"The Herod of today sits in his big palace with hundreds of guards around him. He has heard rumours about the Jesus movement in his country and does not have this movement 'under control'. He will ask his special police to get information so that 'I also may go and worship him'. In at least forty palaces the Herods of today talk regularly with the Minister of Religious Affairs about the news of Jesus and about people going to worship him.

     The religious leaders of today also work hard. They work with the State. They have a secure position. They know the words but do not know the Word. They are the State's religious experts but they have no idea about what God is doing in the world today. Neither do they understand what Jesus is doing in their country. They do not like the new enthusiasm!"

     JOHAN CANDELIN, the international director of the World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty Commission, reflects on the meaning of Christmas... | more...|

“LS” was just 12-years-old when soldiers came to the village in Karen State in eastern Burma where he lived with his family and shot their pigs and livestock.

     “Everyone ran away and my family went and hid in caves,” he told representatives of human rights advocacy organisation, Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), and British-based aid agency Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART), when they visited refugee camps along the Thai-Burmese border recently.

     “LS” related how two villagers were killed and two were wounded when they stepped on landmines the Burmese Army had laid to block their escape before they burned the village.

     “We hid in the jungle with no place to stay,” he said. “Finally we walked for three days to the Thai border where we settled in the refugee camp. Our family was living in fear.”

     DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

"The Backpackers Bible is a great tool for evangelism among backpackers as one of the things they do with all the time they have is read! There is a thriving book exchange among the backpacking community, where people read one book, finish that and swap it with another book. Most hostels and some caravan parks that backpackers stay in have bookshelves and we hope that the Backpackers Bible will be something that becomes readily available to backpackers as they travel from place to place. A combination of the fact that backpackers have so much time to read and their spiritual openness means that there is a huge need for the Backpackers Bible among them.”

      DAVID ADAMS interviews "backpacker evangelists" Dave and Maz Wraight... | more...|

Richard and his wife Helen had been backpacking around Australia for five months when they visited a church and Richard “found” Jesus.

     “I am saved, my life has changed beyond all recognition and is complete,” he writes. “I have found the answers to all my questions and all I want to do now is to live the best life I can and help God to bring his message into the world. Five months ago you never would have convinced me of this.”
      Richard’s story is one of a number of travellers' testimonies contained in the Backpackers’ Bible, a Contemporary English Version (CEV) New Testament aimed at backpackers travelling around Australia and New Zealand. Others include that of Ian McCormack, who had an encounter with God after being fatally stung by a box jellyfish in Mauritius.

     DAVID ADAMS reports on the launch of the latest 'version' of the Bible - this one aimed at backpackers... | more...|

Ian Worby has a dream. He wants Christian radio "to be in every house in Australia".

   While that might sound far-fetched, the Christian radio network he oversees from the Brisbane suburb of Underwood is gaining ground at an amazing pace.

   Worby is the chief executive of United Christian Broadcasters, which runs the national Vision Radio Network. The broadcaster opened its 196th Australian relay station this week.

   "We believe that we've uncovered no longer a latent demand but an overt demand for a dedicated Christian broadcasting service," says Worby.

   "It's not your traditional hymns, praise and worship music, but what we would call adult Christian contemporary, which covers just about every genre you can think of including jazz, pop, hip-hop, scar, country, anything."

   In an article first published in The Age newspaper, JASON KOUTSOUKIS reports on a growing radio network dedicated to spreading the word... | more...|

It can be as little as $35. But it can provide the start-up spark for a business idea which can help people living in developing countries to pull themselves out of the grinding poverty that consumes their existence.

     With the United Nations declaring next year the International Year of Microcredit, two Australian humanitarian agencies have come together to launch a new initiative they hope will provide a means for Australians to lend a helping hand.

     Launched in Sydney last week, Opportunity International Australia and World Vision’s Micro-Enterprise Development project aims to provide loans to small businesses as well as training, mentoring and support to encourage “aspiring entrepreneurs” living in developing countries.

   DAVID ADAMS writes of an initiative to spur Australian corporate interest in the humanitarian benefits of establishing micro-enterprises in the developing world... | more...|

SAS Sergeant Andrew Russell was only 33-years-old when an anti-tank mine left over from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan exploded beneath his Land Rover as drove in February, 2001.
    In Canberra last week to sign a petition by anti-landmine activists, his widow Kylie Russell added her voice to those calling for a ban on anti-vehicle mines.

    “Anti-vehicle mines are indiscriminate killers,” she said. “I do not want any other family anywhere to have to suffer the same loss as my family has.”
    The lethal weapons are estimated to have claimed at least 159 lives - including that of Sergeant Russell - in the two years between January 2001 and January 2003 alone with the latest victims including two Save the Children workers who were killed when they were blown up by an anti-vehicle mine in Darfur, Sudan last month.

   DAVID ADAMS reports on a new push to rid the world of anti-vehicle mines... | more...|

Twenty years of war has gutted the area once renowned for silver beaches and holiday resorts. A brutal battle has pitched Muslims, Christians and Buddhists against each other in a complicated conflict of Tamil versus Singhalese.

    Today the little white building stands as a testament to hope. It’s not a church. It’s a kindergarten or, as the sign out the front says, ‘Peace Nursery’.

   KIM CAIN reports on an initiative helping to bring peace to war weary Sri Lanka... | more...|

"I’d been working for 10 years in medicine when God took me to task and confronted me with passages in the Bible that I’d read and known...I began to feel incredibly sorry that while I’d known what the Bible said, I’d nonetheless persisted in the belief that because I was the doctor working in a system which condoned abortion, I didn’t have a choice."

   A Victorian GP tells of how God transformed her views on abortion... | more...|

Young Australians value friendships, their independence and the feeling of being needed or valued, according to a new survey.

   The survey, carried out by Christian community service organisation Mission Australia, also found that alcohol and other drugs, bullying and emotional abuse and coping with stress are the three issues that young people are most concerned about.

   This year’s survey was the third Mission Australia has undertaken and involved about 8,500 young people aged between 11 and 24 years from across Australia. Surveys were completed online and at schools and colleges.

   Anne Hampshire, national manager or research and social policy at Mission Australia, says responses to the question what young people value - which was asked for the first time this survey - show that young people are “pretty people centred”.

    DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

"Both the US and Australian elections have seen a reassertion of majority opinion over the minority ones that have so dominated our social and political agenda for so long.

   "In the US it was Christians coming out to vote for a man and a party which affirmed traditional marriage and family and were committed to the preservation of life. Despite the war on terror, Iraq and a precarious US economy, exit polls showed that the issue most people voted on was values and morality.

   "In Australia there is no doubt that unless the political machinery is in full denial, it must concede that values were again one of the most important issues. Our compulsory voting system makes it more difficult to attribute this directly in the way you more easily can in America, but it is undeniable, and has been very much confirmed by post election media analysis."

    With elections in Australia and the US now decided, JIM WALLACE - executive chairman of the Australian Christian Lobby - urges Christians to push on to real political influence... | more...|

Kevin Fuller's schedule reads like that of a diplomat, movie star or global corporate high-flyer. During September and October alone the 65-year-old president of Bible distributing organisation The Gideons International travelled to four continents, meeting with people in such countries as China, South Africa and France.

      Back home in Point Lonsdale, however, he's more likely to be recognised as the bloke who serves coffee at the local gourmet food shop he owns with his wife Anne than the honorary head of a global organisation that works in 179 countries and boasts more than 250,000 members.

     "I'm the barista," Fuller admits, laughing at the apparent incongruity of his two roles. "I've just come from Nashville where we had a world leaders' conference where we had all the leadership from all the Gideons all over the world . . . that was like a week ago. And here I am here - it is just an unbelievable change, but I like it."

    DAVID ADAMS reports on a man who gave up his life as a corporate troubleshooter to become the first non-American president of global Bible organisation, Gideons... | more...|

Since its publication in 2003, The Da Vinci Code has topped best seller lists around the world, spawned a veritable industry of companion books and guides (there’s now even talk of a movie starring Tom Hanks), sparked a minor tourism boom and even caused a court case surrounding claims of plagiarism. Chances are even those who haven’t read Dan Brown’s controversial book have heard something of it.

      Yet while its populist appeal has seen it sell more than 17 million copies across the globe last year (around 620,000 paperback copies in Australia alone), it’s many claims - particularly those suggesting Jesus Christ was no more than a mortal prophet - have also sparked concerns among Christians from Sydney to the Vatican.

     “This book is to religious history what John Wayne movies are to the history of the American West,” says Dr Keith Suter, consultant on social policy at Sydney’s Wesley Mission.

     DAVID ADAMS reports on a response to a most controversial novel... | more...|

Tim Edwards is trying to give up coffee, but the cravings have kicked in. Sitting in a café, he’s trying not to think about a full-cream latte with two sugars, and how nicely - at the end of busy week - it would go down. A serious addiction? “Not sure,” he muses, “but at six to eight cups a day, I was a bit worried.”

      As the senior pastor of a 450-strong church in Geelong, ‘doing coffee’ is almost part of the job description: meetings, pastoral visits, desk-work, late nights, more meetings. With cheerful resignation, he says he’s happy to make the switch to tea.

      Making switches, whether it’s a beverage, location or career, is something Edwards seems adept at. After all, it was only 10 years ago that he was performing in front of the footlights with the Victoria State Opera. Now on weekends, he’s behind the microphone in a rambling school gymnasium that’s home to the growing Bayside Christian Church in Geelong. No footlights or fancy costumes, and the music’s more ‘praise and worship’ than Puccini.

     SALLY HOLT profiles a man whose life has led him from opera singer to church pastor... | more...|

There are days when Nathaniel McManus, guitarist with Queensland band Rookie, wonders what he’s doing up on stage performing in front of hundreds of teenagers.
    And then God reminds him.

    “The next day, we’ll put on a show and hundreds of kids will get saved and it’s just, like, that’s why we do it,” says the 25-year-old known to other band members as 'Macca'.

    A recent concert at Wollongong, for example, attracted around 1,200 teenagers with 150 of them asking Jesus Christ into their life.

    “You see the evidence of God moving in the ministry and it just blows me away,” he says. “It just makes it all worth it.”

    They might sing about wanting to get Anna Kournikova into their church but when it comes to sharing the love of God, Queensland band Rookie are seriously earnest. DAVID ADAMS caught up with them in Geelong... | more...|

“John” was still in primary school when he was abducted by soldiers of the Lord’s Resistance Army in northern Uganda and forced to kill.

    “At Soroti, I was given to kill a man but I refused, so I was slapped with a machete on my bare back and was about to be killed,” he told humanitarian aid agency workers earlier this year.

    “I gave in and killed the man by hitting him on the head with a club. Another man was brought and again I refused and I was beaten severely until I killed him. I could not eat for three days because of the sight of blood.”

    John - not his real name - is one of the fortunate ones. He lived to tell the tale. He fought in numerous battles for the rebel group before he was captured by Sudanese soldiers and then subsequently taken by members of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces to a World Vision centre for former child soldiers at Gulu.

    Sadly, John’s story is not unusual in a war which has been characterised by its abuse of children. Reports suggest that between 20,000 to 30,000 children have been kidnapped and forced to fight with as many as 80 per cent of the “soldiers” fighting in the LRA estimated to be kidnapped children. Others are used as sex slaves or weapons porters.

    DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

One of the big stories of this election is that Christians have had a significant impact on the result.
    For years Christians have felt abandoned by the political process, by what they saw as social engineers in Labor, the Democrats and Greens systematically eroding the Christian assumptions underpinning our laws.
    The political influence of the Catholic Church seemed to have waned on all but "life" issues, and the increasing liberalisation of parts of the Anglican and Uniting churches rendered them unwilling to oppose legislation that angered many in the pews.
    However, all this changed at this election. The evangelical side of the church saw the mantle had fallen to them, and picked it up.

  In an article first published in The Age newspaper, JIM WALLACE, executive chairman of the Australian Christian Lobby, argues that Labor should heed the lessons of the recent federal election and start listening to the growing Christian lobby... | more...|

Jamie Edgerton believes passionately that this is a crucial time for churches around the world to speak up and challenge the world’s political leaders to tackle the issue of global poverty.

   “Fundamentally this is a spiritual battle against the powers that be which tolerate the massive and pervasive inequities and injustices that cause and perpetuate global poverty,” the 56-year-old from the Mornington Peninsula near Melbourne told Sight.

   Edgerton is just one of many Australians who have signed up to the Micah Challenge, a global campaign aimed not only at bringing greater attention to the problem of global poverty but at sparking action among individuals and governments to do something about it.

   “The Micah Challenge provides a vehicle for Christians worldwide to prepare ourselves as disciples of Jesus, to respond to the Biblical call for justice, and to co-operate with Him in the extension of His Kingdom,” he says.

  DAVID ADAMS reports on a campaign to help stem the tide of global poverty... | more...|

Who was Micah? DAVID ADAMS takes a look at why those behind the Micah Challenge chose to use the Old Testament prophet's name... | more...|

Want to tell us why you've signed up to the Micah Challenge? Click here to read what others have said... | more...|

In mid-August, around 3000 Christians gathered in a plaza in front of the 1,000-year-old cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, for hundreds of years one of Spain’s most popular destinations for Christian pilgrims.

     While millions still converge on the city every year to bow before the tomb of St James, this group of people from Spain and around 30 countries across the globe were there to pray for the city and the nation of Spain and lift up the name of Jesus Christ in worship.

     In an event organised by US-based theologian C. Peter Wagner, the “Concert of Praise” in Santiago was the latest in a series of efforts to mobilise people to pray for the 40/70 window - a region extending across the globe from Iceland to Japan and encompassing much of Europe, Russia and northern Asia.

  In the latest in an occasional series on Christian journeys, DAVID ADAMS reports on a prayer journey to Spain... | more...|

It’s a bold plan and one which is certain to turn heads. In fact, that’s exactly what a group of Christians behind a proposed prime-time television advertising campaign aim to do.
    In a project that’s fast gaining momentum across the country, they are leading the development of a series of ads which would put Jesus at the forefront of people’s minds and stir conversation about His relevance to our lives today.

   Martin Johnson, one of the project's directors, says that the essence of the 'Jesus. All about life' campaign was really about mobilising “quiet Christians” to share their faith with their families, friends and neighbours.

   “The campaign will generate interest but unless a person who is interested in the campaign meets somebody, comes across somebody, talks to somebody who actually is a Christian then they ain’t actually going to go much further.

   DAVID ADAMS reports on an initiative to raise the profile of the Gospel in homes across Australia... | more...|

Who to vote for can be a tough choice and one which isn't necessarily made less so by the inclusion of Christian candidates on the election ticket.
    The Australian Christian Lobby is among those calling on Christians across the country to make an informed decision when they vote at the Federal Election in October and weigh up both the parties and candidates they elect to support against their Christian values.

   “I would hope that Christians would look at their vote in every instance by weighing up against their faith belief,” says Jim Wallace, the organisation’s executive chairman.

   DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

ESSAY: COMBINING CHRISTIANITY WITH COMPETENCY

   "This election don’t vote for Christians! OK, hopefully I got your attention. ‘What’s wrong with voting for Christians?’ you ask. Nothing, as long as the person you vote for is competent to represent the electorate."

   DAVID AYLIFFE argues for taking a broader perspective... | more...|

"We live in a dangerous world, and I believe the world is being further endangered by a narrowly focused security agenda – the key feature of which has been a sustained attack on global values, global standards and global institutions which constitute the system of human rights and international law.

   "Human rights embody common values of human decency and dignity, equality and justice. Their erosion weakens the basis of our common security...

   "And yet, in the name of creating more security we see governments attacking human rights, flouting international law with impunity and turning their backs on multilateralism." 
  In an extract from a speech given in Adelaide earlier this week, Amnesty International secretary general IRENE KHAN argues that a 'narrowly focused security agenda' is endangering rather than supporting human rights... | more...|

As news spread last week that the Prime Minister, John Howard, had called a federal election for October, prayer teams across the country were being mobilised.
    Among them were the hundreds of people who form part of the Parliamentary Prayer Network, a non-denominational group of Australians who join regularly in groups across the country to pray for our state and federal parliaments.
    In conjunction with the Australian Prayer Network, they are calling for Australians to take part in 28 days of prayer and fasting kicking off this Saturday (11th September).

    DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

“Last night, (we) a big worship time in Maroussi (a suburb of Athens) outside the train station,” wrote Andrew on an internet message board last week.

   “It was such an amazing time, and we started to draw a bit of a crowd...I opened my eyes and saw this kid...and God said ‘Go talk to him’. He was smiling and enjoying the music. I went over and asked him if I could talk to him after the music was finished, and he said yes.

   "He spoke very little English, and it was somewhat difficult and took some time, but he gave his life to Christ last night! His name is Vincent, and he received a lot of joy from God and answers to some tough questions. God is so good! It was only the Holy Spirit that could have got through those language barriers, and He did.”

   Andrew is one of more than 370 people who are in Athens and Thessaloniki this month as part of Youth With A Mission’s Games Outreach (YWAMGO).

   DAVID ADAMS reports on YWAM's Olympic Games outreach... | more...|

“We as churches are absolutely dismayed that the Government of Sudan does not want to have this peace keeping force,” Bishop Mvume Dandala told Nicholas Kerr, a member of the Australian delegation which was led by the chair of Christian World Service, Reverend Gregor Henderson.

   “If people massacre each other, you can’t just stand on the periphery and shout at them, ‘Please stop!’ There has to be a way to step in.”

   But the bishop warned that if Australia wanted to send in a force, there would first need to be a dialogue with the African Union.

   “The world is being threatened by a situation where powerful countries seem to believe they have a right to act unilaterally,” he said.

   “This is one of the greatest sensibilities that nations must develop in dealing with one another.”

   Bishop Dandala, general secretary of the All African Council of Churches, met with a delegation from Australia late last week. NICHOLAS KERR and DAVID ADAMS report... | more...|

UPDATE: Federal Parliament passed the Marriage Amendment Bill on Friday, 13th August.

A watershed moment passed in early August when the shadow attorney-general, Nicola Roxon, stood at the podium at the National Marriage Forum to deliver a statement from leader Mark Latham that Labor would supoort the Government's move to enshrine the institution of marriage in law as being solely between a man and woman.

   "We understand how strongly many people feel about retaining and promoting the institution of marriage between men and women as a bedrock institution for families," she said.

    The announcement has been welcomed by the forum’s organisers who have said Labor’s move not only indicated that the major political parties acknowledged the concerns of the churches but that it indicated they had recognised the size of the Christian constituency interested in protecting the definition of marriage.

   DAVID ADAMS reports on the National Marriage Forum... | more...|

A mass of humanity - somewhere around 70,000 people - huddled together in the desert; living in tiny huts which provide only the barest shelter from the burning sun and torrential rains.
    Fear reigns here: fear of the outbreak of disease, fear of what the future holds. Yet it’s also fear which keeps people here and prevents them from returning to their homes: fear of being killed or raped or perhaps worse, watching their loved ones being cut down or raped before their eyes.
    That’s the picture World Vision’s chief executive Tim Costello painted last week after returning from the Kalma camp in Sudan last week, a place created on a sand-dune in the western Darfur region.
    Costello broke down as he spoke of the estimated 50,000 people who have been killed in the conflict which is shattering the nation and of the women who spoke to him of the use of rape as a weapon of war.

   “This is organised, it’s systematic, it’s absolutely terrifying,” he said.

   DAVID ADAMS reports on the humanitarian nightmare unfolding in Sudan... | more...|

There’s a noticeboard out the back of Agape Home, an orphanage based in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, that cares for children who either have AIDS or have lost parents to the disease.

   On it are pinned photos showing the smiling faces of those children that have been adopted by people living in western countries like Canada, Germany, Switzerland and, to a lesser degree, Australia.

   Above those are another set of photos. The smiling faces of the children, some no more than babies, shown on this board are no different from those next to them. But these children haven’t been adopted. Their tiny lives came to end when the AIDS virus claimed them instead.

   The sound of those children still living at the orphanage playing in the background, Julie Bruce, 45, an Australian Red Cross worker from Sydney, stands in front of the board and relates how she held one of the babies in her arms as she died.

   “This time around we’ve had a couple of babies who have died,” she notes. “The time before, I didn’t think I’d get through it - we had probably about 10 babies die in six months so it was really hard.”

   DAVID ADAMS speaks with Julie Bruce, an Australian working at the Agape Home in Chiang Mai... | more...|

A look at AIDS in Thailand... | more...|

Several members of the Sight team recently went on a trip to northern Thailand. Here are their reports...

MY MISSION: LEANNE GRAY tells of how her family came to be involved with the Pakpingjai Home in northern Thailand... | more...|

SIGHT-SEEING: ADAM KELSALL on how a journey to Thailand helped to broaden his 'horizons'... | more...|

Tinagon was just eight years old when he first went into a state-run home in Chiang Rai, northern Thailand.

   His future was bleak. His mother had abandoned his family and his father, an alcoholic, was in prison. His older sister, unable to care for him, had no choice but to place in the first of several homes where he spent the next few years of his life just trying to survive.
   Then, four years ago, Tinagon came with a group to Pakpingjai, a home for boys in the small village of Ban Don, about 160 kilometres north-east of Chiang Mai. After having a look around, he asked to stay.

   Tinagon, whose nickname is ‘boy’, will complete his school studies this year and may go to university next year as well as pursuing his talents in playing the guitar and drawing. Tinagon’s also now one of the leadership team at Pakpingjai, entrusted with leading worship times at night and watching over the younger boys at the home. 

   “The kids in the state homes, nobody teaches,” he says. “But here I’m teaching them about the Bible and we worship God together.”

   In the first of a series of reports looking at missions in northern Thailand, DAVID ADAMS reports on the Pakpingjai Home Development Project... | more...|

"Now you’ve got to understand that delivering people from poverty is at the core of the Biblical message. There are obviously 2000 verses of scripture that call upon people to respond to the needs of the poor. More than any other subject. The only description that Jesus ever gives of judgment day is how we responded to the poor. It’s in the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew. This is the way he does it on judgment day, He asks these questions: 'I was hungry did you feed me, naked, did you clothe me, sick, did you care for me, a stranger, did you take me in?' Namely, the Jesus I believe in, always comes to us, presents himself to us through the poor and the needy in the world."

   In a speech given at a fundraising dinner for Opportunity International Australia in Sydney last month, US-based author and academic Dr TONY CAMPOLO presented some thoughts on helping the poor... | more...|

Since it was first diagnosed more than 20 years ago, HIV/AIDS has killed more than 20 million people. Another 38 million are currently estimated to be affected by the disease with as many as two-thirds of them living in sub-Saharan African where up to 20 per cent of the adult population is affected.

   The battle against AIDS is far from over.

   Almost 20,000 delegates gathered in Bangkok last week for the 15th International AIDS conference to hear of the latest developments and newest threats in the fight against the disease - “described as the most devastating disease humankind has ever faced”.

    DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

In a country where 80 percent of the population is Christian—the largest percentage in Africa—and the rest of the population following traditional religions, religious beliefs have become a key factor for Namibians to cope with the epidemic.

    MANUEL QUINTERO reports on the difference faith in God can make in the fight against the AIDS... | more...|

It was the first time a Christian album had debuted at number one on the mainstream ARIA music charts and, according to the Sydney-based Hillsong Church team that produced it, “makes a powerful declaration that Christianity is alive and well”.

  For All You’ve Done is the latest in a string of 13 live worship albums released by the church. The double CD contains 15 praise and worship songs written by nine songwriters, all of whom are members of Hillsong Church.

   “It’s very exciting that the worship of Jesus Christ is the most popular music in Australia this week,” says Hillsong’s senior pastor, Brian Houston.  

   “It makes a powerful declaration that Christianity is alive and strong and the church in the 21st century is going forward.”

    DAVID ADAMS reports on the success of Hillsong's latest music offering...  | more...|