give talk tomorrow nite

[earlysda]

Tomorrow nite i've been asked to give a talk at a college here in Pune.  The owner is SDA, but he doesn't follow SDA principles, and the school is basically just a normal, worldly school from what i understand.  But there are several Christian teachers, and they know the man of the house where i'm staying now.  This man was asked to give a talk around 3 weeks ago, and i've been asked to give it tomorrow.  There should be around 30-40 students present.  My plan is to talk on: "How to Live Forever".  The alternate title is: "How to Never Die".  Yes, i know, the same thing, but different words have different impacts depending on the person.

Please pray for me.

[NB]

will do... 

[earlysda]

The talk went well.  Mostly it was a Bible study.  Only 11 of the students at the 135-student school are Adventist, so they probably made up about 1/4 of the audience.  After the program, two Adventist girls came up to my friend and asked him to pray for them.  They said they are not going to take the exams on the Sabbath.  Now this school is owned by a SDA man!!!!!  I pray that the owner will repent, and trust more in the blessings God wishes to give than in the million plus dollars some evangelical Christian group has invested in his campus to re-build a hospital there.

[NB]

thank you for the update.... I hope the girls prayers are answered in some way... good for them for taking such a stand for our Lord

[earlysda]

Haven't heard yet what happened to the two girls....

October 21-25 there will be an evangelistic series for the Tamil-speaking people of Mumbai.  The Tamil-speakers are of course from Tamil Nadu, and have gone to the big city in Maharastra to find money.  It is estimated that there is around 800,000 population of them in this 20,000,000+ city.  They are usually poorer (than even the low standards) of the native people, and many live in slums.  Many of them are Christian, and being away from their home-town, they are more open to the gospel.  But we SDAs have been sitting on our bums.  There is one large church downtown to which only 30 people come to every Sabbath (English), and several other Marathi or Hindi-speaking churches.  Probably there are less than 2,000 members in this great city, even tho it was reported by the Division president's wife that last year there were 1,500 baptized just in this city alone - ha! (so don't believe much of what you read about baptisms in third-world countries). 

Anyway, there will be an evangelistic series, and i'm going to have a drawing of Jesus' Second Coming printed up on standard paper size, and laminated, and given away to the 500 or so attendees they are expecting.  Do you think that is a good idea?  I offered to pay for some of the expenses, like to rent the hall for 5 days will probably cost over 200usd, but was told that even tho the top pastor for Mumbai is trying to snag all the funds donated from overseas for these meetings, they know that God will provide, and they would rather have something for the attendees to take home.  I hope to have a little table too selling Tamil 1858gc books.

Please pray for us.

[NB]

this sounds good... and I hope the weather will be better so that more people will be coming to the meetings...  I like the idea of the laminated picture.  Something they can put up in their homes and keep their eyes on Jesus.   

[earlysda]

The family i stay with now both came out of the Catholic church, so they are (the husband) quite against any kind of picture to display of Jesus, as they've been in a situation where that pic became a "god".  But i think if the pic is used to lift the mind up to God, it can be of tremendous use.  There is nothing wrong with illustrating heavenly principles, but in making out the picture to have some special power or something - then that is an idol.

Now i have to decide today what Bible text to add to the pic, as i want the pic to point them to the Word.  What would you suggest?  I'm thinking of something along the lines of "and every eye shall see him", but maybe it should be something like "and the dead in Christ shall rise first".

[NB]

I like 'every eye shall see Him' because it also points to the 2nd coming which many are not in opposition to for some odd reason.  It is our great hope! 

Yeah, some have a problem with pictures but as you said we are not to think that they hold any power and bow down to them...  we have one in the church that is against all pictures of Jesus and it is kinda crazy how he destroys all pictures of Jesus.  It almost gives the impression that he is doing evil and that could be a stumbling block for some...

[Agape]

ohdear... i too am one of those who resists any imaginary picture of Jesus being displayed.
He looks in all as a mamby-pamby european weakling in most poses.
What I could take acception to is when someone finally does a picture of how the Son of God, our King looks like as described in the book of Revelation.

The danger in your asian part of the world is indeed real with using idols and pictures for worshiping and praying to for needs. This would cause me to resist making the pictures and handing them out.

I see that you talked with Newbie about this last October. Would you tell me what happened with your plans of giving them all an imaginary picture of Jesus?

[earlysda]

Yes, i used the drawing of Jesus sitting on the cloudy throne surrounded by his golden-haired angels, and used the text "and every eye shall see himl".  I printed up 500 copies, and am down to about 100 now.  I know that this drawing will be nearly the only witness some of the seers will ever have of Jesus, so tried to make it very nice with lamination and everything.  In Jakarta one SDA family mother took a hint from the drawing, and started writing notes in various places around the house (even in the bathroom!) about keeping our thots in heaven

I agree with you totally about the mamby-pamby thing - something i usually call the "marshmallow god".  Somehow most people can accept a little baby Jesus, or one that is weak, but get concerned when he is shown in his power and glory coming to judge the people.