Car for the Bogis 

We have been using a small motor bike for the last 9 years and as you can imagine it will be very difficult to do that with three kids. Therefore, Anika and Zoehim have actually begun praying for a new car for our family. So here is what we have come up with as we prayed and discussed about our new need:

1. We will ask the Lord for people who would want to support us with financial donation for this need of ours.
2. We will make 500 hand made greeting cards and ask 25 people to sell 20 cards for us for a fixed donation of a minimum $10.
3. We will save some money for the next 6 months.
4. We will trust the Lord and go for test drives for the next 6 months in the local showrooms.

Should the Lord speak to you, please let us know (aldrin@bogisworld.net) and we will be thrilled to give you more information as to how you can partner with us on this need of ours which will also serve the ministry we do here in South Asia.

Blessings

Aldrin& Viky

Anika, Zoehim and Veho

Speaking Ministry 

Addressing 274 young people at KOSTA (Youth Conference in Sydney) in the Question and Answer Session.

Disciple All Nations - Pt. 3 
Part 3, continued from yesterday.

By Jim Stier

In his book The Rise of Christianity, sociologist Rodney Stark, writing as a neutral social scientist, attributes a large part of the triumph of the Christian faith in the Roman Empire to the different moral and ethical level that the Christians lived out in that culture. During the great plagues in 165 A.D. and again in 251 A.D., the responses of the pagan Romans and the Christians were stunningly different. Dionysius, a church father and bishop of Alexandria, relates how the Christians flocked to the city to minister to those in need, even though many of them died as a result. Meanwhile, the pagans fled, leaving their sick relatives and loved ones behind to die. This sacrificial service by Christians was so powerful that what had been seen as a tiny Jewish sect grew to become the official religion of the greatest empire on earth. Christianity also became the primary molder of ethics and moral ideals for the West. Who says we can’t change things?

Please notice that western civilization wasn’t changed because Christians took over the institutions of power, but because they awakened the conscience of an Empire. They offered a better way to live and lived out what they were offering in a graphic way.

It takes a lot of effort and money to change things in a whole nation. Does this mean that we think in terms of competing programs, where one must win and the other must lose in our allocation of manpower and resources? Our enduring tendency to polarize has also gotten into the debate on discipling nations. We hear things like, “We need to quit putting so much emphasis on the unreached and focus our limited resources more on discipling nations.” This is another false dichotomy.

In Matthew 28:18-20, we are specifically commanded to make disciples of “all nations.” How could it be otherwise? Could God want relatively good, just, and prosperous societies in the West, and ignore the needs of the rest of the world? Could God play favorites? Is this consistent with His character? No! His character demands that He show the same concern and love to all nations, without favoritism.

(Come back tomorrow for the conclusion of this thought-provoking article about discipling nations.)