William Carey - A Giant

I've been reading a biography of William Carey by his grandson, S. Pearce Carey. What an amazing story!

I told Trish last night that reading his biography makes me feel so small. I realize in so many ways how selfish and lazy I am. This man was tireless. He taught himself something like 38 languages: Latin, Hebrew, Greek, Bengali, Hindi, Sanskrit, Oriya, Telegu, Marathi, Assamese, Pashto, Kashmiri, Manipuri and many more. He translated at least part of the scriptures into 35 different languages. He was preaching in Bengali within 8 months of landing in India. I've been in India for almost 3 years and while can carry on a conversation pretty well, but still am not to preach.

His exploits were many. In addition to translation and printing, he started or had a hand in starting hundreds of schools, many mission centers, and a university. He published journals and newspapers, and through them raised awareness of sati (widow burning). His tireless publicity prompted the law which led to the abolition of this practice. In fact, he accomplished much more than he himself ever anticipated.

The cool thing is through it all, it's very clear from his humility that he knew that everything that was accomplished was by God's grace. Because I can see God working through him, rather than being discouraged that I have accomplished so little, I'm filled with hope. I know that the same God that used Carey is working in and through me!

How cool is it to think that if I will wholly devote myself to Him and His service that he can do much more through my life than I anticipate! This book is a great testament to what God can do with someone wholly yielded to Him and willing to obey even when friends, family and supporters wavered in their support of Him.

I'm inspired! I'm encouraged! Praise be to God that He's still using William Carey over 170 years after his death. I've redoubled my efforts in learning Hindi. I'm daily reading my Hindi Bible. Who knows, maybe once I'm able to preach in Hindi, then 'll start learning Bengali.

The other thing I saw quite clearly is that Carey labored for many years before he saw a single convert. He was faithful to the vision and calling God gave him, continuing service in India for near 40 years. One of his last sermons was from Galatians 6:9 reminding me that we too will reap if we don't grow weary. So, I press on.

Earthquake!

Yesterday, just before 3 PM I was sitting at my computer and felt my chair rocking back and forth. It was as if someone had walked up behind me and grabbed the back of my chair and pushed it back and forth. We have wobbly chairs, so I wasn't sure what had happened so I went into the next room and said, "Did you feel that?"

Megan and Pastor Rajesh both felt it, but Victoria was oblivious.

I immediately went online to see if I could find some observation station with live reporting, but couldn't.

This morning I was greeted with an email announcing an earthquake that struck Bhutan at that time yesterday. It was 6.1 on the richter scale. I think that place is about 260 miles away. Here's a link to the USGS site.

This is the second time we've been able to feel an earthquake here. The first time was just after we moved here.

Frustrated with Microsoft and Google

I'm very frustrated with Microsoft and Google. I just realized (after having spent hours across 3 days designing an html email update) that Microsoft no longer supports background images in Microsoft Outlook (2007 version). They did in the 2003 version. Gmail also does not support background images. This is really frustrating as I know very little about html and design and don't know how to accomplish what I wanted to accomplish apart from a background image. Most email clients do support this functionality.

You can read more about it at http://www.email-standards.org/what-you-can-do/.

So I ended up sending the email as it was. Some people will get it with a picture (if you use a Mac, use Mozilla Thunderbird, Yahoo and several other email clients). Many (maybe a majority) will get an email with a great big space at the top where the picture should have been. Not very professional or nice looking.

If someone knows an easy work around for this for next time, please let me know.

Trish Leads Women's Retreat

“She washed my feet with her hair and her tears.” Jesus can say that of the woman in Luke 7, but I can also say it of my wife, Trish.

In May, Trish and a friend named Jodi, led a women’s retreat for the ladies of Bible Centered Fellowship. The theme was Behold the Lamb. Trish asked me to come and take pictures. When I got there, I discovered that she wanted to tell the story of the woman washing Jesus feet and act it out with me sitting in for Jesus. It was a very moving experience. I really just wanted her to get up and stop. I felt so unworthy, yet at the same time really loved. They followed up this story by washing the ladies feet.

The ladies really enjoyed the participative discussions. They said they’d never experienced a retreat like that.

Insights from Weeding

This morning I spent a few hours weeding our flower beds. While weeding I was meditating on the Bible lesson I'll be teaching tonight - the creation story from Genesis 1:1-25. I had several insights that I wanted to share with you.

First, I was thinking about how many times in that passage that God was separating something. He separated light from darkness, day from night, waters above from waters below, and water from land. Here I was separating weeds and grass from plants. I was thinking about how God also makes set apart, or holy.

Thinking about our holiness or "set apartness" made me think about the parable of the wheat and the tares. In that parable we learn that there are non-believers in among the believers and that God would separate them in the harvest. This is also established in Matthew 7 where we're told that many prophesy and cast out demons in His name, but at the judgment he'll say, "Depart from me for I never knew you." This had me thinking about our churches and wondering how many people are there that don't know God through faith in Jesus Christ. Said another way, I wondered how many people in our churches don't have saving faith. In my garden, there's more weeds than plants. Is it that way in the church too?

As I pulled weeds I also thought about how creative our God is. Do you know how many varieties of grass and weeds there are? Do you know how distinct pieces of the same type of weed can be from one another? In Genesis 1 it says He created grasses and plants that reproduce according to their kind. There are so many kinds, it's amazing! The differences in shades of green alone is amazing! Our God really went all out. I could also go on about all the different kinds of ants he's made, many of which emerged to display His glory as I was plucking weeds.

I also thought about sweat. You know there was this curse as a result of man's sin that had something to do with working by the sweat of the brow. Was my brow ever sweating! It had me wondering how much easier that work might have been had man never sinned. In fact, I started wondering if weeds themselves were not a result of the curse. Thank God that even though there's a curse for sin, in Christ there's redemption and blessing!

In the beginning God created.... and His creation is really amazing! He said, "Let there be light" and there was light. He said the light was good. He separated the light from the darkness. Even in my life I see Him separating light from darkness as I'm sanctified. Praise Him that the same grace that redeems us and separates us by declaring us just also separates us by conforming us into His image.

It's pretty cool what you can observe just weeding the garden!

Pythons and Swords

Last night I went to Tilabari with one of my disciples to see one of his disciples lead a small group in Bible Story telling. When we arrived in Tilabari, we got a rare treat. There was an enormous crowd at the edge of the village and Nasib was waiting for us nearby. He explained that some of the villagers had caught a large snake and asked if we wanted to go see before we started our small group. So we went.

When we arrived there was a large crowd around a very large snake. This thing was at least 11 feet long. It was a python (I believe a Burmese Python). Nearby there was a goat that it had killed, but not yet eaten. The villagers were waiting for the forest department officials to come and relocate the snake.

Just so you can get a better idea of the size, Here's a picture with the people in the background:
So that's the deal about snakes, let me tell you about swords. Jyotish was leading the small group and was supposed to be telling the creation story. When he arrived, he hadn't prepared well. He couldn't remember which days what happened. While he was fumbling through telling the story, a lesson came to me from God's Word.

I shared with the students how important it is to learn God's Word. They really need to learn the stories they'll be telling completely. I reminded them that God's Word is called a sword (talvar in Hindi). I told them that if we're going to battle it is important that we handle the sword properly and hold it tightly, not allowing it to be removed from us. I reminded them that in 2 Tim. 2:15 it says an approved workman who doesn't need to be ashamed handles God's word accurately. I told them that this is akin to learning the story and telling it exactly right. How can we make good observations and applications from a story if we don't tell it right. I told them to get to practicing handling their sword reminding them of the promise in Joshua 1:8 that if we don't allow the book of law to depart from our mouth, but meditate on it day and night so that we're careful to do all that it says, that we will then make our way prosperous and successful.

Please pray for Nasib and Jyotish as they lead this group of 7. Pray for their 7 disciples, that they'll handle God's Word like a sword.

Going Batty

Yes that's a bat Trish is holding. It's a fruit bat, but at night when it swoops over your head, you'd swear it was a pterodactyl or a vampire bat.

Every year in February and March these creatures visit the cotton tree just behind our house for several weeks. We love going up on the roof and watching them.

This particular critter had the misfortune of running into a power line and getting electrocuted. We discovered him the next morning.

Our friend Gopal (pictured) said he was going to eat it, but chickened out when he got home. He said by the time he got it home, it didn't smell very good, so he threw it out.