A Prayer Request

I just wanted to ask that your thoughts and prayers go to a coworker of mine, and a fellow Lineman brother here in Central Cal who experienced an electrical contact.  He is alive, but has had to endure double amputation of his hands.  No names will be posted.  If you work for the company, you've likely already been tailboarded - opportunity to sell your vacation hours will soon be available.  If you don't work for the company, please just pray for him and his family.  God knows who he is.

The Lights Are On, But Nobody Came To Visit

Is it an "Open House" if no one comes to look? That's my question concerning this last weekend. We had an open house on both Saturday and Sunday, and not one soul came by. Actually, in the last 7 months of our home being on the market, we have yet to have even one person come by to look at the property. According to the comps in our area, we have the home priced correctly. We keep the property clean. Folks have even taken fliers from our signpost out front. Still, not one person has come to look. It would appear that I jumped ship in Oakhurst too soon. Here's to hoping that everything is resolved soon.

"The nurses dealt with the body like it was rubbish," Wei said. "They wrapped it up in a black plastic bag and threw it in the trash."

I listened to this story on NPR: Morning Edition, on Monday. Please take time to listen to the story. Use this link. Here is print from a news release I found on WorldNetDaily:

MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH
Police force abortions on Christian women
Dozens of unborn reported killed by mandatory chemical injections

---

Posted: April 20, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com

Liu Qibao, the Communist Party secretary of the Guangxi autonomous region

Dozens of unborn babies have been killed in a sweep by Chinese authorities of the Guangxi province that snared pregnant women and brought them against their will to a hospital for fatal abortion injections, according to a Christian ministry that monitors the district and ministers to those in need.

"After 41 women were forced to have abortions on [Tuesday], China Aid Association has learned that the Youjiang District People's Hospital of Baise City performed forced abortions for at least 20 more pregnant women on [Wednesday]," an alert from the organization said.

China Aid, which has its U.S. offices in Midland, Texas, confirmed that eyewitnesses are reporting that the latest roundup of pregnant women involved more than 20, who were transported to a hospital by government "Family Planning" authorities.

"Within 30 minutes, about 10 of them were injected forcefully for an abortion. This means within [the] last 24 hours, at least 61 babies were killed by forced abortions," the sources within China told CAA.

"At bed Number 37, Ms. He Caigan was nine months pregnant. Officials injected her baby's head and 20 minutes later, her baby stopped moving and died," the sources confirmed.

Many of those targeted in the killing rampage were Christians, CAA said.

"About 6 a.m. on [Wednesday], Pastor James Liang's wife Ms. Wei Linrong gave birth to a boy, but he was dead because of the injection. She received three injections – one is to induce the birth and the other two to kill the baby in the womb," CAA's sources reported.

Liang formerly was a pastor in the government-sanctioned Three-Self church before he became a House church pastor a year ago, according to information from China Aid Association's Bob Fu. Eyewitnesses told CAA that the couple wanted to keep their child because of their Christian faith.

Officers from the government surrounded the section of the hospital where the women were being held, the report said.

"CAA urges the international community to register your protest and concern with letters and phone calls to the chairman of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, Party Secretary of Baise City, Mr. Liang Chunlu, and the Youjiang District People's Hospital," CAA said.

The Population Research Institute's research earlier indicated in the past the United Nation's Population Fund, into which the United States had poured money, actually has assisted Chinese government efforts to force married couples to have only one or two children.

China maintains, at least in some areas of the country, a one-child policy sometimes enforced through a policy of forced abortions. It is believed China performs some 10 million involuntary abortions a year.

First exposed by WND in 1997, what has come to be known as "gendercide" in China – due to a cultural preference for boys – has resulted in the deaths of at least 50 million girls.

The organization provided the following contact information:

• Chairman Wei Qing Zhang, National Population and Family Planning Commission of China
  Hotline for complaints: :+86-10-8250492
  Also can be via e-mail.
• Youjiang District People's Hospital
  Tel: +86-776-2839393; 2697723
• Party Secretary of Guangxi Province: Mr. Qibao Liu
  Tel: +86-771-5883508
• Governor of Guangxi Province: Mr. Bing Lu
  Tel: +86-771-2807778
• Party Secretary of Baise City Mr. Liang Chunlu
  Tel: +86-776-2834089

In searching out the particulars of this story, I have found some interesting things. In 2002, President Bush denied the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) some 34 million dollars which had been appropriated by the U.S. Congress. The President continued to deny funds to the UNFPA for several years. The denial of funds was based on the fact that the UNFPA monies would go to China's Family Planning Commission- the perpetrators of forced abortions. I find the statements of Ms. Thoraya Obaid, the Executive Director of UNFPA, to be ironic, when considering that her organization's involvement in China permits even more forced abortions to occur. Ms. Obaid made claims that UNFPA involvement in China did not encourage abortion. What will the UNFPA have to say now? So far, they seem to be avoiding the issue altogether. A search of all news stories, featured stories, statements, etc. for the week of April 20, 2007 on the UNFPA website garnered nothing on the subject of China or forced abortions.

Please pray for Pastor Liang Yage and his wife, Wei Linrong of Baise City, Guangxi Province, China. Pray for all of the mothers whose children were murdered in their wombs by the Communist People's Republic of China. Pray for He Caigan, whose 9 month old child was mere days from birth, but was killed by Communist Party officials who missed their "family planning targets last year". The birth rate was 13.61%. The Communist Party goal was 13.5%. Chairman Wei Qing Zhang's job is on the line after all...

Keep the population low for the betterment of China?

I'm looking into how I can help our brothers and sisters in China. Here are a few groups who have been looking out for the oppressed in China longer than I have.

Persecution.org

China Aid

Population Research Institute

House and Home

Moving your place of employment before you are sure that you can sell your house is a task best left to those with either lots of money, or a desire to live out of a suitcase for a length of time. Not being the former, I fall into the latter category. That said, there is still a home for sale in a beautiful neighborhood of Mariposa.
It brings to mind a song I learned as a child. Sing along if you know the song.
CLICK HERE FIRST
Have patience, have patience. Don't be in such a hurry.

It's hard to wait. Our family prayer request is that the home either sell, I manage a transfer back to the area I worked in, or that God come up with something better. I'm open to ideas. I am also looking forward to being able to sleep in my own bed again.

Now. On a different note. I'm feeling nostalgic. If you were born in the late 70s or early 80s, click on the links below to take yourself back to what was likely a church program you did as a kid.

Good Morning

Agapeland

Noah

Bullfrogs and Butterflies

Rainy Day Song


If you feel the need to listen to these songs again, you can find them here. 28 years later, and they're still selling.

Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people

Last night our local church put on a charming Christmas presentation. The music pastor actually opened the presentation with a long trailer for The Nativity Story. I haven't seen the movie yet, but what little I have seen has caused me to think about the birth of Christ in a different way.

Every year, we unpack our arguments, along with the ornaments and the inflatable singing Santa. The pious and the profane stand side by side at Macy's. Drop-kick a neighbor at Wal-Mart for the last TMX Elmo, but don't forget to grab a pack of candles for advent. When will Christians decide to make Christmas not merely a Holly Jolly time, but a HOLY time? When will we decide to actually set ourselves apart from the distraction that the gift buying and wassail drinking brings? We've long been in need of change.

This is not to say that the season is devoid of good things. People around the nation find it in their hearts to become more generous for at least a couple of weeks. We bake cookies, and send cards. We call on the lonely neighbor around the corner. For the majority of the nation, this is only ONE of TWO days a year that folks recognize that there might be peace and solace to be found in the chapel down the street. We shouldn't throw the holy infant out with the bath water.

Somehow, since time was split, we have managed to lose the incredible sense of mystery and amazement that lives in the nativity story. I don't know if I am feeling it this year simply because of the imminent arrival of my own child, or if I have just grown tired of the ever-present crassness of the Chrismahanukwanzakah "cheer" in the marketplace, and am reacting knee-jerk style. I want Christmas to be about Christ.

When you take Christ out of Christmas - what do you have? *****mas. For those of us in California, that word looks awfully familiar. Mas = More in Spanish. MORE. MORE. MORE. More what?

"Fortasse," inquit "Laetitia diei festi ex ipsis muneribus non proficiscitur..."

"Fortasse," inquit Grinchus, "Laetitia diei festi non est res empticia, non est res quaestuosa!"

Would it help for Christians to tweak the spelling? What about Christmass? Isn't it really about taking some time to think about a 15 year old girl going through labor pains in a barn? We romanticize the act. A teenager giving birth to a baby in the barn of a backwoods inn. There was blood and water to bring Him into the world. He was wrapped in cloths and laid in a feed trough, because the world knew nothing of Him. Let us remember Him now.

Can That Mustard Seed Move Me FROM The Mountain?

Pray, if you would, for the timing in all of our family's future affairs. In the next few weeks I expect to be called to report to Bakersfield for my new job. My wife will soon need to start going to the doctor every two weeks for checkups. We have a house to sell. Hopefully it will draw a buyer soon. I know that finding a buyer this time of year can be more difficult. By December my wife will need to go to the doctor's office every week. Very soon we will be downsizing our income: we have planned for my wife to stop working at the office when the baby is born.

There's a lot that will be going on in a very small amount of time. Throw all of this into the mix; birthdays, Christmas, Thanksgiving, a birth, a home sale, a home purchase, packing and moving a lot of stuff. To be honest - I hope that the LORD really is behind this move, because it will be too difficult to handle on our own.

With all of this on our plate, I ask that you would help us by mentioning us in your prayers. Hopefully, we'll be inviting you all over to our new home sometime soon. I can almost feel myself losing another game of Settlers of Catan (you know who you are).

All in the LORD's timing.

Matthew 17:20

20He replied, "Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."