Posted: 12/14/07

Sarah Blakeman (left) and sister Elli Blakeman are making their own Christmas gifts by knitting scarves. Their father, Clark Blakeman, joined the Advent Conspiracy last year to focus on relational gifts and donating money to charity at Christmas.

Churches push Advent
Conspiracy to teach real giving

By Nancy Haught

Religion News Service

PORTLAND, Ore. (RNS)—The Christmas contradiction gives Pastor Rick McKinley a headache.

Americans will spend about $475 billion this year on gifts, decorations and parties that many won’t even remember next year. They will run themselves ragged—shopping, wrapping and celebrating. And some won’t pay off their Christmas debt until March, if they’re lucky.

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent • What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

“We celebrate Jesus’ birthday by giving ourselves presents,” McKinley said. “We don’t give him anything.”

McKinley is pastor of the Imago Dei Community, a Christian church of about 1,500 members that meets in a high school auditorium here. It dawned on McKinley as he prepared an Advent sermon last year that the call today is to resist consumerism and give gifts like God does.

“These are relational gifts,” he said. God gives himself to people, and God wants people who will give of themselves to the poor.

So, McKinley and a few pastor friends from around the country hatched what they called the Advent Conspiracy. They challenged their congregations: Spend less on Christmas, give relational gifts and donate the money saved to the poor.

Three congregations collected $430,000—Imago Dei collected $110,000 on a single Sunday—and gave most of that to Living Water International, a nonprofit project that digs wells in the Third World.

In the following few months, word of the Advent Conspiracy spread over the Internet. McKinley and like-minded people such as Purpose Driven Life author Rick Warren talked about it every chance they got.

This year, about 491 churches from 10 nations joined the conspiracy, said Jeanne McKinley, who directs the program from Imago Dei Community with her husband, Rick. World Relief, an evangelical mission group, has recruited 500 more churches to participate. About 1,700 individuals joined on the Internet, she noted.

Rick McKinley asks one thing of his co-conspirators—that they donate at least 25 percent of their Christmas savings to clean water projects. The United Nations Development Program estimates $10 billion a year would help solve the shortage of clean water.

“The church needs to be on the leading edge of solving this problem,” he said.

Joining the Advent Conspiracy allowed Jan Carson to “let go of the frenzy of gift-giving and made the run-up to Christmas more peaceful,” she said. Carson wrote short stories for friends and relatives, and she created mix CDs for friends.

Clark Blakeman, another Imago Dei pastor and a conspiracy veteran, and his wife proposed it last year to their four teenagers as a first step toward a deeper understanding of Christmas.

“On Christmas morning, there were fewer gifts, but it was better than I ever would have expected,” Blakeman said. “It was so obvious that the kids took greater delight in the gifts they had made and how they would be received.”

And there was another gift that neither Blakeman nor McKinley anticipated. Families spend more time together as they plan and make gifts. It all becomes relational if people resist consumerism.

“We’re not asking that you don’t spend money on Christmas,” McKinley said, “just that you do it with the poor in mind.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

Two-year-old Anna Phillips works on painting the interior of a new playhouse built by students at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor.

Christmas brighter for children of military
families, thanks to UMHB student project

By Laura Frase

University of Mary Hardin-Baylor

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent • What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

BELTON—Globs of blue paint drip from 2-year-old Reagan Clark’s tiny hands. But before they form much of a puddle, he offers a high five to the blank canvas of his playhouse. He admires his artwork with pride and repeats his mark several times, then he immediately whirls around with a wide grin and fresh paint on his face, ready to go back for more.

Students built and painted four playhouses for four military families from First Baptist Church in Belton. All of the families have young children whose fathers won’t be home for Christmas.

“It’s just going to make it a little brighter this Christmas with Dad not at home,” said Jennifer Larkin, a UMHB freshman from Flower Mound.

The painting extravaganza was incorporated into the university’s traditional Hanging of the Wreaths event.

While students started painting the playhouses early in the day, they left enough to keep the children involved. For two hours, children were allowed to decorate the playhouses however they wanted.

As Jennifer Clark watched her children, Reagan and 5-year-old Easton, decorate their playhouse, a wave of emotion overcame her. Even though she wore a smile, tears streamed down her face.

“How do you put into words the thoughtfulness?” she said as she wiped away the tears. “The thoughtfulness that someone thinks about me. Why me? … It’s amazing.”

This is the Clark family’s second time to be stationed in Fort Hood. With fingers crossed, Clark said, she expects her husband to be home in January after a 15-month tour of duty.

“My kids are missing a whole lot with their dad, and I always wish I could do more,” Clark said. “I could’ve bought a playhouse, but I couldn’t put it together. I couldn’t paint it. … And there wouldn’t be the fellowship.”

Because military families frequently have to move, Clark said it’s hard to bring everything with them each time they relocate.

“Anything that is too big gets left behind,” she said.

But the children’s playhouse will make the move with the family when the time comes, she said. “We’ll always have it to remember Belton and UMHB.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

For some, happy holidays means no gifts

By Michele Melendez

Religion News Service

AUSTIN (RNS)—Scrap the gift lists. Trash the wrapping paper. Blow off the mall.

That’s the mind-set of Americans who can’t stomach exchanging holiday presents. They aren’t grinches or scrooges. They just reject what they consider the wastefulness and stress of the season.

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent • What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

“Over the years, I have watched as the gift-exchanging part of the family Christmas slowly became more and more the reason to get together and how it eventually seemed to become the showcase event of the day,” said Lora-Lee Blalock, 42, a homemaker and artist in Austin.

Blalock’s childhood memories of the holiday radiate warmth.

“We’d all travel from our homes and gather at my grandparents’ house to spend the day eating, playing games, making music together, watching Christmas specials on the TV and just spending time talking and being a family.”

Gifts were secondary.

Blalock said that in recent years she pestered her family to drop the gifts. This year, they’re trying it.

Last year, Noah and Sabrina Parsons of Eugene, Ore., were disgusted by the mounds of wrapping paper and packaging encasing their two young sons’ gifts, which required a trip to the dump. The Parsonses, who run a software company for small businesses, decided no presents this year.

“At the end of the day, you really don’t feel you’ve gained anything with all this stuff,” said Sabrina Parsons, 34.

This Christmas, the couple and their children, Timmy, 3, and Leo, 15 months, will funnel what they would have spent on gifts into a family trip to Mexico. It’s the kickoff to what they hope becomes a holiday tradition.

The parents figure they’ll start now, so when their sons are old enough to start asking questions, Mom and Dad can respond: “You’re not going to get gifts, but you’re getting to go to the beach or getting to go skiing or you’re going to this really cool place you’ve never been to before,” said Noah Parsons, 33.

Besides, the Parsons’ boys would be hard-pressed to recall what they got last year.

Gift amnesia strikes adults, too. Online polling may not be scientific, but consider this: 41 percent of Americans 18 and older polled via the Internet said they couldn’t remember their best holiday gift from last year. San Francisco-based Zoomerang conducted the survey in November for Excitations, a Sterling, Va., company specializing in experience-oriented gifts, including hang gliding.

Mary Louise Foley, campus minister at the University of Dayton, said worshippers should reflect: What is your perfect Christmas? Then try to come as close as possible. If that means no gifts, so be it.

Professing appreciation for a sense of community during the holidays, some have shaped their aversion to frenzied gift-giving into a tongue-in-cheek crusade.

Nina Paley, 39, an animator in New York, said her no-gifts awakening happened about 15 years ago, when she produced a comic strip called “Nina’s Adventures” for alternative weekly papers. One holiday season, she based one of her strips on a friend who plunged further into debt buying presents.

From this, Paley’s Christmas Resistance Movement arose. Its website—www.xmasresistance.org—proclaims: “No Shopping. No Presents. No Guilt!”

Whatever the occasion, mandatory offerings cheapen the moment, Paley said.

Obligatory “material gifts often function as a distraction from love—or lack thereof—rather than a conduit,” Paley said. “By making material gifts representations of love, love itself becomes a commodity. How can that not make one feel empty and hollow?”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

International students share Christmas joy

By Laura Frase

University of Mary Hardin-Baylor

BELTON—When Operation Christmas Child sought gifts for children in developing countries, University of Mary Hardin-Baylor international students heeded the call. For the last month, UMHB students from across the globe posted fliers, collected items and wrapped presents for children around the world.

Li-te (Anastasia) Li experiences a newfound joy in serving others as she assembles boxes of gifts for Operation Christmas Child.  Li and her friend Liu Chen (Linda) Tang in the background are both from mainland China. (Photos by Carol Woodward/UMHB)

“Children who have very little or nothing for Christmas can receive a shoebox full of surprises and often useful items,” said Katherine Graham, UMHB student co-coordinator for the project. “Not only can they see God’s love through these gifts, but also they can enjoy fun gifts on Christmas.”

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

Cross Cultural Crew, the university’s international student group, adopted the project because it offers a global outreach.

“It really hits home with these students,” said Elizabeth Tanaka, UMHB director of International Student Services.

This is the first time Graham, a freshman nursing major, has taken part in the project.

“I grew up in a third world country, Papua New Guinea, and I’ve seen poverty. I have seen these kinds of children receive presents. I’ve seen their faces light up, and the fun they can have with very simple things,” she said.

“It was good for me to catch a tiny glimpse of what love is being spread around the world, and how we can help practically.”

Through Operation Christmas Child, children receive shoeboxes filled with toys and toiletries. This year, the UMHB volunteers collected and filled more than 50 shoeboxes, ready to head overseas. The group divided items evenly—50 percent for necessities and 50 percent for the “fun stuff,” Tanaka explained.

Samaritan’s Purse adds age-appropriate booklets or coloring books that tell the story of Jesus. But occasionally, Tanaka said, students will add donated Bibles in the boxes for older children.

For Anastasia Li, wrapping Bibles, toys and other gifts for children overseas are all a first for her. Li, a UMHB student from Beijing, China, arrived to the United States in June, seeking a chance to learn of the country she had heard so much about. In her first six months, she already has learned more than she expected.

“When I come here, I was not a Christian,” Li said. “My friend helped me to know about God.”

After a taste of volunteering with her heart, Li knows Operation Christmas Child is her first step to serving God.

“I can feel how God is showing me something,” Li said.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

Who were those ‘wise men
from the East’ bearing gifts?

By Benedicta Cipolla

Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS)—They came. They saw. They gifted. That’s about all we know of the foreign visitors who traveled to Bethlehem to see the infant Jesus.

The scene ingrained in the public imagination—a stately procession of three kings in turbans, crowns, elaborate capes and fancy slippers, with an entourage of servants and camels trailing behind—isn’t from Scripture.

Stefan Kalipha (Gaspar), Nadim Sawalha (Melchior) and Eriq Ebouaney (Balthasar) portray the Magi in The Nativity Story, now out on DVD. Most of what's believed about the Magi is drawn from tradition rather than the Bible, experts agree. (RNS photo/Jaimie Trueblood/New Line Cinema)

In fact, the Gospels offer no evidence the wise men from the East were kings, or even that there were three of them—much less that they sidled up to a manger on dromedaries exactly 12 days after Jesus’ birth.

“Legends pop up when people begin to look closely at historical events,” said Christopher Bellitto, assistant professor of history at New Jersey’s Kean University. “They want to fill in the blanks.”

Only the Gospel of Matthew mentions “wise men from the East” who follow a star to Bethlehem. In the original Greek, they were called magoi (in Latin, magi), from the same root that gives us the word “magic.” It’s been posited they were astrologers or members of a Persian priestly caste.

But what matters more than their exact number and status, historians and Bible scholars agree, is that they were not Jews.

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent • What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

“For Matthew, the magic star leading the wise men to the place of Jesus’ birth is his way of saying what happened in Jesus is for the Gentile world as well,” said Marcus Borg, professor of religion and culture at Oregon State University and co-author of the new book, The First Christmas.

While Matthew doesn’t say they converted to Christianity, popular legend holds they were baptized by St. Thomas and died in Armenia in 55 A.D.

The first artistic depictions of the Magi are found in second-century Roman catacombs, but it wasn’t until the early third century, when Christian writer Tertullian referred to them as “almost kings,” that they began to cultivate a royal air.

Their kingly designation also echoes biblical passages in Isaiah and the Psalms. Prophecies foretold gifts of gold and frankincense, two of the three gifts the Magi brought. The third, myrrh, was a burial spice, which some believe foreshadowed Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Around the same time as Tertullian, Origen—a theologian in Alexandria, Egypt—set their number at three, likely because they carried three gifts, said Teresa Berger, a professor at Yale Divinity School.

Later, the wise men were portrayed as representatives of the three races of man as descended from Noah’s sons—Semitic, Indo-European and African.

Fast forward to the sixth century, when a Latin document recorded their names as Gaspar (or Caspar), Melchior and Balthazar, although the source is unknown, and different names exist in other languages.

By the time their relics arrived at the Cologne cathedral in 1164, after stops in Constantinople and Milan, the faithful venerated the Magi as saints, and festivals sprang up to honor them. A 14th-century report of an Epiphany play described costumed “kings” riding through Milan on horseback with a large retinue, similar to contemporary three kings parades in Latin America.

Today, Roman Catholics and some Protestants commemorate the Magi’s visit on Jan. 6 with the Feast of the Epiphany.

In Europe and Latin America, where Jan. 6 remains a holiday in some places, Epiphany folk customs abound. The elderly Befana and Babushka bring gifts to Italian and Russian children, while in Puerto Rico, the “tres reyes” are said to deposit presents in children’s shoes, often in exchange for oatmeal or hay left out overnight for their camels.

In Germany, children dress up as kings and process from house to house, collecting money for the poor, while French bakeries serve galette des rois, or kings’ cake.

In a handful of countries, people still mark their homes in chalk with the initials of the three wise men, CMB, which also stands for “Christus Mansionem Benedicat,” or “May Christ bless this house.”

The Magi may get short shrift in the United States compared to other countries, but they play an integral part in the Christmas story, cropping up in songs and often stealing the show in pageants.

William Studwell, a retired professor at Northern Illinois University and an expert on Christ-mas carols, chose “We Three Kings of Orient Are” as one of two ‘Carols of the Year’ for 2007 to mark its 150th anniversary.

He recalls his own Magi days fondly.

“It’s one of the only things I remember about third grade—being one of the kings,” he said.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

What if Christmas had not come?

By BO Baker

Can you imagine anything more saddening than a Christmas without the Savior? Whether one is a believer or not, we are all involved in the season of Christmas. We purchase gifts to give away. We joy in the sound of music showering down the neighborhood where we live. Expressions of care arriving come so invitingly as we listen to choirs of angels who never seem far away. I’ll be honest with you: I like it, all of it. Our cold hearts need the lift that Christmas brings.

Think about it: What if Jesus had not come? What if he had never entered the mind and heart of the Creator-God?

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent • What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

Suppose the Cross-figure had been little more than a poor grandstander, a radical religionist looking for attention.

Now to be honest, one must add to the story of the birth of a baby from Bethlehem Who introduced him, the touch of miracles that pointed to him, the cross that held him as he gave himself to all mankind, the tomb that lay open because of him, the angels who clung to the battlements of heaven longing to worship the King of Kingdom Come. Yes, all of this, and more. This is the truth that makes Christmas for all of us. Our future hope rests in the fact of the person of Jesus Christ.

Let me ask one more time: What if Christmas had not come? God help! But he did come; and nothing will ever be the same. And because he came, there’ll always be a Christmas:

So long as truth remains in trust,

Conceived with promise held inviolate;

So long as faith confirms the birth

Of day spring’s glad arriving;

So long as wise men find the star,

And shepherds know where angels are;

So long as gifts are brought with care,

And joyful laughter fills the air;

So long as hope responds in kind,

To share the breathless news divine;

So long as children dream their dreams,

Of lions and lambs in single ring;

So long as streets are free from hate,

Where young and old can congregate;

So long as fields awake to green,

Long winter’s wind still welcomes spring,

So long as angel’s anthem sing.

And Virgin’s child is crowned the King—

There’ll always be a Christmas.

BO Baker, a longtime Texas Baptist pastor and evangelist, has written a Christmas reflection for the Baptist Standard 32 consecutive years.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas’

By Sam Underwood

I was listening in (OK, go ahead and call it eavesdropping) on a conversation a couple of people were having in a restaurant. In my defense, it was one of those places where the tables are so crowded together, you might as well be sitting at the table with the ones next to you. I had not paid any real attention to them until one of them gave a heavy sigh and said, “I’m having a hard time getting in the Christmas spirit.”

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of adventWhat if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

Of course, that comment set off my radar. I wanted to hear the response of her companion, so I began to listen closely. Her reply was the sort that falls into the category of “What on earth does that mean?” But she said it anyway: “Oh, you will when the weather turns cold.” I’ve heard that one before, and I always wonder at its meaning. Is Christmas a season marker? Or does it depend on whether or not we have snow, like in the song or the movie? If that’s the case, there’s been no Christmas spirit around here in a very long time.

Even more, I have continued to think about what the first woman meant. What is “the Christmas spirit” she was asking about? Perhaps she meant she had not yet begun her annual shopping that supports the well-being of the economy. You know that siren song: You’re not a good American unless you’ve spent more than you can afford, and you’re not in the Christmas spirit until you’ve worked up the courage to brave mall crowds. Maybe her comment was nothing more than an expression of the dread she had for an unpleasant task.

I suspect it was more than either of those possibilities. I heard in her sigh a longing for something more than she was experiencing. And as I have continued to think about it, I have decided she was more in the Christmas spirit than she realized. What is the Christmas spirit if it is not, in some sense, a dissatisfaction with the way things are? If all had been perfect, if there were no sin and brokenness, no sorrow and pain, would there have been any need for God to invade this world in the life of Jesus? The spirit of Christmas is a spirit of dissatisfaction, a deep-seated, beyond words knowing there is more to life than what we have. But it is not merely a dissatisfaction; there is a longing at the heart of the frustration, a desire to experience “more.” The Apostle Paul says it eloquently in Romans 8 when he declares the whole creation “groans, longing for the redemption of mankind.”

The spirit of Christmas is a dissatisfaction and a desire. But it is more than either of these. At its heart, the spirit of Christmas is a confession that what we really need is beyond our power to buy, as much as we may try to do so. The spirit of Christmas is a gift given by God to those who wait, who sigh, who want God to work, to do something.

Even though she didn’t know it, that woman in the restaurant was much closer to Christmas than she thought. All she really needed was the gift of God’s grace in response to her longing sigh. Of course, that’s all any of us need. And, in Jesus, at Christmas, that is exactly what we have been given.

Sam Underwood is pastor of First Baptist Church in Farmers Branch.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

Miles cannot diminish connection between
Texas volunteer and Moldovan orphan

By George Henson

Staff Writer

CHISNAU, Moldova —Initially, Clay Palmer didn’t know why God led him to Moldova. But looking back, he can see two reasons—so God could work in his life and so he could meet a little girl named Tanya.

Palmer traveled to Moldova with Children’s Emergency Relief International, the international arm of Baptist Child & Family Services, to put shoes on the feet of Moldovan orphans.

Tanya, who was left parentless after her father left her family and her mother died, helps other orphans, working as a translator for the Children’s Emergency Relief International volunteer team that delivered winter boots and warm clothes to orphanages in Transniestria.

When Palmer met Tanya and her mother at a missionary guesthouse, they immediately connected.

“I believe meeting Tanya and her mother was one of the purposes God brought me here. The first was to break me down and make me not so harsh in my life,” said Palmer, a member to Bethel Baptist Church in New Caney.

Tanya’s mother’s bubbly spirit made an impression on him immediately.

“We hit it off, and by the end of the week, her mama would give me a big hug when we came back to the house at the end of the day and tell me how she had been praying for us, that we would be safe and see God work,” he recalled.

At the end of that first week, Tanya left a note for him saying she needed a backpack for school.

“I didn’t have a backpack, but Dearing (Garner, executive director of CERI) did,” Palmer said. “So, I went to him and said, ‘How much will you take for your backpack?’”

Whether the backpack was sold or given by Garner, Palmer no longer remembers, but that’s when he and Tanya bonded.

The next year when Palmer returned to Moldova, he immediately rekindled his relationship with Tanya and her mother.

See Related Articles: • Volunteers share warmth of God's love with needy people in Moldova • Miles cannot diminish connection between Texas volunteer and Moldovan orphan • Transitional living program keeps teen orphans from falling through the cracks • Former atheist shapes God-centered program in Moldova

“But her mother just didn’t look well, and I wrote in my diary, ‘Tanya’s mother doesn’t look well, and if anything ever happens to her, I think God wants me to take care of her,’” he recalled.

The next summer, Palmer learned Tanya’s mother had suffered a stroke and died.

Palmer and his wife began supporting Tanya financially through CERI’s foster care program.

They wanted to adopt Tanya and bring her to the United States, but one roadblock after another prevented that.

First, Moldova’s laws stipulate a parentless child must be declared an orphan by age 16 or the child is considered too old for adoption. Tanya’s father left when she was an infant, but he had not legally relinquished his parental rights. He eventually was found and through an intermediary officially terminated the relationship, but not before Tanya turned 16.

Attempts to secure a student visa or summer visa for Tanya to visit the United States also proved unsuccessful.

“I’m beginning to think this is where she’s supposed to be,” Palmer said on yet another trip to Moldova.

“What she has experienced is common here, and she has a support group that understands her and her culture. Later, she might still come to the States, but spiritually and emotionally right now, she’s better off here.”

Last year, Tanya joined the CERI team of volunteers as they traveled to Moldovan orphanages delivering winter boots.

“That’s when we really got to know each other well. Just getting to spend that extra time together each day was great,” he said with a beaming smile.

When Tanya wanted to improve her English skills, Palmer paid $100 for private English lessons. This year, she served as interpreter for the CERI team Palmer led as they ministered in churches, orphanages and juvenile detention centers throughout the Transniestrian region of Moldova.

“This week has been great,” Palmer said as he again delivered boots, hats and scarves to keep impoverished people a little warmer. “I’ve learned how spiritually mature she is, and that pleases me more than anything.

“And I don’t know—maybe that’s why God led me here again this year, to see how she is maturing.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

Transitional living program keeps teen
orphans from falling through the cracks

By George Henson

Staff Writer

CHISNAU, Moldova—Children’s Emergency Relief International wants to find adult sponsors not only for young children living in orphanages, but also for teenagers who have aged out of the institutions and have no place to go.

Children typically leave Moldova’s orphanages at age 16, at which point they are expected to find a place to live, secure a job and manage their own finances. When many find the challenge too difficult, then end up on the streets or in jail.

CERI is expanding a program designed to help those orphans with the support system they need to succeed in life.

Clay Palmer from Bethel Baptist Church in New Caney places new winter boots on the feet of a child in an orphanage in Transniestria.

For a number of years, CERI has helped orphans get a start through its independent living program. That program will soon be greatly expanded, said Tatiana Ceban, director of the transitional living program.

“We are currently working on the curriculum and hope to begin in March,” she said.

CERI’s central Moldova office works with three orphanages in the region. In those three orphanages, 199 will age out and will need to live on their own in the coming months.

A key component will be life-skills training—helping the young people know how to fill out a job application, budget their money, develop interpersonal skills, provide for their health and safety, and plan for the future. Gender education also will be a part of the program.

“They really have no role models for how men and women are to act,” Ceban said. “We will help them to see how to act appropriately.”

Their education will include information about the dangers of human trafficking—a major problem in eastern Europe. Teenagers also will learn computer and written communication skills, complete exercises to enhance their creative thinking skills and study the Bible.

CERI staff members are interviewing orphans who soon will be on their own so that they can adapt instruction to their individual circumstances, Ceban said.

See Related Articles: • Volunteers share warmth of God's love with needy people in Moldova • Miles cannot diminish connection between Texas volunteer and Moldovan orphan • Transitional living program keeps teen orphans from falling through the cracks • Former atheist shapes God-centered program in Moldova

CERI will help create a circle of support for each young person. Staff will seek to find a family member with whom the teenager can make a connection, as well as link the young person to a teacher, a mature friend, an advocate, a social worker, a mentor and a sponsor.

Mentors will be Christian young adults 21 to 23 years old from Moldova’s churches. The mentors will be carefully selected, trained and encouraged, Ceban said.

The program will begin by meeting in churches, but Ceban hopes donors will help the young people survive by providing for a building for the training.

Financial support for individual young people also is needed. Many have no family whatsoever, and without financial support, their options are limited.

But with help, success is possible.

Sisters Lilia and Elena were orphaned as young children. When they left the orphanage, CERI sponsors enabled them to share a 4-by-4-meter room and attend school. Now, both are approaching graduation. Lilia will graduate soon as a licensed nurse. Elena will graduate from the university and be an elementary school teacher.

Alisa is another success story. Her parents are still living, but both are alcoholics, and she asked to be removed from the home to escape the abuse there. She attends a school that will allow her to work as a police officer, notary or some other profession related to the law. Her sister, Luminita, attends hairstyling school.

Their two younger sisters, Doina and Anisia, live in an orphanage during the week but stay with them in a small room on the weekends.

The need for sponsors in the transitional living program is great. The amount varies but typically is between $85 and $150 per month and usually involves a one-year to four-year commitment. For more information, contact CERI at (281) 360-3702 or visit www.cerikids.org.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 12/14/07

Volunteers with Children’s Emergency Relief International, the global arm of Baptist Child & Family Services, fit children in Moldova’s Transniestrian orphanages with warm socks and winter boots.

Volunteers share warmth of God’s
love with needy people in Moldova

By George Henson

Staff Writer

TIRASPOL, Moldova—Mission volunteers from Texas, West Virginia and Tennes-see converged on Moldova’s Transniestrian region to warm the hearts—not to mention heads and feet—of impoverished people.

Children’s Emergency Relief International, the international arm of Baptist Child & Family Services, facilitated the trip. Volunteers delivered shoes, winter boots, socks and hats to 31 churches, three correctional facilities, three adult-care facilities for the elderly or disabled, three day-care centers and 12 orphanages.

See Related Articles: • Volunteers share warmth of God's love with needy people in Moldova • Miles cannot diminish connection between Texas volunteer and Moldovan orphan • Transitional living program keeps teen orphans from falling through the cracks • Former atheist shapes God-centered program in Moldova

Children beam with joy as they receive new shoes and socks from volunteers with Children’s Emergency Relief International.

Toddlers received sneakers provided through Buckner International’s Shoes for Souls program. Older children, teenagers and some adults received winter boots bought by CERI donors. More than 4,000 people received the footwear.

When the Soviet Union broke up in 1991 and Moldova declared its independence, the eastern region, Transniestria, wanted to stay tied to Russia. After skirmishes, U.N. peacekeepers stopped the conflict, but Moldova continues to embargo goods going to that region. Only Russia recognizes Transniestria as an independent nation.

Poverty is endemic. Many children in Transniestria’s orphanages still have parents living, but the children are sent to institutions so they can have food, clothing and shelter their parents cannot provide them. Resources in the orphanages are scarce, but children in some outlying villages have even less than the children living in orphanages.

While they were gratified to help, volunteers said it was difficult to see children with cold, dirty feet because both shoes and socks were worn through, exposing them to the cold, wet winters of Moldova. Many adults, some more than 80 years old, also received help.

At one stop, a juvenile detention center for boys ages 14 to 18, about 50 of the 59 boys were wearing slider sandals on a cold, wet, muddy day.

Volunteers sort socks by size before giving them to children in Moldova’s Transniestrian orphanages.

Jonathan Gray, minister of youth at Second Baptist Church in Houston—North Campus in Kingwood, said the trip made an impact on him.

“This is my very first mission experience outside of something local, and I’ve just been realizing what a blessing it is to me to be here. More than ever before, I think I realize how much service is a part of living life to the full, like the Bible talks about,” he said.

Weldon Knight of Kingwood has traveled to Moldova three times, and his wife, Joanne, has been four times. They also have sponsored four Moldovan children through CERI programs and remain in contact even with those who are now adults.

One particular scene Knight witnessed continues to haunt him. A young boy arrived wearing leggings that were soaked, muddy and full of holes. In order for the boy to keep the leggings and stay warm, he asked the mother if the feet of the leggings could be cut away before the new socks were put on. The mother gave permission, but then hit the boy in the head, because she was angry that he had embarrassed her.

“Anytime I’m putting shoes on a child’s feet, I think of the verse that says, ‘If you do it to the least of these, you do it to me.’ Well, today, I saw Jesus hit in the head,” Knight said with a cracking voice at the end of one day.

Ted McElroy of Houston first traveled to Transniestria two years ago. A very special part of his experience this year was seeing how children he met on his first trip had grown, he said.

The groups also attended church services in Transnies-trian churches. Seth Polk and Terry Vaughn, both of Cross Lanes Baptist Church in Cross Lanes, W.V., preached the English sermons. Translators interpreted the message into Russian for the locals, and then they translated the sermons of the local ministers to English for the Americans.

The Moldovan mission fit well with the West Virginia church’s emphasis on missions, said Polk, pastor of the congregation. Each year, the church is engaged in local missions, plans two other mission efforts within West Virginia, works on one mission project outside the state but within the United States, and involves members in two international mission trips. The church also dedicates 25 percent of its undesignated gifts to the Cooperative Program unified budget.

The church had been trying to work a Moldovan trip into its plans for a couple of years at the insistence of Vaughn, who was baptized by CERI Executive Director Dearing Garner while Garner was pastor of First Baptist Church in Kingwood.

The trip’s focus on ministering to widows and orphans attracted his attention, Polk said. After Garner made a trip to the church to give details of CERI’s mission, Polk knew it was something in which he wanted his church involved.

A focus on missions is important to the health of a church, Polk said.

“When we go, God blesses at home as well. In our culture, it’s so self-centered, but missions is God-focused and people-focused. It’s helps us to remember that our focus is not supposed to be on ourselves,” Polk said.

CERI teams have traveled to Moldova eight years. The agency was born out of a medical mission trip Garner led while pastor of the Kingwood church. After his retirement as pastor, he maintained his interest in the orphans and impoverished families of Moldova.

CERI also sponsors trips in January in which groups celebrate Christmas with orphans, since Romania observes Christmas according to the Orthodox calendar. CERI also sponsors summer camps with a Vacation Bible School format.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Storylist for week of 12/17/07

TAKE ME TO: Top Story |  Texas |  Opinion |  Baptists |  Faith & Culture |  Book Reviews |  Classifieds  |  Departments  |  Bible Study



• Former atheist shapes God-centered program in Moldova



• Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent


• Miles cannot diminish connection between Texas volunteer and Moldovan orphan

• Transitional living program keeps teen orphans from falling through the cracks

• Volunteers share warmth of God's love with needy people in Moldova

• Former atheist shapes God-centered program in Moldova

• TBM sends chainsaws to Oklahoma, blankets to Iraq

• Laredo ministry seeks to offer children in need a healthy start

• On the Move

• Around the State

• Texas Tidbits


Advent: Red Letter Days
• Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent

• Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont

• Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving

• Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience

• Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project

• For some, happy holidays means no gifts

• International students share Christmas joy

• Who were those ‘wise men from the East' bearing gifts?

• 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent


• Interracial New Baptist Covenant program focuses on unity in Christ

• New Jersey church makes good on $1 million pledge to Gulf Coast

• Baptist Briefs


• Seven tips for the 2007 tax-filing season

• Does ‘Compass' point kids in the wrong direction?

• Romney garners praise, criticism for church-state views in speech

• Practical tips on helping the homeless

• ‘Can you spare some change?' Many Christians unsure how to respond

• GodTube offers Christian alternative to YouTube

• Christian website offers YouTube alternative for wary Baptists

• Faith Digest


• Book Reviews


• Cartoon

• Classified Ads

• Texas Baptist Forum

• Around the State

• On the Move


• EDITORIAL: The gospel in one stunning eyeful

• DOWN HOME: Topanga's lucky tree wasn't aglow

• TOGETHER: Tune your heart to the wait

• RIGHT or WRONG? Meaning of persecution

• 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent

• What if Christmas had not come?

• Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

• Texas Baptist Forum



• BaptistWay Bible Series for December 16: Live the unbound life

• Bible Studies for Life Series for December 16: Being changed by the Savior

• Bible Studies for Life Series for December 23: Being changed by the Savior

We're sorry, but the Explore the Bible lessons will not be posted for at least the remainder of 2007.


Previously posted
• Executive Board may vote on short-term interim executive director

• South Texas Children's Home names president, CEO

• Brothers find home for Christmas

• Family Place helps mother leave fear behind

• Mission workers help bring clean water, love of Christ to Ethiopia

• Romney: ‘No candidate should become the spokesman for his faith'

• Study links video violence to aggressive behavior

• Adams provides pastoral care to HIV/AIDS community in New York

• Stem-cell breakthrough may not end debate—at least for now

• Baptist pastor on hit list in Turkey

• Veteran Baptist journalist Roy Jennings dies at age 83

• British Baptists: ‘Sorry about slavery'


• See articles from the previous 12/03/07 issue here.

Posted: 12/14/07

2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent

By Jason Patrick

As a pastor, I’ve experienced a few difficult Advent seasons in recent years. The season of great expectations seemingly arrives when I’ve experienced significant personal losses.

As a 24-year-old pastor in west Texas during the Advent season of 1999, I was going through the initial stages of a divorce; yet I was fortunate to have the comforting church family of Champion Baptist Church hold me up.

Advent: Red Letter Days • Happy New Year? For Christians it began with Advent • Christian motorcyclists and mudders bring Christmas cheer in Beaumont • Churches push Advent Conspiracy to teach real giving • Fair-trade items offer Christmas gifts with a conscience • Christmas brighter for children of military families, thanks to UMHB student project • For some, happy holidays means no gifts • International students share Christmas joy • Who were those “wise men from the East” bearing gifts? • 2nd Opinion: The two sides of advent • What if Christmas had not come? • Finding the ‘spirit of Christmas'

Two years later, while pastoring a church in Waco, Advent arrived soon after I received the news that my ex-wife and daughter were moving to Virginia. I knew the time I spent with my daughter would suffer significantly. They eventually moved back to Texas four years later, and I am thankful. But at the time of their departure, I leaned heavily upon Downsville Baptist Church. They held their pastor up.

Last year’s Advent season made more sense. I completed a doctorate at Baylor University, and I had been dating a wonderful young woman for a year. We were moving toward marriage. We were just waiting for the right door of ministry to open—a full-time pastorate or a teaching position at a university or a seminary. But the doors remained locked or were eventually closed. The seemingly futile search for a “job” wore down my love’s patience, and she ended our relationship in mid-November. Heartbroken by her loss, I needed to take a Sunday off. My church family understood. Their cards and phone calls expressed their readiness to be at my side.

Now, here again, I find myself in the midst of a painful Advent season.

On Dec. 9, the second Sunday of Advent, I preached for the fourth Sunday since life was turned upside down. The past three weeks, I’d been preaching through my grief, preaching to myself as much as to my congregation, attempting to convince myself again of the hope of Immanuel. Then during our time of invitation, as we sang “Softly and Tenderly,” a glimmer of the wonder of Advent shone through the gray clouds.

The glimmer’s name is Beth. Beth is married to Tim. They are a wonderful couple in their 30s with three children. Tim and Beth were present for me six years ago when I needed someone to talk to about my daughter’s move to Virginia. Beth is one of my few congregants who takes hold of the opportunity to see the invitation time of the service as more than the evangelistic call to come to Christ. During almost seven years as Downsville’s pastor, Beth has come forward on a few occasions to request that I pray with and for her in the midst of her own difficult seasons.

On that Sunday, Beth incarnated our Baptist conviction of the priesthood of the believer. As the second verse of “Softly and Tenderly” was coming to a close (my typical time to nod at our music minister to let her know two verses would suffice), I noticed Beth leaving her pew and coming forward. “Softly and Tenderly” would continue. When she reached the front of the church, she took my hands and whispered, “Today, I pray for you.” Beth softly spoke a prayer for comfort, encouragement and hope. After her “Amen,” she looked up, and tears were streaming down her face. And again, I was reminded that the pastor’s pastor is the church.

Advent is difficult again, but with Christ and his church, hopeful expectation continues to promise grace.

Jason N. Patrick is pastor of Downsville Baptist Church in Waco, Texas.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.