Back on 'Red square' (Stellenosch)

This morning I came through to Stellenbosch to have my card re-activated to use the library. As a past student (worked on my Doctorate here) and a local minister I am graciously granted use of the University facilities. So, I have a new card and a few books to read!

This photo was taken on 'red square' (rooi plein in Afrikaans). Here in this bastion of former Afrikaans conservatism the students poke fun at the institution by calling the main 'sqaure' on the University Campus red square (supposedly because of the red brick floor). At the centre of the square is a statue of J.H. Marais (not Stalin).

It is great to be here again! I remember WISHING that I could complete my PhD and come back here some day! Well, the PhD is done, and I'm back!

Please help Charmone! A miracle premature baby.

Time does have a way of helping one to forget pain. Last night Megan and I sat in our study crying our eyes out! It has been 20 months since Liam was born (follow the story here and here), and we have been blessed so richly by his health and development!

We still continue to pray and fast every Friday, giving thanks, but also remembering those who still continue to struggle with the memory of lost children, and those who struggle with children who have health concerns as a result of premature birth.

When Liam was born at 27 weeks in the Pretoria East hospital we met a lovely lady, Dianne, herself a nursing sister. Dianne had given birth to her daughter Charmone at 26 weeks. Charmone weighed just 800 grams or so at birth and faced a number of severe challenges. Whilst Liam was in ICU for the three months we spent a lot of time talking with and praying with Charmone, Dianne and their family. We rejoiced when she was released to go home, and wept when she was re-admitted to hospital. We stayed in contact and followed the story of her development, the discovery that she was blind and deaf, the doctors' suggestion that due to severe epilepsy she would not survive... It was such a painful journey to watch. We cried many, many times.

Last night we received an email from a mutual friend telling us of Charmone's progress, and that she has the possibility to get implants that will allow her to hear! As we watched the youtube video of her story Megan and I wept, and wept!

Please would you consider helping if you are able to? You can go to Charmone's website at http://www.charmone.info

Or you can donate directly:

If you are able to help anyway, please contact us on 072 275 3246

Account details:

Charmone Foord Trust (IT1969/08)
Acc no 134546946
Branch code 012645 ( Standard bank Centurion)
SMS the word POP to 39055 (SMS costs R15)

Please spare a prayer for Charmone, Dianne, and the rest of their family. Please continue to pray for her healing and for strength and blessing for her parents and her siblings. Please could you also give thanks, with us, for Liam and his remarkable development? We realise each day that things could have been so different for him and for us.
Here's a picture of little Liam in pajamas riding his little truck!

Technorati tags: miracle baby, Charmone, Charmone+Foord, Liam, Premature, 26 weeks, pray

Jesus and the social Gospel - a great article!

One of the most significant struggles I have faced in my new post has been reconciling my affinity for justice and the core of the Good News (which I believe is the the work of conforming the world to the principles of the Kingdom of God) with conservative evangelical prejudice against the social Gospel...

I am constantly amazed and perplexed by the negative response that I get from persons when I suggest that Jesus came BOTH to save souls, and to transform society! Within that last few weeks I had one of my more conservative Christian friends call me a communist, and another accused me of having been sidetracked into secular humanism! I on the other hand have been trying my best to live with courage and obedience as Jesus lived - justly, mercifully, hospitably, and humbly.

One thing that I am sure of is that God has called me to help individuals and communities to rediscover the joy of serving Christ by blessing others. One of the best ways to do this is to work against those structural sins that oppress and enslave people (poverty, ignorance, prejudice, hatred, and abuse). I can just imagine God's smile when a hungry person is fed, a sick person is healed and cared for, and when an oppressive economic system is toppled!

I was so pleased when I found this article, written by Dr Reg Codrington, on Jesus and the social Gospel. I am encouraged by it since it shows that there are others like me who are able to hold together their passion for the Gospel of Christ, their commitment to the evangelical ideal of bringing persons into a lived relationship with God in Christ, and understand that their lives, energy, and creativity are to be spent doing what Jesus would want done.

There was such a great response to a recent post of an article written by my father, that I thought I'd post something else by him. Anyone who grew up thinking that the "social gospel" was a problem would do well to read this.

Jesus and the “Social Gospel”
Dr Reg B Codrington

INTRODUCTION

When I was growing up, the denomination of which I was part used the term “Social Gospel” almost as a swear word. We were taught that “liberal” denominations who placed a focus on meeting social needs were guilty of, and I quote, “sending a well-fed sinner to hell”. The focus had to be on “saving souls” and everything else had to be subjugated to that aim.

Now let me make it clear at the outset that I still believe that the most important thing that can happen to a person is that he or she enters into a vital, living relationship with Christ and lives in accordance with His teachings, as revealed in the Word of God. But I have become increasingly convinced that what I was taught as a youngster was just a part of a much bigger picture which, sadly, I only began to understand nearly forty years later! What a serious responsibility lies in the hands of teachers of the Word to ensure that they teach the whole gospel to our young people!

WHAT CHANGED?

I suppose that one of the contributing factors to my changed understanding of the social gospel was the revelations after 1994 in South Africa about the horrific abuses perpetrated on people by the apartheid regime. What was such a wake-up call was that I had truly believed I was alert to the needs of the oppressed people in our country and had even spoken out on their behalf. I had been part of a deputation to a parliamentary sub-committee to urge the scrapping of the Mixed Marriages Act and had felt very virtuous about doing it. Yet when I look back now, I realize that many things were going on under my nose which I knew nothing about, and my abhorrence for a so-called “social gospel” kept me from doing what I could have done to alleviate the suffering of some around me.

As a pastor of a large church in Pretoria, I had been party to expanding our missions giving to nearly 30% of the budget, but paradoxically, it was my exit from pastoral ministry which truly brought me face to face with the needs of the people of South Africa. Working in a Christian school in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands, I came face to face with Black young people and adults who had no food because they had no jobs; who had no education because they had no proper facilities; who faced the AIDS pandemic with resignation because life had no hope anyway.

I then began to read what some of the Emerging Church writers were saying to the 21^st century church about the importance of being relevant in the world and my wife and I found ourselves saying, “Yes, that’s it!” We could see that the church (with a few happy exceptions) had become a club so concerned with its own survival and comfort that it had forgotten its true mission. I recalled reading Dr Michael Griffiths’ stirring book, “Cinderella with Amnesia”, many years ago, in which he pointed out that if the church forgets its mission responsibility, it has lost its reason for existence. But I began to see that “mission” was a much broader concept than I had ever envisaged.

BACK TO THE SCRIPTURES

As much as anything, I suppose it was the reading of Philip Yancey’s amazing book, “The Jesus I never knew”, which caused me to re-read the Gospels in a new light. I began to ask serious questions about the “gospel” which Jesus taught and, if I were to take His opening sermon as a keynote message for His whole ministry, then somewhere along the line I had missed something vitally important. When Jesus was handed the scroll in the synagogue of Nazareth (Luke 4), he chose to read from Isaiah 61 and announced His anointing as one who would proclaim good news, i.e. the “gospel”. All fine so far, except that His next statement would have been out of sync with the vast majority of evangelical preachers today. They would have said, “you need to turn from your sins and accept Jesus as your Saviour”.

Now Jesus knew that He had come to “save His people from their sins”, so more than anyone He would have desired the salvation of those who heard Him. Yet He chose to define His gospel in a different way. (All quotations from the English Standard Version) Note the elements of it:

• It was good news to the poor
• It included proclaiming liberty to the captives
• It included recovering of sight to the blind
• It included setting at liberty those who are oppressed
• It included a proclamation of a type of “jubilee year” in which those whose land had been taken away must be returned.

What absolutely stunned me when I went back to study this passage was that this is not only the “social gospel”. It is also the “liberation theology” about which I was warned so strenuously by the spiritual elders! And I found that the convoluted “hermeneutical principle” of making this all spiritual rather than actual began to seem a little threadbare.

So, as a lover of the Old Testament prophets, I went back to study the context of Isaiah’s prophecies, only to find verses like, “I the Lord love justice; I hate robbery and wrong” (Isaiah 61:8); “They shall not build and another inhabit” (Isaiah 65:22); and of course the famous Micah 6:8 passage: “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

Back to the New Testament, only to find James defining pure, undefiled religion as visiting “orphans and widows in their affliction” (1:27)

MY CONCLUSIONS

I was therefore left with no alternative but to deduce that the kind of Christianity which Jesus both taught and demonstrated included a large element of social upliftment, based on God’s unending desire that there should be justice, mercy, kindness, fairness and love among the peoples of the earth. I had to conclude that the only way millions of people will ever know that the spiritual Kingdom of God has come on earth is if they see the members of that Kingdom getting their hands dirty in feeding the hungry, welcoming strangers, providing clothes for the needy, helping the sick, visiting those in prison … doesn’t this sound just vaguely like Matthew 25:31-46?

What finally stirred me to put laser printer to paper was the reading of Jeffrey Sachs’ mind-blowing book, “The End of Poverty”. Both he and Bono (who writes the foreword to the book) maintain that we have in our hands the means to end extreme poverty, as experienced by 1 billion people on the planet, by the year 2025. The figures he provides are convincing and shocking, especially when one reads that the United States spent $450 billion in 2004 on the military and just $15 billion on poverty alleviation!

But then I had to look closer to home. It’s very easy for all of us to sit in judgment on the wealthy nations for not doing more … and I certainly believe they should! But before we do that, we really need to ask what Christians are doing to participate in this poverty alleviation. We need to ask if our church really needed to buy that building next door, or put in new carpets, or upgrade the sound system, or have those lavish women’s and men’s breakfasts, when 15 000 people will die TODAY in Africa from preventable diseases – preventable, that is, if someone provides them with the money for the medication, or the mosquito nets, or simply the food to strengthen their bodies against any passing bug!

I recall criticism being levelled against the church leaders of Central Methodist Church, Johannesburg, during the apartheid era, for reaching out to meet the physical and emotional needs of the oppressed, when what they really needed was to “be saved”. May God forgive those who criticized, for that same church is now reaching out to the thousands of people displaced in our country through the current wave of xenophobic violence. I suspect that the leaders of this church have a far better understanding of what the gospel of Jesus Christ should really look like than hundreds of pastors who occupy the so-called evangelical pulpits of this land.

On several occasions in recent years I have visited the Salvation Army in Bournemouth, England, where Sundays include gospel preaching and open-airs, but all week long they are clothing the poor, feeding the hungry, cutting the hair and providing baths for the destitute, even taking hot soup to emergency workers attending to accidents or fires. If that’s the social gospel, we need more of it!

Hilton, South Africa
22^nd May 2008

Vorlage, pre-existent Hebrew texts, the Septuagint and the papiri...

Oh the fun, oh the joy... I am editing a friend's book in my spare time. It is a magnificent piece of work! He is a Biblical scholar of great acclaim... However, when I face paragraphs like this I am reminded why I prefer hermeneutics to exegesis...

My Greek's not bad, but my Hebrew... Mmmmm... It's Greek to me (sort of!)

The view of the Helderberg basin on the way to work!

Driving to work is lovely when you live in the Helderberg. This is a picture of the bay looking towards Gordon's Bay, the ocean and the mountains! It's a bit cold, and will soon be wet... But heck, it's Cape Town!

Have a blessed day!

Another sunset at the seaside!

I managed to get away from work at 5pm today so that I could meet Megie, Courtney and Liam for sunset. It is a crisp clear Cape evening! It's cold, but beautiful! KFC and a sunset! Good times!

Corporate culture and domesticated animals...

I am spending my nights working on the text of a friend (Prof Gert Steyn's) book on the use of Old Testament quotations in the book of Hebrews... I was reminded of a particular Greek word that sums up something of what I am feeling at present. The Greek word, used in Matthew 5:5 is [praeis] (from the root praus) ("blessed are the meek").

This Greek word, [praeis], which is translated at 'meek' in the English translations of the Bible and 'sagmoedig' in the Afrikaans translations of the Bible is a much deeper and more significant word than what we understand meekness to mean in contemporary English. When you hear 'meek' what do you think about? Perhaps soft, spineless, a pushover... Well, the Greek work speaks of a dialectic (google it!) Hegel would have spoke of praus as the synthesis between a thesis and an antithesis - a settled middle ground. Aristotle also used this term in his writings - he defined praotes as the middle ground between orgilotes (meaning extreme anger) and aorgesia meaning excessive 'angerlessness' (or complete passivity and lack of emotion). Of course Aristotle's point was to say that 'to be angry over the right things, at the right time, with an appropriate measure of anger - that's wisdom'. Perhaps that's similar to what Paul was speaking about when he said in Ephesians 4:26 'In your anger do not sin'. And, just maybe praotes was what Jesus showed in Matthew 21:12 when he drove the money changers out of the temple for robbing the poor of the small gifts they had brought to honour God....

The central concept to this dialectic is a balanced and controlled relationship between power and powerlessness... So, it is not surprising to discover the the Greek word pruas was also used in ancient writings to explain the state of a 'domesticated' animal. In short, a wild horse is certainly powerful and beautiful, but it is not all that useful! However, a horse that has been tamed, domesticated (so to speak) is of immeasurable value. It's power and stamina can be harnessed to plow a field, to tow a cart, to pull out trees, and speed passengers to their destination.

I will confess that I am not the tamest of horses out there.... I tend to be a little wild, and I like to 'run free'. Being in a corporate environment is somewhat taxing... But, I am beginning to understand that unbridled passion and skill can frequently be ineffective without direction, focus, and discipline.

So, here I am, a domesticated horse in my stable (office)... I'm wearing my glasses to pretend that I am tame...

Perhaps Matthew 5:5 could be translated: Blessed is the person who has every instinct, every impulse, every passion, and every desire under God's loving control. Such a person shall inherit the earth.

Oh, and get a haircut hippie ;-)

1st generation Apple iPhone running the new 2.0 (3G) firmware in South Africa (and working on Vodacom AND MTN!)

First, off, huge props to Justin Hartman - I believe he is the very first person to have upgraded a first generation iPhone to the new 2.0 (3G) firmware in South Africa! Justin upgraded and unlocked his first generation iPhone and posted about it on his blog on the 21st of July.

I followed him by a week or so, I upgraded and unlocked my first generation iPhone (8Gig model, then at firmware 1.0.2) on Saturday the 26th of July '08. Let me say, right off the bat, that this was probably one of the EASIEST upgrades I have ever done! BUT, there are two complications (which I hope to describe and sort out below). Let me first explain the complications, and then I'll show you how to unlock your iPhone.

Complication number one is that the pwnage tool which I used can only run on the Apple Macintosh (version 2.1 can be downloaded here)... I believe that they are releasing a Windows version (that only runs on Windows XP), but it is not quite as slick and simple as the Mac version.... So, if you have an original iPhone and want to unlock is EASILY find a friend who has a Mac!

Complication number two is that once your iPhone is unlocked you may struggle to connect to the internet using the EDGE service if you have a prepaid Vodacom sim card, or a sim card from MTN, CellC or Virgin! DON'T PANIC! I found a way to *hack* that... But it does require a few 'extra skills' in the terminal, or at least a basic knowledge of FTP and a secure FTP client... I'll tell you how to fix this below.

1. Upgrading to firmware 2.0 and unlocking your 1st generation iPhone for use in South Africa.

I simply followed this simple tutorial (which has links to all of the files that you will need) and it took me about 20 minutes from start to finish to unlock my iPhone... Once again, thanks to Justin Hartman for the heads up.

Simply follow the steps carefully, don't interrupt the process, AND MAKE sure you install the Cydia package during your installation. You will need this to resolve the EDGE problem!!!! Please note the instructions in the tutorial about the boot manager (I stuck with my original boot manager), and also pay attention to ticking the 'unlock' box.

Once I had unlocked my iPhone, connected it to iTunes 7.7, it was up and running within seconds! I had my 'prepaid' Vodacom sim card in it (I had some preloaded data bundles to squash). I imediately noticed that I I could not connect to the internet using EDGE... My wifi on the iPhone worked fine!

2. How to solve the problem with EDGE not working on your upgraded iPhone.

When I tried to connect to the internet for mail, to browse the web using Safari, or the App store etc., I kept getting the message “Could not activate cellular data network: You are not subscribed to a cellular data service” So, I thought 'OK, go into the Network settings and change the APN to 'internet' so that you can connect...' No such luck! Apple has removed the 'tab' that lets you adjust your cellular data internet settings! DON'T PANIC!!! I found a way to enable that again (which I will show you below).

So, I started searching for solutions on the internet. Now, let me say, the easiest solution by FAR is the one that Justin has in the comments on his post today (see Comment number 2) - in short, activate wifi on your iPhone, connect to your wireless access point, navigate to http://unlockit.co.nz, set up a custom APN (in the case of Vodacom it is 'internet'), generate the '.plist' file, download the configuration, install it, reboot your phone and you should be able to connect using your sim card (of course if you're an MTN or Cell C subscriber just enter the MTN or Cell C APN, and a username and password (if they're required) and viola - I have found, however, that with my MTN sim card I simply entered 'internet' in the APN field, left the password and username blank and it worked perfectly!)

Of course there is one HUGE problem with this solution... If you don't have wifi internet access you're stumped... Of course if you had a mac you could share your internet connection via wifi setting up your Macbook as an access point... But that's another tutorial (mail me if you want to know how...).

So, there is another solution, and I think this one is much better! In this solution you 'reactivate' the Cellular Data settings in the Network settings tab which means that you can change the APN, username and password etc., on your iPhone without needing an internet connection... Why is this important? Well for someone like me who flies overseas, when I buy a Vodafone sim card, or some obscure carrier in Israel, Malaysia, or the Ukraine, I can simply put the sim card in, update the APN and log in information on the fly and have my email, Microsoft exchange calendar and the rest up and running in a few seconds...

Right, so how do you re-enable the Cellular Data network settings?

1. Make sure you have installed OpenSSH on your iPhone.
2. Go to 'settings' on your iPhone and enable wifi. Set up a connection to your Macbook, or your wirless router, via wifi.
3. Once connected on the iPhone get your IP address (simply click on the blue arrow on your connected wifi connection on the iPhone and it will show you your IP address under DHCP).
4. Use cyberduck (or some other FTP client) to set up a secure SFTP connection to your iPhone's IP address. In my case the IP address was 10.0.2.7 All 'vanilla' 2.0 iPhones have the following log in information (another bit of *hackery*) username: root password: alpine (I would suggest you change that at some stage BTW - spelling fixed 23 August 2008. Thanks for spotting this!). So, simply SFTP into your iphone using the root account.
5. It will take a few minutes to connect the first time around (your iPhone is generating security keys etc.). Reconnect when disconnected, it should indicate that the security key is unsigned... simply accept it.
6. Now, navigate to /var/mobile/Library/Carrier Bundle.Bundles/ In that folder you will find a file called 'carrier.plist' - if you know how to conver the file from binary to text and want to edit it yourself, drop me an email and I'll tell you where and what to change....
7. Back up your current 'carrier.plist'
8. Download my already converted and edited
carrier.plist file here, simply FTP my file onto your iPhone to /var/mobile/Library/Carrier Bundle.Bundles/
9. Once you've replaced the original file with my modded file, disconnect your SFTP connection and reboot your iPhone (i.e., Power it down and start it up again).

Now when you go to 'settings', 'General', 'Network', you'll see a new tab called 'Cellular Data' viola! You can edit your APN information from there!

I hope this helps!

By the way here are a few 'killer apps' on the new iPhone firmware (and Appstore):

• Microsfot Exchange works!!! At last I can update my calendar, email, address book etc. from the office exchange server.
• Location based software and mapping works (it uses cell towers to triangulate) - not 100% acurate, but it does work.
• The App store works in South Africa! I have downloaded Twinkle for Twitter, the Google App, Facebook App, a Bible, some games etc. You can either download them directly on the iPhone, or connect via iTunes on your computer.
• Visual voice mail works if you're using a Vodacom sim card.
• The AIM instant messenger is also great (it allows me to chat to friends and family who are using iChat and AIM... I just wish there was a Skype or Fring client since most South Africans use Skype...)

On a final note, I get quite a few persons emailing me to ask if the iPhone is worth it... It sure is a handy and wonderful device! However, I need a reliable, business oriented phone for most of my work, so I still use my Nokia E90 as a primary phone. My iPhone has my work sim card in it to make and receive work calls. I use it as a great, handy, entertainment device (I listen to audiobooks and podcasts while driving, I update my twitter status and check facebook when I have a minute to spare) - but when I need to write an email, or do some work, I turn to the E90.

Who knows, when Vodacom release the 3G iPhone later this year I may be tempted to 'cross the floor', but for now, my first generation iPhone has a new lease on life, everything works and I'm loving it as a second device.

Technorati tags: iPhone, South Africa, Vodacom, MTN, fix edge, fix firmware 2.0

Churches and numbers... A political socialisation of the Church's agenda

I have been part of the 'mega-Church' mentality. Recently I have been significantly challenged on the Church growth mentality. The Church has come to believe that our success (if I can use that word) is measured by the number of people that we draw on a Sunday. We say that a BIG Church will have a big voice...

Think about this for a moment, isn't that exactly what politicians do? They count their influence and value with numbers! The bigger the political party, the more votes one has, the more effective and powerful one is.

However, if we think about persons such as Mother Theressa and St Francis of Assisi these were not persons of BIG compassion, BIG courage, BIG obedience... Not big numbers.

I need to think about this a bit more. However, I would love to hear what you think.

Of course I am not saying that we should simply settle for small Churches with NO effect! But, that we should be careful to measure our Churches by the wrong measurement standards!

It takes a village to....

Takes a village
Originally uploaded by merlinmann.

Indeed it does Mr Mann... A village indeed... Oh, and I believe it ALSO takes a village to raise a child... But that's a different picture ;-)

Conclusive proof that Benny Hinn performed a 'miracle' according to experts - Hayibo!

A friend tweeted the following story today. It comes from hayibo.com (hayibo is an African word that exclaims surprise, disbelief, and shock).

If ever you were sceptical that Benny Hinn (well known for his hairdo, lovingly called a Hinn-doo) cannot perform miracles, then here's some conclusive, expert, proof!

Benny Hinn performed miracle in Johannesburg say experts

JOHANNESBURG. Religious and scientific experts say there is strong evidence that American televangelist Benny Hinn performed a "genuine verifiable miracle" in Johannesburg on the weekend. According to the experts, Hinn and his colleagues made thousands of dollars disappear from the bank accounts of worshipers, before making the money reappear in offshore accounts.

Hinn's followers say there is nothing supernatural about the movement of funds from South African to American banks, but veteran observers of paranormal events are adamant that a verifiable miraculous event took place.

The miracle was widely publicized over the weekend by News24.com, which reported that Pastor Todd Koontz, one of Hinn's on-stage colleagues, told worshippers that God would turn them into millionaires or billionaires within twenty-four hours if they donated $1,000 by credit card.

According to News24.com, hundreds of worshipers mobbed the stage with their credit cards after Koontz told them that the window of opportunity for the blessing was only two minutes.

This morning investigators from the Vatican, as well as representatives of the scientific community, agreed that a miracle had taken place.

"A fool and his money are easily parted, but this was something special," said head investigator, Cardinal Dante Purgatorio.

Psychologist Gunter Glibb agreed.

"To make that many adults behave in such a profoundly silly manner, to hand over thousands in return for a 120-second shot at being written a cheque by some sort of imaginary heavenly cashier – something more than idiocy, ignorance, naivety and greed was at work here."

The South African organizers of the weekend's gathering could not be reached for comment on the alleged miracle, but hotel staff said that they had last been seen checking out in the early hours of Sunday morning, "giving each other high-fives and lighting cigars with smoldering R200 notes".

Meanwhile journalists at all of South Africa's major media stables are eagerly waiting to hear from any person who became a millionaire or billionaire twenty-four hours after making their donation to Hinn's Miracle Crusade.

According to a leading Johannesburg editor, three worshipers have come forward so far.

"The first two were a couple who got an email from the widow of a Nigerian prince, promising them $200 million if they sent a $500 administration fee," he said.

"Ag shame, they were pretty stoked, and they'd already sent the money, so we didn't say anything."

He said the third had been a Ms Frillypanties Mazakadza, who said she had been given $600 million at work the day after attending the Crusade.

However it was quickly established that this had been a tip at the Harare coffee shop where she works as a waitress.

It pains me that true Christ followers should be lumped in the same boat as people like this...

For those of us who feel, and act, differently to this person. Let us work to display the true healing and transformative power of Christ in the world. Let us feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick, and spread Christ's love, acceptance, and forgivness through simple acts of sacrifice and witness.

Watching the Rugby in style! Go Bokke

Yesterday we watched Rugby in style!

Pity we lost to the Ausies.

Great to be at Dawie and Isebel's place.