Am I a thief or a good shepherd?

When we were living in Siberia, a friend pointed out that it is important when preaching the gospel to an indigenous people to go through the "door" instead of a window. This basically means that it is essential to learn the culture and the language of the people and to find the cultural keys.


Then today I came across these words from Jesus, "I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber." It occurred to me that many people who do not respect the culture of the people they are trying to reach actually are thieves in the eyes of the receiving culture. It is often the complaint of Siberian people that they are not interested in Jesus because he is the "Russian god." Anyone who comes preaching Jesus to them without respecting their culture and taking the time to understand them is most definitely seen as a thief. I certainly don't want to be a thief.


Jesus goes on to say, "they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger's voice". It's pretty plain to see that time is needed for people to learn the voice of the messenger. When the voice is heard, understood and trusted then this is a like the shepherd entering in through the gate.

I hope you will take the time to be a friendly shepherd rather than a thief when sharing the gospel with people.

Shaking the world view

Over the last couple years I have been learning in practice, what I knew in theory. That is that for people to receive the gospel their word view needs to be shaken. I particularly enjoyed the argument of people from One Story, that it is within the imagination of a story that people's world views are challenged. In fact the very same thing happened for C.S Lewis. In his biography he retells how it was in the realm of imagination and stories that he allowed himself to imagine that God was real.

I have recently been sharing with people an experience from Tuva where people we spent time with there had their world view challenged by our presence and the ensuing battle between angels and demons camped about our tent when we camped together with them. They fully expected to face punishment from the evil spirits after we upset the balance. When they did not face the repercussions of the evil spirits it challenged their world view.

If this is what is necessary to challenge people with the gospel in non western cultures, shouldn't it also be necessary in western cultures? To challenge a western thinker with the gospel of Jesus, the dominant paradigm must first be tackled. What is the dominant paradigm of the western person? I would love to hear your thoughts on this topic. There are a few dominant paradigms. One of them is most definitely that of consumerism. It seems that our whole lives in the west revolve around what we consume, than what we produce. And it is not uncommon that people will go on shopping sprees for the sake of entertainment. This paradigm is centred in "what can I take?" instead of "what can I give?"

Churches have become consumeristic too. People spend time in church wanting to be entertained, to make friends, to feel good, i.e to receive. Where as the foremost reason we should go to church is to worship God.

So my task over the next 18 months, while I live in a western country will be to undermine the western world view of consumerism and perhaps other paradigms as well.

The spirituality of music

My writing of late has been a little scarce, I will try to get back into it again.

I have some seed thoughts about music. Simply put, the voice is the most basic and primitive form of music. It is when the voice is stretched and abnormal frequencies are made that the building blocks of music are created. I have no doubt that the most ancient and primitive forms of music were voice only. Rhythm would have followed next, followed by impromptu percussion. But already in the primitive growth of music, percussion and rhythm were accompaniment for singing.

Later on, many discoveries would have been made that created various frequencies, not unlike singing. I wonder then if early instrumentation was not then a mimicry of singing. The development of instrumentation is a means of embellishing the environment for the voice.

True, much music is now completely absent of voice altogether. But in many ways this music is searching for deep gutteral ways to articulate what words fall short of doing. Words can be mistakingly seen as synonymous with voice, but they merely overlap.

Instrumentation is a wonderful thing and I enjoy it. It enables a musician to express themself, in the security of the "other" without necessarily shining a spotlight on the soul. But I find the voice the most naked and vulnerable of musical expressions, one that can never be truly matched by a musical instrument.

The voice expresses the deepest yearnings of the soul. We all have a voice, and whether we admit it or not, we can all sing (even if we do not want others to hear us!). When we sing out loud we open our soul up to breathe and we can call out to the deep. When we direct our singing towards the Creator God, it can become the purest of prayers, especially if we don't know the words, but simply sing.

Give it a try, open your mouth and sing out loud to your Creator. He just might answer you.

Can Christians be demonically attacked or influenced?

This is a bit of a hot topic between various Christian circles. Some charismatic believers will tell you that a Christian can actually be demon possessed. Others will tell you that a believer can not possibly have a demon live within them because the Holy Spirit is already living within them. Often the verse "Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?" (2 Cor 6:14) is cited as evidence of this. It is important when reading scripture to always take the whole passage into account. In full the scripture reads:

14Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? 15What harmony is there between Christ and Belial[b]? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? 16What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people."[c]
17"Therefore come out from them
and be separate, says the Lord.
Touch no unclean thing,
and I will receive you."[d]
18"I will be a Father to you,
and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty."

The scripture is exhorting the believing person to not marry the unbelieving person. This is the strictest sense of the meaning "to be yoked together". It is referring to sexual union, and is therefore an exhortation to not sleep with a temple prositute.

This does not necessarily mean that a believing person may not have been opened up to demonic influence in their life. In the old testament law in the book of Deuteronomy (chapter 5) the Lord teachers his followers to not worship idols and false gods. The consequences of such actions bring a curse upon someone's life. If this curse is not broken then it will carry on to the third and fourth generations (verse 9). The good news though, is that Jesus can break the curse and then his blessing carries on for a "thousand generations" (verse 10).

People who come from animist backgrounds have been highly exposed to demonic influences. An animist culture has much idol and demon worship. This opens individuals and families up to demonic influence and possession. The demons have actually been given permission into these peoples lives. This is known as spiritual bondage. It is these bondages that often keep people from coming to know the truth of Jesus. But even when people do come to believe in Jesus, there is much healing to go through. A person can make a choice to believe and invite the Holy Spirit into their life. But this does not mean that the demon will automatically leave a person's life. The demon needs to be told to leave, since it was first given permission. The Holy Spirit enters someone's life when given permission. In fact as the Holy Spirit is gentle, He will not force any deeper into a person's life than the permission given. The Holy Spirit will draw back when grieved. A demon on the other hand will cling on very tightly when first given any permission, a little like "given an inch, a mile is taken".

When a person gives their life to Jesus, they are then in a position to command demons to leave, in the name of Jesus. Before this step, they do not even have the power to tell a demon to leave. So a demon will not leave someone unless commanded to do so in Jesus name. It may be possible to command a demon to leave a non-believer, but unless that person then believes, the demon will bring even more back.

Last year I met a Siberian pastor, from the Eveny people group. He came from an animist background and knows a lot of which he speaks, from personal experience. He is from a Baptist church. He has a lot of believers come to him for prayer to be set free from demons. Other Baptists disagree with him because it is not part of their doctrine. But this pastor has prayed with many believers for deliverance from demons within their life. The demons are commanded in the name of Jesus to leave the person's life. Their permission is revoked.

So it is possible that someone may have brought demons with them from their past life before they believed. But is it possible for a person who is already a believer to allow a demon into their life? Well not unwittingly, I would say. A person who is a believer has the Holy Spirit, and should be able to listen to the Holy Spirit, and therefore not partake in activities that are occultic, demonic etc. But sadly today there are so many noises in a person's life, that we rarely take the time to slow down and just listen to God. Therefore many believers do not know the voice of God very well, or choose not to listen when the Holy Spirit warns that something is sinful.

I recently became aware of a young girl, who is a believer but had been taking part in Zen Buddhist meditation. It was her misunderstanding, that Zen is not a religious practice. To know whether this is true or not it is necessary to understand what Zen meditation is. In a book called "Zen for Christians" the following is laid out:

"Zen for Christians does not mean Zen adapted for Christians in the way that yoga for pregancy means yoga adapted for pregnant women. The Zen in this book is just plain Zen, but the presentation of Zen in this book is especially for Christians..... Zen is a way of liberation from suffering- both the suffering we experience ourselves and the suffering we cause others. It is a practical and experiential tradition, centred in a form of meditation..."

"Zen is a way of selflessness, in two senses of the word. First, Zen is a way of directly experiencing what Buddhism calls "no-self" - realizing the distinction between "me" and "not me" ..."

It is clear that Zen meditation is simply not a "non-religious" practice. The idea behind Zen meditation is for the meditator to "empty" themself of all consciousness, to become aware that they are really nothing. The goal is to reunite with the universal consciousness, to reach enlightenment or "nirvana" as the Buddha (Suddarthu Gautuma- a mere man) supposedly did. The goal of Zen is to detach oneself from suffering. However Jesus teaches us to go through suffering. And we are made in God's image. Therefore Christian meditation is to realise that we are made in God's image. Zen meditation is the opposite of this. In deed in a person's involvement in Zen meditation they are opening themself up to demonic influence, giving a demon permission in their life. It is my clear hope and prayer that this girl will seek prayer deliverance ministry after opening herself up in such a way. If she does not, she will face much trouble in life.

At the start of Jesus' ministry he went around all of the Galilean countryside casting demons out from peoples' lives. He was preparing the ground for the word to be preached later on. Demons produce barriers to people listening to the gospel. In any place of ministry demons need to be bound and cast out before any real success will follow. Is it any wonder that many churches in the west do not grow, when we allow so many demonic influences into our midst?

Jesus would rather that we were hot or cold, but not lukewarm in our love for him. It is when we are lukewarm that we compromise and allow lies into our midst. Let's find a passion for Jesus and for holiness, cast out the demons from our midst and invite the Holy Spirit to minister in our communities.

Who is the evil empire?

I feel compelled to comment on the current conflict that has been occurring within the Caucasus. The media have the wool pulled over our eyes. They want us to believe that the USA, EU and NATO are wonderful benevolent forces that are above approach.

Let me postulate a few ideas for you:

1) The US and OPEC countries formed an agreement in the 1960s that led to all oil being traded in US dollars. This has led to unprecedented wealth for the US and for the major oil producing countries.
2) Iraq was the first country to threaten to break from this agreement. Aside from America's many reasons for going to war in Iraq, no one can dispute that oil was a part of the equation. If Iraq broke from the agreement and did not trade in US dollars it may have started a chain that would see the collapse of the US economy. Iraq was suggesting they would trade in Euros instead, a point which put France and Germany against the military actions of the US. Interestingly, USA's biggest ally, Britain does not have the Euro.
3) Iran are a large oil producing country, they are also considering breaking from the 1960s agreement.
4) The US would love to have a strategic and secure military base in Georgia, which would put them on Iran's doorstep.
5) Georgia has been enemies of the Abkhazians and Ossetians long before the Russian empire.
6) The conflict is really two empires rubbing up against each other.

South Ossetia have a legitimate claim to independence, just as much as Kosovo does. They voted for their independence in 2006. They have operated as a de facto country since 2006, with the protection of Russian peacekeepers. Georgia attacked South Ossetia first in an attempt to gain "territorial integrity" to secure their bid to join NATO and ultimately the EU.

Anyway, please have a look at the videos and read the article and have an open mind.

Western media use pictures to tell lies.
Twelve year old girl tells the truth about Georgia.
Well reasoned historical explanation about Georgia and why they are guilty.

When was the world created?

The Mayans believed that the world was created on August 11th, 3114 B.C. Were they close?

What is the biggest cause of death in the world today?

Just recently I stumbled upon a really cool little website when searching for a world clock. It's choc full of statistics, and numbers are something I can really relate to. The website has different categories, one of them caught my eye.

The world death count (causes of death).

What are some of the biggest causes of death in the media today?

Traffic accidents are certainly talked about a lot. A lot of money is poured into making us feel guilty for going 5 kms over the speed limit. Death count in 2008 to date: 695 290

Of course cancer is also a big cause of death, and God forbid that you are brave enough to stick a cigarette in your mouth in public these days, you just might get lynched. Death count in 2008: 4 242 159

What of HIV-AIDS? A cause of death that affects Africa in a big way and is largely and sadly quite unnecessary. Death count: 1 810 070.

Cardiovascular disease is the biggest commonly recognised cause of death in the world. A percentage of this statistic is also filled by people who die of old age. Death count: 9 764 500 and counting.

What of war? Surely it ravages so many lives. (And by the way I know that it does, and living refugees are huge victims of war.)
Death count: 99 972 (Much smaller than traffic accidents.)

But there is one cause of death that dwarfs all these statistics, in fact it is a higher cause of death than all the above combined. Abortion so far in 2008 has killed 22 million, 652 thousand and counting, very rapidly. Abortion is the hidden killer, we hear very little about it in the media. The figure in Australia every year is about 100 000. It is a staggering statistic to know that abortion kills SO much more lives than any other cause.

I'm not an abortion activist. I am motivated by lives staring me in the face, that hopefully when changed will shun such evil. Prevention after all is better than cure. But these figures are just evil. I challenge anyone out there to tell me how such greedy massacre is at all acceptable.

A ranch on Mars

So it looks like I may have left my sports research phase behind me. (Time will tell). I spent a lot of time researching the history of football codes, and then I discovered a sports opinion blog called The Roar. I seem to have spent an inordinate amount of time writing comments and articles at that blog, and my own blogging slowed down a bit as a result. In the end I got a bit ticked off by some of the people who continued to claim that soccer is the best sport, and as such were not a lot of fun to debate with. It started to feel like the debates were going around in circles. So, it's time to spend my brain space on other things.

A friend may have just rescued me from my football induced stupor when he asked me if I had heard about the Phoenix probe that has just landed on Mars. I had heard of it, but I nearly ignored it, which is so unlike me.

I still have lots of reading to do to catch up on the goals of the probe. Exploration of Mars fascinates me, because I see it as part of God's plan and gift of the universe to us. Imagine if sin had never entered the world. Imagine where we would be today. No wars, no death. Technology would have advanced far into space by now. Nevertheless, this does mot mean that the wonders of space are not for us now.

I like to think that Mars and the other planets are there for us to use as resources. There is bound to be a lot of mineral wealth in space, say for instance in the asteroid belt, which is between Mars and Jupiter.

The Phoenix probe landed on Mars on May 25th. It landed near one of the poles to search for ice. The purpose of the project is to research the history of water on Mars, to get an idea of climate change there and whether life may have possibly existed there.

The probe landed in a very specific spot, which is quite amazing in itself. The level of science needed to send this probe is staggering. The probe is digging into the Martian soil. Information is being sent back to earth via the martian satellites which then beam messages to earth's sattelites.

Such sophisiticated technology leads me to imagine future possiblities. The temperatures by the poles can get as low as -80 C over night, which is a little too cold for human habitation. Temperatures at the equator however can get up to +27 C. So human habitation would be possible by the equator but not by the poles. (At least in the early stages). Robots however could travel to the poles and even build roads to the poles to mine water. In fact much of this could even happen before humans ever set foot on Mars. Indeed the fact that two satellites already orbit Mars and send communications back to earth are actually the beginnings of human infrastructure on Mars.

It may still be a generation or two before humans set up a colony on Mars. I guess we need to set up a colony on the moon first to make this possible.

Australia needs to clean up before hosting more major sporting events

There would be few in Australia who would argue today that it was not a wonderful thing for Sydney to host the Olympic games in 2000. I attended some events in Sydney and was there enjoying the atmosphere with hundreds of thousands of other Australians and also international people. I had the pleasure of having my photo taken with a gold medalist. I was there in the main Olympic stadium cheering on our athletes towards the prize of a medal. I was there in Darling Harbour with 5 000 others watching Cathy Freeman win the 400m gold, and in tears knew that this was a great moment for reconciliation between Indigenous and European Australia.

But still there were some noises from the international media about Australia having human rights issues, because of the conditions that many indigenous Australians live in. Some sports followers despise the connection of politics with sport. But to be a sports lover and to ignore politics is wrong. We can not enjoy ourselves while our brothers and sisters are suffering around us.

Once again, in an Olympic year the issue of human rights has hit the headlines again. Chinese oppression of Tibetan monks and freedom protesters in Tibet has caused a lot of controversy around the world. Olympic torch relays have been interrupted. People have debated about whether protesters should have interrupted the torch relays. Mean while, China has mostly deflected the international criticism and told the world to stay out of their internal matters. Effectively, we the international community have been told to "mind our own business."

Many in Australia have joined the protest call for Tibetans to be given their democratic rights and choose their own path in the world. This point of view is the overwhelmingly correct political path to take. I also agree with this point of view. But how is it, that we in Australia also managed to deflect much of the international criticism handed our way during the Sydney Olympics? Now it appears that the world doesn't bother us too much, and we are allowed to go our own way, for better or worse.

I along with millions of Australians shed tears on February 13th when the Federal government apologised to the stolen generations of indigenous Australians. It was an important and long overdue step for our nation, and many Aboriginal people were grateful for the apology and step taken. May 13th followed February 13th with a $718.7 million budget pledge to "Close the Gap" between the quality of life for indigenous Australians and European Australians. The government deserve a chance to get it right and implement their policies. But it has to be said, that quality of life for indigenous Australians has to be among our highest priorities in Australia.

We love and adore our sport in Australia. We love nothing more than seeing an international team perform well. We love nothing more than hosting a major international tournament. But what happens, the next time we host a major international sports tournament such as a Football World Cup and the life expectancy of indigenous Australians is still 17 years less than the rest of the population? The rest of the world will look on Australia again and call to attention our human rights problems. Am I being pessimistic to say that the situation will not have improved by then? Time will tell, but money thrown at a problem does not usually solve it.

We can spend tax dollars on earning major international sporting events, but when we host them, is our country really worth showing off to the world? I argue that we need to earn the right to host these major tournaments. As a country we need to sort out our own problems before we start boasting to the rest of the world that our country is in order.

We owe it to the the original and continual custodians of Gondwana land. The Great South Land can still be as great as the one it could have been.

Rugby season opener

While watching the sports channel the other night I saw an ad for the Russian Rugby Championship. I had previously wanted to get to a game, but the stadium looked hard to get to. Last night's game was at the Lokomotiv Stadium downtown. The stadium has a capacity of 4000 and sits on one side of the field. Going to a Rugby game is the closest I will get to Aussie Rules in Russia.

The game was scheduled to start at 18:30, but the marching band were still strutting their stuff at 18:35.


The weather has been warm and in the 20s for over a week now. But it turned cool yesterday, 17 degrees with patches of rain. Some die hard rugby fans turned out in the rain. There were 1300 at the match.


The two teams were lined up by 18:40. The team on the left is Yenisey (a Krasnoyarsk based team). They have just turned professional this year. It's a bit of an anomaly because most of the other teams are not professional. The team on the right is Krasny Yar (also a Krasnoyarsk based team). Krasny Yar won nearly every championship in the 90s, but they are still an amateur team. There are 6 teams in the Premier Rugby League in Siberia (4 of them are from Krasnoyarsk), and a further 8 in European Russia. After the national anthem, the game got underway at about 18:45.


I asked some people in the crowd who the stronger team were. Apparently Yenisey. So in true Aussie form I decided to barrack for the underdog Krasny Yar. I had no idea just how much an underdog they were. From very early on Yenisey dominated the play. I cheered away for Krasny Yar, and to my amusement the majority of people were supporting Yenisey. There was a group at the back cheering for Krasny Yar though. I had fun stirring the group of kids in front of me that insisted Yenisey are the team to go for. (It seems cheering for the under dog is not the Russian thing to do.)


Yenisey just seemed to move a lot faster than Krasny Yar did, and so it seemed as if they had more players on the field. They were able to cover the gaps better.


By half time the score was 24-0 in Yenisey's favour. Krasny Yar barely even looked like scoring, although they were trying very hard to stop Yenisey.


The Yenisey players were also a lot bigger. It seems that turning professional, they have been able to take all of the best players, at least the best from Krasnoyarsk anyway.


Our American friends were intrigued by the differences to American Football. I couldn't explain all of the rule differences, just the major ones, as I don't know the game of Rugby well enough.


Yenisey are about to score another try. The style of play of both sides almost completely ignored shots on field goals. Even at 24-0 when Krasny Yar could have taken an easy shot on goal, they decided to push forward for a try and failed to score. In the end Krasny Yar did score. The final score was 33-5 in Yenisey's favour. Last week Krasny Yar defeated Sibir 61-8, so I don't think that this will be a very competitive season. Sibir and Siberian Federal University may be more well matched but a long way behind the competition. There simply aren't enough teams for another division. But perhaps some more sponsors will get on board and all of the teams can turn professional, if so maybe the talent will be spread around more evenly.


In Aussie Rules we feel cheer leaders are unnecessary, but Abigail seemed to enjoy them, when the ball was at the other end of the field. If the ball came close Abigail would get excited and comment on kicks etc.