Total Solar Eclipse

From Total Solar Eclipse

This morning we were all surprised at the splendour of the eclipse of the century. We have been longing for rain, but when I woke up to the sound of rain falling on my roof I was worried that our prayers had been heard just one day too soon.
As you can see in the photos there were some clouds, but we could see the sun except twice, first it was eclipsed by clouds for almost a minute and then the it hid behind the moon.
We could not have hoped for a better view of the eclipse.
My Ayah told me the story of how Ghona demands that the Sun repaid the loan she took when creating the Earth, the humans and all the other things in it. The Sun will never be able to make the final payment and so Ghona has her punished.
All Hindus, she said, plead with Ghona to release the Sun again. My Ayah admitted that she herself had stopped her cooking fire as a concession to that story when the Sun disappeared. She has heard a modern explanation of the phenomenon involving the Moon passing between the Earth and the Sun, she said but nobody in the village believes that. She has known the story since she childhood, and I'l have to concede that it did work again today.
I will go back to praying for rain.

No ghosts only evil spirits

Six year old Victoria turned my attention from 'The Last Mughal' by William Dalrymple with the statement. She and two friends were playing dominoes on my floor - building towers and discussing life.
At first I was shocked and asked her where she had heard that, but like all good children she was too loyal to tell, and when I had caught myself we talked about belonging to God and not needing to be afraid.
That was when my good Christian friend and neighbour Sprint who is also six gave me the second shock of the evening, 'I used to be afraid,' he told me, 'until my parents took me to the local which doctor who put an amulet around my neck. Now I am not afraid, but my [older] brother is still a little afraid.'
'Oh.' I managed to respond, not wanting to set him up against his parents.
The children continued their conversation with the two girls asking Sprint about when he had seen Jesus from his chest up in a cloud while they had been praying. The discussion was matter-of-factly and discussions ensued about whether Jesus' hair was long like that in the picture on Jonna's wall or shorter like in the Jesus film they have all seen.
They all agreed that there was a heart on his chest; not the popular one we usually draw, but one the shape of a fist with blood dripping from it. This is from a poster many Christians keep in their houses to ward of evil.
It was a rare moment of insight into the beliefs of my neighbours and friends through their children. I can reassure you that the names have been changed but am less sure there is much reassurance in there being no ghosts around being that there are still evil spirits.
Earlier today I received a phone call from a friend who had received a letter threatening him to move away from where he lives and has always lived - or face the consequences. The letter came in the mail but was not signed. When I reminded him that he would be protected here he replied, 'The laws of the country protect me, but the laws of the religion I left are clear about the consequences of leaving the faith.'
I will reassure myself that I have been baptised into the family of God and had the sign of the cross on my chest and my forehead as symbols that I belong to the One true God.
Pray with me that the children - and my friend; whatever the evil they may face will Know the power of the Almighty God who has overcome All evil.

There is Life in Bangladesh

Last week when my gardener invited me to visit his home church today for the baptism of twelve new believers I didn’t think I would go. Sunday is a work day and I don’t encourage (read; ‘allow’) my teachers to take time off on school days. As it is I only have one class on Sundays, and that with a co-teacher. From my gardener’s perspective the excuse didn’t really work. He ended up with support from my director and so I went.

I had planned on going by bicycle – it is only thirty minutes from here and I need the exercise – but then yesterday I was told the head of the church – the GS, was coming by in a car and invited me to join him.
We were due to leave at half past eight from LAMB so I had plenty of time for our monthly birthday celebration at the school which started at twenty to nine and finished in an hour. Church started at nine and we got there just in time for a light snack and tea. When the service was over at twenty past two we had been at it for over three hours. Nobody was troubled by the timing, and I have been here long enough that I impressed myself by not being bothered by it either. I’ll leave it to those who are so inclined to sort out when things happened and stick to the more interesting ‘what.’
I am not going to guarantee anything about the following as, apart from the sermon and my two minutes worth, everything was in Santali, a language I do not know.
The visitors, including myself, were invited to bring greetings and so we did. These included the clergy, the church politicians and representatives from two NGOs, one of which had paid for the feast afterwards the other being me. I didn’t realise until after I had had my turn that I wasn’t there as my gardener’s friend, but as the LAMB representative.
The first thing that happened after the introductions was a couple who were accepted back into the church after church discipline. They didn’t look too repentant, and the male part was an active participant in the church afterwards. I am blessed with not knowing anything about the story. The idea is that they are now forgiven so I really shouldn’t know; and don’t.
The sermon was exactly twenty two minutes from six before the hour until twenty seven past? It was a good sermon, the preacher who works at LAMB, started by saying he was going to read the text for today but was going to preach from Matthew sixteen. That’s not true, he started by praising the congregation for participating well and encouraging them to continue to come every Sunday so that the GS might be motivated to fund a bigger church building. The main point I took home from the sermon was that we can all be like Peter – perhaps not be too bright, but we can be used by God if we will let Him. (The sermon was in Bangla which I do understand.)
After the sermon, and before communion, there was to be baptisms. Two families from the village who have resisted the gospel have decided to become Christians. I would like to think that my gardener friend has had a part in this, but nobody took the honour for it, at least not in a language I could understand. Since there was a 'real' pastor there, the congregation also accepted three previously baptised Christian’s from another church into this congregation. They had been looking for a fellowship. We only call it sheep stealing when it is the other way. Besides, I have come to be rather fond of sheep stealing because it often means someone who is looking for money (rather than God) leaves one church and becomes part of another. In order to do so, he will have to go through some sort of Baptismal classes where he might hear the gospel again. He will then hopefully learn that becoming a Christian is not about getting rich – even if it is about God looking after his sheep.
Yesterday somebody called me and introduced himself with the following sentence, “I want to become a Christian because I need money.” He went on to explain how I would give him a job if he became a Christian and that many people do that. I told him that becoming a Christian would give him lots of trouble and no wealth and that he should try to find some of these people who have become Christians and rich to find out how they had done it, since I couldn’t help him. I can’t think of anybody who has become rich by becoming a Christian, but I know several Christians who have had their share for problems – my friend the gardener is one of these; he is an old man who doesn’t always have enough of anything in Maslow’s pyramid, not for himself, nor for his wife or children. No, that is not true, there seems to be genuine love between him and his wife. Her eyes were as bright as the sun and that in spite of her needing a cataract operation within the foreseeable future.
Sorry, I got sidetracked from the service, there were twelve new believers four little children, three not so little children an old widow and two sets of husband and wife, then there were the two toddlers whose parents took the opportunity now that the pastor was present to have their children baptised.

We aren’t quite done yet, but we did get ready for communion. It was an opportunity to see four pastors; the congregational pastor who has very little training and doubles as my gardener, the pastor who has responsibility for a greater area with several congregational pastors under him, then there was our former pastor at LAMB who is more senior again in some capacity and the GS who is the head of the church. They took turns giving out the empty cups, the oblate, the wine (rose water) and 'sitting out.' If there was anything that showed who was more important it might have been in the reading which my gardener didn’t do. Reading also required good young eyes as there were no electric lights in the church. (There were no candles either that would have made the heat unbearable.)

When everybody had been served, two of the pastors suddenly disappeared out the front of the church, I know from a photo shown later, that they went some ways into the village to find an old lady who was too weak to come to or sit in the church. The lady really needs wheels.
The last ceremony in the church was for a couple who had been married in a secular ceremony and now were blessed in church; a girl who might have been their daughter looked to be about eight so it was about time. (Couples who do not get their parents’ blessing to get married often run away and then get a church blessing once the marriage has been consummated.)
We were all ready to leave when someone remembered that the wives of two of the visiting people might also want to be introduced so we took the time to bring them up front and have them remind everybody who they were – as in who they were related to or perhaps how they are all related. It is a great pastime for many here to go through each other’s pedigree.

I had not been bored for a second in church, it probably helped that our former pastor had asked me to bring a camera, and called me up front to document every part of what happened, but also because I had time to reflect on how the congregation was alive and involved. It was great to be reminded that there is Life in Bangladesh.
I was also impressed by the relationships between the sexes. We sat on opposite sides in church, but there was room for all. The pastors were all men, but the men and women worked together at the feast afterwards, at least my gardener and his wife did. And they talked to each others as friends.
By the time we got to the end of the service I had passed my camera off to a boy of perhaps twelve. He was keen and did a great job taking photos.
I had time to enjoy the day and rejoice in what God is doing in one little corner of His kingdom in Bangladesh.

Lichu

This might not be the conventional spelling of what is possibly the best fruit in the world but it is worth sharing our blessings with others. God has certainly given us a fantastic treat.
One of my colleagues' daughters who goes to a boarding school is home on holidays. She invited me to come visit. When her mother asked what she was going to feed me, she replied 'Lichu' ['Li' as in list, 'ch' as in church and 'u' short and aspirated in a way I can't match to another English word.]


As we arrived, two colleagues and I, they were cleaning the seeds for next year's rice, and I got to help a bit. Then we were fed the lichu and tea. As we were about to continue our round to three other families from the school who live right there a wind blew up with the promise of rain.
We hurried home. As I savour the lichus and enjoy the relative cool of the evening we are still waiting for the promised rain.
Next come the mangoes...

Family everywhere

I went to Greece to spend Easter with my family; my brother and my parents. It was a great time because we know we belong together. It was good to reconnect and spend time together,
When I came back home, it was definitely like coming back to family here in Bangladesh. There are so many great people who make up for not having any biological family nearby.
Tomorrow I am going to Dhaka for a WMPL Field Conference. That is much like family too. I look forward to spending a couple of days with other missionaries talking about what God is doing in various places, to be refreshed and to be encouraged to continue in the work God has given me here.

With our hands

One of the highlights of of my week is first grade writing. The twelve pupils are keen to learn and work; they have the energy and enthusiasm of a hundred wild elephants.
The result isn't always as colourful as here but it is often hard for them to stop once they see what the result will be like.
On each 'leaf' they wrote something they can do with their hands. There is much good to be done.

Easter in Greece

After a holiday in Greece I am back at LAMB. It was wonderful to spend time with my family; parents and brother in Athens. There is so much (rubble) to see. Everywhere you look there is another pillar, column or piece of an ancient statue testifying to how old the place is.
The Greeks can boast of the oldest democratic constitution in the world - more than two thousand years old. It didn't include women and slaves, nobody is perfect. (They have changed it since.)
In Dubai, on the way to Athens, an electronics show offered to take a three dimensional photo of me and save it in a square of crystal glass. It was impressive, but it was nothing like the 3D statues the artists made in Greece around the time of Christ. The (remains of) old buildings and statues were truly impressive. The 3D photos in Dubai were a little expensive anno 2009. I reckon it would have been expensive in 9 AD too.
It was a great way to celebrate my mother's seventieth birthday.
Easter Sunday we participated in a Sonrise service at Areopagus, where Paul spoke to the Athenians. There wasn't quite the crowd I imagine would have been there in Acts 17, but the message was still about salvation in Christ.

Easter

I'm going on a holiday to Greece. You can see photos from my trip by clicking here but not until such times as when I have taken photos and had the opportunity to upload them there.
Leaving LAMB School for two weeks seems like a treat, and it is good to be able to leave knowing that there are good colleagues who will keep it running and care for the children here.
In Greece I will meet up with my parents and my brother to celebrate my mother's seventieth birthday. She is still young and it was her idea that in stead of the hard work of organising a party we go on to Athens together and relax.
I will miss the teen group and the church service they will lead on the Saturday before Easter Sunday. They have been working on worship, prayers, Bible readings and a sermon with a power point presentation explaining the stations of the cross. I have put photos of their illustrations made in plastic beads on my Danish blog.

Horror

When Karen asked for two days off two weeks after her grandfather died, I thought this was the traditional memorial service held by many thirteen days after someone dies.
The grandfather had died on the railway and, as is the tradition here, (almost) everybody that visited had lifted the sheet that covered his remains and seen the mutilated body. Though only nine years old, Karen had also seen the body.
On the second day of the ritual one of Karen's friends came to school saying that Karen had been possessed. I was called to talk to the children and asked what was going on.
The friend said the following. 'Karen smelled like she was possessed; of death and rotting [flesh].'
We talked about what other reasons there could be for the smell, and then about Karen being created and loved by God, and agreed that Karen belonged to God.
In the afternoon I talked to a colleague from the same people group (Santal) who explained that the ritual centres around calling the spirit of the deceased and appeasing it with sacrifices of food and wine.
I could hear the women ululate from my house and knew that the rituals continued to late into the night on the second day. Towards midnight a storm blew up and added to the fear of those present. (I know this from the testimony of a colleague who sheltered some of the relatives who had come to take part in the ritual.)
When I asked Karen about what had happened, she told me of her fear when 'the spirit had taken hold of her.' I don't think the makers of horror movies could have imagined it worse.
I asked Karen, and her cousin who is also a student at the school, whether they knew that God loved them; the cousin said he did, but Karen said no. I asked whether they knew that Jesus was stronger than the all spirits, again the cousin said he knew, and Karen that she didn't.
Some will question the truth in this story, please do.
I request your prayers for the children for whom this is what happened; pray that they will know that they are loved by God and that He is stronger than all that might otherwise scare them. Pray also for their families that they all may know the Truth and be set free.

Mutiny over

The mutiny is over for most, but for the families of those killed this is just the beginning of a long ordeal to deal with what has happened. Many will speculate as to how it could go so wrong; about fifty bodies have been found and the search is still on. You can read about this in Bangladeshi newspapers - see the links in my last blog below.
Pray for the children, wives and families of those killed that they will not, in addition to the loss of a father, a husband, a brother or a son also lose their own lives to grief, vengeance or hate.
Peace and order has been restored for most, pray for the peace of those who now grieve such losses.

Mutiny

Today the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR,) a division of the armed forces, mutinied for better pay and for autonomy - their officers are traditionally from the army. There has been fighting in Dhaka and tension in at least one other BDR camp.
In the late afternoon it looked as if a mutually acceptable solution had been found, but negotiations resumed at 9:30 pm because the BDR would not surrender for fear that the army would not honour the general amnesty declared by the prime minister earlier.
This is not a conflict that effects us a great deal in this part of the country, but it is a cause for prayer that the government will be able to maintain law and order.
If you want to get the latest Bangladeshi news first it is often available on bdnews24.com. If you want more in-depth news you should try The Daily Star.
I will go to bed and sleep, but before that I would like you to join in prayer for Bangladesh and all the people who feel they don't get the recognition they deserve. Pray for God's provisions for all, for justice for the oppressed and for a willingness to sacrifice not through dying but through living for others.

Too much old money

Money seems often to be a problem, most commonly because people feel they don't have enough. In an article, 'Withdaw false cases against JNU students' in The Daily Star on Wednesday, 11 February 2008 it was evident that there can sometimes be too much, too.
Agitated students from Jagannath University demonstrated for eight issues of which the last was a "demanded [for] removal of the Bangladesh Bank branch from the campus which pollutes air by burning old currency notes beside the campus."
I am sure there is a good explanation for this, but it is hard to imagine that there is that much old money to burn. You can read the entire article by clicking on the headline above.
If you have a better explanation, please leave a comment on this blog.

Dr Simon Sircar

The church of Bangladesh today, Sunday, 8 February 2009 mourns the death of Dr Rev Simon Sircar who died this Sunday morning at about ten thirty. We mourn with and pray for the family who grieve the loss of a husband, a father and a grandfather.
At the same time we praise God for the gift He gave us through Dr Simon Sircar. Dr Sircar was probably the greatest preacher of our time. For twenty two years he headed up College of Christian Theology in Bangladesh or (CCTB). Before that he served as a pastor in Immanuel Baptist Church in Dhaka. Dr Simon Sircar was the first Bangladeshi doctor of Theology.
Simon Sircar was known widely because of his extensive preaching ministry in churches of all (protestant) denominations. Many people testify to having met the Lord through his preaching and most Christians, at least in Northern Bangladesh will have benefited from his teaching and if not directly then most certainly from teaching by Dr Simon Sircar's students at CCTB.
Here at LAMB several Christians testify to the influence Dr Sircar has had on their faith and on how God used him to bring them into and closer into fellowship with God.
It was appropriate that the texts in our church today on Sunday Septuagesima were Jeremiah 1 about the anointing by God to speak His word to us. The second text was as appropriate from Phillipians 3 about the message Dr Simon Sircar preached, the message of the "righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me." (NIV) The last reading was from Matthew 25 about the talents and the faithful servant who used the gifts of God and was rewarded with Heaven. Simon Sircar was such a servant. He is now sharing his master's happiness.

Planting season

It is the time of the year when; no, it is one of the times of the year when the farmers are busy planting their fields.
The country undergoes a transformation from dirt brown to light green. It is fascinating to watch both the change and the labour that goes into this, the most important activity done in Bangladesh.
The farmers provide food for everybody. If the rice crop is good, everybody eats. If it isn't, many go hungry.
In this photo the life giving water is lead to a field far away. (There are more photos if you click on the one shown.) Over the next couple of months we will watch as the rice grows, the colours darken and then when the rice ripens we will watch as it brightens into yellow and harvest. Then there will be another planting season in April or May.
I hope to be able to show you the fruit of this labour.

Good news and bad news

The good news is that the present head of the government has expressed 'embarrassment' at misconduct in her own ranks.

Another news item is that 50,000 cases filed against members of a certain political party and 70,000 against another will be reviewed. This will be done because the filing of the cases or their verdicts might have been politically motivated. (The Daily Star, Tuesday, 27 January 2009.)

The good news is that if you belong to the first political party there is a political likelihood that you will get away with it. The bad news is that if you belong to the other you probably won’t.

The challenge for the present government is to prove the fear of the bad news wrong; a little more 'embarrassment' will go a long ways towards showing that the good news is that there is justice for all.

Please, Most Honourable, rise to the occasion; and to the rest, please pray.

It's the time of the year when

the countryside is transformed from this

by men like these

to the green and beautiful place we know as Bangladesh.

At my door today

I didn't know until today, but Chappo, like Bimol, had arrived yesterday afternoon. They both come from 'my' village and are neighbours, but they had not travelled together. They both wanted to see a doctor and came via the only person they know at LAMB - me.
Bimol stayed at my house and we spent the evening together talking about his family and my recent visit there with friends from Denmark. He shared about his concern for his children; their education and the engagement of his oldest daughter. We talked out and he went to bed while I was still preparing today's lessons at my laptop.
Chappo stayed on the veranda in front of the under-fives clinic. Because she is a woman she couldn't have stayed at my house anyway so perhaps it didn't matter that I hadn't seen her. We couldn't have talked much anyway; her village Bangla is a challenge, to say the least, for me to understand.
Chappo has come almost every month for several years now. She has a chronic illness that requires her to take medicine every day. A former missionary pays for her medicine and travel every month. (400-500 Taka; GB£ 4-5, US$ 6-7 or DKr 30-40) This has made a tremendous difference in her life. The first time she came, Chappo looked much older than her 50 or so years.
Bimol didn't stay for lunch as his back pain didn't require much other than pain killers and the compulsory worm medicine we seem to give all patients at LAMB - I don't think they are related. He wanted to get home as soon as possible.
Chappo came to the school to find me after she had seen a medical assistant. There was something not quite right with her heart sound and a senior doctor had been called upon to see her. Chappo understood as little or less about what the medical assistant had said as I did of her Bangla; she did understand enough to be afraid.
I was able to find a staff member in the out patient department who made sure Chappo got seen and reassured her as best he could.
The doctor took Chappo off of the medicine that so changed her life after her first visit to LAMB; perhaps the abnormality of the heart rhythm is a side effect of the medicine. Before she left on her four-hour return journey, Chappo came to the school and thanked me for the help I had given her over the years - her gratitude is hereby passed on to the former missionary who has paid for the treatment.
She didn't need my advice, she just needed someone to listen to her fear and encourage her hope in God. Then she left on her own.
Chappo is facing the realities of death - please pray for her. I know there are millions like her, but Chappo was the one who came to my door today.

Thank you Md Ahmed

After almost two years under a caretaker government led by Md Fakhrudin Ahmed Bangladesh today has a democratically elected parliament. The enormity of the achievement is hard to overstate. There is a world of difference between what would have been and the democratic elections that took place on 29 December 2008. Md Ahmed and his team of advisors have diligently worked to bring to justice the corrupt and to ensure free and fair elections for a country so proud of the freedom it gained in 1971.
I don't think any two year period in the history of Bangladesh has done more for democracy and freedom; many corrupt politicians have been brought to court; unjust systems have been changed; transparency in politics has been improved; new voters previously excluded because of cast or creed have been allowed to vote and today a democratically elected government was sworn in.
All of these changes have been accomplished by the diligent work and uncompromising effort of the Chief Advisor and his caretaker government since 11 January 2007. It has been possible only because Md Ahmed had the support of the armed forces and of the grate majority of people in Bangladesh.
There is reason for praise, there is reason for hope.
Thank God for Md Ahmed and pray for the newly elected Government.