bit like home, but when I looked around and became aware that I was about the only white face anywhere in the area it sometime feels a bit awkward. Children love to stare and point and say, “How are you” (emphasis always on the YOU!). I just smile back and wave. It’s an interesting place.

The roads on this trip were pretty interesting. Sometimes they were as smooth as anyone could ask for and other times there were long stretches that resembled more of a dry river bed that a road. The dust was often so thick that one couldn’t even see the car ahead – or the one coming at me. Thank the Lord for His protection while traveling.

DROUGHT
Though we have had a little rain things continue to be in serious condition. Agriculture and Tourism are the main industries in this country, but if the rains continue to fail and the government continues to struggle with leadership issues, then both of these lifelines will be greatly affected. We could use a lot a rain for a long time to make up for the lack we have experienced. I pray it will come soon. If it doesn’t, it is going to a long stretch until the next expected rains come in October. Less than 2% of Kenya is forested, so there is not much help from the trees in helping to form clouds in the sky.

LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE
I am returning home just in time for the Africa Leadership Conference, which will be held over the next week at ANU. Church of the Nazarene leadership from all over the continent and some from the US will be here and it will hopefully be a good time to be challenged, trained, inspired, and to catch up on the news from places we have not been to, or at least been to for a while. It will also be a time of getting all the exams graded since they have to all be turned in by next Friday. I guess I’ll be splitting my time between the two events.

Mary Jane has been as busy as a bee getting ready for our international guests. Yesteday she was off to the travel agent to make the first payment for our choir tour and then off to the airport to greet incoming visitors. With me being gone I haven’t been able to keep up on everything that has been happening, but we call once a day and try to keep in touch. I know we both will be happy for a little down time before we start gearing up for our next big trip. It will be here before we know it and Lord willing I will be arriving in my hometown one month from today. A lot still has to be done between now and then.

So, it’s time to get this letter on the “net” and soon after I’ll start getting the sound system in place for our guests and the upcoming meetings. And so it goes…I hope you all have a great day and a wonderful weekend!

Be blessed and be a blessing!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

Settling Down

Wed, 15 Apr 2009 17:00:00 -0700

It has been a little more than a month since I last posted an update on this blog. Things have been busier than I had expected, and look to be even busier in the month to come. Here are a few highlights from the past month: - Ariel turned 2 on March 26th. We had a birthday party with a bunch of our friends and coworkers. She is a beautiful young girl who looks and acts quite a bit older than a (barely!) 2 year old, especially when compared to her older brother. Gabriel and Ariel are very nearly the same size, and Ariel is not far behind Gabriel (who is 15 months older) in speech and other cognitive abilities. (Ariel has her mouth full of a special Brazilian chocolate candy in the above picture) - I have been teaching English on the weekends at two local English schools. These are private schools who offer classes on weekends and during the summer and winter holiday seasons to students who want to learn more advanced English. It has been fun tea

The Gospel - Mark Driscoll

William Anderson — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 12:26:00 -0700

Resurrection Faith (part three)

John Fraser — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 13:33:00 -0700

He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles;

Here Paul begins to list the eyewitnesses – not to the Resurrection itself, but to the risen Christ. Keep in mind that these reports were in circulation within 2-3 years after Jesus’ death. There can be no doubt that these people actually reported having seen Jesus after his death. Those reports were either true or false. One thing they were not were myths and legends that developed over a long period of time. Paul himself checked with the apostles to verify the contents of his preaching as he writes in Galatians 1:18-20. He says, “Then three years later I went up to Jerusalem to become acquainted with Cephas, and stayed with him fifteen days. But I did not see any other of the apostles except James, the Lord's brother. Now in what I am writing to you, I assure you before God that I am not lying.”

Skeptics sometimes like to use the illustration of the game where you have a line of people and the person at the start of the line gives a message to the next person. They pass it to the next person and so on, until it gets to the other end. Then you see how the message got garbled in the process. This, they say, is how we got the stories about Jesus in the New Testament. The problems with this illustration are numerous. The biggest problem is this: all you need to do to find out what the original message was is to ask the person at the front of the line. In fact, that’s the only way you can tell that the message was changed is by comparing the last person’s story with the first person’s story. So in order for this to be the process by which we arrived at the stories of Jesus in the New Testament, you have to assume that nobody checked with those who were reported as eyewitnesses. However, we have specific claims that people DID check with the eyewitnesses, and not just by Paul. Luke also specifically claims to have checked with eyewitnesses, as does John. Paul even basically swears an oath here in Galatians that he’s telling the truth. But if those claims were false, then these men were lying. Is it possible Paul was lying? The early and consistent testimony of church history is that Paul died a martyr’s death in Rome around 64 AD under Nero after having risked his life countless times to proclaim the Gospel message throughout the Roman Empire. Of first importance in that proclamation was the eyewitness testimony of those who had seen Jesus after his Resurrection. This was not a game for Paul and for the other eyewitnesses – it was quite literally a matter of life and death.

He Appeared to Cephas

The first appearance Paul reports is one to Peter (Cephas is Peter’s name in Aramaic), and evidently to Peter by himself since it’s listed separately from the appearance to the Twelve. Some skeptics object that we have no report in the Gospels of such an appearance. But this is not entirely correct. It’s true that there’s no narrative of such an appearance, but in fact an appearance to Peter by himself is mentioned by Luke. This happens after the narrative of Jesus appearing to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. Luke writes, “And they got up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found gathered together the eleven and those who were with them, saying, ‘The Lord has really risen and has appeared to Simon’” (Luke 24:33-34). Simon is Peter’s original name which Jesus changed to Cephas (or Peter), meaning rock. So here in Luke we have a clear reference to this first appearance to Peter mentioned by Paul in 1 Corinthians. We have no other details of this appearance, but Luke indicates that Peter, after going to the tomb himself to verify the incredible story of the women, returned to his home “marveling at what had happened” (Luke 24:12). This private appearance to Peter most likely occurred at his home.

Then to the Twelve

The next appearance listed by Paul is to the Twelve. Luke and John both record an appearance of Jesus to his disciples on the evening after his resurrection. In Luke it occurs immediately after the passage given above. The Emmaus disciples return to Jerusalem to find the eleven and others who are with them talking about Jesus’ appearance to Peter. The two from Emmaus then recount their own testimony. Jesus then appears to all of them. Interestingly, Luke records that they became frightened thinking that it was a spirit. Jesus says to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” He then asks them if they have something to eat, and eats a piece of broiled fish in front of them. This is an absolutely remarkable story given the completely unexpected nature of it. Luke does not portray Jesus here as a spirit-like being at all, but as having the properties of a normal human being. At the same time, he also can do things normal people can’t do, like appearing and disappearing at will. But the Gospel narratives give nothing else unusual about Jesus, except that he is sometimes recognized immediately and sometimes not recognized until later. If this was a legendary development, why does Jesus’s body not glow or something else to indicate its supernatural qualities? Luke indicates that the angels in the tomb were “dazzling” in appearance – why not Jesus? Even the disciples seem to have doubts and questions about their experiences. This is consistent with what we would expect from anyone who sees a person they’ve known after their death, but hardly as an apologetic for the Resurrection written afterwards to dupe a gullible populace.

The skeptic likes to raise the objection that at this point in the story the Twelve was no longer twelve, since Judas had reportedly committed suicide after betraying Jesus. In fact Luke says the disciples on the road to Emmaus returned to “the eleven.” So how can Paul say that Jesus appeared to the Twelve? One solution immediately presents itself in Luke’s account of the election of a replacement for Judas in Acts 1. We are told that Matthias was chosen for this role. But we are also told that Peter gave the necessary qualifications for this office in Acts 1:21-22: “Therefore it is necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us -- beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He was taken up from us -- one of these must become a witness with us of His resurrection.” So the only candidates were apparently those who had accompanied the apostles from the beginning. Luke has already indicated that there were others gathered with the eleven when Jesus appeared, so it’s quite possible, even probable, that Matthais was one of those present at that appearance on the first evening. Of course, John reports that Thomas was NOT present for that first appearance, but that eight days later Jesus appeared to them again when all of the disciples were present.

Then to more than 500

Paul makes a remarkable report that Jesus also appeared to a group of more than five hundred people at one time. He also adds the note “most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep.” This obviously was not part of the original creed which Paul had received, but was added by him when he wrote the Corinthians. Skeptics will argue that this appearance must be fictitious, because there is no record of such an appearance in the Gospels. Some suggest that the appearance in Matthew 28 on the mountain in Galilee may have been this event, although Matthew only mentions the eleven. It’s conceivable that Matthew just omitted reference to a large crowd besides the disciples, although arguments from silence make for poor evidence. But the skeptic’s argument is itself an argument from silence: the Gospels do not specifically mention such an appearance, so there must not have been one. Of course, even when multiple accounts mention the same appearance (such as the one to Peter and to the Twelve), the skeptic says those ones didn’t happen, either for some other reason!

What is remarkable about the five hundred is Paul’s statement that most of these eyewitnesses are still alive. For one thing, it indicates that he must have known who these people were and had some sort of up-to-date information on their whereabouts in order to make such a claim. After all, he was writing to the Corinthians some 20 years after the events in question. How could he claim that most of these eyewitnesses were alive without having some reliable source of information on them? And of course it also raises the question of why he would add this to his letter. He’s clearly using this list as evidential support for the claim that Jesus had really risen from the dead. The information could be verified by his readers, and Paul is staking not only his own apostolic authority on the veracity of his claims, but also the entire truth of the Gospel message itself, a message which he had risked his life to proclaim and eventually gave his life for it. Would he have made a claim like this if such an event had not been reported by eyewitnesses? And again, since the event itself appears to have been part of the early creed and was thus in circulation within 2-3 years after Jesus’ death, how could such a story have originated? Skeptical theories such as hallucinations absolutely won’t work. For more than 500 people to have a hallucination of the same person at the same time would be at least as great a miracle as the Resurrection itself.

Then He Appeared to James

This James is not the same James as the member of the original apostles by that name, the son of Zebedee and the brother of John. Paul is referring here to James, the brother of Jesus (Mark 6:3) who became a leader in the early church (Gal. 1:19) and wrote the book of James. This is in itself a remarkable fact. The portrait of Jesus’ siblings in John’s Gospel is that they did not believe in him and may in fact have been somewhat embarrassed by him. How is it, then, that one of Jesus’ brothers not only became one of his followers after his death but a leader in the early church? According to this early church creed, it was because Jesus himself appeared to James after his resurrection. Paul himself met personally with James to confirm this story. So there can be no doubt that James, the brother of Jesus, reported having seen his older brother after he had risen.

Then to All the Apostles

The penultimate appearance on Paul’s list is to “all the apostles,” apparently meaning a different group than the Twelve. The word “apostle” means one who is sent or commissioned and is used in the New Testament to refer to individuals other than the Twelve. A.T. Robertson believes this final appearance to be the one narrated in Acts 1 at Jesus’ ascension. While this is a plausible explanation, we don’t have enough information to be certain.

The list of eyewitnesses that Paul gives here is impressive. He says that all of these people claimed to have seen Jesus after his resurrection. As we have already learned, this creed was almost certainly in circulation among the churches within 2-3 years of Jesus’ crucifixion. Is it possible that these stories had developed as legends in such a short period of time? That’s out of the question. Legends take far longer than that to develop. As A.N. Sherwin-White notes, even two full generations is not sufficient to wipe out a core of historical facts. Besides that, Paul himself met with at least some of these eyewitnesses personally, and was also able to make the claim that most of the 500 were still alive at the time of the writing of his letter to the Corinthians 20 years after the crucifixion. They weren’t legends.

Could the reports have been mistaken in some way? Did people simply think they had seen Jesus but they actually didn’t? Natural explanations involving things like hallucinations are just not plausible. Hallucinations are subject-dependent, so it’s not possible for two people to have identical hallucinations at the same time, let alone 500 people! Even taking just the testimony of the apostles, it’s impossible that they could have all been deceived into thinking that they had seen Jesus when in fact they had not.

It’s also inconceivable that they could have fabricated the story. What would have been their motive? To achieve fame and glory? If that was there motive, they would have had plenty of opportunity to recant after it became clear that their “reward” for their deception was going to be persecution, imprisonment, and martyrdom. But tradition records that all of the apostles except for John were martyred for their faith without ever recanting of their testimony. Skeptics have challenged how good the evidence is for the martyrdom of all of the apostles. The accounts for some of the apostles are admittedly sketchy, but there are good early traditions for many of them, including James the brother of John who was put to death by Herod in Acts 12:2, Peter, and Paul among several others. As Tim and Lydia McGrew point out, even the fact that the apostles had seen others of their number put to death would have been enough to give strong motive to recant on their testimony. So how strong is this eyewitness testimony? Strong enough for the eyewitnesses themselves to have risked, and in many cases given their lives for it, to deliver their message to future generations.

Dwelling in the Gospel - Tim Keller

William Anderson — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 07:53:00 -0700

One of the sessions from the 2008 Dwell Conference in NYC on Urban Church Planting.

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Thu, 09 Apr 2009 21:25:19 -0700

Hello from Kenya!

“Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:4-5).

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly” (Romans 5:8).

GOOD FRIDAY
I hope that God draws you especially close to His heart today as around the world Christians are remembering the Passion of our Lord and the price that He paid to redeem the world from the bondage of sin. I hope also that you find time today to reflect and focus on what that sacrifice means for your life.

We will be having the first Good Friday service of the University Church at noon today. I will be speaking, but the focus is on the cross and Pastor Gift Mtukwa will be sharing communion for the first time in his ministry. It will be a memorable time for all present because of this being another “first” for the church, but more importantly for the reason we gather.

OFF TO MACHAKOS
This week I have been living off campus in a little town called Machakos, and teaching a class on Christian Beliefs. Machakos is about a two-hour drive from ANU (depending on the condition of the roads and the traffic). The group I am teaching is made up of public school teachers who are trying to get their degree in education from ANU. They are a delightful group, mainly from the Akamba tribe and each day they begin our class time by singing me a song in their mother tongue. Naturally, I have to ask for an interpretation to find out what they are saying, but the harmony is beautiful and like most Kenyans I have met, they quickly become a group that is easy to love.

It’s a little lonely in my room between classes, but since I haven’t had a lot of time to prepare, plus the fact that I have never taught this subject before, I need the extra hours to get ready for the next day’s class. So far it seems to be going well, but I guess I won’t know for sure until I get all the tests graded from the final exam. In any case, by next Friday it will all be over.

FINAL EXAMS
The students of our main campus and town campus are gathering daily now to take their final exams. Since I am not around during this time I can’t experience it with them, but my thoughts and prayers surround them. Tension is high and fear of failure is very real. So much depends on the outcome of these tests and everyone is very focused on the possible rewards and consequences. Their life situations can change literally 180 degrees should things go badly. If you could breathe a prayer on the behalf of these students I know they would appreciate it.

CHOIR TOUR
As our choir finishes their exams they are starting to leave the campus one by one. We will not see them back at school again until about a week before they leave for the US. That last week will be filled with lots of practice and last minute planning. Hopefully, by that time I will be in the States and successful in my attempt to get my CDL so I can drive the bus for the group. I plan to pick them up at the airport in Indianapolis on May 28th, so we trust all will go well on all fronts.

Please keep this tour in your prayers. This project is costing over $50,000 (plane tickets, lodging, food, ground transportation) and right now it is a really big faith venture for us. We know that the recession is hurting a lot of people back home and here as well, but we also know that the Lord hasn’t brought us this far to leave us now. We are convinced that when all of this is said and done that it will be a lesson in trusting God that our students will never forget.

THANKS FOR BEING THERE
While I am on the subject of finances, just let me say thanks to all who are a part of the Church of the Nazarene and for the support that they give to missions. Like all parts of international work, the mission program of our church has great challenges facing it financially that are in many ways unprecedented. Your faithful support of the World Evangelism Fund makes it possible for so many missionaries and support staff to continue to spread the message of Scriptural Holiness to 156 world areas. I know that the natural tendency is to think of work closer to home first¾and certainly that is very important¾but your faithfulness to the global picture is also vital. Thank you for being there for us. We don’t say it nearly loud enough or often enough, but we are grateful far beyond what we able to express. We are proud to be “deputized” to be your missionaries! This is your ministry just as much as it is ours.

SAD NEWS
Last week I received an e-mail from a youth pastor named Michael Pence, from Bedford, Indiana asking me about how to involve his teens in missions. He seemed so concerned about them looking beyond their own little world and grasping the big picture of God. I told him about our coming choir tour and encouraged him to bring his group to where we were going to be on his district so we could have some time of interaction with his kids. He worked part time at the church and at night in a factory to pay the bills. On the way home from church last Sunday with his nine-year-old son he fell asleep at the wheel, flipped his truck, and landed in a flood-swollen creek. Both he and his son drowned in the water. His wife stayed at church following the Palm Sunday service to practice for an Easter Cantata never thinking that by Good Friday both her men would be buried and she would be looking at the cross alone. Life is sometimes so very hard and I hurt and grieve also with this lady for a brother and son I never met, but whose ministry struck a chord in my life. Good Friday and Easter is going to have a totally different meaning this year for her. Please keep the Valley Mission Church and Mrs. Pence in your prayers.

Well, once again it is time to go. My hope and prayer is that you will have a wonderful Easter weekend and that the Risen Lord will meet with you in a very special way this Sunday.

Be blessed and be a blessing…

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

Resurrection Faith (part two)

John Fraser — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 14:42:00 -0700

that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures

Paul begins here to lay out what exactly it was that was of “first importance.” Three historical events are given here: that Christ died, was buried, and was raised on the third day. Paul also uses the expression “according to the Scriptures” twice. Finally, he states that Jesus died “for our sins.” N.T. Wright points out that Paul probably doesn’t have any specific proof-texts in mind, but the Scriptural revelation as a whole. The themes of redemption and atonement are, of course, prominent themes in the Old Testament. Jesus’ death is shown in the New Testament as being prefigured in the Passover, and in the Old Testament sacrificial system. Paul may have meant that Jesus’ Resurrection was prefigured in the Scriptures (Jesus himself referred to it as the “sign of the prophet Jonah”), or perhaps even that the Resurrection on the third day was prefigured. Some have seen this in Hosea 6:1-2: “Come, let us return to the LORD. For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us. He will revive us after two days; He will raise us up on the third day, that we may live before Him.” Some messianic passages in the Old Testament were originally predicated of the nation of Judah. This is the clearest passage in the OT that looks like a resurrection on the third day.

Christ Died For Our Sins

The death of Jesus by crucifixion is, of course, recorded in all four Gospels. Some critics have alleged that Jesus didn’t actually die on the cross, that he just fainted and then later revived. This is sometimes known as the “swoon” theory, and is an attempt to explain how the disciples came to believe that Jesus was alive after his death (or apparent death as the theory goes). However, this idea is utterly implausible for several reasons. First, Roman centurions were very experienced in executing people, and knew how to tell when someone was dead. We have testimony from John’s Gospel that indicates that the soldiers took Jesus to be dead. In order to hasten death for the two criminals executed beside Jesus, the soldiers broke their legs with a heavy mallet. This would result in death in short order, since crucifixion victims must push up on their legs in order to take a breath. Lacking the ability to do that, they would die of asphyxiation quite quickly. But when the soldiers came to Jesus, they saw that he was already dead and didn’t break his legs. Furthermore, John records that one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear to double-check that he was dead.

According to John, “one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe” (John 19:33-34). This is a remarkable statement. First, the fact that this is given not one but two attestations as to its veracity (“the man who saw it has given his testimony which is true and he knows it’s true”). This sounds almost like an oath in a court of law. Second, what the eyewitness saw was blood and water flowing out of Jesus’ side. Apparently this was unexpected and unusual which is why he commented on it and reinforced the comment with an oath as to its veracity. But it’s also consistent with the mode of death. According to Dr. Alexander Metherell (M.D.), “Even before he died . . . the hypovolemic shock would have caused a sustained rapid heart rate that would have contributed to heart failure, resulting in the collection of fluid in the membrane around the heart, called a pericardial effusion, as well as around the lungs, which is called a pleural effusion.” This unexpected event was noteworthy to John. It’s consistent with Jesus’ medical condition at the time of his death. It also proves that he was, in fact, dead.

He Was Buried

All four of the Gospels record the burial of Jesus in a tomb by Joseph of Arimathea who was a member of the Sandhedrin, the ruling council that condemned Jesus to death. Matthew and John both indicate that Joseph was a follower of Jesus, with John adding that he was a “closet disciple” for fear of the other Jews. It seems highly unlikely that this was a legend or an invention of the early Christians. There would have been no reason to invent a member of the council that condemned Jesus to come forward and to be the person who gave Jesus an honorable burial in his own family tomb. And while the Gospels include different details in the post-Resurrection narratives, all four include Joseph’s involvement in the burial. For these reasons the late Cambridge University NT scholar John A.T. Robinson said, “the honorable burial of Jesus is one of the earliest and best-attested facts that we have about the historical Jesus” (Strobel, 210).

Skeptics object that there is no other historical record of such an individual, and no clear identification of a city called Arimathea. However, there are many other references to Joseph in non-canonical literature. Some of it is clearly legendary, but the city of Ramah, which was the birthplace of the prophet Samuel, is called Armathaim in the Greek translation of the Old Testament (1 Sam. 2:2). This may well have been the city where Joseph was from. For the early Christians to have invented and named a specific individual from a specific group if that person did not exist would be a curious move, given that the information could be checked out.

He Was Raised on the Third Day

Some skeptics argue that Paul did not believe in a physical resurrection, but a spiritual one. Thus Paul doesn’t specifically mention the fact that the tomb was discovered empty as the Gospels indicate. These skeptics sometimes point to 1 Cor. 15:42-44 as evidence for this contention: “So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.”

Paul makes a number of contrasts between the present body and the resurrected body, including that the present body is “natural” while the resurrection body is “spiritual.” This is taken to mean “physical” and “ghost-like" by the skeptic. However, this is a mistake. Paul uses the exact same contrast with the exact same words (“natural” and “spiritual”) at the beginning of the letter. In 1 Cor. 2:14-15 Paul writes, “But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one.” When he speaks of the “natural” man and he who is “spiritual,” he doesn’t mean one with a physical body and one who is a ghost! Rather, he’s talking about the orientation of the person, whether towards the earthly (natural) realm or towards the heavenly (spiritual) realm. This skeptical theory is rather bizarre for another reason. Skeptics normally assert that the belief in the Resurrection was a process of accumulating myth. Yet according to the skeptics’ theory here, the earliest belief (in 1 Cor. 15) is more mythologized than the later versions which appear in the Gospels where Jesus is physically resurrected!

There is also the point that if Paul thought the Resurrection was spiritual and didn’t involved Jesus’ body coming back to life, what was significant about the third day? Why the delay? A spiritual resurrection wouldn’t require a waiting period of three days. Presumably Jesus would have gone to heaven spiritually immediately upon his death. But Paul says he was raised on the third day, the same day that the tomb was discovered empty by some of Jesus’ women followers according to all of the Gospel reports. This story is also a very unlikely invention, as women were not considered to be reliable witnesses in Jewish culture. In fact Paul’s list of appearances in 1 Cor. 15 fails to mention any of the appearances to the women reported in the Gospels. This can be explained in one of two ways. Either the story of the women was invented later and inserted into the Gospel accounts (highly unlikely), or the early church creed left out the appearances to the women in part due to the cultural stigma against having women as witnesses, and in part because creeds only record information which is deemed essential. This explanation makes much more sense of the evidence.

Our Church in Paonta Sahib, HP, India was attacked by Hindu Militants

HENRY JOHN — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:31:00 -0700

We would like you to pray for our Church in Paonta Sahib,HP, INDIA. The Church got started in 2008. Last Sunday during the worship service a group of Hindu Militants attacked our Church Pastor and the small congregation. They abused him and beat him up. They have asked to leave the town, since he is living in a rented house. He has two little sons. They have threatened his landlord and asked his landlord to move him and his family out from the house.

Please pray for him and his family and the Church people. It is a very small group of 18-20 people. The authority of the town did not even care to help him nor did the police.

I was able to talk to him over the phone. He need prayers. He doesn't know where to go. I have uploaded couple of videos to show you what is like when a group of Hindu militants attack a Church.

Resurrection Faith (part one)

John Fraser — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 14:42:00 -0700

In preparation for Easter, I'd like to walk through one of the key passages in all of Scripture that points to the faith of the earliest disciples that Jesus had risen from the dead. I'll also be commenting on the implications of our Easter faith at the end of the week.

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles; and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.

1 Corinthians 15:3-8

This passage is the earliest witness in the New Testament to the Resurrection. I'll be examining it one piece at a time. Skeptics, of course, regard the Resurrection as a myth or a legend, a story that simply developed over time as people told stories about a charismatic Jewish peasant preacher named Yeshua. But of course nobody today could believe such nonsense . . . could they?

Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is universally recognized as an authentic letter of Paul, written to the church in Corinth around 55-57 AD. This passage from Paul is recognized as having the form of an early church creed. It’s stylized as a creed and uses some early expressions such as Peter’s Aramaic name (Cephas) and “the Twelve.” Paul tells his readers that he had delivered this creed to them that he had previously received, the contents of which consist of a number of historical claims. The words Paul uses are important – he uses two technical rabbinic terms for receiving and handing on of sacred tradition¹. He wasn’t merely passing on gossip that he’d heard. The accepted date for Paul’s previous visit to Corinth was 51 AD. So when Paul says he had delivered this message to the Corinthians, he was referring to something he had done on his previous visit. But when did he receive it? Obviously prior to that. It’s also significant that he says this was “of first importance.” James D.G. Dunn notes that “he assuredly does not imply that the tradition became important to him only at some subsequent date. More likely he indicates the importance of the tradition to himself from the start; that was why he made sure to pass it on to the Corinthians when they first believed.”²

Thus it appears that this creed was received by Paul very early after his remarkable conversion, which occurred on his way to Damascus in about 33-34 AD, within just a couple of years after Jesus’ crucifixion. It’s possible he received it in Damascus, or he may have received it on his visit with the apostles which he mentions in Gal. 1:18, which would have been no later than 37 AD. But this creed would have already been in circulation before that. Thus Dunn writes, “this tradition, we can be entirely confident, was formulated as tradition within months of Jesus’ death [emphasis original].”³ Even liberal New Testament scholar Gerd Lüdemann says, “We can assume that all the elements in the tradition are to be dated to the first two years after the crucifixion of Jesus.”⁴ N.T. Wright agrees, saying this creed was likely formulated with 2-3 years of the crucifixion.⁵

If all of this is true, and there’s no good reason to doubt it, then these historical claims simply cannot be dismissed as myths and legends that developed over decades or even centuries as some skeptics claim. Many skeptics point to supposed late dates for the writing of the Gospels to bolster the myth argument, but those arguments are irrelevant (besides being generally mistaken). The historic core of the events surrounding the first Easter can be traced back to within months of the death of Jesus by crucifixion on that Good Friday almost 2000 years ago.

It’s interesting that the creed which Paul delivered so carefully to the Corinthians was not a statement of doctrine, dogma, moral teachings, or esoteric religious philosophy. It was rather a set of very specific historical claims. The only item in it that could be called doctrine is the phrase “for our sins.” This is significant. The foundational claims of Christianity do not have to do with doctrine, dogma, or a philosophical system. They have to do with specific claims of specific historic events. Why is this important? Historic truth claims are true or false. It’s not a question of whether they are true for some people but not for others. And if the historic truths of Christianity can be shown to be true, then Christianity is true, and it’s true for everybody.

It’s also worth mentioning that these claims were quite literally a matter of life and death. Paul had persecuted the church and had been present for the execution of believers, giving his approval. After his amazing conversion, he put his own life on the line repeatedly to proclaim this very message around the Roman Empire, ultimately giving his life for it in martyrdom in Rome. Skeptics may say there were lots of miracle stories, although you will not find any miracle story attested like this one. And you will not find another miracle story for which so many eyewitnesses were willing to give their lives in order to testify to the truth of what they had seen. This was not merely idle gossip or tall tales, but a life-transforming message that survived against all odds to continue to be preached today.

As Paul said in his sermon to the people of Athens in Acts 17,

Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.

Acts 17:30-31

Interesting that in the crowd that heard Paul that day, some scoffed, some said, “we’d like to hear more about this,” and some believed. These are the same responses that you still see today whenever this message is preached. In 2000 years, nothing has changed! One of my favorite things about that sermon of Paul’s is that one of those who believed on the same day was Dionysius the Areopagite. This was a member of the Athenian ruling judicial council, a leader of the city and probably a man learned in law, arguments, and evidence. That message changed his life that day, just like it continues to change lives the world over.

¹N.T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God, 319n13.
²James D.G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered, 855.
³Dunn, 855.
⁴Gerd Lüdemann, The Resurrection of Jesus: History, Experience, Theology. London:SCM, 1998. Cited in Dunn, 855n129.
⁵Wright, 319.

D. A. Carson - What is the Gospel?

William Anderson — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 04:04:00 -0700

Panel Discussion - What is the Gospel?

William Anderson — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 07:34:00 -0700

A great panel discussion on the gospel that is well worth your time to watch. Click here to watch larger version of the video.

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 03 Apr 2009 00:07:49 -0700

Hello from the Maasai plains of Kenya!

“Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners¾of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life” (I Timothy 1:15-16).

HOLY WEEK
This Sunday, Palm Sunday, begins the most precious week of the year for the Christian faith. I hope that it is a time of serious reflection for each of you and a time when the grace of God and the sacrifice of God will become more real to you than ever before.

CRUNCH TIME
Final exams are underway and now the students get the opportunity to show what they have learned and the teachers get the opportunity to see how good a job they have done in preparing them. These exams will go on until the 17th of the month and each one lasts from two to three hours. Tension is in the air since 60% of the final grade comes from this one test, but relief comes afterwards along with a sense of accomplishment and the joy of knowing that the trimester break is just ahead.

BOOM!!!
We had a little bit of excitement here on Tuesday. At about 6:00 p.m. I was down at our house when all of a sudden there was a loud explosion. Almost immediately my phone rang and it was my neighbor (Nancy Pitts) asking me what had happened and I didn’t have any more idea than she did. Shortly afterward though we found out that the water heater in the Cashman Men’s Dorm exploded, tearing out a rock wall, shattering windows as far away as the girls dorm (about 150 feet) and sending chunks of wood flying in all directions. The amazing thing about it was that not one person was injured even slightly. The guys in Cashman may have to do without hot water in their showers for a while (but if you are not the first ones in line you have that anyway), but other than that things will continue on as normal until all repairs are made. How grateful we are to the Lord for His protecting hand over our student body. ANU certainly is holy ground!

RECORDING
Mary Jane led our Shangilia Singers into our mass communication studio for several hours this week to produce a CD that we can take to the US with us when we go. We will produce about 500 of them to take with us for sale and hopefully they will be a blessing and an extension of our ministry after we have returned to Africa. The students are also bringing some of their handcrafts (necklaces, jewelry, Massai souvenirs, etc.) to sell to anyone who may be interested in African wear. The proceeds will give them a little spending money in the States since most of what they have has been put toward their plane tickets.

KITISURU HIGH SCHOOL
Last Sunday my nephew, Corey, and I went to school – to Kitisuru Boys High School (a boarding school) to share in a church service with about 190 boys. I don’t think Corey will forget it quickly. The Kenyan style of worship is vastly different from what we have in the States, as are the facilities that it is held in. Still, when I got an opportunity preach, the students were attentive and a good number of them sought Christ at the close of the service. God is good and getting to share His Good News in places like this are some of the highlights that I will remember long after our time here is over.

MACHAKOS
Beginning Monday of next week I move off campus to the city of Machakos, which is about two hours away. I will be spending the next two-weeks teaching a Christian Beliefs class to a group of teachers who are trying to get their bachelor’s degrees. Teachers here are not yet required to have education degrees, though the country is moving that direction. ANU is helping to make that dream come true for them. So, I will be out of touch most of the next two weeks since I won’t have Internet access, but will be home on the weekends. Hopefully, all will be quiet on the home front and no news will be good news. Mary Jane will be checking the email, however, and can pass on to me anything that I need to respond to.

THANKS!
Just a word to say how grateful we are to all who have been a part of the ANU Nazarene Student Scholarship Fund. To date, nearly $49,000 has been received and the amount continues to grow monthly. For all of those who were contributors to the first year of giving and those who are taking part this year we say a big, “God bless you!” In September we will be starting to give out the interest off this account and we are going to see some very happy students for years to come. Once again we are seeing what difference a little can make in the life of others when the Lord blesses the gift. I pray He will bless the giver in like manner.

Have a wonderful Palm Sunday! Say “Hallelujah!” and wave a palm branch wherever you are. The King of kings is in our midst! Bwana asifiwe!!! Asante Yesu! (Praise the Lord! Thank you, Jesus!)

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya

What is the Church?

William Anderson — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 07:24:00 -0700

What Is The Church from David Tate on Vimeo.

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 27 Mar 2009 00:36:48 -0700

Jambo!

“As I looked, ‘thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. His clothing was as white as snow; the hair of his head was white as wool. His throne was flaming with fare and its wheels were all ablaze. A river of fire was flowing, coming out from before him. Thousands upon thousands attended him; ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him. The court was seated, and the books were opened’” (Daniel 7:9-10).

My classes are over for the trimester and the above passage has the same apocalyptic style as the book of Revelation that I have been teaching, so I thought it would be appropriate to begin this newsletter in that vein.

BUSY DAYS
This is the last full week of school before exams begin next Wednesday. Teachers are trying to cram one more bit of knowledge into the students and the students are trying to endure one more assignment as they cram to get ready for the tests. This is the biggest thing of the semester (60% of their grade) and everyone is focused on it.

TRIP TO NAKURU
I was invited last Sunday to preach in Nakuru. Our houseguests had taken off for Uganda and Mary Jane was trying to rest up from some very busy days so at 5:30 a.m. I began the 2½-hour drive alone. Driving in the dark is always a challenge here. First of all, almost every car, bus, and truck you meet has their bright lights on. There is the occasional vehicle that has no lights at all, but usually one is blinded by the oncoming traffic. That wouldn’t be quite so bad, but the roads are narrow and the traffic loves to hug the middle of the road to keep from falling off the edge. Usually there is not much of a shoulder and few roads have any kind of painted lines on them so it’s often hard to tell where the payment ends and the drop off begins.

Added to these difficulties are the road hazards. Dark people in dark clothing walking, bicycles without any lights or reflectors, and animals (wild and domestic) that can come out of nowhere cause a state of constant tension. I never get sleepy driving here. Then there are the police checkpoints. Sometimes they are marked and other times there are just spike strips stretched across the road to make you stop. Combine these things with the fact that almost every truck, bus, and van fills the air with clouds of black exhaust fumes and you have a pretty good idea of driving after dark in Kenya.

At the first crack of sunrise most vehicles turn off their lights. There seems to be the feeling that they will use them up if they use them too much, so I have learned to watch carefully.

When I finally arrived in Nakuru I called the pastor to get directions to his church. He sent me to meet him at the local post office (which took me a half-hour to find) and said he would be there in twenty minutes. An hour later he finally showed up, but in the meantime as I waited at the post office with my windows up and my doors locked, I was constantly dealing with street boys and men begging me for money. I couldn’t give to one without giving to them all and I know they thought I had an endless supply of money, so they just stood by my window, tapping on it and scratching it with their fingers for what seems like an eternity and waited. I waited also. There was nothing else to do until the pastor got there. It’s heartbreaking, but there is no end to the suffering and poverty one finds here.

As I waited in the car with my windows up, the heat began to rise. People walked by, merchants begin to put out their wares, and some folks were headed for church. Soon people begin trying to sell me things, but they found I was an unwilling customer.

Finally, the pastor arrived and off to church we went. I got there at 9:30 just as a Sunday School class was beginning. At 1:00 p.m. we finally finished our services and left the building. During the time in between there was a time of praise and worship, about six local music specials, offering, and other local rituals. Eventually our school choir sang several selections and I had an opportunity to preach through an “interrupter.” All in all it was a good service with a great bunch of people. The power went off for the first half of it, but eventually a generator was brought in and we were modernized once again. Africans never let a little thing like the loss of electricity to stop a church service.

This Sunday I will preach at Kitisuru Boy’s High School, which is an hour or so north. This will be my third trip there so hopefully we will be having some students from there at ANU one of these days.

FINALLY DONE
Mary Jane has been working like a beaver trying to train our choir and get all the logistics taken care of for the upcoming trip. She has been faithful to the task and firmly determined to get it done. She led the group in a concert yesterday for our final chapel of the trimester and it was great. We are going to have a great time traveling in the “singing bus” throughout the US.

Here is the final edition of our slate with the Shangilia Singers. We finally have the passports, the visas, and the flight tickets nailed down. We have nine men and ten women who will be making the journey. The group will arrive in Indianapolis, Indiana on May 28th and will fly out of Miami, Florida on July 9th. A big “thank you” to Mary Jane’s sister, Jackie, who managed to get the domestic flights for us finally.

May 30 Northeastern Indiana District NMI Convention
May 31 (am) Anderson, Indiana Southdale Church of the Nazarene
May 31 (pm) Northeastern Indiana District Campmeeting
June 2-3 Georgia District NMI Convention
June 6 Nashville, Tennessee Educational Foundation Meeting
June 7 (am) Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene
June 7 (pm) Louisville, Kentucky Farmdale Church of the Nazarene
June 9 New Albany, Indiana Christ Community Church
June 10 Hartford City, Indiana Church of the Nazarene
June 11 Rockville, Indiana First Baptist Church
June 12 Chicago Central District NMI Convention
June 14 (am) Kansas City, Missouri First Church of the Nazarene
June 14 (pm) Olathe, Kansas College Church of the Nazarene
June 15 Lenexa, Kansas Global Ministry Center Chapel
June 16 St. Louis, Missouri South County Church of the Nazarene
June 17 Nashville, Tennessee Trevecca Community Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (am) Leesburg, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (pm) Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 23 Clearwater, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 24-30 Orlando, Florida General Assembly of the Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (am) Pompano Beach, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (pm) Venice, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 8 Redland, Florida Church of the Nazarene

All in all, it will be a little over 5000 miles total driving distance. Now I need to pass the test for the CDL. One step at a time…

Well, enough for another edition. Lord willing, I’ll be in touch next week. Be blessed and be a blessing!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya
Weblog: http://randyandmaryjane.wordpress.com

Equipping to Serve Workshop Resources

William Anderson — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 07:23:00 -0700

Since we closed down the School of Ministry we started a series of workshops called "Equipping to Serve" for all the Calvary Chapels in Romania. So far we have done three workshops- the gospel, Bible overview and How to study the Bible. Below are links to download the PowerPoints and handouts from the two Bible workshops and the video channel for all the teachings. All these downloadable resources are only in Romanian, as well as the teaching of the last two workshops.

Echipare pentru slujire channel: http://vimeo.com/channels/ 36124

Vederea Generala a Bibliei.zip

(4 MB)

Includes handouts from every book of the Bible

Cum sa studiem Biblia.zip

(1 MB)

Updated Gospel Series Resources

William Anderson — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 05:40:00 -0700

I forgot to add a link to download the videos I showed during the powerpoints. So here is what I added to my last blog entry:

PowerPoint Videos (93.5 MB)

I played three videos with the PowerPoints. Only the first one, Hubble Ultra Deep Field 3-D, is embedded in the first powerpoint slide 29, "Why is the Gospel Important?". I think you should put this video in the same file as the PowerPoint. The other two are not embedded but have a photo slide to indicate when they should be played. "A doua sansa - Jean" is shown in the fifth powerpoint slide 66, "How Do I Share My Testimony?" and "Isus al meu/My Jesus" is shown in the seventh powerpoint slide 67, "Why Don't Christians Live the Gospel?".

Links to Gospel Series Resources

William Anderson — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 06:47:00 -0700

Here are links to the videos, handouts and powerpoints from the 10 week gospel series I did. There is no powerpoint for week 6 as we watched the Hope DVD that week. On the gospel list you will find what handouts were given out each week.

Links to Online Videos

Gospel Video Channel: http://vimeo.com/channels/ 25736

To download the videos you would have to become a member then log-in. You can't download the videos from the channel page. What you would do is click on the title in the embedded video on the channel page and that will take you to the video's full page where you will find the button to download on the lower right part of the page. You will have to scroll down the page a bit to see the button.

The Hope online - Româna

(best viewed on Internet Explorer) English

Links to Download Videos

PowerPoint Videos (93.5 MB)

I played three videos with the PowerPoints. Only the first one, Hubble Ultra Deep Field 3-D, is embedded in the first powerpoint slide 29, "Why is the Gospel Important?". I think you should put this video in the same file as the PowerPoint. The other two are not embedded but have a photo slide to indicate when they should be played. "A doua sansa - Jean" is shown in the fifth powerpoint slide 66, "How Do I Share My Testimony?" and "Isus al meu/My Jesus" is shown in the seventh powerpoint slide 67, "Why Don't Christians Live the Gospel?".

Links to Download Handouts and PowerPoints

PowerPoints Româna

(70 MB)

English PowerPoints

(70.6 MB)

Evanghelie Noţite

(1.35 MB)

English Handouts A4

(0.63 MB)

English Handouts Letter

(0.63 MB)

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:23:26 -0700

Hello Spring Lovers! I hope it’s beautiful where you are!

“O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water” (Psalm 63:1).

DRY AND DUSTY
That verse could very easily have been written about Kenya. It is about as dry as I have ever seen it here and we wait (sometimes impatiently) for the long rainy season, which is overdue, to begin. The grass is basically gone and 10 million Kenyans are on the verge of starvation according to our local news reports. There are a lot of factors that figure into this crisis, but a lack of rain is one of them. It’s not the first drought to hit the country and probably won’t be the last, but it is certainly is sad to see.

SCHOOL DAYS DWINDLING
There are only two weeks left before classes are over and the final exams begin. This becomes not only a time of increased pressure over the material that will be covered on the tests, but also for those who haven’t gotten their fees paid yet. No one will be allowed to sit for their exams that has not paid their school bill in full. Some wait for a miracle to happen and some have plans in place to take care of the shortfall, but every trimester there are those who get really stressed over this issue. We hope all will find a way to get their bills paid, but it is ultimately the responsibility of each student to cover the costs. That’s part of the educational experience no matter what part of the world one lives in.

BUSY DAYS
There have been the regular duties of preaching and coordinating chapels and department events here and at the town campus, but I got an extra job this week. Our speaker for Thursday’s chapel cancelled and I got to fill the slot. It always a joy to speak to our students and staff, but usually I prefer a little longer head’s up to plan for it.

This weekend we will be attending a wedding of a colleague and Sunday I will be driving to Nakuru, in the Rift Valley, to meet up with Shangilia (our music group) and do a service in a church there. It’s always fun to meet new congregations and see new places, but it’s about a 2½-hour drive each way surrounding the two-hour service. That makes a pretty full day, especially when driving on Kenyan roads.

Mary Jane is staying busy trying to wrap up our travel plans for our US tour, teaching her class, and coordinating with incoming guests. We thought we would have everything settled for our trip by now, but things are rarely what they seem. Tickets have to be confirmed by Wednesday of next week so we should finally have those details behind us at that point. Then all we have to do is get the group ready and trust that all the needed money comes in. We are holding off until the last moment possible to allow a couple of students who didn’t make it through the visa process the first time to try one more time. We have to have our final count by Tuesday night, however. I think this is one of those projects that takes on a life and identity all of its own. We will be so glad to have done it, but on this side of the mountain it is quite a climb.

As soon as this trimester in over I begin teaching a class in Machakos, which is about a two-hour drive each way from here. Each class will be four hours a day, but fortunately they only last for two weeks. Following these classes we host a regional conference here on campus for a week and then it is time for the new student orientation and off we go again for another trimester. Come to think of it, getting on a plane and flying off is looking better and better…

SEEING THE WORLD
Our houseguest students, Corey and Joe, are headed for Uganda this weekend. They are really making a lot of friends here as they study for the trimester and now they are going to expand their horizons a little more. I know they enjoy spreading their wings a little and making the most of their trip abroad. When they leave here after the trimester is over they will spend a month hiking through Europe. Oh, to be young and full of energy! There is a big part of me that would love to go with them.

SCHEDULE
We are continuing to add to our upcoming music tour, but I think our slate is now about as full as we can make it. Here is what it is at present…

TIME TO GO…
Well, I’ve been informed that the Internet connections are going to be closed down for maintenance in a short time so I had better get this off. Thanks for your continued notes and prayers. We hope to be in touch again next week. Have a blessed weekend and Lord’s Day!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya
Weblog: http://randyandmaryjane.wordpress.com

Lies and Statistics (part 2)

John Fraser — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 05:09:00 -0700

I thought it might be helpful to illustrate the information I gave in my last post in chart form to help bring some clarity to the situation. The first chart is the religious trends in the U.S. based on the ARIS. Keep in mind that Kevin Slater cherry-picked that data by comparing only the numbers from 1990 and 2008 for everybody except atheists (for which there was no number in 1990), leaving out the important figures from 2001.

As you can see from this first chart, the trend for Catholics and generic Christian churches has reversed since 2001 against the total population. While neither group has reached the same percentage of the population as in 1990, they are both trending that direction. By simply taking the percentage from 1990 and 2008, however, this important trend is entirely overlooked. Mainline churches, by contrast, have plummeted and are trending sharply downwards. As we’ll see in the second chart, this is true not only as a percentage of the adult population, but also in terms of raw numbers. Baptists continue to decline as a percentage of the population, though their numbers are still growing and the rate of decline as percentage of the population has slowed significantly. Those reporting no religion increased slightly as a percentage of the population from 2001 to 2008, but not at nearly as sharp a rate as in the 90s. The number of atheists rose slightly, though it’s worth noting that the rate of growth of atheists as a percentage of the population is actually about the same as the poll’s margin of error.

Looking at the second chart is perhaps more revealing, since it gives actual number of adherents rather than just percentage of the population. Slater claimed at one point that “attendance is down almost across the board.” This is just factually incorrect. Actually the only group which has lost in terms of number of adherents since 1990 is mainline Protestants. Every other group has grown with the most notable growth coming among Catholics and generic Christians. Generic Christians actually recovered from a decline in the 90s and exploded with growth in the seven year period between 2001 and 2008. If you’re wondering what a generic Christian is, it seems to be basically non-denominational Christian or Bible churches.

Why is all of this important? Well, first I think it’s important for believers to understand the times that we live in. It can be discouraging to think that the country is going to hell in a hand basket, and reading articles like the one by Kevin Slater might give the impression that we’re fighting a losing battle. But a closer examination actually gives the impression that what has been happening since 2001 looks more like a religious revival than any kind of a decline. Why isn’t anyone talking about this?

Another reason I think it’s important is to call attention to the kind of gerrymandering of information that often goes on in the media. As we’ve often seen in recent years, narratives are very important in the media in terms of how things are presented. A big part of the liberal, secular narrative is that religion is going to become less and less important to people and will experience a steady decline. A lot of people are waiting expectantly for this to happen in the U.S. the way it has supposedly happened in Europe. As a result, anything that gives the appearance of it happening here is reason for celebration among the liberal elites. But as the ARIS shows, whatever happened in the 90s is no longer happening.

Now it’s entirely possible that Christianity will decline significantly in the U.S. at some point in the future. What’s interesting to me is that the Christian worldview doesn’t depend on the number of Christians increasing – it only depends on the message of the Gospel being spread around the world. I believe that as that happens the number of Christians will increase, but the Bible also predicts that many will fall away. Secularism, on the other hand, really depends on the number of secular people (ie. atheists and agnostics) increasing. In fact, most secular thinkers expected this to happen a long time ago. The fact that it hasn’t happened and isn’t showing any signs of happening in most of the world (where religion is actually growing) is what has caused most sociologists to decide that secularization theory has been disproven. I believe this in itself demonstrates the inadequacy of the secular worldview. However, in the popular thinking of most secular liberals, secularization theory is just a fact that will eventually be empirically demonstrated. While it’s difficult to overcome the blind faith of secular liberals, it will be interesting to see at what point they decide that their worldview is in tatters.

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William Anderson — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 07:25:00 -0700

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Lies and Statistics

John Fraser — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 16:51:00 -0700

I was interested to find an article recently about the state of religious belief and denominations in the U.S. based on the recently released American Religious Identification Survey, done in 2008. I was even more interested when I compared what the aforementioned article said and what the report actually revealed. It’s amazing how someone can selectively report facts which bolster their preconceived ideas and ignore the ones that don’t. The thrust of the article (and the title as well) by Kevin Slater of the SW Iowa news is that religion is taking a “backseat” in the minds of Americans and that many Americans are “losing their religion.” Mr. Slater uses the ARIS report to bolster this contention. But let’s do some “fact-checking” here, shall we?

Says Mr. Slater, “One of the most telling findings was the number of Americans who now claim to have no religion. That number has doubled in the last 18 years to its current total of 15 percent of Americans.” This is almost true, but also very misleading. The ARIS includes numbers from 1990, 2001, and 2008. In 1990 8.2 percent of the U.S. adult population reported no religious affiliation (the other categories included Catholic, other Christian, other religions, and didn’t know/refused). In 2001 the number of “nones” (no religious affiliation, not to be confused with “nuns”!) jumped to 14.2 percent. In 2008, it was 15.0 percent. So Mr. Slater’s claim that the number of “nones” has doubled is technically wrong; 8.2 percent to 15 percent is not double. But the growth of this group dramatically slowed between 2001 and 2008, recording a 0.8 percent increase of total population, compared to the 6 percent increase of the population between 1990 and 2001. It would be interesting to ask why the growth of this group has slowed so dramatically if one were actually interested in asking questions rather than simply pushing an agenda.

In a similar vein, Mr. Slater continues, “The percentage of Americans who define themselves as Christian has dropped from 86 percent in 1990 to 76 percent in 2008.” Again this is misleading because he omits the numbers from 2001. In 1990 the number of reported Christians was 86.2 percent of the population. In 2001 this had dramatically dropped to 76.7 percent. In 2008, the figure was 76.0 percent. Again it appears that what had been a marked downward trend of Christians slowed dramatically between 2001 and 2008. The decline of 9.5 percent of the population between 1990 and 2001 slowed to a drop of only 0.7 percent between 2001 and 2008. Something interesting is definitely happening here, but Slater seems oblivious to it.

Slater also says, “Attendance is down almost across the board, with Baptists falling from 19.3 to 15.8, and those of the Jewish faith down from 1.8 to 1.2 percent.” There is multiple weirdness in this statement. First, Slater says “attendance is down” giving the impression that he’s talking about sheer numbers (which is what “attendance” usually means). But then he refers again to percentages of the population, using Baptists and Jews as examples. Again, he’s missed some telling information and also done some more misleading. First, the percentage of Baptists among U.S. adults did drop from 19.3 percent to 15.8 percent between 1990 and 2008 as Slater says. But again, the bulk of that occurred between 1990 and 2001 when the percentages were 19.3 percent and 16.3 percent. From 2001 to 2008 the drop was only 0.5 percent compared to the 3 percent drop from 1990 to 2001. But the raw numbers increased between 2001 and 2008 from 33.8 million to 36.1 million (which was also higher than the figure of 33.9 million in 1990), so to say “attendance is down” seems rather like a false statement altogether. Slater puts a slight caveat at the end of his article, saying “Baptists, who constitute the largest non-Catholic Christian tradition, have increased their numbers by two million since 2001, but continue to decline as a proportion of the population.” This contradicts his statement that their “attendance” is down, and also fails to note that as a percentage of the population, they have declined but not at nearly such a rate as was seen between 1990-2001. Interestingly, the number of professing Jews showed more of a steady decline: 1.8 percent in 1990, 1.4 percent in 2001, and 1.2 percent in 2008.

Then Slater says, “meanwhile, the number of atheists, while still small, has nearly doubled from 900,000 to 1.6 million.” It’s interesting that rather than give the percentage of the population, Slater just gives the raw number of atheists when he’s only used percentages up until now. The percentages are 0.4 percent in 2001 and 0.7 percent in 2008, which Slater simply notes is “still small.” Well, yes. Less than three-quarters of one percent is indeed small. Perhaps “miniscule” would be a better term. But 1.6 million sounds much more impressive, doesn’t it? It’s also pretty generous to say that 900,000 to 1.6 million is “nearly double.” The ARIS combined the number of atheists and agnostics in a single category in 1990, so the number of atheists alone wasn’t measured that year.

In another caveat at the end of the article, Slater says “Only 1.6 percent of Americans call themselves atheist or agnostic. But based on stated beliefs, 12 percent are atheist (no God) or agnostic (unsure), while 12 percent more are deistic (believe in a higher power but not a personal God).” This was a new question on the existence of God that ARIS included in 2008 that wasn’t asked in 1990 or 2001, so we can’t compare with previous years. Slater appears to have come up with his figure that 12 percent are atheist or agnostic by adding together these three answers to the question of whether God exists: “there is no such thing”: 2.3%, “there is no way to know”: 4.3%, and “I’m not sure”: 5.7%. It seems he wants to boost the number of atheists, though it is interesting that only 0.7 percent of people identified themselves as atheist while 2.3 percent said there’s no such thing as God. Possibly some atheists are shy about identifying themselves as such. Of course, Buddhists don’t believe in God, either, and neither do some other religious people who might not consider themselves atheists per se. It’s also interesting that at the end of his article he repeated the increase in the number of atheists, again claiming it had “almost doubled” from 900,000 to 1.6 million.

But more importantly, Slater left out two sizeable groups that have seen an increase since 2001, both in terms of raw numbers and in percentage of the total population: Catholics and “generic” Christians. The percentage of Catholics was 26.2 percent in 1990, declined to 24.5 percent in 2001, but then climbed back to 25.1 percent in 2008. The percentage is not back to 1990 levels, but it is growing, and in terms of numbers Catholics have grown from 46 million to 57.1 million between 1990 and 2008. Generic Christians, on the other hand, saw an even bigger spike between 2001 and 2008. In 1990 this group was 14.8 percent of the population, then dropped to 10.8 percent in 2001, and now has grown to 14.2 percent in 2008. In terms of numbers this is an increase from 25.9 million in 1990 to 32.4 million in 2008.

In one of the few things that Slater actually gets right with no misleading, he does note that most of the decline in Christian churches has been in mainline denominations. Mainline Protestants show a markedly different trend from the previous ones. There was a slight decline in percentage between 1990 and 2001 (from 18.7 percent to 17.2 percent) which still represented an increase in raw numbers. But between 2001 and 2008 mainlines churches dropped dramatically to 12.9 percent, losing over 6 million in raw numbers during that time from 35.7 million to 29.3 million. Observers of the contemporary religious scene will surmise that many of these former mainline Christians now attend generic Christian churches. This is undoubtedly the result of the increasing liberalism of mainline churches in the last decade, a trend which has been underway for some time and will no doubt continue even as their numbers dwindle.

There are several things that are interesting to me in all of this. It’s interesting to see the trends in religious belief in the U.S. It seems that there was a downward trend between 1990 and 2001 which has either leveled off or reversed itself. The total number of professing Christians in the U.S. now stands at about 76 percent of the adult population. Whatever else may be said, the U.S. is still a highly religious country and still stands as a stark exception to the supposed rule of secularization theory. It’s interesting that, while the number of atheists has grown slightly since 2001, the number of generic Christians and Catholics has grown more. Mainline Protestants meanwhile are dropping like a rock.

But the most interesting thing to me was the slant on all of these stats given by Kevin Slater. It’s plain that he had an agenda to push, namely that religion is on the decline and atheism is on the rise. A closer look, however, shows that this thesis is not supported by the data, at least not from the ARIS. If anything, the trend of the 90s which showed a marked decline has slowed and in some cases reversed itself in Christian churches with the exception of mainline Protestants. Likewise, the growth of people reporting no religious affiliation leveled off to only a slight uptick of less than one percent between 2001 and 2008. Anyone can cherry-pick a mountain of stats to support their pet theory. It appears that the theory Mr. Slater wants us to believe, however, is simply wrong.

Update from Africa Nazarene University

Fri, 13 Mar 2009 04:36:35 -0700

Hello from East Africa!

“See that what you have heard from the beginning remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is what he promised us – even eternal life” (I John 2:24-25).

Well Friday has rolled around again. Here in the Nairobi area it is warm (mid-90’s), dry, and very windy. Whatever grass is left is in short supply and the Maasai herdsmen continually look each day to find places to graze their flocks of cows, goats, and sheep. Sometimes they have to go many miles for a little nourishment for their animals. It’s no wonder they are all so thin.

WRAPPING THINGS UP
We are now just three weeks away from the first final exams. For those who have been through them before the plans to prepare for the tests are already are already underway, and for those who have not experienced these joys there is a sense of fear and foreboding in the air. This is a time for teachers to be sure that the lessons are sticking and that students are reminded not to procrastinate with their papers and reviews. Some will heed the advice, but sadly, some will not. I guess it’s just human nature to try and put off until tomorrow what should be done today.

CAMPUS LIFE
Classes seem to be going pretty well at this point. I have only six more sessions of each of my classes and it will be time to close the books. During the break after the final exams are over I will be teaching “Christian Beliefs” at one of our satellite locations in Machakos. It will be over an hour’s drive each way for two weeks and then teaching for four hours each day. Well, at least it’s a way to spend a break from the regular routine.

SHANGILIA NEWS
We have been to the American Embassy three times in the last week and day-by-day we are making progress in our trip plans. This has certainly not been a walk in the park. I have been doing my best to take care of things for when we get to America and Mary Jane is trying to cross all the “T’s” and dot all the “I’s” on this side of the big pond. We now have a solid eighteen students that have been approved to go and two more who are trying to get clearance. We have to know the exact number by Monday because at that point we will be confirming the airline tickets. We are so grateful to so many people who have been praying, giving, and encouraging us in this endeavor. We have picked up a few new meetings, so our slate for May-July now looks like this:

May 30 Northeastern Indiana District NMI Convention
May 31 (am) Anderson, Indiana Southdale Church of the Nazarene
May 31 (pm) Northeastern Indiana District Campmeeting
June 2-3 Georgia District NMI Convention
June 6 Nashville, Tennessee Educational Foundation Meeting
June 7 (am) Gallatin, Tennessee First Church of the Nazarene
June 7 (pm) Louisville, Kentucky Farmdale Church of the Nazarene
June 9 New Albany, Indiana Christ Community Church
June 10 Hartford City, Indiana Church of the Nazarene
June 11 Rockville, Indiana First Baptist Church
June 12 Chicago Central District NMI Convention
June 14 (am) Kansas City, Missouri First Church of the Nazarene
June 14 (pm) Olathe, Kansas College Church of the Nazarene
June 16 St. Louis, Missouri South County Church of the Nazarene
June 17 Nashville, Tennessee Trevecca Community Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (am) Leesburg, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 21 (pm) Fort Myers, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 23 Clearwater, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
June 24-30 Orlando, Florida General Assembly of the Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (am) Pompano Beach, Florida First Church of the Nazarene
July 5 (pm) Venice, Florida First Church of the Nazarene

We have had some other requests, but until we know exactly the locations (depending on the price) of where we are going to be able to fly in and out, we can’t confirm any more meetings. This is a pretty ambitious schedule as it is and our students are going to see not only a lot of America, but also a lot of the bus. We will be spending several thousand miles together – and making memories that will last a lifetime.

I will be leaving to come back to the states two months from today. I have to arrive in time to make arrangements to get a Commercial Driver’s License so I can drive the bus on the trip. I guess the teacher will have to become a student for a while until I get those tests behind me.

STUDENT UNREST
During the early part of this week the students from Nairobi University had some protests that led to riots and some damage to property. One of our trips to the embassy found us on a road that was blocked by students so we had to find another way around. It’s nice to be on a Christian campus where such things just don’t happen. Not everyone here is an angel to be sure, but there are different standards and expectations where we live. Between the guards, the fences, walls, and dogs, I don’t know how we could feel any more secure.

FAMINE WALK
Last Saturday, Corey, Joe, and me joined students from our campus on a walk to Ongata Rongai to raise awareness and funds for famine relief here in Kenya. There are literally millions who are suffering food shortages because of the drought and other political factors that have brought about such problems. There is so much need and so little we can do, but we do what we can. Earlier on we collected food and took it to some of the areas hardest hit and as time goes on we will be involved in other compassionate ministry projects, but right now our steps, contributions, and prayer tell the message that someone out there cares.

CHILDREN’S MINISTRY
Tonight we are going into town to spend the night with some other missionaries, Russ and Donna Lovett. Tomorrow morning Mary Jane is going to traveling with Sarah Reed, our field children’s ministries director, to train local church workers in area of children’s ministry. Teaching people how to make Bible quiz boxes out of cereal boxes, using construction paper and scissors to make object lesson sermons, and showing how to make do with what one has are specialties that Mary Jane has become very skilled in. I married a pretty creative gal.

Well, I’d better get this off in the mail and get back to work. I hope you have a wonderful weekend and a blessed Lord’s Day! E you next Friday!

Randy and Mary Jane James
Africa Nazarene University
Nairobi, Kenya
Weblog: http://randyandmaryjane.wordpress.com

Christian celebrities

John Fraser — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 14:11:00 -0700

I was quite disturbed recently to learn that the youth pastor of a certain high profile megachurch regularly charges a fee of $4500/day for speaking engagements. That includes travel days as well. So, for a single speaking engagement this unnamed youth pastor would charge $4500/day for three days (one day of travel each way plus the day of the engagement), as well as first-class airfare and two nights in a five-star hotel for him and his assistant. To say that I find this outrageous is a bit of an understatement. I didn't realize that things like this went on in the Christian world. But apparently this is the going rate for second-tier Christian celebrities like youth pastors. Some top-tier Christian speakers will charge $10,000/day.

I'm not saying that all big-name Christian ministers are like this, so I don't want to be the one to start any rumors about anybody in particular. There may well still be some big-name Christian speakers who still serve the Lord for a heavenly reward rather than an earthly one. I know there are a great many non-celebrity status pastors, missionaries, evangelists, and professors who simply want to serve the Lord often for very little in return.

What a contrast there is between our contemporary celebrity culture and the attitude of the apostle Paul. When Paul preached to the Corinthians he took pains to do it free of charge (1 Cor. 9:18). In his second letter to the Corinthians, he indicates that he received support from other churches so as not to be a burden to the Corinthians (2 Cor. 11:8). He also worked at his trade making tents during some of his time in Corinth (Acts 18:3). This is where the term “tentmaker”, referring to a bi-vocational Christian worker, comes from. To be sure, Paul said he had a right to receive financial compensation for his ministry, but that he deliberately gave up that right among the Corinthians (1 Cor. 9:14 and following). But seriously. Is any Christian minister worth $10,000/day or even $4500? There just seems to be something profoundly wrong with an arrangement like this. What would Paul say to today’s celebrity pastors?

It’s encouraging in some ways that the Lord is raising up Christian workers from the two-thirds world in our day and age. We need it. American values are badly out of alignment. Gospel preachers from poverty-stricken areas of the world could do us a lot of good and teach us again about storing up treasures in heaven rather than on earth.

Leaving Home to Return Home

Wed, 11 Mar 2009 17:00:00 -0700

After spending nearly 6 months in the States visiting family, friends, and partner churches (not to mention having our 3rd child, Abriana, in October), we have finally made it back home to China. We were made to feel very much at home in the States (Oklahoma, in particular), and we do in fact see Oklahoma as our 2nd home. However, China is our real home in the sense that this is where we will (as God provides) spend the vast majority of our time and energy over the next few decades. We had originally planned to return to China in mid-January, however we were delayed nearly 2 months when my wife's new Peruvian passport didn't show up until the last week of February. We were finally able to fly out of Oklahoma on Tuesday, March 3rd. The next 8 days took us through Los Angeles, Seoul (Korea), Hong Kong, Canton (a large city in southern China), and finally home to northwestern China. We took 4 different flights (2, 1, 13, and 3 hrs long) and then 4 d

How Do I Defend the Gospel? (Video & Notes)

William Anderson — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 16:50:00 -0700

Cum apăr Evanghelia? from William Anderson on Vimeo.

The is the ninth and final teaching in a series I did on the gospel of Jesus Christ at Calvary Chapel Bucuresti on March 8, 2009. We looked at why we should defend the gospel, what apologetics is and it's goals and limitations, guidelines for doing apologetics and what the Bible says about how we deal with people. We finished by looking at arguments for the existence of God, for the Bible being the Word of God, the ten most common objections to Christianity and the "test drive" proof.

Tragedy at the Church ( News)

HENRY JOHN — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 04:31:00 -0700

It was a sad day for the congregation of First Baptist Church. Pastor Fred Winters was shot by 27 years old man while he was preaching on happiness. What was the motive behind the shooting no one knows. Many have responded to the news and commented. Some have asked the same old questions - where was their God when all this was taking place? And others have questioned why bad things happen to good people? Why God didn't stop that person? Many skeptics and atheists and agnostics have laughed and mocked about God at this horrific and evil incident. And again this horrible event would lead to number of debates, whether guns should be allowed, whether church should have metal detectors, whether only members should be allowed with their Id proof etc etc.

All what I can say that God is in control. My finite mind cannot reason and explain, why God does what he does. But I am assured by the scripture that God works out everything for the good for those who love him and called according to his will ( Romans8:28). The Scripture is full of accounts where God allowed his servants to go through life threatening situations and circumstances and rescued them out of all dangers. But there are accounts where God's servants were killed by the hands of evil men. John the Baptist , Stephen,James, the brother of John and host of other Christians found in Hebrew 11 were killed. I am reminded of John Wesley once said, when you go to work, be prepared to preach, pray, and die [for the Truth].

As there will always be skeptics, there will always be people of faith in Christ. One thing we can both agree on is that it was a terrible tragedy for Winters to be gunned down in his place of worship in front of his family. My heart goes out to their family and their church.

My heart goes out for the families of those pastors who are killed in India, Paskistan, China and Sudan every now and then. But some of these stories never make headlines.

What are God's Purpose in the Gospel for Me (Video & Notes)

William Anderson — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:34:00 -0800

Care sunt beneficiile lui Dumnezeu în Evanghelie pentru mine? from William Anderson on Vimeo.

This is the eighth in a series of in-depth teachings I did on the gospel of Jesus Christ at our church,Calvary Chapel Bucuresti, on March 1, 2009. We looked at three purposes: 1. To be His Child. 2. To Follow and Obey Jesus. 3. To Become Like Jesus. As we looked at these three purposes we also looked at what it means to be a disciple, how we love God and people, what is character and it's importance and what Jesus did during His earthly life that we should apply to ours.

How to Share the Gospel

William Anderson — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 10:32:00 -0800