If you wait for perfect conditions,
you will never get anything done.
Ecclesiastes 11:4 (NLT)
Update from Frann Clark:
My cataract surgeries were scheduled for Oct. 16 & 30. They did the one on Oct. 16 & all went great. The following Tuesday (21) the clinic called my daughter & asked if we could be there the next afternoon to do the right eye. I went for the day after checkup yesterday & he said that it was fine. Some pressure involving the right eye so he gave me drops & said to come back in a week.
Please pray that the pressure problem will be solved.
Tuesday, I hope to go to Jennings to see Riley at the VA home. Please pray for safe travel. I am still not able to drive but maybe soon.
God Bless You
Frann
Today’s the day! On Mission in Kentwood will meet at FBC, Kentwood at 8:00 this morning to complete acts of ministry in Kentwood. If you want a real blessing, take part in this ministry.
U.S. Condemns Beating of China Pastor’s Sons
By Staff of Baptist Press
BEIJING (BP)–The United States has voiced grave concern over the brutal beating Oct. 16 of “Pastor Bike” Zhang Mingxuan’s two sons by public security officials in China.
State Department spokesman Robert Wood released a statement Oct. 23 that specifically highlighted the “continuing official harassment of Pastor Zhang, … including his arbitrary detention and the forced relocation of his family.” The State Department called on the Chinese government to release Zhang immediately, permit his family members to return home, condemn the violent acts committed against his sons and bring the individuals responsible for the persecution to justice.
The statement came the day after two congressmen, Frank R. Wolf, R.-Va., and Christopher Smith, R.-N.J., issued a joint letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, asking her to call for Zhang’s release and demand that the damages inflicted upon his family be rectified. Both congressmen met with Zhang and his wife in Beijing this past July and heard firsthand about the abuses Christians in China suffer at the hands of Public Security Bureau officials.
Pastor Zhang was traveling when his family was attacked and efforts to contact him had been unsuccessful. On Oct. 22, however, he called his eldest son to say he was being detained by public security officers but was not allowed to tell anyone where or in what conditions he was being held, according to a report from the human rights group China Aid Association (chinaaid.org). Zhang’s wife and sister also reportedly have been detained in a Beijing hotel.
In order to receive medical reimbursement for his injuries, PSB officials coerced Pastor Bike’s eldest son, Zhang Jian, to sign a statement that he received only minor injuries in the beating, China Aid reported. Hospital records, however, indicated he received severe injuries that required complicated surgery.
On Oct. 10, police sealed the door of the house church where Zhang Mingxuan preaches and blocked it with two truckloads of garbage, even though the government just weeks earlier had given the church permission to meet, China Aid reported. Pastor Bike has been arrested 26 times, beaten and evicted from his home numerous times because of his faith.
China Aid, on the web at http://www.chinaaid.org, said it is assisting Zhang Jian and his family with medical expenses, legal help and other needs and urged concerned citizens to contact the Chinese Embassy by writing to 2201 Wisconsin Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20007 or by calling 202-338-6688.
Compiled by Baptist Press assistant editor Mark Kelly.
If you are a collector of “stuff” (old stuff, new stuff, cheap stuff, inexpensive stuff), this devotional will make you think. (David and I are guilty of collecting the old, inexpensive “stuff”!)
TREASURE OR TRASH?
Years ago, there was a woman who went browsing through an antique store. While she was there, she found a piano that she fell in love with. It was a magnificent old mahogany upright with beautiful carvings across the front. Inside the top was a beautiful hand detailed painting along the back along with the serial number and name of the original maker. It had been made in 1901. It had a warm full tone and so she thought all it needed was to be tuned.
So she bought the piano, brought it home and called a piano restoration specialist to come out to tune it. But it didn’t take him long to determine that the pinblock had been “doped.” He explained to the woman that old pianos “die” when the pinblock dries out because the pinblock can’t keep the pins tight when they’re tuned. When this happens, if someone wants to sell a piano in this condition, they will sometimes dope it, which means they lay the piano on its back and pour a mixture of anti-freeze and water around the pins to swell the pinblock. Sometimes, it will add some life to an aging piano; in this case, it ruined it.
The woman was so disappointed and so angry that she put the piano outside her home and made a sign for it that said “Free: 500 pounds of firewood”. What she thought was a treasure had turned to trash.
Have you ever had something like that happen to you? You find something that you love, something you think is going your life so much better, but shortly after you get it, it’s destined for the trash pile. How many of you have corners in your garages and basements and attics where you keep all those so-called treasures? Yard sale lawn mowers that can’t cut a lick of grass, one of those slicer-dicers you thought your kitchen just couldn’t do without, maybe even your collection of 8-track tapes – now there’s a treasure!
We pursue many things in life hoping to gain a wonderful treasure. We spend our lives in the pursuit of “things.” But there are moments when we’re forced to stop and ask ourselves, “Is what I have really such a treasure, or is it nothing but trash?” The apostle Paul was a man who once faced this difficult question. Here’s the conclusion he came to:
“But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ.” (Philippians 3:7-8)
Paul says, “At one time, I had it all. But the things that I used to think were important, I have weighed them, I have evaluated them, and I have come to the conclusion that they are absolute garbage compared to what I have in Jesus Christ.”
What were those “things”? In the first few verses of Philippians 3, Paul sets forth his credentials as a Jewish leader. Paul says, “If you were to look at me, you would assume, ‘Here is a man who has it all. He has prestige, he has honor, he has power. He has everything that a man could possibly want.'”
But, again, “What things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ.” Everything he had as a Jew that he considered to be important, he re-evaluated and came to the conclusion that it really wasn’t all that important. “Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ.” (3:8).
Now I understand that generally the things that are important to us are not the same things that were important to Paul, but they are “things” nonetheless. Maybe we enjoy living in our dream house. Maybe new clothes or jewelry excites us, maybe a new computer, maybe a new car. Maybe making it big in sports is our pride, maybe being popular and well-liked. Maybe those awards we’ve hung on our walls. But when you take all these things and you compare them to our blessings in Jesus Christ, they’re a pile of garbage, and we need to understand that.
Take a look around you. What do you see — treasure or trash?
Have a great day!
Alan Smith
Helen Street Church of Christ
Fayetteville, North Carolina
Trusting you have “the real treasure” in your live,
Anna Lee
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