Partner Updates

Dear friends,

This past weekend was a four-day holiday in Taiwan to commemorate the February 28th memorial when thousands of people were slaughtered by incoming forces from China in 1947. Many of the Taiwanese leaders were taken away at night and jailed or killed. For years this was a taboo subject, but as democracy flourished here it became a part of the history of this land.

Last year we took a group of pastors to Montreat Conference Center in North Carolina (see September 2016 update). We planned to have a retreat here in Taiwan for these pastors six months after our return, to check in with each other and to see how this experience shaped them and is still shaping them. We had pastors from every corner of Taiwan join in this experience, so Sunday afternoon they drove down from the high mountains, or took a several hour train ride from south, east, north, and west.  

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It can be depressing to hear the daily news from around the world. So much division among people groups, among political parties and their supporters, even among church folks. So, I have been convicted by the Apostle Paul’s challenge to the church at Corinth and to us, “All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us” (2 Corinthians 5:18-19).  

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Dear friends,

I had been asked to be the speaker at a conference for aboriginal youth. Earlier in the week they said on the news that a tropical storm had formed in the Pacific southeast of Taiwan. They weren't predicting that it would amount to anything, so I didn't give it too much thought. But the day before I was to leave for the east coast, they were predicting that it might seriously intensify and was headed to Taiwan. After weathering through so many typhoons over the years, I know that typhoons have a mind of their own and things can change dramatically. I called the pastor in charge of the conference to ask her what she thought (I was secretly hoping they would reschedule the conference.). She replied "We're going ahead. Just pray!"

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Dear friends, 

It's a beautiful Sunday evening here with cool breezes. This is Taipei's weather at its best. This week has been extremely rich with a variety of experiences:

Monday was a national holiday commemorating the February 28, 1947 incident when an anti-government uprising was violently suppressed by the KMT-led Republic of China government. Thousands of civilians were killed, perhaps as many as 30,000. 

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Dear friends,

It has been a tremendous week in China. I taught the first week of a course on Spiritual Theology at Jiangsu Seminary with about 90 students. This year's class is quite different from last year's class, since half of the students are regular seminary students and half are at the seminary from a rural area of the northern part of Jiangsu province. The first four days they sat on opposite sides of the large classroom. On one side were the mostly younger seminary students in brighter, more fashionable clothes, several using their cell phones for their Bibles. The rural evangelists, dressed mostly in black or brown coats with faces lined with stories from rural life, sat on the other side.

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Dear Friends,

One morning I walked out of the seminary to the road heading down the mountain to the bus stop. As with so many people who take public transport around the world, you never know exactly when a bus will come, so you have to plan extra time. It was already hot and humid, so when I got on the bus, the air conditioning felt good. I took the fifteen minute bus ride to the subway station, where I caught the subway to Taipei main train station.

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Dear Friends,

The Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus (EECMY) University Student Ministry (USM) was started in the 1960s. The early leaders of EECMY were very passionate about their ministry and asked Emperor Hailesilase to allow them to build a building to accommodate it close to Addis Ababa University. 

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Dear Friends,

Sunday afternoon, May 17, 2015, I had the privilege of offering words of blessing to one of my former students who was being installed as the senior pastor of one of the larger Taipei churches. It was an interesting service because it included a celebration of the retiring pastor and the installation of the new pastor. The retiring pastor and the new pastor have served together for the past five months as a kind of bridge time.

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