TEAM PLAYER;The Rot of Segregation The GROWJOURNAL May - August 2011. Editor: David Dungji Chinke Contributors: Rotkang Job Randal Dick(guest) ISSN: 2141 - 9507 Published in Nigeria © 2011 by Engraved in Gold Media Enterprises +2348065721408 Jos, Plateau State Nigeria " EDITORIAL : What Difference Can 1, Make? I love basketball, and basketball; like football is a team sport, no matter how much one can dribble and shoot, he/she is no good without the team. But once in a while, in sporting history, someone emerges that is somewhat ahead of the other players. He/she shoots three pointers and layups, he/she dribbles, passes and dunks, most of these types are all-rounded and make a lot of shots and tend to look like they actually win the game for the team. Michael Jordan is one of such who had a knack for winning games at the last minute; he was described once as 10 years ahead of his generation, even Clyde Drexler, Scottie Pippen, Charles Barclay and our own award winning Hakeem Olajuwon, could not match his record in the NBA. Though Jordan was way ahead of his compatriots, he definitely could not do it without them and definitely for a time had most of his assists from one other exceptional team mate: Scottie Pippen. Many exceptional ball players have the same history, Coby Briant had Sharkyl O’Neal, Rasheedi Yekini had Daniel Amokachi, Finidi George, Sunday Oliseh and so on. But even so, these exceptional individuals tend to still stand out in the crowd! This is because the very principle behind teamwork is built on the character and stamina of the individual player. When these individuals are not in one accord or do not give their best, the team often suffers. This happened to the Las Angeles Lakers when Coby and Shark were not in good terms. It also happened to the super eagles when the players stopped passing the ball to Rasheedi Yekini. One hot afternoon as I walked down a small path, laid on a beautiful lawn, I couldn’t help but notice a beautiful tree planted in the middle of the lawn. I wondered about God’s greatness to design a tree like that. It had a beautiful canopy that provided such a beautiful efficient cover against the scorching sun. The popular proverb says: a tree can never make a forest. This wise saying carries a lot of weight, but at the same time, when looking at it from another perspective, better one tree than none at all! As you read this edition of the GROW Journal, imagine yourself in a hot desert, looking for a shade to sit under, though the cactus is known to have many uses these days; I bet you that in a place like that you would prefer one good, Shady tree any day than a hundred poisonous cactus plants spread over the landscape. This edition of The GROW Journal focuses on the Universal focus of Christ’s mission and how individual persons and groups play their unique roles within the greater team to make humanity truly free! Far opposed to the concept of social segregation. " COVER : Team Player; The Rot of Segregation! By David Dungji Chinke Segregation is defined by the Encarta dictionary as : enforced separation of groups: the practice of keeping ethnic, racial, religious, or gender groups separate, especially by enforcing the use of separate schools, transportation, housing, and other facilities, and usually discriminating against a minority group. (Microsoft® Encarta® 2008. © 1993-2007 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.) There are many reasons why people are separated from others, sometimes it is for their own good; for health reasons, sometimes sick people are quarantined to stop the spread of a disease! But some other times segregation is illegal and dehumanizing. In fact it is a well known fact that Hitler of Germany tried to use the principle of quarantine to wipe out the Jews during the second world war (see the third Reich by Albert Speer). This was a norm years ago when the world was built on ethnocentricity and slavery – different races and tribes dominated one another and held weaker races and tribes as slaves – the weaker ones often suffered segregation and even alienation. Most recent is what we have in the truncated apartheid regime of south Africa, the genocide in Rwanda and that of Bosnia in Europe. Black slaves suffered this also in United States of America a long time ago, until it was vigorously fought by the civil rights movements in those days! The allied forces fought Hitler of Germany for a similar reason. In Africa, it is not uncommon to find certain groups that are segregated and even discriminated against; such tribal groups and indeed families are described as outcasts and derogatory names are used to describe them. Though some of these things are fading away, we still struggle with some tribal conflicts. Within our smaller units, it is not uncommon to find certain families and groups still being judged by their history as being undesirable for some certain positions in the larger community. Today the world has not completely overcome these ills but the United Nations forms a very strong force against dehumanization especially through unjust segregation. Every individual Human being is to be treated based on his or her own personal merit. When looking at it from the bible which is arguably the most reliable source of ancient history available to us today, we see that segregation began as both a man made and God made phenomenon (and thus is used to achieve both positive and negative results). It all began from Genesis 3 after the fall when God chased Adam and eve out of the Garden of Eden so that they could not partake of the tree of life. Then follows Cain who was punished for murder, he was made a wonderer and marked out from the rest of humanity. Then Enoch was taken away by God because he was so close to God. Genesis 6:1 and Jude 1:6 then record for us that God decided to segregate certain unscrupulous beings that were tampering with his human creation. As a result of this wickedness was increasing on the earth. GE 6:1 When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the LORD said, "My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and twenty years." GE 6:4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days--and also afterward--when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown. GE 6:5 The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. 6 The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain. 7 So the LORD said, "I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth--men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air--for I am grieved that I have made them." 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD. God decided to destroy all humans on the earth and only Noah and his family were spared. This process also involved segregation. Noah and his family were protected in the big water vessel called the ark. After this world disaster, God Himself regretted what he had done and promised Noah he would never destroy the world again (Genesis 8:20-22). 1 The LORD smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: "Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done. But not long after this, Noah’s great – great grand children began rebelling against God again. These people practically redefined the meaning of segregation. God had instructed Noah to make sure he multiplies and fills the whole earth, he was not to separate himself from the rest of the undiscovered earth (Genesis 9:1-3). He was to dominate and rule over it. The people instead decided to cluster in one place and build a city and tower called Babel. They were more interested in reaching heaven rather than dominating the earth. Therefore they segregated themselves from the rest of the unconquered earth. Probably as someone once pointed out: in their baby like way of thinking thought they would survive at the high points in the tower, just in case God decided to change his mind and send another flood after all! God was not happy with this and he confused their languages and this started a new kind of segregation! People were from then on segregated by language barrier and also probably by race also! From then on, racial and language barriers have been one of the major causes of large scale conflicts. Indeed the real core issue is as a result of disagreements between individuals. In an article I wrote in the COCIN Headquarters youth magazine of 1999, Youth of Standard: I made this point, that temperament may be indeed the unit of culture. I do believe that many sociologists and psychologists will agree with me on this. Our differences in the way we think and in our desire to rule and dominate most often is the cause of conflicts and is a major factor contributing to communication gap in addition to language differences and skin color. This is clearly shown as segregated people often experience enmity with the very people they originate from. This is shown clearly in the biblical story of Abraham in Genesis 12: 1 who was drawn from the Chaldeans, or the people of Babylon. Abraham on God’s instructions journeyed to the land of Canaan to take possession of it. Israel, Abraham’s seed were a people segregated by God himself in order to create a kingdom and civilization that would meet his standards of what he felt humanity was supposed to be. In the book of 2nd Kings we see how God used the Chaldeans to conquer Israel the children of Abraham when they consistently disobeyed him. In that process he began what I call the Theocratic timeline shift. A process that brought all humans together again to begin afresh what God himself had truncated at the tower of Babel. God had stopped them from uniting to make a name for themselves, because they had not yet obeyed him by filling and dominating the whole earth. But now after creating this unique Jewish civilization, he desired them to share its values through integration with the rest of the world. The contribution of Daniel and his three friends to the Babylonian kingdom was a little part of this missionary move. This move was calumniated by the appearance of Jesus who united all humanity and defeated Satan with his death on the cross and resurrection. The bible says in Galatians 3: 28: 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. And in Colossians 3:11 Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all. And also in Romans 10:12 For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile--the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." Jesus reversed the curse of Adam to restore the true image of God to Man. So that no man may be segregated and thus maltreated based on his, temperament, personality, age, gender, tribe, race or the group he/she belongs to. Each person is given a right to life and livelihood. Segregation within the Body of Christ Signs of trouble began when Acts records that : AC 6:1 In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. Deacons were quickly appointed to deal with the situation, these were spiritual men who were full of wisdom. These problems do also occur today and are not something Christ did not envisage; he himself said the kingdom was that of wheat and weeds. That the kingdom would remain this way until the time of the harvest when the wheat will be separated from the weeds. The weeds would be burned up. This appears to be a threat of a greater segregation and even a possible holocaust. This elimination of the weeds was to be done by God himself and not men, and he in fact stated that angels have been barred from conducting any form of separation at this point. Indeed segregation in the church is only a measure taken in extreme cases of unrepentant wrong doing! (1st Cor. 5:1-5). Church history shows that when human beings take too much into their hands in their efforts to discipline one another, the devil takes advantage of such to perpetrate evil. Because of this, some have over the ages lumped Christianity with a few other religions that tend to be tyrannical and inhuman. But indeed the church also started as a victim of segregation, for years before Emperor Constantine, Christians were even killed for being Christians which forced them to hide and separate themselves from the world in order to meet together in fellowship. In the church today, there are two types of segregation: 1. Self imposed segregation 2. Segregation by the rest of the church Self imposed segregation comes when a group of people feel they alone possess the truth and declare exclusivity thus they see all others as inferior. Some of these groups become victims of segregation by the rest of the church because of some perceived unchristian doctrines. Some segregated groups become cults or are labeled as such by the others. But segregation in the church has been known to evolve into a less desirable situation; some segregated cult groups have been known to have deteriorated into occults. Others have developed into powerful denominations or even world religions. But as I tried to point out in the book The Right to be Wrong; Humanities only Plea and the Key to Revival: even the church today needs to learn from Christ’s way of solving problems of differences of opinion. Love was his answer, Love of God and neighbor and submission to God’s greater will. Indeed Jesus insists that he alone is the way to human beings living a fulfilled life here on earth and beyond. He asserts that the power to live above the deficiencies and failures of human nature which make a human being to look down on his or her neighbor are vested in Jesus himself. He often challenged people to see him as one who is beyond such boundaries as seen in Mathew 15:25 MT 15:25 The woman came and knelt before him. "Lord, help me!" she said. MT 15:26 He replied, "It is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to their dogs." MT 15:27 "Yes, Lord," she said, "but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table." MT 15:28 Then Jesus answered, "Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted." And her daughter was healed from that very hour. Jesus challenged the ethnocentric tendencies of this so called gentile woman in this way by indirectly referring to her as a dog! (In Nigeria we call this “Abokin Wasa”) She boldly retorted, yes even if I am a dog, give me what is due to me, I know I am still important to you! She got a commendation and a miracle! He repeated this in his encounter with the Samaritan woman and the Roman centurion. That is why in my latest book the Kingdom of heaven on earth; the metaphysical dynamics of revival: Jesus is indeed the true humanist, and though the united nations and other humanitarian and humanist groups have tried to restore human dignity, and self esteem, even through teamwork in what has become now a global initiative, called the global village; Jesus is and remains the best protector of human dignity. Jesus preached and showed love, non retaliation, non segregation, kindness, health of the whole man, and he provided for the needy, not only physical food but life after death; thus we believe that the world must adopt a more Christ centric approach to humanities; instead of usurping and rejecting him, we must join his real body of believers scattered around the world within these well known self segregated groups called denominations to restore his genuine ministry and to bring back a better Humanity! That would indeed be the greatest team work! David Dungji CHINKE is a graduate of Bachelor of Arts in Theology (Missions and Evangelism) from Jos ECWA Theological Seminary (JETS). He was once a vibrant member of NIFES after which He has been involved in various youth programs as a youth leader which include the Grace Communion International (GCI) Youth Educational Program, and now he runs a non-denominational ministry called GROW in conjunction with Christ Revival Mission Interdenominational (CRMI). From his experiences with a formally non evangelical background, and a subsequent powerful experience with evangelical Christianity, he has written 4 life changing books which will greatly enrich your spiritual life and library. The GROW Journal is a recent part of these efforts. He is Married with one daughter. " Technology and Globalization By Rotkang Job Have you heard? Just like the Biblical story of the tower of Babel in the book of Genesis 11, man is at it again, determined in a step by step fashion, one block at a time, and either choking with mortar the gaps or spaces between blocks or laying cut out squared stones on one another, trying to reach God or make a name for themselves. But this time, building ideas and testing his knowledge through the biggest scientific project in the history of mankind, the L.H.C, not a building project though. The L.H.C, which is an acronym for Large Hadron Collider, is a giant particle accelerator machine, which is designed among other things, to simulate the conditions of the universe in the first fraction of a second of its history or birth. 13.7 – 15billion years ago when cosmic explosions took place – the big bang which created time and space. In other words, the large Hadron Collider (L.H.C), like the Biblical tower of Babel, is a collective effort, a worldwide collaboration or part of an ongoing international effort involving thousands of scientists, engineers, students, and has cost $ 10 billion including significant pieces of national budgets to unlock the secrets of the universe and displace God’s supremacy or dismiss Him as the one God, the creator of “the heavens and the earth”. The world is one on this project. “Behold” says God, “They are one people… and this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will be impossible”. In addition, this tool (The L.C.H) will look into the very nature of the physical world and, indirectly, into God’s. It will also, give scientist, new insight into a new world of the very small, smaller than the microbial world-atoms! This is one of the many implications of having a global village. Just as global cooperation is used to create new technology, technology itself has been created to aid and sustain this global community. One of the ways technology aids this global community is through cell phones or the popular GSM. With these innovations come many positive and negative implications, one question we all ask is: what part of these technological innovations can Christians freely participate in? Most of us have GSM phones which are now modified to even provide internet services (one of the technological inventions that contributes in no small way to this global community) and though useful projects like the GSM and the World Wide Web are not as daring in their motive as the L.C.H, we can’t help but consider seriously the ideas portrayed in the movies like: Arnold Swasniger’s Terminator and also Will Smith’s I-Robot, we @ GROW can’t help but wonder how many Christians (including we ourselves) who @ present are so eager to understand and point out the whereabouts of the 666 can throw away their Phones, laptops and internet modems if these inventions are actually used to bring into being the possible dreaded anti Christ World government!!? Rotkang Job is a graduate of the University of Jos with a degree in Microbiology. He is a literature enthusiast who writes the science and technology column of the Redeemed Christian Church Praise Digest. This article was featured in the October 2010 issue of the Praise Digest. Being a committed member of GROW; He has contributed to this edition of the Journal. The article has been modified to fit our present needs. " Invisible Missionaries in China By Randal Dick An important part of preaching the gospel is being sensitive to opportunities. An excellent example of this is the current global village economy, where rich or rapidly growing economies import cheep labor from other countries to fill their labor needs. Every week, an average of 1000 Filipinos leave the Manila airport on their way to be oversees guest workers. Increasingly, Christian leaders or the Philippines realize that these workers are being allowed into places where missionaries would not be permitted, and they have begun providing mission training to as many members as possible! Among those who are now actively spreading the gospel in China are a couple we shall call Mary and Jesse Escara. Mary and Jesse had a deep desire to reach parts of China were the gospel has not penetrated. They were given an opportunity to go to china on a one month tourist visa. At the end of the month, in order to obtain an extension, Jesse had to become a student. Although he had very little money, he sought enrolment in one of the universities. God gave favor, and he and Mary were granted student visas. Jesse immediately enrolled at the university for classes in Chinese language studies. Extra funds had to be spent for the visa upgrade as well as for mandatory medical examinations. Additionally, Mary suspected that she might be pregnant. Getting started in mission Mary and Jesse spent those first months waiting on God, in prayer, to see how he would open doors for them to reach people around them with the gospel. The area where they were working was home to more than 20 recognized ethnic minorities. At first Mary and Jesse went to universities, parks and public places to build friendships with Chinese people. They invited them to their apartment. When they had enough people, they began an “English Corner.” The group grew. After several meetings, they were able to determine that most of the group was open to reading the Bible and decided to convert the English corner into a small group Bible study. New comers continued to show up. To keep numbers small and reduce the risk of being reported to the authorities for conducting private meetings, they thought it best to start an additional English corner group on a different day of the week. Blessed in China God continued to bless and encourage them. It was confirmed that Mary was pregnant. By this time, their resources had dwindled down to about a two weeks budget. They transferred to a new apartment with nothing inside except for a small dining table and a bed. However, Jesse wanted to continue to host people in their apartment. On one occasion they were expecting more than 15 people, and they did not have a sofa. They reasoned that it would be more affordable to purchase an inexpensive carpet, and the guests could sit on the floor. He measured the floor area and calculated that they would need about $36 to cover the living room A few days before the event they were walking on a roadside when they heard a sound like falling dry leaves. When they looked down they found 300 RMB. One hundred RMB is about $12. You do the math! So that afternoon Jesse went to a hardware store and purchased the needed carpet. The big day arrived and Mary excitedly prepared Filipino dishes for their guests. They had a simple but joyful party. When the party ended and as their guests were departing, each of them, one by one, approached Jesse and gave him a gift of money. The total amount was more than 500 RMB (more than $60) – more than one month’s food allowance. The time arrived far too quickly and Mary had to return to the Philippines since it is illegal for foreigners to give birth in China. Jesse remained behind to complete the semester ad to disciple the two groups, which had grown to 40 people. He then returned to the Philippines to be at Mary’s side. Joshua was born, and the family arrived back in china the following year. This time they focused their work on a people in an even more remote province with a large Tibetan population. Joshua seems to be quite an effective missionary too. Mary and Jesse hoped the new baby would do well in the mission field. As it turns out, he is so full of smiles that many people cannot resist stopping to take another look at him, which of course results in many more conversations and some additional relationships. RANDAL Dick is the superintendant of Missions for Grace Communion International. Formally known as the WCG, this church was never truly known for its passion for mission except through TV broadcasting. This was because it was previously a segregated church that claimed exclusivity. But now Grace communion understands that even though God is disturbed by the sins of the world, he is also concerned that all sinners should be brought back to him! It has since become Evangelical. This is the mission that we at GROW still share with GCI and though we do not meet together anymore, we still keep in contact with their members here in Nigeria and abroad and wish them the greatest success as they try to send the message around: we were blind but now we can see! And we are not ashamed of it! This article is used with Permission from the Grace Communion International Website, WCG. Org /Window on the World.htm. © 2004. <<  <<   >>