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“Americans are a great people; there is no doubt about that. They are great in building cities and railroads … Americans have a wonderful genius for improving the breeds of horses, cattle, sheep, swine … Americans too are great inventors. They invented or perfected telegraphs, telephone …. automobiles … They are great in democracy … Needless to say they are great in money … They first make money before they undertake any serious work .. to start and carry on any work without money is in the eyes of the Americans madness … Americans themselves are great in all these things and much else; but not in Religion … Americans must count religion in order to see or show its value … To them big churches are successful churches … To win the greatest number of converts with the least expense is their constant endeavor. Statistics is their way of showing success or failure in their religion as in their commerce and politics. Numbers, numbers, oh how they value numbers! … Mankind goes … to America to learn how to live the earthly life; but to live the heavenly life, they go to some other people. It is no special fault of the Americans to be this-worldly; it is their national characteristic; and they in their self-knowledge ought to serve mankind in other fields than religion.”

Kanzo Uchimura
Can Americans Teach Japanese in Religion?
from The Japanese Christian Intelligencer, pages 357 – 361 – published in 1926

Wow! A friend sent me this quote a while ago. It sums up a lot of what I’ve thought over the years. I don’t agree totally with the author’s assertions, but there is a lot of food for thought there. As an “MK” or “third culture kid” it has been my lot in life to never wholly fit in anywhere. There is too much of my parents’ thinking in me to fit in locally and too much latin thinking to fit in in the US. It really drives home the Apostles reminder that we are but pilgrims in this world. Having been raised in different parts of the world has allowed me a different perspective on life. And the author’s assertion that folks in the US count success in religion by the numbers is very accurate. And this thinking has invaded much of the western hemisphere. Success is too often measured in terms of people attending, decisions made, offerings and tithes received and baptisms. Read the rest of this entry »

This has been mouldering in the back files long enough that I don’t recall where I got it.  Don’t know if it’s an original thought or something I heard or read.  STILL, it’s good enough I think it’s worth posting here. 

Power – the ability and means to inflict your ideas and values on others.

Authority – the right and ability to lead others in a certain direction.

Well, I’m in the middle of a hard drive swap.  And somehow misplaced the “keys” to this site.  Finally got it unlocked again and so we’re back in business  -  such as it is.

Here I am – past 1:30 in the morning – wondering why people prefer to believe the lie than to live in the light and truth. It is easy to dwell on the enemy’s strategies to deceive and his cunning in dragging people to destruction. Many people know satan and preach about him far better than they know God and preach about HIM. Read the rest of this entry »

Well, we had a great visit to the US of A.    70 days.  11,000 miles.  25 different beds.  It’s amazing what all can pass in a short period of time.  This is just  a brief note to try and prime the pump.    Time will tell what all I will have time to extract from my brain and jot down here.  It’s good to be home and it’s good to get back into the swing of our regular ministry as well.  It was a blessing to share with the brethren in the US and to minister to many as well as to be ministered to. But our regular work is here and it’s good to be back and to see how God has worked in people’s lives while we were away. 

Open for me the gates of righteousness; I will enter and give thanks to the LORD. This is the gate of the LORD  through which the righteous may enter. I will give you thanks, for you answered me;  you have become my salvation. Psalm 118:19-21

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever. Psalm 118:29

Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. I Thessalonians  5:16-18
Yes, we are once more at that time of year in which families will travel many miles to gather together to eat large meals and then sit stupefied before the “one eyed monster” hoping their alka-seltzer will kick in soon.  Somehow the focus on the giving of thanks has gotten lost in the idea of “turkey day”, “t-day” and televised parades.

And yet, the idea of taking time to give thanks to the Divine Being has been a part of our history from the beginning.  George Washington declared a day of thanks and so have many others over the past couple centuries.  And it is fitting indeed that we set aside time to give thanks for the myriad blessings we have received.  Yet I wonder, will folks remember the blessings received even in the face of the many trials of the year past?  Will people remember to give thanks or will we as a people focus only on troubles and supposed perils before us?

As we come to this special day, the fourth Thursday of November, let us not focus only on the food and family traditions – let us focus on He Who gave Himself up for us so that we can stand before the Father in holiness and humility.  Let us give thanks to our God and Redeemer for He has indeed blessed us with many blessings in the midst of troubles and trials.  May His Name be praised for ever!

Three weeks ’til US elections 2008 and folks are full of doom and gloom.  The gun boards are rife with talk about “What ‘battle carbine’ should I get?”, “What magazines for my ‘battle carbine’ should I get?”, “Who has the best price on bulk ammo?”, “What are you going to do if the obamanation gets in?”, etc.  There’s a lot of speculation about what the future holds and “The End Of The World As We Know It” (otherwise known as TEOTWAWKI)  is “just around the corner”.

Now, I’m no more in favor of “The Messiah”’s policies than the doom and gloom crowd.  His ideas of “taking from the rich to give to the poor” are just so much warmed over communist pap – policies that have failed the world over and will continue to fail because they ignore the basic problem.  The basic problem being the fallen nature of man as well as the vastly differing talents and abilities of mankind which mean that you can NEVER have a “level playing field” by stealing from one to give to another.  The best we can do is to provide freedom so that each person can reach the place that they are able to reach without government’s encumbering “help”.  The only system that has ever allowed such freedom was put into place in 1787 when the US Constitution was ratified.  And that system was based on Biblical principles and a Biblical world view.  No, it was not necessarily “inspired by God” but the men who wrote it and who ratified it had an overwhelmingly biblical world view even though they differed greatly in their understanding of God’s will for mankind.  And that foundation gave rise to the freest society that the world has known where each was able to reach as high as his abilities would take him.  In the past few decades, however, that freedom has gradually eroded due to the encroaching tenets of socialism/communism which decree that the state is the possessor of all and that none have any rights which are not permitted/granted by the state.  This philosophy flies in the face of “We hold these truths to be self evident, that that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights…” Those words are also part of our founding, being taken from the Declaration if Independence and predating the constitution by just over a decade, and show the mentality and ideas of those who set the course for the nation.

But now, over two centuries after the founding, we have become a nation which denies that God has a role in our day to day lives.  We’ve turned our backs on our Creator and we’ve enshrined each person’s darkest urges as “unalienable rights” while denying that rights have any source other than the government.  We’ve turned our backs on godliness and placed unprincipled people at the helm of our nation.  Is it any wonder that the ship of state seems about to run aground?  Someone once observed that a democracy will only last until the people learn that they can “vote themselves largess from the public coffers”. With the recent “bailout” – not to mention decades of government funded “welfare” – we have proven that as a nation we have indeed learned to “vote ourselves largess” from the public coffers as each representative and senator seeks to bring as much pork home as possible, ignoring the greater good of the nation as a whole.

But, is it time for doom and gloom?  I think not.  Recently a friend sent me a few verses which I share with you here.

Proverbs 16:33 -Make your motions and cast your votes, but God has the final say. (The Message)

Daniel 4:32 – … the Most High is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone he wishes.” (NIV)

Daniel 5:21 - ” …. the Most High God is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and sets over them anyone he wishes. “(NIV)

Acts 17:26 – “From one man he created all the nations throughout the whole earth. He decided beforehand when they should rise and fall, and he determined their boundaries.” (NLT)

As Christians we need to remember that the Lord is Sovereign and that He is in control.  When a nation turns away from God they can only expect to lose His blessing.  I’m reminded of the following passage from 2 Thessalonians 2:10-12

They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.

WOW!  As a nation that pretty much sums us up, doesn’t it?  I can’t believe how folks are eating up the lies and deceptions being told by “The One”.  And yet when I look at how we as a nation “delight in wickedness” (how else can you describe our acceptance of every form of degeneration and how as a nation we embrace things that God has called “abominations”) I understand why God sent us this powerful delusion and also that those who believe the lie will be condemned.

So, doom and gloom?  Why?  We are seeing the natural outcome of a nation that turns away from God.  I saw the years between Bushes as a wakeup call to the nation.  And yet we slept on, ignoring the need to turn back to God’s path and hardening our hearts against Him.  Come what may, the Lord is in control and that’s all I need to know.  As Christians it may become more and more difficult and we may come under greater and greater persecution.  But what can compare with those who gave their lives for the Gospel over the centuries?  We’ve not yet reached the point of being thrown to the lions or burned at the stake – at least not in the west.  Folks in the east have been undergoing horrible persecutions for decades.  More people gave their lives for the Gospel in the twentieth century than in all the preceding centuries combined – and the western church slept on, complacent in her wealth and comfort.

Rather than doom and gloom we need to be preaching victory in Jesus the Christ – the TRUE Messiah.  If people will turn to Him then it matters not what goes on around them, they will be at peace.  And that is where our job lays, dear reader – in proclaiming the Gospel of Truth to all those around us and in calling them to repentance and new life through Christ who gave His Life to set us free from our bondage to sin.

The “Independent Christian Church Ministers” question of the week is about sin, specifically sins we don’t talk about as a church – if I understood correctly the question. And this is a great question because too often Christians act like they’ve “got it all together” and have no problems or sin and everything is hunkeydorey.

But from the beginning this has not been the truth. The truth is that Christians too commit sins. We also need God’s continuing forgiveness and grace and mercy. The Apostle John wrote If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives. (I John 1:8-10) And the Apostle Paul wrote Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. (Colossians 3:5-10) Both John and Paul recognized that as Christians we have a lot of growing to do and part of that is in facing our earthly nature and “putting it to death”. Both of these passages were written to CHRISTIANS, folks who were already in the church, had already received forgiveness for their sins – and yet needed to be cleansed from their earthly nature. In fact, “the disciple Jesus loved” (John) included himself in the issue by using first person plural.

So, what can we as a church do about sin in our midst? In the past (and present in many cases) the custom was to throw out anyone who didn’t “toe the line” and who was thought to have “kicked over the traces”. And indeed it is important to not wink at sin and we SHOULD practice church discipline when folks refuse to repent and insist on continuing in sin when confronted biblically with the issue.

But I believe that we must start with ourselves. Each and every christian must learn to look critically AT HIS OWN LIFE and to seek out the earthly nature which leads us down to perdition and eradicate it systematically from our own life. Each and every aspect of our person and character must be held up before the powerful light of God’s word and examined critically – do I indeed measure up to Him or must I continue eradicate the sin that holds me back? Paul wrote to the Romans “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” (Romans 12:1-2)

It is easy to “conform to this world” because we see how this world works all around us. It is easy to imitate that which we see all the time. But God is calling us to a new vision – one that is only possible when we learn to renew our minds according to God’s Will and His Word.

Traditionally the church has been quite hard on visible sins. The drunk, the homosexual, the adulterer or fornicator has been an easy target because their way of life is obvious to all. It is the subtle sins that cause most problems in the church however. Wrath, malice, envy, hatred, gossip, lying, deceit, pride – these are the ugly secrets that cause divisions amongst us. The greatest common denominator amongst them is the issue of egotism. When “I” am the center of the universe then nothing works as it should. When Christ becomes the center then I can fulfill my proper place and I can learn to allow others their proper place as well. When Christ reigns supreme in my life I can submit to Him and renew my mind in all ways – giving up those sins that so easily entangled me when I was still seeking earthly things and learning to run the race He has set before Me.

The “worship wars” and other recent issues are sins which we as a Church have allowed to break the unity that Christ seeks amongst His people. When each side insists on doing things their own way without seeking a common ground for agreement then we have open warfare amongst us and the winner is the enemy. When we learn to love each other and to seek ways to work together than reasons to separate we can gain victory over the enemy of our souls.

There is no panacea for the sin that besets us because it is an individual issue that we as a congregation must help each other to face and over come. The closest we can come to a “one size fits all” answer is to learn to love each other as the Word teaches us to do and to help and edify each other in love so that Christ is exalted over all and all are submitted to Him in love and obedience.

It’s been a while since I’ve taken time to just write “something”… or anything, for that matter. I guess getting old is tough – it took me a whole month + to do it in.

Today the topic is due to thoughts generated by the horrific occurrences of September 11, 2001. It is inevitable that our minds should turn to such thoughts on the anniversary of that event. Many are remembering “where I was” when they heard “the news”. Me? I was visiting Deane and Bijie in NE Colorado, getting ready to head out for a speaking date at a Bible college up in Nebraska. I walked upstairs and found them sitting with coffee cups in hand, watching the news. “One of the Twin Towers was hit by a plane!” they informed me. “One of the WHAT?” is the unspoken question the flashed in my brain. I’ve never held NY to be “the center of the universe” as some do, much less put much importance in most of her “landmarks”, so I’d little idea of what they were talking about.

They handed me a cup of coffee and we sat there watching the news unfold. I’d been there just a bit when we saw the second plane strike the second tower. At that point I knew we were at war and that the world would never be the same as it was before. Later that day as I headed north I stopped in most towns along the way to top off the gas tank and saw the prices steadily climbing into regions that would not be normal for several more years. The news kept drifting in via the radio. The President is somewhere unknown. The vice president is also hidden away. All air traffic is shut down over the entire nation. Another plane has hit the Pentagon. Another plane has crashed. The immensity of the event was slowly increasing in the national awareness – but I knew that our lesson was not learned.

That bit of knowledge was confirmed a few days later as I headed back home to Colombia. As I sat in the airport in Miami talking with an elderly couple I found out that my premonition was right. They had confiscated the EMBROIDERY NEEDLE and the 1/2″ SEWING SCISSORS of a white, protestant, grandmother missionary on her way back to her station on Colombia’s Caribbean coast (but ignored the more potentially lethal sharp steel ink pen in her husband’s shirt pocket) . Not only that, they were wanding women’s brassiers and acting as if EVERYONE was a potential terrorist hijacker – ignoring the commonality of ethnic and religious background of the perpetrators – an ethnicity and religion that is foreign to the typical US citizen and not too hard to spot. But as a nation we put our head in the sand and started to play the “I don’t really know who my enemy is” game.

Prior to September 11, 2001 I regularly carried my usual 3″ bladed pocket knife on board airplanes. At no point did I ever feel the urge to cut throats and crash the plane into a towering building, it was just a tool, an instrument for peeling oranges, opening letters, trimming string, cleaning fingernails and myriad other mundane daily tasks. But there is a mentality, Jeff Cooper – deceased – called it “hoplophobia” (the fear of instruments), that believes that inanimate objects cause violence and mayhem. I saw this yesterday as I read an article in a newspaper from Cali about the sport of Olympic Trap shooting. The “reporter” asked “don’t you ever get the feeling that your ‘wires may cross’ when you pick up a weapon?” (referring to “getting the urge” to simply shoot someone) This is the mentality that refuses to accept that some people have a deeply seated problem called sin – that it is the PERSON who makes the decision to do harm, not the inanimate object. As much as some people claim to be “enlightened” and “educated” and “modern” – they still hold a superstitious fear of “talismans” that supposedly by themselves can cause harm. The calm and rational analysis of this situation reveals that the item itself is incapable of doing ANYTHING without the intervention of some person. A knife or a gun or a baseball bat or a chair leg or any other potential weapon will merely lay there until some PERSON picks it up and uses it – for good or for bad. People are the problem, not objects. And learning to discern WHO is probably going to cause harm would do us a lot more good than a bunch of mindless knee jerk rules to prohibit objects.

It has been shown that the majority of crimes are committed by a minority of the criminals. When a house is burglarized or a woman or child is raped you can lay a fairly safe bet that the perpetrator is a prior offender. They may not have been caught before, but the odds are that they have done this crime before. And when it comes to the type of crime that was committed on September 11, 2001 there is yet another factor – that of religiously inspired hatred. It has been shown that there a number of similar atrocities that have been committed over the decades prior to September 11, 2001 that can be linked to people similar to those who committed the acts of terrorism against the United States on that date. They were all committed by Muslim men between 18 and 40 years of age. By pointing out this fact I’m not attempting to engender racial or religious bigotry or hatred, but rather raising a red flag. When you see bombing after bombing committed by the same demographic – does it make sense to stick your head in the sand and pretend that EVERYONE will do the same type of thing? Think back to 1941 to 1945. Who were the “Kamikaze”? They were not white protestant women. They were not italian catholic men. They were not even German Third Reich soldiers – they were Japanese soldiers trained and prepared for this type of attack. Interesting to note – they too were inspired by their religion to give their lives to take out others.

So, seven years later, we are now treating everyone as an enemy when they go through the airport “security system.” We are pretending that the arthritic grandmother from Racine Wisconsin is at least as big of a threat as the young Arab man with a one way ticket and a tourist visa. In fact, our rules and regulations FORBID screeners from noticing that someone is a muslim male and treating them to well deserved scrutiny. Many occurrences have shown that screeners “randomly” choose an obviously NON muslim to fondle while a group of possibly radical extremist muslims waltz through the “security” checkpoint – just to prove that we aren’t “profiling” and are “being fair”.

Along with the varied thoughts on airway travel and taking down buildings with planes come thoughts about the upcoming election. Many are saying “If so and so becomes president the world will end, our nation will be destroyed and all hope is lost!” (Both sides of the political turmoil claim this) But the truth of the matter is – no matter WHO becomes president they will have arrived at that position with the consent and assistance of the general populace. No matter which way the winds blow they will NOT arrive at the White House “from nowhere” nor from another planet – they will have arisen from amongst the entire nation. The problem is not “who’s President” or “who’s going to be President” but rather “who are the people who are choosing their candidates and ushering them into office?” I’m amazed at the general lack of godly characteristics of the majority of the candidates this time around. Is this really “the best” we can do as a nation? If so, we are indeed in deep trouble – because we have allowed our godly principles to sink into virtual oblivion. This year, once more, we will choose from amongst ourselves the person we feel best represents who we are as a nation. Our choice will reflect what we have become – for good or for ill. Our choice will NOT “signal the end of all we are” – it will merely reflect what we have become.

Our only true hope as a nation is to repent from the sin of turning away from our Creator and to turn back to His Paths and His Will in our daily lives. We can not live for the devil and expect God to bless us when we choose a leader. We can only expect our daily life and our daily choices as a nation to be reflected in the leader who is finally chosen to govern over us.

The big question is – what will this year’s election say about what we have become as a nation?

The “Independent Christian Church Ministers” group question this week is phrased below, with only minor adaptations from “The Wall” so that it reads well here.

We all have a desire to challenge our congregations/ students/ or whomever we work with to go deeper in their relationship with God… What does deeper look like? And how do you judge your effectiveness?

One of the most beautiful descriptions of the church is that of a family.  As we think of a growing family, with new additions on a regular basis, we know that not all members of the family have the same level of maturity, much less the same relationship with each other and their father. A wise father treats each child as an individual and seeks to help each of them reach their potential.  This can be a long and slow process and it helps when the older kids pitch in, much like in the old “one room school house” where often the older students tutored the younger ones in their school work, and where the younger children would learn as they listened to the older kids do their lessons.  The church works in much the same way in that new christians can look to their elders (spiritually speaking) to learn and grow.

So, “what does deeper look like?” is a question that changes as each individual grows and matures.  To the new convert a deeper relationship will be in learning to have a regular devotional time with God.  To someone who is older it may be learning that God is not only there for troubled times, but also in times of joy.  This relationship grows deeper as the person learns that each part of their life should be subjected to Christ’s authority and as they learn to give financially and also of their time.  This deepening of the relationship is a lifelong process as the christian learns to connect with God on deeper and deeper levels, as they grow closer and closer to Him.

As for judging effectiveness, again it’s on a case by case basis.  Sometimes with an individual (starting with one’s self) one tends to think “Will they never ‘get it’?”  And then WOW, some comment or occurrence shows that they DID get it, that they WERE paying attention and that they HAVE learned.  Working with people is not a “one size fits all” endeavor.  Each individual has their own personality and needs and their own approach to life.  Certain lessons are easy for one – but HARD for another, and vice versa.  Sometimes I find myself frustrated when someone (myself included) does “something stupid” or manifests a shallowness in their relationship with God.  But then I try to remember that it’s a learning and growing process, just like turning a first grader into a rocket scientist.  At first they may struggle with “one plus one is two.  two plus two is four.  four plus four is eight.” but as they grow and build on that first foundation they then move on to more complicated processes of mathematics and other sciences until they’ve reached the place where they can design and build extremely complicated machines or do other intricate calculations.  How did they reach that point?  By building on the basics, one day at a time.

The Apostle Paul wrote to the Ephesian church: “And He personally gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, for the training of the saints in the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ,  until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God’s Son, [growing] into a mature man with a stature measured by Christ’s fullness.” (Ephesians 4:11-13)  I’d say that he summed it up much better than I can.