Greetings from Charlotte,
On the world scene this week, wildfires and searing heat are scorching the "gay-friendly" nation of Australia (see "News and Prophecy" article), refugees from war-torn Syria are struggling with mud and freezing rains in Jordanian camps, Britain is preparing to leave (and perhaps help reshape) the EU, and America continues to spend money it does not have—in what promises to be a very interesting new year! Here in Charlotte, Mr. Meredith has been writing and holding meetings. His Tomorrow's World program last weekend, entitled "The Soon-Coming Great Tribulation," is expected to draw more than 4,800 responses. Mr. King's program the previous week, entitled "The Apostles' Amazing Journeys," received a total of 5,347 responses. Mr. Meredith is also preparing to do a live Tomorrow's World Online Presentation, entitled "What's Ahead for America and the World," scheduled for Sunday, February 10. Mr. Mario Hernandez has returned safely from visits in Guatemala and Mexico. He reports that brethren are very positive in spite of dangerous conditions in parts of those countries. Living University classes will begin next Wednesday, January 16, and we are looking forward to another very positive semester—see announcement below.—DSW
Church Administration
From the Australasian News Update
Update on Brethren in the Philippines (Typhoon Bopha Disaster Update): In the Philippines we have ten brethren whose houses were wrecked and eight who were given assistance for new roofs, relief goods and groceries. Now that they have shelter at night, they have started to clear the debris around their houses and are able to sow some seed in their farms. We will take care of another two families who have just communicated to us their problems. The brethren in Camval province want to thank [everyone] for their care and prayers. Most of our brethren have their property intact, though soaked during the typhoon, but no lives were lost—including animals. Their farms, plants and houses were the only victims of the storm.—Felipe Casing
Firstfruits of the Tomorrow's World telecast in Hong Kong: Today [December 30], we baptized the firstfruits of the Tomorrow's World telecast in China... a beautiful young lady who is so very grateful.... [She] said, "Because of your program Tomorrow's World, my search for the Truth was over and finally I'm in the real Church of God."—Bruce Tyler
Tomorrow's World Television News: Nicole Wrona and I recently visited our television media agent in Sydney, to discuss opportunities for wider television coverage in both New Zealand and Australia. In Australia, our near-nationwide station 4ME, a Seven affiliate, is starting to show some promise in response numbers, albeit this is a rather expensive channel. We questioned the Operations Director as to how we might improve the recognition factor for the Tomorrow's World program and discussed the opportunity to air free "promos" advertising the program at different times of the day. We are now in the process of considering how we might formulate and produce a number of powerful, eye-catching 30-second promos. Our agent is also seeking to provide us with an additional weekly nighttime airing on 4ME. In New Zealand, the Prime TV (Sky Network) contract is due for renegotiation early in 2013 and your prayers for a successful bid are requested. We are also looking into additional airing opportunities on NZTV.—Michael Gill
Historic Events for LCG in Sri Lanka: The brethren in Colombo, Sri Lanka, were greatly excited by events on the weekend of November 24-25. First, during Sabbath services, Regional Pastor Bruce Tyler and Area Pastor Zig Svalbe ordained Mr. Kuma De Silva as an elder. Mr. De Silva is the first minister to be ordained in Sri Lanka since the formation of the Global/Living Church of God. He will provide a greatly needed ministerial presence, serving the brethren and assisting in the witness to the region.
"Tomorrow's World Presents" in Sri Lanka: The second exciting event was the presentation, "World Events and Bible Prophecy," given by Mr. Bruce Tyler at the Cinnamon Lakeside Hotel near the center of Colombo. This was our first such event in Sri Lanka and it attracted almost a 20 percent response to our invitations. Another presentation may be planned for next year. The invitation letters requested visitors to bring a Bible so they could follow along and prove for themselves what the Scriptures really teach. Most people who attended did just that. After the presentation, a number of people were very interested in speaking to the members and ministry and remained for a considerable time. An active minister from another church was one of the last to leave and he thanked us for the very interesting presentation. Judging by the depth of interest, we expect to have a few new people attending services soon.—Zig Svalbe
Translating the Bible Study Course into Thai and Indonesian
Thailand: We have recently begun to translate the Bible Study Course into three new languages! The languages are Burmese, Thai and Karen. Karen is a tribal language spoken by 5-10 million people scattered in Myanmar and Thailand, and it is the native language of many of our members here. The languages spoken in this part of the world are quite different from English, and most people come from a cultural and religious background that is also very different from a western audience. So the first step in the process is to simplify and adapt the English lessons before translation. This saves a considerable amount of time that would otherwise be spent struggling to translate difficult sentences in an understandable way. I have hired a Burmese teacher to translate the lessons into Burmese and Karen, and my wife is translating into Thai. After a lesson is complete, I ask several others to proofread it and I do my best to proofread it as well. The final stage is the layout. The languages are written with complex scripts, with no spaces between words. This can be a challenge to do correctly, with only limited support in the software. For the Karen language, I had to write some custom software for efficient keyboard input and another program to enable text to break at the right location at the end of lines. We should be done with the first lesson in the first languages soon and we have several more in progress. After printing the first lesson we will send it to the members and a few dozen others on our mailing list. We expect that these lessons will provide a good foundation of basic knowledge for those whom God calls. Please pray for the success of this effort, and that it may bear good fruit in this area of the world in the near future!—Ryan Foster
Indonesia: The punishment that God gave to mankind at the tower of Babel has led me to this job—translating materials from English into Indonesian. I have been translating the Church's articles and booklets into Indonesian for almost 20 years. At present, I am doing audio translations from the sermons, magazine and Tomorrow's World telecasts. Starting in 1999, we made available all translated materials on our Indonesian Web site www.indolcg.org, to read, stream and download. Currently we receive around 400 to 500 visits from 10 different countries around the world each month. A member from the Adelaide congregation in Australia has been helping me with the translation work since 2004. We currently have around 700 articles translated into Indonesian. The real challenge with translating English into Indonesian is the difference in customs and colloquialisms between English and Indonesian. Sometimes the Indonesian language just does not have any direct word that can represent a word used in our English publications. When this happens, we must use several resources like encyclopedias, dictionaries and history books—even a little research over the Internet. For example, in Lesson 16 of the Bible Study Course the word "scapegoat" and the explanation provided will simply not provide ample information for Indonesian readers to understand the real intention and meaning. As we can expect, Indonesian translated materials are usually a bit longer than the English ones, and commonly, we need to go through five sequential steps when translating an English article into Indonesian, from rough draft to refined, edited and proofread result. Two of the most difficult booklets we have translated are The United States and Great Britain in Prophecy and The Beast of Revelation, both by Mr. John Ogwyn. The reason for this is they contain many unfamiliar words, situations, and contexts for Indonesian readers. Even though we love our job, we look forward to the time when everyone on this planet will have just one language.—Arius Nusantara
Living Youth Programs
Next Online Teen Bible Study: January 20
The online Teen Bible Studies will resume on Sunday, January 20. The Bible Study that evening will be presented by Mr. Sheldon Monson.
2013 European Teen Summer Camp, Chevetogne, Belgium, August 16-25
LCG youth camps strive in their different ways to provide a balance of spiritual instruction and active pursuits that will challenge and excite our young people—all taking place in a well supervised, Godly environment.
The Living Youth Camp Europe this year will be held at "Domaine de Chevetogne," Belgium. Arrival date will be Friday, August 16 with departure on Sunday, August 25. The cost for each person attending will be £120 sterling/€150 euros. Accommodation is in dormitories, which is also where Sabbath services, Bible studies, meals and sing-alongs will take place.
Schedule permitting, activities will include hiking/orienteering, water-skiing, leather work, music, Bible and Christian education, volleyball, football, badminton, basketball, nature discovery, PowerPoint Presentation skills, speech and initiative training. The camp session includes two Sabbaths for relaxation and spiritual instruction. The week will culminate with a special Sabbath dinner followed by a sing-along.
Application forms are available from the UK Regional Office ([email protected]) or from Mr. Rees Ellis, Belgium ([email protected]). Please send camper and staff applications to the UK Office and an e-mail copy to Mr. Rees Ellis.
Feast of Tabernacles 2013
International Feast Sites Announced
We are happy to announce the international Feast of Tabernacles sites (as of this writing) for 2013:
Australia (Victor Harbor, SA)
Canada (Kimberly, BC)
Canada (Shawinigan, QC)
Canada (Rocky Harbour, NL)
Canada (Collingwood, ON)
Barbados (Christ Church)
France (Côte d'Azur)
Guyana (Georgetown)
India (Manipur)
Indonesia (Batu)
Israel (Jerusalem)
Jamaica (Montego Bay)
Kenya (Isibania)
New Zealand (Bay of Islands)
Nigeria (Lagos)
Philippines (Baguio)
Philippines (Davao)
Philippines (Don Carlos)
Philippines (Maranding)
South Africa (Glentana)
South Africa (Port Shepstone)
Tobago (Crown Point)
United Kingdom (Buxton)
Vanuatu (Orap)
Do Not Make Housing Reservations
Please do not make your festival housing reservations at this time. We will soon announce a date for online festival registration, in The World Ahead. Until then, brethren are asked to wait to make any housing arrangements.—Festival Office
Finance Department
Hall Vouchers
The Spring Holy Days are already on the horizon and many of you are beginning to contract the halls. As you fill out the vouchers, please note that Passover/Days of Unleavened Bread fall across March and April. It will aid in the timely processing of the monthly hall vouchers if you remember to put the hall rent for the Last Day of Unleavened Bread on April's monthly hall voucher. Thank you in advance for your help.—Accounts Payable Staff
Living University
Living University—A Week To Register
There are only a few more days remaining until the start of the next semester. Classes will begin January 16, so those wishing to take classes need to register and purchase textbooks as soon as possible. For those who have never taken a Living University course, you will need to enroll in the University first, and then register for your selected course. A complete listing of "Spring Semester" courses (spring in the northern hemisphere), can also be viewed on the Living University Web site, www.livinguniv.com, under the link "Spring 2013 Class Schedule." A list of textbooks can also be found on the Web site. There is a limited amount of financial aid available, primarily for "seniors" (those age 65 and over), those currently in their third-tithe year, those who have completed the LCG Bible Study Course, and teenagers enrolled in the dual enrollment program. If you would like more detail on financial aid options, please view the Living University catalog on the LU Web site, http://www.livinguniv.com/Expenses/fin-aid.htm. To make an application to Living University, to register for courses, and to find out more, please visit the www.livinguniv.com Web site. For additional information, please contact Mrs. Michelle Broussard at [email protected] or by phone at 704-708-2294.
Mail Processing Department
We have been experiencing problems with our international Tomorrow's World and Living Church News deliveries so we have implemented a different process to speed up delivery. We hope that this will fix the problem through rerouting the deliveries. If you do not receive your January-February Tomorrow's World magazine by the end of this month, please e-mail us at [email protected]. Or you can contact your local minister and he will pass the information on to us. Thanks to all of you for your help and patience as we work through this problem.—Gaylyn Bonjour
Internet Operations
Tomorrow's World Presents: Dr. Meredith online! (Repeat Announcement)
Join Dr. Meredith and thousands from around the world for a special, online, live "Tomorrow's World Presents" February 10 at 3:30 p.m. EST, entitled "What's Ahead for America and the World." Dr. Meredith will discuss powerful prophecies about events leading up to the return of Jesus Christ and the establishment of the Kingdom of God on this earth. Dr. Meredith will also explain what true Christians should be doing today, what original Christianity is, and what is the real Work of the Church of God. For more information and to register, please visit the following Web page: TomorrowsWorld.org/online-TWP. Register soon and mark your calendars for February 10 at 3:30 p.m. EST. We will live-stream this presentation directly to your computer.
Tomorrow's World Internet Operations Update: 2012 was an amazing year!
Tomorrow's World activity on Google and Facebook continues to increase, with more than 110 million search results and total Facebook page impressions recorded in 2012. Of this total, Facebook users and Google searchers received Tomorrow's World advertising content more than 89 million times in 2012, along with tens of millions of other contacts Internet users made with our Tomorrow's World content online, through organic search, via social media "share" or "forwards," or through other channels such as Twitter, our online Bible Study Course, weekly e-zine newsletters and other secondary Web sites. Facebook users have probably noticed that our page now serves more than 36,000 unique users, but you might not be aware that we have often had 48,000 or more "talking about" our content. Very encouragingly, the "viral" reach of our most popular posts has on a number of occasions approached nearly half-a-million unique Facebook users! This is a huge reach, and does not even include our various secondary Facebook sites that also generate activity. We thank God for the growth in reach and impact He has given our Internet efforts in the past year! We thank God for this growth and we also thank all of you for your prayers and your support as the Living Church of God continues to make preaching the Good News of the coming Kingdom of God our priority.—Wyatt Ciesielka
Comments
Pride vs. Humility: Bible prophecies reveal that in the last days people will be proud, boastful, haughty and headstrong (2 Timothy 3:1-5), and that scoffers will ridicule the idea that a real God inspired the Scriptures (2 Peter 3:3-5). Even many "Christians" today are unaware of what God reveals in His word about pride and humility. The Bible states that "pride goes before… a fall" (Proverbs 16:18), and that humility is a prerequisite for honor in God's sight (Proverbs 15:33; 29:23). God says that He looks on the humble (Isaiah 66:2), that He dwells with the humble (Isaiah 57:15), that He raises up the humble (Psalm 147:6) and that He gives grace (unmerited pardon) to the humble (Proverbs 3:34). Jesus said, "blessed" are the humble (Matthew 5:5). Peter urged Christians to "be clothed with humility" (1 Peter 5:5). The Scriptures reveal that God used Moses because he was humble (Numbers 12:3), and that Jesus Christ was exalted because He humbled Himself by dying on "the cross" for our sins (Philippians 2:8-9). While many today doubt that God exists or wonder what His will is, the Bible clearly explains what God is looking for in each of us—"to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God" (Micah 6:8).
Have a profitable Sabbath,
Douglas S. Winnail
News and Prophecy—January 10, 2013
Australia Ablaze Again! Raging wildfires burning brush and farmland have broken out all across Australia and Tasmania, fed by widespread drought, high winds and months of record-breaking temperatures. Emergency alerts about "catastrophic" fire conditions were posted in the heavily populated eastern and southeastern parts of Australia, where recent temperatures were "the highest since statistics began being kept in 1911" (New York Times, January 9, 2013). Reports say that firefighters have been pushed "to their limits and residents to their wits' end" (ibid.). The fires are the latest in a series of extreme weather-related calamities that have hit Australia in recent years. In 2009, wildfires fanned by high winds killed 173 people and blackened thousands of acres. In 2011, flooding and cyclones plagued the country on the heels of a decade-long drought (Wall Street Journal, January 8, 2013). What modern news sources fail to point out is that during this same period of time, Australia has attracted world attention with its income-generating "Gay Mardi Gras" celebrations while the Australian government plans to legalize same-sex marriages. Many residents of the "land down under" are unaware or don't seem to care that God warned in the Scriptures that these behaviors are abominations in His sight (Leviticus 18:22), and nations that condone and promote these perverted activities will be punished with various plagues, including droughts and fire (Leviticus 26:14-22, 31-32; Deuteronomy 28:15-24, 34). To better understand what is happening in Australia and what the future holds, be sure to read our insightful booklet The United States and Great Britain in Prophecy.
When Will the End Come? 2012 was a year of dramatic predictions that failed! On December 21, expectations based on the Mayan calendar that the world would end were dashed when that prediction failed. One source stated, "Apparently, doomsday theorists have been prepping for a fiery comet hitting the earth, ice storms destroying our power grids and other heinous catastrophes in vain" (emphasis ours) (ABC Action News, December 21, 2012). California preacher Harold Camping apologized for his failed predictions of Christ's return and the destruction of the world on May 21 and October 21, 2011. He announced, "We have learned the very painful lesson that all of creation is in God's hands and He will end time in His time, not ours... We humbly recognize that God may not tell His people the date when Christ will return" (Christian Post, March 6, 2012). Many today are attracted by dramatic speculations, but our biblically illiterate societies overlook plain words of Scripture. The Bible clearly states that God has a plan that He is working out and that God alone declares "the end from the beginning" (Isaiah 46:8-11). Jesus told His disciples to "watch and pray" and be ready for His return. However, He warned, "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father" (Mark 13:32). The Bible is very clear that human beings cannot predict the date of the end of the age, though we can watch for signs that Jesus said will occur just before His return.