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Editorial July August 2007“God blessed them & said to them, be fruitful, multiply, & fill the earth, & subdue it [using all its vast resources in the service of God & man]; & have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, & over every living creature that moves upon the earth.” Gen 1:38 AMP Ken & I have just enjoyed an extended holiday in Europe & New York. For Ken it was not all holiday as he attended conferences in Stockholm & New York. However, I enjoyed travelling for 6 weeks with one of our daughters, Joanna. While we were overseas & since we have been back, the Lord has spoken very clearly that we are to press in & continue looking to Him for the transformation of health care. Our western worldview struggles with the concept of transformation because we don’t rightly discern the Kingdom of God in our midst & we have put aside the creation mandate to fill all things & subdue it. Health care is positioned in the spheres of creation in an amazing way as it is founded on the healing work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The city of health care is an integral part of His Kingdom & we need to work towards affirming & reinstating His Lordship to see Him glorified in & through it. What happens in transformation is up to Him as He is Lord. We don’t really know what to expect but we may see many saved & healed; we may receive amazing revelation about the prevention & treatment of disease & see the dead raised to life. Miracles of healing are occuring now although they are usually not acknowledged as such. Although we are not yet seeing transformation, Godly change is occurring in health care. Ken’s article in this newsletter documents the growing acceptance of the relevance of spirituality in health care, which is evidence of this. Ever since the enlightenment when science & spirituality were divorced from one another, there has been a coldness in health care to spiritual things. From the 70’s on, we saw the new age have increasing influence in health care but the door remained closed to Christianity. However, there is now a growing awareness of the benefits of looking at spiritual aspects for our patients & the clinician. It is opening the door for us to discuss spiritual things with our patients. The term, spirituality, is often looked at with suspicion by many Christians. The ABC program, Compass, recently had 2 programs on faith-to-faith dialogue, which promotes acceptance & incorporation of other forms of religion. This universalist approach that all roads lead to god is gaining acceptance in some parts of the church & reminds me that even the elect will be lured away in the times that we are living in. However, acceptance of the relevance of spirituality in health care is something that we have been looking & praying for. It allows us to discuss spiritual things with our patients from an evidence based platform. It is an open door for Biblical health care. God is also leading clinicians to adopt Biblical principles in their practice & workplace. Chris Hayes has been applying principles of Biblical health care to the management of chronic pain. His article is a discussion of his contribution to the Shalom conference at Vellore. The Lord reminded us recently that this new ‘door’ is only influencing health care in the western world. Nations that have a non-western worldview, which is closer to a Biblical worldview, already enjoy an ‘open door’. A friend from PNG told us of the church that he has established in his ward. He preaches every Monday morning & leads many of his patients to Christ. He says that the environment in the ward is different to other wards & they experience fewer untimely deaths. They are very aware of the spiritual warfare in their workplaces & that God is at work in their midst. We hope that Chris’s & Ken’s articles will stimulate an awareness of God’s involvement in our workplace & further our understanding of Biblical health care. Let us continue to pray that His name will be exalted & His power released in the health systems of our nation & the world. “Seek the peace & prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” Jer 29:7 |
Global Prayer Summit for Health Care6-9th Oct, Kwanglim Prayer Mountain, South Korea “The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It's our handle on what we can't see. The act of faith is what distinguished our ancestors, set them above the crowd. By faith, we see the world called into existence by God's word, what we see created by what we don't see.” Hebrews 11:1-3 Message There are times when we glimpse a little of God’s majesty, His grace and almighty power at work in this world. This Prayer Summit was such a time. Whenever, we gather together with others to seek His face and wait on Him, God draws near and we experience His presence in a mighty way. Over 90 people from Asia, Australia, the Caribbean, Europe, South Africa and the US gathered to hear His voice at Kwanglim Prayer Mountain, which is one of 2-300 ‘prayer mountains’ in Korea. I had heard of Yonggi Cho’s amazing church of 800,000 and their prayer mountain but never imagined that there would be so many places for people to come humbly to seek Him in prayer. If God were scanning the world looking for faith – He wouldn’t have to look much further than Korea. Over 25 percent of the population of 48 million are Christian and there are probably very few nominal Christians in that number. All of the churches have red neon crosses that dot the skyline all over Seoul and the surrounding countryside. Most of the churches hold early Morning Prayer meetings (5.30-6.30) 7 days a week, as they prefer to meet corporately for prayer. I attended one where after a short message, the lights were dimmed in the auditorium, leaving the large cross above the altar illuminated and everyone began praying Korean style (all at once). Although we were in a corporate setting, each of us was simply face to face with the Lord and were ushered effortlessly into His presence. His peace was overwhelming. Koreans pray because they have been threatened by hostile enemies for the last 100 years. Amazingly, they don’t consider the North Koreans as an enemy even though North Korea had recently detonated a nuclear device. We were told repeatedly, “they are the same as us.” They believe their nation will be reunified and pray in faith to that end. Their faith is the substance of what they hope and pray for, they are certain of what they do not as yet see. This reminds me of Noah’s faith; he was obedient to the Lord and built an ark in faith that what God said, would happen. The South Korean government has also built a railway station near the Demilitarized Zone which is described as “not the last station from the South, but the first station toward the North.” They are a nation where faith is coupled with action, which must gladden the heart of the Father. It was to this nation that God called us to seek Him for health care. Chris Steyn, the International Coordinator for HCFI, led the summit with an excellent study on the message of the 7 cities of Revelation. Chris describes himself as “an amazed slave rejoicing at the privilege of following in the footsteps of the Master” and demonstrates that humility in his life and teaching. The 7 letters are relevant not just to the 7 cities named but also to messianic communities and believers throughout history. “The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place….Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near.” Rev 1:1,3 The message is particularly relevant for ‘end time’ societies including the sphere of health care. Chris said that we need to understand ‘the big picture from the Lord’s perspective’. We are too often blinkered by the world and particularly the concerns of our own little world that we forget God’s purposes for our own lives, the lives of those whom we influence and the world. These letters reveal more about Jesus Christ Himself; His way of evaluating and exhorting His people; and His view of how Christians ought to influence history. He went on to expound the scripture, looking at the common elements of each letter to see how God saw the cities, their strengths and weaknesses, the things that he brought them to account for or commended them for and closing with the admonitions and blessings He proclaimed over them. This was then applied to the city of health care and corporate prayer was made in response. Repentance was both personal and corporate and was deep as was the freedom and peace we experienced at the conclusion of the 3 days. The Lord dealt with each of us drawing us nearer to Him and to one another. “The One who..” We looked first at the way that He revealed Himself to each city. Collectively, God reveals that He rules sovereignly over His body, over history, over death and over creation. He is the ultimate warrior and love-giver. He is absolutely glorious, absolutely perfect, absolutely Holy and absolutely truthful. Chris concluded that He deserves to be in the centre of our lives, families, churches, healthcare, institutions, practice, theory and education. Our work should be Christ-centred – patient related or patient specific but not patient-centred – He alone is worthy of that place. If Christ is not in the centre of our work, we should repent wherever that is not the case and pray to restore Him to His rightful place. Chris exhorted us that in faith we should aim for “the maximum possible in a broken world.” I was particularly encouraged by that because sometimes, even though I know that nothing is impossible with God, I feel that I am expecting too much to see health care transformed by the power of God. It doesn’t lower our eyes or lessen our faith to look for the ‘maximum possible’ in fact it encourages us to expect great and wonderful things even beyond what we could hope or think. “I know your works” To each city, God says, “I know your deeds”; your works not your motives, promises, ideas, commitment, dreams or visions. Our works reveal what we really believe, the attitude of our hearts. Chris commented that God puts people near us, our colleagues to bring out the best in us and the worst is us – He wants us to grow to maturity – He knows our works. He knows our circumstances He knows where we live; the tribulation and persecution that we experience; our poverty; our social situation; our weaknesses. Knowing that He understands our situation encourages and exhorts us to look up to Him, to trust Him in every circumstance. Knowing that we are transparent before Him also brings us to repentance in the areas that we know do not line up with His standard. Chris then played a song as we waited on the Lord in repentance. The lyrics of the song, ‘Soldier’ by Phil Driscoll were very moving and comforting and lifted us up. “Yes, you are a mighty warrior but don’t forget you are still my child.” One of our group had set the song to a slide show which was very inspirational. The Positive Things that He commends God commends the cities for their faithfulness. Five times he commended their perseverance. 1. Perseverance 5 times 2. Patience 3 times 3. Service 3 times 4. Intolerance of evil 5. and discernment 3 times 6. No denial of His name or faith 2 times 7. Spiritual growth once 8. Love once 9. Faith once 10. Holiness once The things that we need to repent for 1. You have left your first love 2. False doctrine 3 times – Balaam, Nicolaitans, Jezebel 3. Alive in name only 4. Shoddy service 5. Lukewarmness 6. Spiritual pride 7. Spiritual blindness about own condition 8. Wickedness I shared a little about the true foundations of health care which brought false doctrine into focus more clearly. If Christ is not acknowledged as the Lord and the healer, we agree that healing can occur without Him. We leave out the message of the Cross and its power in our lives and its power to save and deliver. Without it we believe that it is our actions that bring healing. The underlying root of this is our Western worldview that has blinded us to God being “in, through and over ALL things”. When we regard evidence based medicine as a ‘pure science’, we are accepting that God has no place in health care or healing. We go to work and allow science to take the place of God and it doesn’t measure up to the Lord God Almighty. He calls it idolatry. Chris then played 2 songs from Don Francisco with more of Marilyn’s excellent slides. These musical interludes ministered powerfully to us and led us nearer to Him. Idols of the 7 cities CITY IDOL SIGNIFICANCE Ephesus Artemis Worship of magic Smyrna Emperor Worship of power Pergamos Polytheism Worship of own gods Thyatira Guild gods Worship of profession Sardis Prosperity Worship of luxurious life Philadelphia Brotherhood Worship of human love Laodicea Man Worship of self We then looked at the idols of the 7 cities, each of which are relevant to health care. I also shared on the counterfeit foundations of health care. Artemis (Greek) or Diana (Roman) is a manifestation of an entity which has been evident from ancient times. She is a nature divinity of a mother or queen of heaven figure who has power in fertility and is a nourisher of mankind. She is sometimes known as the earth mother and appears in nearly all cultures in some manifestation. In health care, magic or ‘unauthorized unusual powers’ are used in diagnosis and a myriad of modalities used by New Age practitioners. Chris told us that 2000 nurses in Holland are trained in Reiki and are known to use it on patients sometimes without their permission. Chris described Emperor Worship as the big boss who is always right; who can make no mistakes; is not to be criticised; who is above the law and can do whatever he wants; who doesn’t have to set a good example; who governs by domination not inspiration. We can readily identify these people in our workplaces – they maybe a doctor or administrator or director of nursing or other ancillary service or even someone without much authority who abuses the authority that they do have. It seems to be in our nature to put people up on a pedestal and to idolize them. In Australia we also tear them down again – the tall poppy syndrome – where we are really looking to usurp their power or authority for ourselves. Pergamos is described as the place where “satan’s throne” resides, which may refer to the large altar to Zeus. However, they worshipped a great many gods including Asklepios, the Emperor and a myriad of lesser deities. Chris talked about multiculturalism and pluralism that arises from polytheism and leads to fragmented lives and societies. It opens the door to all of the ‘isms’ including materialism, socialism, capitalism and liberalism. Pergamos is also known for its large Asklepion, a centre for healing & worship of the god, Asklepios. Health care today incorporates many idols and doesn’t see man as being created in the image of God and as such of inherent value. Communist atheistic societies demonstrate the extreme of this philosophy, they view man as expendable; they divorce the soul and body and ignore the spiritual. God’s answer is whole person health care based on a Biblical Christian worldview. Thyatira was a trading city with more guilds than any other city in Asia Minor. Health care is idolized as these guilds were; it is given preeminence in our lives. Many professionals build their careers on the ruins of their family life. There is disdain for anything that is not accepted by reductionistic medical science. Even believers idolize their professions and accept that God is excluded or marginalized from health care. Just as Sardis was a very wealthy city, we see the greed and worship of the luxurious life in health care today. There are many people in medicine for the money; to be a somebody. There are often inordinate inequalities in salaries and inordinate profits that are obtained from medical equipment and drugs. Philadelphia was named in honor of Attilus who was known as a ‘brother-lover’. It exemplifies human love or humanitarianism. Human love is not what God requires of us as believers. He requires that we demonstrate His love and compassion. Laodicea is exhorted to open its eyes to see from God’s perspective; to understand our sin and depravity. Many health care professionals are “building kingdoms of self all over the place”. Their career comes first. Chris remarked, “me, myself and I are an evil human trinity.” Words of Advice from Our Lord 1. Repent 5 times 2. Hold Fast 3 times 3. Remember from where you have fallen twice 4. Do not fear suffering and tribulation twice 5. Do the first works – God is calling us back to our initial enthusiasm 6. Be faithful unto death 7. Be watchful – put on the armour 8. Strengthen things that remain 9. Buy from me gold that is refined in the fire; white garments that you may be clothed. 10. Anoint eyes with salve so that we can see. 11. Be zealous – boiling hot not lukewarm 12. If you hear my voice open the door. Warnings from the King If you do not repent: 1. I will remove your menorah which signifies the Lord’s presence among the people 2. I will fight against you with the sword of my mouth – the fear of the Lord 3. I will cast you into great tribulation 4. I will give to each of you according to your works 5. I will come upon you as a thief – unexpectedly 6. I will vomit each of you out of my mouth His Rewards for those who Obey 1. You will eat of the tree of life – death is the greatest enemy of health care. 2. You will receive the crown of life – we can walk in the place of death wearing the crown of life. 3. You will eat hidden manna – they won’t know where it comes from. 4. You will receive a white stone with a secret new name. 5. We won’t be hurt by the second death. 6. We will receive power and authority over the nations. 7. We will receive the morning star. 8. You shall walk with Me for you are worthy. 9. Yu will be clothed in white garments. 10. Your name will not be blotted out of the Book of Life. 11. I will confess your name before My Father and before His angels. 12. I have set before you an open door that no-one can shut. 13. Deceivers will be made to worship at your feet and know that I have loved you. 14. I will keep you from the hour of trial that shall come upon the whole world. 15. I will make you a pillar in the temple of My God and you shall go out no more. 16. I will write on you the name of God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem which comes down out of heaven from My God. 17. I will write on you a new name. 18. I will come into dine with you and you with Me. 19. You will sit with Me on My throne. The blessings far outweigh and outnumber the warnings. God is so amazing with a generous heart bursting with a desire to bless us. We were blessed at the conclusion of the Prayer Summit with a visit to the SAM hospitals. They showed us over their facilities and wined and dined us all in their intercessory chapel. It was awesome to see the CEO and other department heads worshipping our Lord. On our last Sunday in Seoul, Ken and I attended Yonghi Cho’s church and heard him preach on faith (Mk 11: 12-14, 20-25). He concluded that, “In order to have victory in our lives, we must experience miracles. We need miracles that move high mountains.” I also liked Chris’s statement on victory – to deal with the giants in the land, we need David’s stone – ‘a small stone with jet propulsion’ - divine power and guidance. |
Missions Project Update December 2006Letters From the Thai/Burma Border Dec 2006 Hi All, Hope you are well and enjoying the summer. We are fine here. Ken, Kevin and I arrived in Mai Sot, a border town on the Thai Burma border, on Monday afternoon after two flights, cabs, minibus rides on the wrong side of the road down steep hills, and long waits in the sun. Mai Sot is home to many illegal and legal Karen Burmese who live amongst the Thai population. The largest refugee camp nearby, Mae La (population around 40,000) has been the home to many of the Karen refugees who will be coming to Australia in the next year or so (around 3,000 Karen, Mon and Karenni people will come to Australia in our 06-07 refugee intake). We're here to run training programs for health workers working for the Karen Department of Health and Welfare. There are 22 in the group, most of them will return to clinics in Burma after the training has finished. Some will stay on the border and work in the head office, supporting the development of programs on Malaria and TB prevention, child and maternal health plus all the other aspects of health that must be catered for. The topics we've been asked to teach on include training skills, drug and alcohol, and mental and emotional health. We teach with interpreters from 8.00-3.00 each day, in a facility out of town. It's a hot cement room but it has electricity which should seem like luxury compared to the bamboo roofs we taught under last year, but I think I prefer the breeze in a wall-less classroom. Winter started yesterday but it's still too hot to be outside in the middle of the day. The Karen are only just beginning to understand the concept of mental health. They're fairly well trained in physical health aspects, but are struggling to come to terms with diagnosis and treatment of depression, anxiety, PTSD and other common conditions. This afternoon's class was on suicide prevention strategies, and many of the health workers had their own stories to tell. Suicide is common in this part of the world. The people have lived in a traumatized state their whole life, with nothing but hope to cling on to. As I've mentioned to many of you already, the SPDC (Burmese Army) offensive has this year been the worst in the last ten. There are many tens of thousands of people living in the jungle (formal term - IDPs or Internally Displaced People), foraging for food and sleeping under trees. They've fled the SPDC who usually burn their villages and crops, steal their animals, conscript the fit and healthy into labour gangs and kill others etc, where it suits. Living in constant fear and the trauma of seeing death, losing homes and family members etc contributes to a range of mental health conditions. The stories we hear from the health workers are horrific, but they are so used to living in this state they are often not obviously emotionally disturbed by what they see, and what they live through themselves. They tell us that people usually commit suicide without any warning, they are so focused on finding food and surviving and looking after their families that they don't have time to think about their emotional health. Then, one day, it get's too much. We're working towards building basic diagnostic tools and prevention treatments, and over the years hope to help them set up a stable treatment program for trauma related mental health issues. It will be interesting to see how they go in setting up prevention programs, given that the community doesn't have a concept of "mental health". At this stage the best treatment program they have is humour. We seem to be laughing at things all the time, which relieves some of the tension that could otherwise make for a very heavy program. Mai Sot is a fairly busy small town, full of motorbikes and tuk-tuks and 4-wheel drives. I walk down to the market every morning as the sun comes up to buy fruit for the students (many of them don't eat during the day unless we take food for them), and negotiate the standard Asian bags of live frogs, buckets of eels and trays of deep fried cockroaches to find something more enticing to eat. Fortunately for us there's a cafe across the road which serves eggs for breakfast so we have some break from eating Thai, 3 times a day. It sounds a bit unthankful when I think how lucky we are, that we're eating 3 times a day and many others aren't, but variety is good. We're getting on well as a team, are meeting with other aid workers about town and learning more each day about the 'picture' of helping the Karen. So, all is well, and we feel very privileged to be here. The students are beautiful in heart, intelligent, and very focused on serving their people. They're pretty amazing, passionate about doing the best they can in the situation, rather than escaping it. Working with them makes me feel good about humanity, which is a state that can be challenged a bit when I focus on the ugliness of the war they're fighting. xo, Janet Hi All, I'm now in my third and final week for this trip to the border. It's still a special place to be, although I understand that it's not everybody's cup of tea. Since Ken and Kevin returned to Australia at the end of last week, my time has been completely taken up with teaching, preparation and meetings, but tonight is a night off. So on the way back from teaching I rode my $1 per day Thai rent-a-bike around the backstreets of Mai Sot. It's pretty grotty out there, with goats and chooks and cows living in and amongst the shanty towns and the accumulation of rubbish that smacks of a semi commercialised society - plastic bags everywhere. Rows of beautiful banana trees make it look a lot prettier, and the kids love seeing a white girl riding a bike. They are so cute, calling out across the fields and running down the laneways to take a look and smile and wave and practice their one or two words of English. The side of Mai Sot that I'm working in is cleaner and stronger and much more inspiring. And the students continue to keep me on my toes. Last week I ran a class on strategies to reduce anxiety. I asked them to provide the case study. And it went something like this... "How do we work with people who are anxious because the SPCD has taken their children". Ouch. I suggested something simpler, but no, this is their reality and what they need to deal with. So, I asked them what the likelihood is that the children will be returned. "1-10 percent". Ahah. Then we talked about what happens to the children and I'm guessing you can work that out for yourself. Children being taken is a major contributor to adult suicide. The next class was on anger management and one of the first questions was whether they need to forgive the SPDC. We had a very long conversation on this point. So long that it ran over to the next day, and I asked Ken and Kevin to participate in a panel discussion. The upside is how ready the students are to help their community, and how actively they struggle with our western concepts to see if they can help within their own cultural understanding and their sometimes very different circumstances. In most cases we've been able to work our way towards strategies of use to them. Last week I spent a bit of time with a passionate Karen guy who is shooting footage for fundraising material and has a dream of making a TV special in 2007 He is very good, but has a way to go in terms of his learning some story-telling techniques, updating his equipment etc. He's a real go-for-it guy and a huge pleasure to have spent time with. Before Ken and Kevin left we were taken to a hotel out of town that has the most beautiful Thai cushions spread across a floating pontoon, surrounded by soft lights, serving great food... such a lovely oasis. I used to wonder how people could go to places like this when they know how the people around them are struggling, but I think learning to live with this level of struggle is a process, and times away in beautiful places is part of the process of learning to cope. Being able to escape here and there makes it easier. Have been there a few times and loved every minute of it. I spent yesterday with Dr Simon, a Karen pastor who has been running a Bible College in Mae Lah refugee camp for 16 years. He's a fabulous man. They've built lecture rooms and class rooms out of the standard bamboo that most of the houses are made from, with teak leaf roofs. The difference is that he in all his industriousness has broadband internet and solar powered lighting. Didn't expect to find that. He runs classes on computer training and a whole range of thoroughly modern things. Travelling along the border with him was a pleasure. On the border road you're usually stopped several times by Thai army or Police who want to check your passport, check your vehicle etc. Over the years Dr Simon has invested a lot of time in these guys, who now greet him as a father, as he hands over bags of oranges. I'm sure it's all in love, not bribery. This is a special place full of very inspiring people, most of whom laugh a lot; share what they have, look to the future with expectations of good things. I have a few more days of teaching to go. At the moment I'm teaching the heads of 5 programs - Malaria, TB, Mobile Health Clinics, Manpower and Training, and Health Information on how to develop a strategic plan. It is very difficult for them, very slow progress. They are so used to being reactive to disaster that the complexity of this type of planning process is all new. Not surprisingly, many people in the West struggle as well. The classes are very interactive and there is lots of discussion and I'm learning a lot about how they work. Much time is taken up in trying to work out Karen words for English words and concepts. Karen is a fairly simple language, so sometimes it can take 5 or 10 minutes for them to work out what I'm saying. Gives me time to think which is good. Am off to Sukhothai and Bangkok at the end of the week, and back to Sydney on Saturday evening. Thank you again for your support, hope you're all well and looking forward to seeing you in the new year, xo, Janet
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Health Care In Christ is an inter-denominational organisation serving the Lord Jesus Christ & the Body of Christ in health care. Our mission is to advance the Lordship of Jesus Christ in health care, to see health care 'In Christ'.
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