1 Chron 12:32 report, 36: On building houses . . . and on creating an "army" of worms and ants

As we think about initiating truly sustainable and practical "mission to and from the Caribbean" projects in communities across our region and beyond, we first of all must put our priorities right. For, as Haggai warned the people of God in his generation -- on why their apparent prosperity seemed so brittle and futile:

HAG 1:2 This is what the LORD Almighty says: "These people say, `The time has not yet come for the LORD's house to be built.'"

HAG 1:3 Then the word of the LORD came through the prophet Haggai: 4 "Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin?"

HAG 1:5 Now this is what the LORD Almighty says: "Give careful thought to your ways. 6 You have planted much, but have harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it."

HAG 1:7 This is what the LORD Almighty says: "Give careful thought to your ways. 8 Go up into the mountains and bring down timber and build the house, so that I may take pleasure in it and be honored," says the LORD. 9 "You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?" declares the LORD Almighty. "Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with his own house. 10 Therefore, because of you the heavens have withheld their dew and the earth its crops. 11 I called for a drought on the fields and the mountains, on the grain, the new wine, the oil and whatever the ground produces, on men and cattle, and on the labor of your hands."

That sounds a little close for comfort in today's Caribbean!

Maybe, there is more to our region's economic woes than meets the matrerialist's eye, then? So, too, we can see the searing force of the song of ascents sung by the returning exiles, in Psalm 127:1, which (ironically, given what Haggai had to warn more or less the self same returned exiles some years later!) begins:

PS 127:1 Unless the LORD builds the house,
its builders labor in vain.
Unless the LORD watches over the city,
the watchmen stand guard in vain.

Of course, we have glossed over a major gap: an individual or family often has enough resources to build a house or start up a business, but (with extremely rare exceptions) no one individual or family can [re-]build a Temple.

That gap is what this post adresses.

As, the vital issue is: how can we mobilise such a critical mass of the community of God's people across our region, as can begin to fulfill our potential?

A book just in -- thanks to the kind gift of a certain brother over in Florida; God bless him, his family and a certain highly favoured cat! -- brings forward a crucial idea from the Back to Jerusalem movement of the Chinese church: an army of worms. In their words:

Sometimes it seems as if a lot of mission effort consists of "elephant" plans -- huge and grandiose strategies . . . But it is easy for border guards to detect an elephant . . . . [W]e believe God wants to send an army of insects and crawling creatures . . . We don't have a lot of money or any grandiopse plans. But we are an army of little ants, worms and termites who know how to work underground, because that is how we have learned to work in China . . . . little worms and ants can go anywhere . . . [Hathaway, Yun, Yongze, & Wang, Back to Jerusalem (Carlisle, UK: Piquant, 2003), pp. 90 - 92.]

This -- as the authors take time to point out -- is all in line with an astute biblical observation by Agur:

PR 30:24 "Four things on earth are small,
yet they are extremely wise:

PR 30:25 Ants are creatures of little strength,
yet they store up their food in the summer;

PR 30:26 coneys are creatures of little power,
yet they make their home in the crags;

PR 30:27 locusts have no king,
yet they advance together in ranks;

PR 30:28 a lizard can be caught with the hand,
yet it is found in kings' palaces.

In short, the joint combination of a great many tiny efforts has a cumulative effect that can be astonishing. This of course is exactly what happened with Nehemiah when he mobilised the people to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem: what had lain in ruins probably for generations, was rebuilt in fifty-two days [Neh. 6:15.]

So, we can see a challenge: a heavily persecuted, largely underground Chinese church with far fewer per capita resources than we have here in the Caribbean is seriously targetting mobilising, sending and supporting at least 100,000 workers as a missions force, i.e. as a tithe of their full-time workers. Can we even begin to come close to thinking like that? Can we actually develop a self-sustaining, practically achievable strategy that would yield similar results, relative to our own scale as a region and to our huge strategic potential?

I am confident that we can do just that.

For, just as a thought experiment, let's do what Physicists call a Fermi calculation based on educated guesstimates that may tell us a bit about the possibilities we can unleash.

Say that we can have 1 in every 100 Christians as a full-time worker, and that we target tithing that number to the mission fields beyond our region. Counting just the claimed eight million or so evangelicals across the region, that would give us 72,000 full-time workers in our region, and 8,000 mobilised for the mission fields of the 10/40 window and elsewhere. In army terms, that's nine or so "divisions" at home, and an expeditionary "division." [But as Paul more than proved in Acts, a well supported "platoon" of say 20 - 40 can be more than enough to be a very effective missions force in any given tartegtted region or community! Maybe, even a "squad" -- or, thinking in Cavalry, tanker or air unit terms, a "squadron" -- of 5 - 12; which is in fact about the scale of Paul's missionary teams. (Of course, we aren't out to shoot people, just to love them. Love is far, far cheaper -- and in the end, more effective, too -- than war.)]

How could we fund such a division-strength global "expeditionary force" of missionary workers?

Per capita incomes are of order US$ 2,000 - 5,000 across most of our region, so the "evangelical regional product" in our region is maybe of order US$ 10 billions. One percent of that is US$ 100 millions, and a tithe of that would give an annual potential regional missions budget of US$ 10 millions. With reasonable matching funds from partners across the world, that could go a long way towards supporting serious intiaitives with both people and money. (And, with a shared vision, we probably would be far more generous than that.)

In short, an "army" of Caribbean "missionary ants and worms" -- ever notice how we hear folk sayings about suicidally uncooperative "crabs in a barrel" but never any such sayings about ants in a barrel? -- can do a lot more than we think.

Next time, let us begin to explore how we can begin. END

Rom 1 reply, 38c: The road to reformation (a yet further reply to Patrick White in The Gleaner, July 1, 2013)

So far in this series of responses to an article trying to dismiss the Judaeo-Christian foundations of our civilisation by Mr Patrick White in the Jamaica Gleaner of July 1st, 2013, we have:

1: Exposed and rebutted the agenda of willful defiance of God, his creation order for sexuality and consequential sound principles of morality under false colours of law and "rights."

2: Corrected the misleading historical myth that Christian sexual ethics are part of an inevitably losing war of irrational religion against science and reason.

3: Addressed the issue of grounding ethics and morality in the teeth of the rise of evolutionary materialist scientism, which cloaks atheism and amorality in the lab coat, demanding genuflection.

Now, we must pause from correcting specific errors (DV, much more to come! We will have to range from origin of the cosmos and the earth to life and ourselves and more, so high has the wall of fallacies and myths cloaked in lab coats been made that we need to break down . . . ), to highlight the road to reformation, as we understand nationhood, law, rights, freedoms, responsibilities and government under God and the dynamics of repentance, renewal, revival and reformation leading to God-blessed transformation through key biblical examples and the seminal analysis of Francis Schaeffer a generation ago.  (BTW, his How Should We Then Live videos here will be a good investment, as will be the book. His complete works are here, though the price is a bit stiffish. [I am glad I bought my copy about 20 years ago!])

A good place to begin our reflections is Acts 17, where we see Paul c. AD 50, in Athens. 

For, having gone to Macedonia in answer to a vision that called him to come over to "help us," he had been harried and hounded from one city to the next, through unjust persecution. Now, at length in Athens, this great lion of God turned at bay, having been provoked to his core by seeing this proud capital of learning, freedom and the arts wholly given over to dumb idols and the intellectual and moral chaos that stem from those rotten roots. 

He therefore started in the market place as had Socrates nigh on five hundred years before, and reasoned with passers by. 

Mars Hill, in Athens. The text of Paul's speech in Ac 17
is on a bronze plaque at the foot of the outcrop of rock,
to our right of the cluster of three people

There was puzzlement and debate, and the members of the Areopagus Council invited him to come talk with them. Perhaps on Mars Hill itself, more likely, in the nearby Agora, the marketplace where in C1 that council seemed to habitually meet. Of these learned men, most were apparently only seeking intellectual entertainment at Paul's expense by intending to expose his assumed half-baked ignorance -- they were deriding him as a "spermologos" (a seek-picking sparrow of a dabbler who had only a few half understood scraps of knowledge taken out of context) --  and routing him in debate.

They got more than they bargained for.

A lot more.

For, just as a great lion pushed too far turns at bay and vexes those who unwisely kept on pushing, harrying and pursuing, the apostle took a bold stance before the Areopagus:

Ac 17:16 While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was greatly upset because he saw the city was full of idols. 17 So he was addressing the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles in the synagogue, and in the marketplace [the Agora]  every day those who happened to be there. 18 Also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him, and some were asking, “What does this foolish babbler want to say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods.” (They said this because he was proclaiming the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.) 

19 So they took Paul and brought him to the Areopagus [possibly, on Mars Hill itself -- pictured below -- or (more likely)  in the neighbouring Agora], saying, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are proclaiming? 20 For you are bringing some surprising things to our ears, so we want to know what they mean.” 21 (All the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there used to spend their time in nothing else than telling or listening to something new.)

22 So Paul stood before the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I see that you are very religious in all respects. 23 For as I went around and observed closely your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: ‘To an unknown god.’ Therefore what you worship without knowing it, this I proclaim to you.

24 The God who made the world and everything in it, who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by human hands, 25 nor is he served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives life and breath and everything to everyone.

26 From one man he made every nation of the human race to inhabit the entire earth, determining their set times and the fixed limits of the places where they would live,  27 so that they would search for God and perhaps grope around for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 28 For in him we live and move about and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we too are his offspring.’

29 So since we are God’s offspring, we should not think the deity is like gold or silver or stone, an image made by human skill and imagination.  30 Therefore, although God has overlooked such times of ignorance, he now commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has set a day on which he is going to judge the world in righteousness, by a man whom he designated, having provided proof to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

32 Now when they heard about the resurrection from the dead, some began to scoff, but others said, “We will hear you again about this.” 33 So Paul left the Areopagus.

34 But some people joined him and believed. Among them were Dionysius, who was a member of the Areopagus, a woman named Damaris, and others with them. [NET]

 Paul's approach gives us some key examples and ideas:

1 --> As we have already outlined, he first found a culturally bridging point of contact, the now famous altar to the unknown god that points to the rhetorical kairos, the opportunity and occasion that focuses attention and opens the way for the speech to effect a breakthrough.  So, while he is going to do a "look at the foundations and their cracks" radical critique, he is not introducing something utterly strange, but is explaining what the unknown God honoured in a municipal monument right there in their city has told him to say to the Athenians (and through them, to all peoples).

2 --> Subtly, he is also reminding the Athenians -- proud guardians of Greece's intellectual heritage (which is the heart of our own intellectual culture) -- that on the most important point of knowledge, the foundational ground of reality, the root of being, they have had to build a public monument to their ignorance. Craaack . . . the foundations of the pagan, cynical, skeptical worldview and culture -- "the common people thought the stories of the gods were equally true, the philosophers that they were equally false, the politicians that they were equally useful" [cf. Gibbon et al.]  --  have a fatal structural flaw.

3 --> He then proceeded to correct common misunderstandings: the Creator of the cosmos is not dependent on us, nor is he confined to temples like the idols are. Instead, we depend on him, and as their own poets have put it we are his sons and daughters; it is in him that we live, move and have our being.

4 --> He is the creator of nationhood, and is Lord of the times, places and resources we have as nations; so supervising the course of history that from time to time, in the face of pivotal moments [kairous], we are moved to grope for him, however blindly.

5 --> In this time, he has decisively intervened in history, showing us that we will stand before the bar of eternal judgement by raising  Jesus (the one who will be our Judge, having felt the full force of human frailty and temptation) from the dead.

6 --> Accordingly, he calls us to face and acknowledge the credible truth, repent and put our trust in God in the face of Christ.:

 It is worth pausing to read here on in context, and (esp. if we have not yet done so . . . ) to  watch here, to flesh this out:

The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel from Slaves4Christ on Vimeo.


Thus, Paul -- as do today's Christian thinkers -- found an acceptable point of contact, pointed to the key error he would correct, outlined our status as creatures and nations accountable before our common Creator, Sustainer, Lord and Father, then introduced the gospel. The key point of warrant for the gospel (and thus for the reality of that hitherto unknown God) is the resurrection, as attested by over five hundred eyewitnesses and the fulfillment of scriptural prophecies given in the key case some seven hundred years beforehand.  And, in light of that gospel, we are all called to repentance.

Alas, as outlined, that was the sticking point. 

For, the idea of a bodily resurrection cut across deeply entrenched worldview assumptions. 

So, many in the audience in effect said: never mind our acknowledged ignorance and whatever evidence you may present, we don't accept that God can be like that. 

The immediate results were therefore scanty, and Paul was literally laughed out of court. 

The plaque, at the foot of Mars Hill (HT: Ben & Kristy )

But, today, Dionysius the Areopagite (one of the few who heeded the gospel call that day) is remembered as the first bishop of Athens, and as its patron saint. 

Indeed, from a map of modern Athens, we can see that the road by Mars Hill is now called Apostle Paul Street. Its continuation by the Acropolis is Dionysius the Areopagite street. Behind the Agora is Holy Apostle church.
 
 To cap it all off, the above once- mocked Mars Hill speech is on a man-sized bronze plaque affixed at the foot of the hill itself. 

The verdict of history is in: the future belonged to the Apostle and even more to the gospel he proclaimed that decisive day. 

Not to  the skeptical scholars or to cynical politicians of the ilk of a Pilate: "what is 'truth'?"

Just so, in our day, by God's grace the well-warranted truth of the gospel will again prevail. For:

7 --> as Paul put it in Acts 17, God created the nations, and so controls our places and times [kairous], that we are forced to grope (however blindly and ignorantly) for him in the midst of crises.

8 --> Then, as Paul’s presence in Athens exemplifies, God sends his spokesmen into such places at such times with the call to repentance, renewal and reformation, opening the door --

“so that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles [εθνη -- ethne, from  ἔθνος -- ethnos  n. 1. a race (as of the same habit), i.e. a tribe] through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Holy Spirit.”[Gal. 3:14, NIV '84] 

9 --> Therefore, following Eph 4:9 - 16, "[Jesus] . . . gave" leaders to the church, "to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up . . . attaining to the whole measure of the fulness of Christ." [NIV '84]

10 --> So, God is now sending the gospel of blessing to the nations of the Caribbean in our time of kairos, thus calling out, creating, building and equipping his body, the church “the fulness of him who fills everything in every way” as the means of blessing for our region and beyond, to the wider world.  It is worth pausing to list some follow up resources here, on:

1. The gospel as an historical fact-anchored, life- and community- transforming game changer "of first importance"
2. The six first principles foundational discipleship teachings of Heb 6:1 - 2 . . . lay and build on these
3. The Fulness of Christ vision (cf. Eph 1:17 - 23 & 4:9 - 24), discipleship, working with the cell dynamic (N.B. Manual) and godly transformation. (Cf. also reference note, here and a discussion in light of the issue of the sins of Christendom etc, here.)

11 --> Thus, God is sending us out as his disciples, into — and beyond — the local community as “God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”

12 --> Consequently, as we live, love, evangelise, disciple, serve, and provide high integrity leadership, Christ’s reforming and transforming redemptive fullness will naturally, often invisibly and imperceptibly, spread through "all things" across the Caribbean Basin and beyond.

13 --> This promotes truly sustainable -- God-blessed -- development under the vision of Psalm 127:

 PS 127:1 Unless the LORD builds the house,     
its builders labor in vain.   
Unless the LORD watches over the city,     
the watchmen stand guard in vain. [NIV '84]

We see here a picture of the God who is not only Creator and Lord, but enters into  history, bringing us to repentance and reconciliation, graciously opening the doors for a mutual agreement -- a covenant -- with promises, conditions and blessings.  Thus, opening the door for the four R's of reformation:

R1 Repentance: True revivals start here.  As we repent, we "put off [our] old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires . . . [and will] be made new in the attitude of [our] minds . . . put[ting] on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness."  [Eph. 4:18, 20 - 24.]

R2 Renewal: this is the living out of repentance as we learn and live by the light of God’s word and the power of God’s Spirit. "Don't let the world squeeze you into its mould.  Instead, be transformed from within by the renewing of your mind.  Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is." 

R3 Revival, proper: the pouring out of God's Spirit in times of refreshing.  Thus, we receive anointed power from God to walk in good works in the face of a deceived, corrupt world. "In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people," so we are called to "Repent . . . and turn to God, so that [our] sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord."

R4 Reformation: the transformation of a community, its institutions and culture under the impact of the Lordship of Jesus as those who surrender to him fill their lives and ways with his fulness.  Of course, this threatens those who draw pleasure and power from sin (or even make their living from it), so revivals will also face persecution.One man's revival and renewal of life and culture is another man's rebuke and challenge to power base, pleasures, favourite sins or profits.

That is exactly the challenge that faced Nehemiah, in the aftermath of the exile and an only partly successful resettlement, when he learned about the broken down walls of Jerusalem. After prayer of identification and repentance, he obtained the permission of the King, and letters of authority. Then, he arrived and did not announce himself, quietly surveying the damage for himself.

He then called a public meeting:

Nehemiah's night tour (HT: BSO)

Neh 2:¹¹ . . . I went to Jerusalem and was there three days. ¹² Then I arose in the night, I and a few men with me. And I told no one what my God had put into my heart to do for Jerusalem. There was no animal with me but the one on which I rode.

¹³ I went out by night by the Valley Gate to the Dragon Spring and to the Dung Gate, and I inspected the walls of Jerusalem that were broken down and its gates that had been destroyed by fire. ¹⁴ Then I went on to the Fountain Gate and to the King's Pool, but there was no room for the animal that was under me to pass. ¹⁵ Then I went up in the night by the valley and inspected the wall, and I turned back and entered by the Valley Gate, and so returned. ¹⁶ And the officials did not know where I had gone or what I was doing, and I had not yet told the Jews, the priests, the nobles, the officials, and the rest who were to do the work.

¹⁷ Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision.” ¹⁸ And I told them of the hand of my God that had been upon me for good, and also of the words that the king had spoken to me. And they said, “Let us rise up and build.” So they strengthened their hands for the good work. [ESV]

But of course, there were those who from v. 10 had been greatly displeased  "that someone had come to seek the welfare of the people of Israel."

Cleverly, they showed up with an offer to "help" -- as in, stop the suicidal rebellion that "obviously" was being plotted. (Just as, the serpent in the Garden showed up with an offer to "help" Eve and Adam.)

Neh 2:¹⁹ But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they jeered at us and despised us and said, “What is this thing that you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?” ²⁰ Then I replied to them, “The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim^[a] in Jerusalem.” [ESV]

They set out to rebuild, amidst difficulties, internal divisions, entrenched sins that had to be exposed and corrected,  and in the face of slander and threats from without (with collaborators from within!). Eventually, they had to set a guard even as they built, but then:

Neh 6:¹⁵ So the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, in fifty-two days. ¹⁶ And when all our enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem, for they perceived that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God. [ESV]

(Sadly, our own case is so much more devastated that it cannot be fundamentally corrected in seven and a half weeks! But, we can use this little exercise as a break in project, to begin by scoping out the problem and seeing what we will need to do to begin to fix it, if we will.)

But the matter did not stop there, repentance and renewal led to a breakthrough of revival that led on to reformation for Israel.  This we can see in Chs 8 - 9, esp:

Neh 8:1 And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the Water Gate. And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses that the Lord had commanded Israel. ² So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month. ³ And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law . . . . 

⁵ And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people, and as he opened it all the people stood. ⁶ And Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, “Amen, Amen,” lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. ⁷ Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites,^[a] helped the people to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places. ⁸ They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly,^[b] and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading . . .

⁹ And Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who taught the people said to all the people, “This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn or weep.” For all the people wept as they heard the words of the Law. ¹⁰ Then he said to them, “Go your way. Eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” [ESV]

 This is the spiritual breakthrough moment. 

Hearing and heeding the Word of God read and expounded so they could understand their covenant of nationhood under God, the people were broken in heart, and turned, in a Spirit-inspired resolve to restore their nation under God.  From this moment, the reformations led by Ezra and Nehemiah came that would restore the nation to spiritual and moral health, through the power of the truth that is the Word of God.

But, there was an enduring consequence of national sin: never again was Israel wholly free from foreign, pagan dominion or overlordship, until that sad generation came when Messiah came, but was rejected by leadership gone astray, ending in exile and dispersal. Which has been restored from only in our time, nearly two thousand years later.

Sins have consequences, and national sins have national consequences.

So also, we see the significance of prophetic intellectual and cultural leadership in the name of God, and with the intellectual horsepower to challenge and break entrenched unbelief. 

This, in the past generation, Francis Schaeffer emphasised, and we can illustrate this by adapting one of his diagrams, taking the roof off of a worldview:

Schaeffer -- cf. here on -- also provided another pivotal diagram that we can adapt (with the correction of his error on the role of Aquinas), the line of despair, which will help us understand key intellectual currents over the past centuries and their consequences in our civilisation:

The key force of the line of despair is that it invites the lower storey to eat up the upper one, as Schaeffer often said, when nature is made artificially autonomous from the union with the Grace that gives us truth from God by authenticated revelation, nature eats up grace:

No wonder, the serpent in the garden always wants us to reject the Word of God and turn to the things we see around us, refusing to heed the authenticating sign of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead with 500+ witnesses.

In reply, let us determine to apply the scripture principle, as taught by Paul:

2 Tim 3:¹² Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, ¹³ while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. ¹⁴ But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom^[a] you learned it ¹⁵ and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. ¹⁶ All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, ¹⁷ that the man of God^[b] may be complete, equipped for every good work. [ESV]

Peter speaks likewise, in the face of impending unjust execution at Nero's hand:

2 Pet 1:¹⁵ And I will make every effort so that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things.¹⁶ For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 

¹⁷ For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son,^[i] with whom I am well pleased,” ¹⁸ we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. 

¹⁹ And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, ²⁰ knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. 

²¹ For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. [ESV]

We must never underestimate the significance and power of the Word of God. 

But for those who have been misled to suspect, deride and dismiss it, we must be willing and able to provide both warrant for confidence in the gospel and the wider word of God, and a solid worldviews case. 

Sometimes, things are so bad that we have to start where Paul started in Athens, with key cultural markers that can be used to anchor a worldview case, from the ground up.

But once that has been put in place, we can tehn ser about the worlk of discipleship of individuals and fsamilies in communites and nations, which "naturally" leads to reformation as a community and then indeed a nation is more and more filled with Christ and his gracious blessing by the power of the gospel. Indeed, that is actually an overlooked part of both the gospel call to repentance and a part of our discipling mandate:

Eph 2:⁴ But^[c] God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, ⁵ even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ⁶ and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, ⁷ so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 

⁸ For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, ⁹ not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  

¹⁰ For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. 

Titus 2:2 But as for you, teach what accords with sound^[a] doctrine . . . . 

¹¹ For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, ¹² training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, ¹³ waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, ¹⁴ who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

¹⁵ Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority . . . 

Matt 28:¹⁸ And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in^[b] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”[All ESV]

So, our work is cut out for us, to provide godly, prophetic intellectual and cultural leadership that restores our understanding across our region and the wider world that we are nations under God, with government, laws and cultures under God. In that context, we are called to build our worldviews and lives on a sound foundation, informed by the gospel. 

Through this same gospel, we are led to repentance, renewal, revival and reformation, issuing in God-blessed transformation.

Any who would lead us away from this sure anchor for our souls, lives, families, churches, communities and nations speak with the voice of the snake in the Garden. A voice that -- whether or not they know it -- echoes the lies of the Dragon. From such let us turn away.  lest we become like those Jesus had to rebuke:

Jn 8:⁴³ Why do you not understand what I say?

It is because you cannot bear to hear my word.

⁴⁴ You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. ⁴⁵ But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me . . .   ⁴⁷ Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God.” [ESV]

It is time, high time, to turn from destructive apostasy cloaked in a lab coat, to the truth from God that gives us life, transformation, blessing and hope. END  

Capacity focus, 66: The ~ US$ 120 - 150 multi-touch, capacitive touchscreen tablet is here -- e.g. the Ainol Novo 7 Elf 2 for Android 4.x

(Two Sigma/Digital learning transformation series  

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12  )

Following up on a conversation today, I decided to check back on where the sort of tablets that would work for the digitalised education initiatives in view here at KF are.

They are here, at least as an initial wave.

The first eye-catcher on the price-point is the Ainol Novo 7 Elf 2 Android 4.0 1 GB RAM with 8 GB, from Amazon:

 On basic specs:

• Amlogic 8726-M6, 1.5GHz, Cortex-A9 dual core; GPU: Mali-400
• Operation System: Android 4.0.3
• RAM: 1 GB DDR3, ROM: 8GB Nand Flash
• Screen: 7 Inch, Capacitive Screen, 1024 x 600px
• Multi-Touch: Yes, 5 points multi-touch

(The unit also takes a micro SD memory chip, so the memory can be boosted.)

Then, we see that this can be had with a carrying case with mini keyboard for US$ 127. 42.

This is of course not a product endorsement, it is just to say that we are in the price ball-park.

A little beyond this, there seem to be several metal framed tablets with a bit more performance, and I even saw a 10.1 inch tablet for under US$ 170.

What is most impressive, too, is the Android 4 operating system. This video comparison of two tablets a bit above the Elf (note the metal frame), gives a good idea:



The access to the Google App Store also allows a free Kindle Reader to be set up. Where also, Libre Office has indicated that around December, they should be releasing their version of the Open Office open source office productivity suite.

Thus, the enabling technology is coming along to develop a cyber campus based education initiative. END
 _________ 

U/D Sept 4: The above, of course is a matter of what popped up first. I note, the Coby -- yes, that familiar "low cost" consumer electronics brand -- Kyros 7" MID7042-4 is on Amazon for US$ 126.46 (marked down from $179.99). However, what catches my eye is the Ployer Momo9 III, at Amazon with multi-touch capacitive screen for US$ 89.99 and generally respectable mechanical build quality. This is said to have reasonable battery life and performance, with a reasonable screen. The key departure seems to be what Arpan Deb, an Indian reviewer, notes on an earlier version:

Moore's law has been vindicated again. ARM CPU's used in Android tablet and phones are doubling in power and reducing in cost, every few months. I can optimistically look forward to quad core CPU's in phones and tablets, coming out in late 2012 or early 2013 . . . . A company in China, broke many technological and commercial barriers by developing a Cortex A8 based CPU, which can run at speeds of 1 – 1.5 GHz and costs only $4.00 each [--> dateline: Jan 5th, 2012]. The A10 chip from Allwinner [--> Cf Wikipedia] is a game changing CPU that has paved the way for tablets that are high on features and very low on cost. The Ployer MOMO9 uses the Allwinner A10 1.5 GHz CPU . . . 

That is a significant breakthrough indeed, and a low-cost, reasonably high performance processor on the ARM architecture could indeed be a game changer. Indeed, Wiki points out:

The Allwinner A1X is known for its ability to easily boot from an SD card GNU/Linux distributions such as Debian, Ubuntu, and other ARM architecture-capable GNU/Linux distributions. The ability is in addition to the Android OS usually installed on the Flash memory of the device. . . . . Many manufacturers have adopted the Allwinner A1X for use in devices running the Android operating system and the Linux operating System. The Allwinner A1X is used in tablet computers, set-top boxes, and mini-PCs.

And, a quad core is rumoured.

In short we may see a shakeup in the phones, tablets and PC market based on low cost adequate performance processors and the Android OS, with Linux also in play. This becomes highly significant as we see Microsoft moving to a Tablet-centric philosophy for Windows 8.

Well worth bearing in mind . . .

Continued coverage of the Paris AK and suicide bomber attacks of Fri Nov 13, 2015

Sky News:



Death toll seems to be 127 or 128 -- the night club toll has been moved from 100 to 87. Sky news 6:25 am sat EC time says 99 critically injured. 1500 extra military on Paris's streets and 120,000 across France.

A Time report seems a useful summary:

Paris is on lockdown Friday night as a series of attacks shook the city, with at least 128 people reported dead in at least three locations.

Explosions were reported outside a France-Germany soccer match at Stade de France, at least 100 hostages were taken during a heavy metal concert at the Bataclan theater, and shootings were reported at the Le Petit Cambrodge restaurant and Le Carillon bar, which are right across the street from each other. Shots were also reported outside the nearby La Belle Equipe cafe. Authorities say shots were also fired at a sixth, undisclosed location. At least 120 people were killed in all.

Developing. END

Going Nuclear: Cyberstalking design advocates and their families – re: “Say hi to XXXXXXXXXX and the kids for me, you demented child abuser”

This attempt as headlined to implicitly “out” and threaten my wife and our children – not to mention (per the outrageous rhetoric of Mr Dawkins and fellow New Atheists) to try to falsely smear me as a child abuser for trying to raise my children in a Christian home – moves matters at and around UD beyond the context of debate to something far more poisonously menacing and destructive.

So, let's do a little equation:

Threatening, obsessive hostile anti-Christian commentary x repeated unhealthy references to sexual matters in same x Mafioso thug style “outing” attempt on wife and children = cyberstalking

Cyberstalking, FYI, Mr “The Whole Truth,” and co, is a crime; freedom of speech does not entail freedom to menace, threaten or harm. And, in this context, anti-Christian bigotry, repeated unwholesome sexual references and slander as headlined are aggravating factors.

By right of fair comment, I also note that the resort to menacing me by an “outing”-attempt, via otherwise irrelevant reference to my wife and our children as above is also an illustration of the thuggish consequences of the Alinskyite poisonously polarised atmosphere being cultivated by uncivil Darwinist and Neo-Atheist objectors to Design Theory and wider design thought, such as by P Z Myers and co. As, I warned against in a recent post here at UD.

Let us now cut to the chase:

Cyberstalking and Internet harassment (including when such pass through the Internet and so across international borders) are considered criminal offenses in the UK and the USA, as well as other possibly relevant jurisdictions. Because of the obsessive, hostile, personal, and threatening nature of the correspondence I have received, including repeated, patently unwholesome sexual references and the “outing” attempt against my family, I will be contacting an attorney from my local public prosecutor’s office on this matter and also the police, which will set record of prior complaint if matters go worse than this; and, given my domicile in a UK Overseas Territory, may have the effect of further activating UK and international action. Further to this I must note the vulgar language, obsessive behaviour and repeated unwholesome sexual references in the context of an attempt to name my wife and allude to my children in a patently threatening manner; in a situation which they have no material relevance to or involvement in. It is thus specifically credible that the behaviour fits the profile of an Internet predator, and so this will be my one and only warning to the anonymous Cyberstalker falsely known as “The Whole Truth” and ilk, to stop the harassment IMMEDIATELY.

For more detailed record – this is no invitation to foolish talking point debates and disputes, as innocent children are now held hostage by patently implied threat in an unwholesome, poisonously hostile context; it is a watershed moment where the civil and the uncivil will now reveal themselves and their heart-motives by their actions – let us next notice the underlying deep context. Namely, Mr Alinsky's uncivil, ruthless and polarising counsel from his infamous list of Rules for Radicals, which has spread far and wide in our time, wreaking havoc as it goes:

13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. In conflict tactics there are certain rules that [should be regarded] as universalities. One is that the opposition must be singled out as the target and ‘frozen.’…

“One acts decisively only in the conviction that all the angels are on one side and all the devils on the other.” (cf. pp. 127 – 134.)

(And, in the context of the threats implicit in the above, the well-known Mr Dawkins and his fellow “New Atheists” are also directly implied as contributing to a hostile atmosphere of anti-Christian bigotry. This is particularly relevant, as the “child abuse” in question is plainly the inference that as a Christian I would have instructed my children in the teachings of the Bible and the Christian faith. Ironically, but ever so tellingly, one who falsely accuses me of “child abuse” is now stalking my children. Let us not forget as well, that in the recent Johns Foster-Parenting case in the UK [cf. video by Christian Concern of the UK], the UK's Office for Equality and Human Rights submitted to the High Court, a claim that included the notion that Biblical Christianity was an “infection” that children should be protected from. Not only were they not rebuked by the Court for this offensive abuse of taxpayers' money but – in an extremely troubling ruling that is a revelation of the intent of radical homosexualists to stigmatise or even onward criminalise conscience-based objection to their behaviour – the Court went on to rule that such Christians are unfit to be foster parents. So, onlookers, consider: who are fit parents? Those who seek to raise them up in a God-fearing, civil, well-mannered fashion, or those who wish to hold them hostage through cyberstalking and outing tactics?)

The headlined snippet is also the direct answer to those who imagine that the “outing” tactics now being routinely used by Darwinist advocates in an attempt to counter reasoned criticism and to intimidate critics are harmless or within norms of civilised, free-speech behaviour. Plainly, since they cannot cause me to be “expelled” by “outing” me, and since I am willing to put up with spam waves, there is now an attempt to “out” and implicitly threaten my family in a context of several spam posts to a personal blog.

The particular person who has attempted to threaten my wife and children – yes, we have seen all the old Mafia movies where the enforcer expresses menacing, saccharine-toned false solicitude for the family of a victim of intimidation – may be obsessed and even unhinged; but Darwinist objectors to Design Theory must now recognise that when they routinely follow Alinsky's evil counsel to stoke the flames of contempt, abuse, personal attack dehumanisation and demonisation, they are implicitly giving the cultural permission that the unhinged extremists “need” to legitimise their threats and deeds in their warped minds.

And, no, my pointing out the vicious nature of this personal attack is a corrective, so don't even THINK to now try to twist this into a blame the victim, he- hit- back- first turnabout false accusation.

This has gone too far for such clever rhetorical stunts to now be taken as anything less than willfully complicit, enabling behaviour.

Darwinist objectors to design thought, your side has crossed the nuclear threshold here, to outright criminality, and your side has now underscored the nihilistic amoral bankruptcy of what all too many on your side have been doing and the implications of the inherent amorality of evolutionary materialistic factionalism, as Plato warned against in The Laws, Bk X, 2,350 years ago.

It is further worth noting that the above clip comes from a comment submitted to one of my personal blogs in reply to a recent comment here at UD (cf. Point 12) where I summarised my moderate, Rom 2:6 – 8 and 14 – 16 based “God judges by the light one has or should have” inclusivist theology (in response to an issue raised by/about IslamISTS). That is, the underlying motivation is anti-Christian bigotry.

I cite counsel on the relevant UK law:

Under Section 1 of the Malicious Communications Act 1998 it is an offence to send an indecent, offensive or threatening letter, electronic communication or other article to another person and under Section 43 of the Telecommunications Act 1984 it is a similar offence to send a telephone message which is indecent offensive or threatening. In both cases the offence is punishable with up to six months imprisonment and/or a fine of up to £5000 . . . .

In most cases involving malicious communications or cyberstalking however there will be more than one offensive or threatening letter or telephone call and therefore the police will often choose to charge the offender with an offence contrary to either Section 2 of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 also punishable with up to six months imprisonment. Part of the reason for using this charge is that when someone is convicted of an offence under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 the court can make a Restraining Order preventing them from contacting their victim again. Breach of a Restraining Order is punishable with up to Five years imprisonment . . . . If the e-mails, cyberstalking etc. causes the victim to fear that violence will be used against them then the police can choose to charge the offender with an offence contrary to Section 4 of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 which is punishable with up to five years imprisonment and also allows the court to make a Restraining Order.

If the e-mails, cyberstalking etc. is racialist in nature or motivated by religious hostility then charges could be brought of Racially or Religiously Aggravated Harassment contrary to sections 32(1)(a) or 32(1)(b) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 . If convicted offenders could face up to 7 years imprisonment.

Given the ostensibly anonymous nature of the commenter hiding under the lying Internet moniker “The Whole Truth,” the only reasonable means of fulfilling a requirement of certain jurisdictions is this public notice. 

Let me be specific:

a:You, sir are to cease and desist in your attempted “outing” behaviour, and your attempts to implicitly threaten myself and my family including minor children (including the implications of repeated unwholesome sexual references you have made). 

b: In particular, given the otherwise irrelevant attempt to identify my wife and refer to our children, you are to forthwith cease from harassing, threatening, vulgar, suggestive, abusive, indecent and/or obscene, religiously hostile and similar communications in any form or forum to myself or to third parties or in public, and 

c: you are therefore also to immediately remove from your blog or other relevant contexts any and all references you have made that contribute to such harassment, intimidation, indecency, bigotry or threats.

 

d: This notice of and demand for removal also holds for any third parties who set about propagating your misconduct across the Internet, or who harbour your misbehaviour under mistaken notions of freedom of expression, whether they are domiciled in the US, the UK or anywhere else in the world. 

For, freedom to express views and propagate ideas does not include “freedom” to threaten, intimidate or harm people, especially minors and women. Nor, “freedom” to abuse local and global telecommunication services in so doing.

(I have already had to caution my children to beware of physical stalking, as I do not know whether you have or may acquire confederates, associates or like-minded fellow-travellers in my immediate vicinity. In case you do not understand my point, this constitutes notice that you, though your unhinged, obsessive and threatening behaviour, have given me credible reason to fear for the safety of my wife and our children. Thus, having hereby given you a public notice to cease and desist, I will shortly notify my local police and Public Prosecutor's Office; which per provisions of local law as a UK Overseas Territory may then activate the relevant UK statutes.)

And, in light of the provisions of relevant jurisdictions, do not imagine that you will be protected by Google's cleverly worded tort-evasion policies for Blogger Blogs or Wordpress' similar policies. END

___________

F/N: A predictable rebuttal attempt talking point will be to try to pretend that I am exaggerating the threat in the above and am trying to stifle "free speech." So, I ask you onlookers, to reflect on what relevance my wife, her name [as incorrectly reported] or our children have to do with any discussion whatsoever over intelligent design, or the more specific matter that I happen to hold a moderate inclusivist theology, i.e. that God judges us by the light we have or should have? The correct answer is: NIL, save that they can be used as implicit hostages to threaten or harass, or even intimidate. What I have had to reply to above is therefore patently shameful -- nay, shameless and inexcusable -- cyberstalking misconduct.