Global Mission Mondays: Qatar

We missed last week's global mission monday because we took a trip to visit Priluki and Chernigov, but we are back this week and praying for the country of Qatar.

Here is some information to help give us an idea of what Qatar is like:

Qatar has the third largest gas reserves, the highest GDP per capita, and the second highest income per capita in the world.  Qatar has an emirate-type government; its legal system combines Islamic (or Sharia) and civil law codes in a discretionary system of law controlled by the Emir who acts as an absolute monarch. 

Qatar has a high standard of living, with many social services offered to its citizens and all the amenities of any modern state. With no income tax, Qatar has one of the lowest tax rates in the world.  Many people from all over the world come to Qatar to work and expatriates form the majority of Qatar’s residents - nearly three quarters of the population of 1. 7 million.  The majority of the non-citizens are individuals from South and South East Asian and Arab countries working on temporary employment contracts and in most cases without their accompanying family members.

Qatar is a Muslim country and about 90% of the population is Muslim although there are many religions practiced by the various ethnic groups in the expat community.

No foreign missionary groups operate openly in the country, but the government allows churches to conduct Mass.

Qatar is a destination country for men and women from South and Southeast Asia who migrate willingly, but are subsequently trafficked into involuntary servitude as domestic workers and laborers, and, to a lesser extent, commercial sexual exploitation.  According to the Trafficking in Persons Report by the US State Department, men and women who are lured into Qatar by promises of high wages are often forced into underpaid labor. The report states that Qatari laws against forced labor are rarely enforced and that labor laws often result in the detention of victims in deportation centers, pending the completion of legal proceedings. The report places Qatar at tier 3, as one of the countries that neither satisfies the minimum standards nor demonstrates significant efforts to come into compliance.

[information via wikipedia]

Birthday Party at the rehab center

Today I drove out to the rehab center in Sloboda for our weekly bible study.  When I got there I found out that today was their cook Vova's birthday and he had been cooking for two days straight for his birthday meal.  So we all sat around the table and I got a second lunch out of the deal.

Vova said this was the best birthday he can remember as the last few birthdays were either spent in prison or strung out on drugs somewhere.   It was visible on his face that he was just happy to be with a group of guys who cared about him regardless of the fact that he was in a rundown house in a village.

After lunch we studied Ephesians together.  These guys are growing in their ability to study the bible and it is always a joy for me to see them thinking through scripture and trying to understand it and apply it to their lives. 

A must-read book about Christianity in Ukraine

Last summer I saw Communities of the Converted at the Knotts' house and I started thumbing through it, intrigued by a book about evangelical communities in Ukraine.  We ended up buying the book and in September I started reading it finally finishing it a few weeks ago.


Robert Legvold wrote this review of the book that does a much better job summarizing Catherine Wanner's work than I could:

 "Wanner, a historian and anthropologist, provides a fascinating entrée into contemporary Ukrainian culture by exploring evangelism's surprising resurgence in the chaotic crosswinds of post-Soviet life. The phenomenon is not new. It traces back to the nineteenth century, waxing and waning with the imperial and Soviet regimes' fluctuating moods. Wanner does more than detail the flow of evangelists in and out of Ukraine, the size of their swelling congregations and collateral enterprises, and their role in society. In subtle but lucid fashion, she plumbs the complex interactions that result when Western evangelism encounters Ukrainian ways, changing both; explores the thrust and meaning of conversion for the converted; weighs the impact of global ties on Ukrainian evangelism; and explains the unique success of Pentecostal movements in the country. She weaves into her analysis the voices of missionaries and believers, from individual entrepreneurs to members of Europe's largest evangelical church -- which happens to be located in Kiev."

This book was the first book I've read that traces the origins of the evangelical church in Ukraine, explains how it grew and changed under Soviet rule,  and how it reacted after the fall of the Soviet Union.  In many ways it helped me to understand why the Baptists churches are not at all like American Baptist churches, why the Pentecostal churches are the way they are,  how the church's persecution by the U.S.S.R influenced the way that the church relates to work, education, and culture.  Most of all it helped me understand the evangelical mindset in Ukraine as it put into words (with historical support) things I have noticed and wondered about living in Ukraine for the last 10 years. 

For any evangelical from the west that is planning on living long term in Ukraine this is a must read book. 

Remodel project

Today we replaced two more of the old drafty wooden windows, leaving only one window left to replace.  The process is pretty messy so we have been going room by room.  

This is a picture taken last year about his time.  To take out the windows we had to chip out the plaster and undercoat all the way to the wooden frame around the window.  Then we removed the window sill (which we stripped of paint using a heat gun) pulled the windows out of the frame and then pulled frame out.

The new windows install fairly easily.  We attached them to the brick work to hold them level and then using mounting foam along the edges to seal and hold the window in place.

Then we took apart the window frame and used the longer boards to extend the windowsill by about 4 inches. 

The next step will be to put up drywall along the sides and then plaster and paint. 

Global Mission Mondays: Kuwait

Tonight at our church prayer meeting we will be praying for Kuwait.  Here are a few facts about Kuwait to help give us a picture of what is going on in Kuwait and how we can pray.

Kuwait is a country of about 3 million people, nearly 2/3rds of which are expatriates who have come to Kuwait to work.  The country has the world's fifth largest oil reserves, and has about a tenth of the worlds oil.  Kuwait is the eleventh richest country in the world per capita. 

Estimates of the percentage of people in Kuwait who practice Islam vary between 89% and 99%.  Despite Islam being the state religion, Kuwait has a large community of Christians (est. 300,000 to 400,000), Hindus (est. 300,000), Buddhists (est. 100,000), and Sikhs (est. 10,000). Hindus account for the largest number of expatriates in Kuwait. Members of religious groups not mentioned in the Quran, such as Hindus, Sikhs and Buddhists, are not allowed to build places of worship or other religious facilities.

[information from wikipedia]

In Lumine website

This week I spent some time updating In Lumine Media's website.  

If you haven't checked out our site recently click on over and have a look at what we are up to with book publishing in Ukraine. 

Reading List: Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl

Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl was in the attendee bag at the Desiring God national conference last fall and since it looked like a lighter read than most of the books I've been trying to work my way through, I picked it to be next on my list.

N.D. Wilson writes with a style that goes from tongue-in-cheek, to a carnival announcer selling tickets to a side show, to an impudent philosophy student, to poetic storyteller.   He reminds me of Chesterton and probably would be very happy to hear that, as he is a big fan of the man.  

The book is about this world we live in, its fascinating inhabitants, its absurdities, the ridiculous and tilt speed with which it spins, and how all of these things point us to a Creator who is much bigger than we normally think, much more imaginative than we usually give Him credit for, and much more down to earth than one would expect. 

Wilson is a storyteller who sees life for what it is: God's story of which we are all a part.  I enjoyed the view that Wilson gave of the world.  I enjoyed the vivid storytelling that made me want to preach better and made me want to help others see God as the divine storyteller who speaks us into existence and gives us a part to play in His story.

First off my reading list

The first book on my 2011 reading list was "Preaching Christ in All of Scripture" by Edmund Clowney.  Nearly all the endorsements for this book agreed that anyone who preaches should read this book (which is partly why I bought it) and after reading it I would have to agree with them.

Clowney shows how to see that all of Scripture speaks of Christ and how to present Christ from all of Scripture without allegorically looking at every story, or forcing Christ into the text.

After showing how Christ is the central theme of the bible, Clowney devotes several chapters to sermons that he wrote in order to show how to preach Christ from various sections of scripture.

I was already familiar with Clowney's ideas, as I'd listened to a class on preaching Christ that he taught with Tim Keller at RTS, but I still found the book very helpful and very informative.   I would recommend both listening to the lectures (available on iTunesU) and reading this book if you are a teacher or preacher.

Culinary Cultural Differences

I saw this the other day on one of the food blogs in our RSS reader and it made me think about some of the conversations I'd had with Ukrainians about why Americans don't like certain Ukrainian dishes:

Chris Cosentino: I think for a lot of people, texture is a big issue. We’re a culture of texture. Every country has its preferred food texture. . . Our texture is crunchy. We like our potato chips, our tortilla chips, our french fries, our fried chicken. We’re not a culture of jiggly and soft.

Just recently I had to explain to some friends that I don't like holodetz because of the texture. The flavor is like gravy but gravy shouldn't have the texture of jello. 

While American taste may be mostly for crunchy things like Cosentino says, I just thought it was interesting that texture actually is a cultural taste.  Because of that we take for granted our value of certain textures and never stop to think that other cultures may not value that texture at all.   Who knows, after another decade in Ukraine I might find that my preferred texture is no longer crunchy...or I may convert Ukraine to my preference of crunchy.  We'll see.