The “Washington Post” published an article recently about how missionaries are spreading the Gospel with great effect by means of the new information technology. Drawing on the truth that “faith comes by hearing the Word of God,” they are distributing audio recordings of the Bible in local people’s languages and giving them play-back devices. They are showing a film of the life of Jesus to people who have never seen a movie before. And they are teaching children to read by means of ingenious curriculum using the Bible and tape-recordings that students can follow along with. The result is that the children are loving Jesus and absorbing His teachings, as are many of their parents as well.

What surprised me is how positive the article was. It raised the usual issue of whether or not it is right to proseletyze and to impose our culture, but the point emerged that more and more Americans are become Buddhists, so what is wrong with more and more Cambodians becoming Christians? The article, which focused on the Christian revival in Cambodia, also quoted a local official who said, If the Buddhist monks have problems with this, let THEM start teaching children how to read.

On this Veterans Day (observed), I would like to salute the veterans of our armed forces, past, present, and future (which includes our troops on active duty who, if they survive, will become veterans). To them I say, I support you not just by feeling sorry for you. Rather, I admire your prowess, exult in your victories, and thank you for protecting me.

One of the things I love about our church is that although we are what might be called a micro-church, we support 7 seminarians. I’ve been in churches a hundred times bigger than we are that don’t support anywhere near that many church workers, if any at all. Another thing I love about our church is that, small though we are, our congregation consists of such a variety of people–families with babies, the elderly, cool 20-something singles, uncool curmudgeons; and also Africans, Hispanics, Asians, and even Iranians. It all reminds me of the unity-of-variety that St. Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians, what a body is supposed to be.

Anyway, at church yesterday one of the seminarians from our congregation gave the sermon, Vicar Chris Yang. He did a fine job, expounding Luke 20:27-40 and exploring the glorious new life that, through Christ, awaits us after death, when “our hope turns into reality.”

He also tossed off an observation that has me still thinking, that fear and love are two sides of the same coin. I can see that: we fear death because we love this life; we fear embarrassment because we love our status. Vicar Yang related it how we are to “fear and love God.”