The Chande Project

Which side of The Church are its critics looking at?

2007-05-20T13:00:00.000-07:00

I've long been convinced that the heroic character and destiny of The Church is best viewed from the frontier of missions and ministry. Those disengaged from the essential work of The Body have the poorest view. It is almost certain that those who think least of The Church are not seeing it's face - but rather it's behind.

If you want to really get to know Christ's purposes through The Church, get in front and see it blaze new trails of light in darkness.

As Thy new horizons beckon,
Father give us strength to be
Children of creative purpose
serving man and honoring Thee
Till our dreams are rich with meaning
Each endeavor Thy design
Great Creator lead us onward
Till our work is one with Thine

- Catherine Cameron
God, Who Stretched the Spangled Heavens

Henry V

2007-05-15T10:17:00.000-07:00

As I considered all of the people who are fighting in this battle, I thought of something from Shakespeare's Henry V- where the young king tells his tired and outnumbered army -

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

There is a brotherhood that is formed on the battlefield. Of course my heaviest concern is for those on the frontlines in Zambia - those brothers and sisters who are fighting everyday to love like Christ in a way that often leads to significant sacrifice. I am also praying for those here in the States who must fight a different kind of battle. Some among us are very weary and are for lack of a better expression - fighting to fight. Others have fresh legs and passion for the battle and are chomping at the bit to "get at it."

No matter where we live and how we feel right now, there is tremendous joy in following Our King into this fight. Though there is some pain now and those who are not fighting seem better off for it, we know that the day will come when those with the most scars will also be those with the fewest regrets - Galatians 6:17 comes to mind.

Orphans: Pleading For Their Prosperity

2007-05-15T10:06:00.000-07:00

Chande Ambassador Bible Study:
When it comes to orphans, what does God expect of me?

Truth #1 - As we seek to find God’s solutions to the AIDS pandemic, we know for certain that it is God’s will for His people to become advocates for orphans.
Our first bible study will move through verses 27-29 of Jeremiah, chapter 5. Let’s try to understand more about this idea. In this short passage, we can identify 7 principles that shape our understanding of orphan advocacy

In making His holy case against His people, explaining why they deserved judgment, God says:
Like a cage full of birds, their houses are full of deceit; therefore they have become great and rich; they have grown fat and sleek. They know no bounds in deeds of evil; they judge not with justice the cause of the fatherless, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy. Shall I not punish them for these things? declares the LORD, and shall I not avenge myself on a nation such as this?"

PRINCIPLE #1 – BIRDS IN A GUILDED CAGE
Verse 27 uses the imagery of a cage full of birds to remind us of impotency and bondage. Just as birds are meant to fly, so God’s children are meant for freedom. Unfortunately, many of God’s people limit themselves by finding joy in things that hinder their flight (Hebrews 12:1). When people engage in a whole-life love for Christ, they find themselves soaring. (Is. 40:31)

PRINCIPLE #2 – WHEN SIN COMES HOME TO ROOST
Notice the word deceit in verse 27…It would be a good thing to remember that when we are not championing God’s truth, we are supporting Satan’s lies by default. Just like a cage crammed full of birds waiting to be sold (for sacrifice?), the houses of these people are full of lies. It is not a stretch to remind us that those who live for themselves often have miserable homes.

PRINCIPLE #3 – DOES WEALTH ALWAYS COME FROM GOD?
The fact that these people have become great and rich tells us that financial abundance is not always a gift from the Lord. In this context, their wealth is a result of their wickedness. Their wickedness is not only proactive evil but also passive in allowing the fatherless and needy to be abused. Wealth can result from either proactive or passive evil or a combination of both. Zaccheus was wealthy from both forms of evil (Luke 19). We don’t know how the Rich Young Ruler gained his wealth but we do know that he kept his wealth through passive evil. When he refused to do as Jesus commanded and sell his possessions and give all to the poor, he was sinning. It both cases, obedience meant voluntarily choosing poverty through generosity. We’ll discuss this thought further in the Bible Study For Big Idea #3 – Can I Really Call People To Sacrifice?

PRINCIPLE #4 – IS YOUR SOUL FAT?
The words fat and sleek reveal that God expects us to responsibly share the excess that comes our way. Just as consuming more food than we need is bad for our bodies, so is consuming more than we need bad for our souls. The idea of obesity here also refers to inactivity. The early disciples in Acts were committed to the simple spiritual discipline of sharing.

PRINCIPLE #5 – YAWNING AT INJUSTICE“They know no bounds of evil” seems to refer to a moral ambiguity that yawns at injustice. The idea here is of a seared conscience. A seared conscience has an obvious spiritual affect on a person. Less obvious is the affect a seared conscious can have on society. When groups of people are able to do nothing while millions of others die, a seared conscience may be to blame. There seems to be a connection to verse 21-23 which says that the people have lost their ability to fear or even sense the heart of God.

PRINCIPLE #6 – WHY JUSTICE MATTERS
God accuses the people of failing to judge the cause of the fatherless with justice. Injustice is blasphemy against God because it molests His decrees and perverts the people’s view of His goodness through general revelation. The natural order of sowing and reaping is a part of God’s general revelation about himself. When the wicked prosper and the righteous suffer, God’s natural law is violated. While we know that through the cross, God leveraged the violation of the natural law to fulfill the whole law’s requirements, God’s personal offense to injustice in general is evidenced in His rhetorical question in verse 29, “shall I not avenge myself?”

PRINCIPLE #7 – LIVE LONG AND PROSPER
The phrase “to make it prosper” sets a very high standard. The goal of most giving these days is to make the poor a little less poor. The standard of scripture is to help the fatherless become prosperous.

The Hebrew word used here for prosper is perhaps most famously used in Psalm 1 where the Psalmist describes the man who delights in the law of the Lord as being like a tree planted beside a creek which bears fruit in season and never dies. It says of that man – whatever he does shall prosper. Just as God is faithful to prosper the Psalm 1 man, so we should be faithful to prosper the fatherless.

The word for prosper is also used to describe Jospeh’s work in Egypt
When Samson was filled with the power of the Spirit, the Bible literally says “the power of the Lord fell prosperously on him.
The word is used often of Solomon’s wealth
Acts 4:34-35 says that the early church was unique in that there was not “any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.” The radical giving of a few made poverty in their midst extinct. The policy of the early church was not merely to help the poor among them but to eliminate poverty.

Fathers naturally want their children to prosper (Mt 7:11). Who wants the fatherless to prosper? God does and He wants His children to feel the same way.

The KJV of Isaiah 1:17 says “Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.” This language refers to proactive concern not merely reactive giving. It is not enough to give when asked. Notice also the phrase “learn.” Doing the right thing often involves a season of intentional training. Intentional training is a mark of maturity. Hebrews 5:14 says that it takes constant practice to discern good from evil.

NatuRally Race...

2007-05-15T06:40:00.000-07:00

During the first weekend of June, a whole bunch of us Chande folk will be in Wellsporo, PA for the Susquehannock Trail Rally Race.

Please be praying for:
The safety of the Naturally Team
Our witness during the race
Favor among many in regards to the orphanage
Safe travel

Video From Ingelwood's Trip

2007-05-14T10:04:00.000-07:00

Here's some video I got from Jan Van Norman - I love this song:

The Ambassador Project

2007-05-14T09:06:00.000-07:00

The Ambassador Project: Transformation or Releif?

God used Jeremiah 5:28 to help me understand what exactly I should be calling American Christians to do in response to the AIDS orphan crisis. Giving $30 a month is a great start but I have come to believe that full obedience in this area involves "pleading for the cause of the orphan that it may prosper."

The goal of our work in Zambia has always been transformation and I believe that goal has been too ambitious for most consumer Christians (many of whom are pastors) in Americans to embrace. Transformation isn't a popular concept when it comes to seemingly hopeless situations like the one in Zambia. Most people are willing to give a little to help the poor be a little less poor and that's the idea that most foreign aid agencies have embraced. The commercials on tv appeal to a common standard ("for just pennies a day you can help a child like Paco can have three meals a day, basic housing and healthcare").

The truth is, we'd want much more for our own children. The basics just wouldn't cut it. We don't just want our own children to survive, we want them to prosper. So if every good father wants their own children to prosper, who wants the fatherless to prosper? God does...and if God wants something, then every obedient Christian is called to give it to Him. (Thy kingdom come, they will be done...)

The Ambassador project is about raising up advocates who plead the cause of the orphan so that it prospers. We are going to begin train people called to go to Zambia in the art of pleading for the orphan. Our trips will involve connecting individual Americans with 5-6 orphans. Over the course of 2 weeks, 1 American will get to know a handful of orphans better than anyone else in the west. When these Americans return home, we will equip them as they begin to plead for those six orphans.

You can learn more about Jeremiah 5 and God's call to plead for the orphans by reviewing the Bible study I'll post tomorrow.

Working Hard

2007-05-12T10:58:00.000-07:00

We Americans work hard in Zambia!

Find The Chanda

2007-05-12T10:55:00.000-07:00

Can you pick out the Zambian in the group?

Where Elephants Fight

2007-05-12T10:49:00.000-07:00

Mike and I wrestled in Pastor Chanda's office (which is about 4'x6'). Pastor said while laughing - "where elephants fight, the grass suffers!" I didn't have any pictures of that but I do have us painting the Wusakili school building. Enjoy.

Testimony of Jan and Charles Van Norman

2007-05-12T10:37:00.000-07:00

Charles and I are very proud to be Christians and members of Inglewood Baptist Church, Grand Prairie, Texas – a church with a vision for missions.

In 2006, when we decided to go to Zambia we knew we would see things Ed and Linda Miller and the 2005 IBC Team had described but we didn’t know the eagerness of the people to learn about Jesus nor the severity of the poverty.

We always heard that God doesn’t call the equipped but that He equips the called. We are not teachers, but we do know that God held us in His arms and that He stood by us during these two mission trips and gave us courage to speak His word. It didn’t seem to matter to those precious children that we had a funny accent. What mattered was that we were all there to love them and to share about Jesus. We were thrilled that 77 made professions of faith in 2006 after Holiday Bible School and 103 in 2007.

In America, from the time we open our eyes in the morning until we go to bed, we have so much more than most people in Zambia. Nothing stopped them from walking miles and miles or catching a rickety bus to travel to hear the Word of God – so often we cannot just drive a few miles to our local church. Our teaching at the Chande Baptist Orphanage was to begin at 9 am, but the children walked and had been there since before 8 and were singing praises and eagerly awaiting our arrival.

The children who attend Chande Orphange School wear green uniforms. Some of the 50 precious children in our room had torn clothing or buttons missing, but that didn’t seem to matter to them. One of the first sad sights in our class was a little girl who had a square cut out of each shoe for her big toe because she had outgrown her shoes. Most children who attend Chande are either single or double orphans. They were so excited to be there. They had memorized John 3:16, various worship songs, the books of the Bible, and most wrote beautifully. Each day they wanted to write down the things they had learned and put them in the Bibles they were given.

In 2006, we were co-teachers of the 5th grade. This year, we requested 6th grade so we could renew our relationship with the children. One precious little girl hugged Jan and said “I thought you had forgot about us”.

After the 2006 trip, Jan knew she would be returning to Africa, however, Charles was unsure he would return. God had a greater plan in mind for him. Everyday on his way to work, Charles says the prayer of Jabez. “Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil”. One morning, through this prayer and the verse “go ye into all the world and preach the gospel”, God let Charles know that he was being called back to Africa.

At times someone in our group would do something unusual or silly and we would say “what happens in Africa stays in Africa” --- but, we don’t agree with that. We had 14 team members who go in different directions and interact with different people and we think we should spread the news of what happened in Africa and what can continue to happen with our support. We have been provided the names of 76 children who need support of $30 a month. We are committed to finding sponsors for these children and contributors so the orphanage building can be completed and operational.

These trips have been life changing experiences and we are thankful to have been a part of the 2006 and 2007 Zambia Mission Teams from Inglewood Baptist Church. Our challenge to others is that they pray about (1) joining the 2008 Zambia Mission Team, (2) supporting a child and (3) contributing to the orphanage building project.