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This one might sound scarily geeky, but if you can overcome the fear factor, you can probably improve your internet experience. Why wouldn't you want to read more?
Eddie Arthur provoked me to this post when he described another frustration of travelling in countries where the internet is less developed. What Eddie is describing is a DNS problem. DNS is what converts human readable internet addresses into the IP addresses which computers on the internet use to talk to each other. So for example shaddick.net is converted to 67.15.157.12.
I won't go deeper into how DNS works – mainly because I don't really know, but if you aren't averse to a little technical adventure and your machine isn't in an office and already configured by an IT department, you might take a look at OpenDNS . They will explain how to configure your machine to use their DNS servers rather than the ones automatically configured for you by default (DHCP). If you do follow the OpenDNS instructions, please take care that you note your current settings first so that you can put them back if you find that your internet connection seems to be broken.
My experience of OpenDNS over the last month or two has been great, but I'll be interested in your comments if you try it.
When AIM decided to set up regional offices in Africa, we recognised that good communications links would be important to their function; so we specified that offices would need to have reliable high speed internet connections. My experiences over the last couple of days have demonstrated that 'high speed internet' is definitely a relative term…
Kenyan telephone lines, where they haven't been cut down and sold by an enterprising local, are notoriously noisy and unreliable so dial-up internet access via a landline is almost a complete non starter so many people do email via mobile phones. Web access isn't really practical unless one pays for a link to a wireless internet service provider.
The regional office I have been working with over these last few days knew that even the wireless ISPs are often not working and decided to go for a reliable option – satellite internet. For about £1000 a company came and set them up with a 1.5m dish and a satellite modem. Now they pay about £80 a month for a 'guaranteed' 64kbps connection limited to 1GB total traffic each month. For the non-techies that's just slightly faster than a dial up link in the UK and about 100th of the speed of the broadband connection I have at home for less than £20 a month.
Next time you complain about your connection speed, be glad you don't live in Nairobi and pray for us as we try to work out how we can get our secure web based personnel placement application to work over this kind of connection. Currently it takes at least two minutes to bring up some pages! The alternative is to move the office to another country.
{mosimage}Yesterday I (Paul) flew from Heathrow to Nairobi. I will be spending the next 8 days here in Kenya. I am here to give some IT support to one of AIM's new regional offices. Meanwhile, Margo will be at home with the four children. We would appreciate your prayers.
Over the weekend Luke wasn't well so please pray that he won't be sick again while I am away.
As we have mentioned before the mission is in the middle of a major
reorganisation. Thw new regional offices are absolutely key to good functioning of the mission under the new structure. I expect to be giving some training in our the use of
our new web-based personnel placement system. I will also be giving some advice on computer security, particularly in the context of countries where Christianity is a minority religion.
At the end of this week I have asked some of the people who do IT work out here to get together with me for a IT forum. This is the first time we have met here. Pray that we will have a productive meeting together. My main objective for our meeting is to see how we can improve the support we give to AIM personnel using Information Technology here in Africa.
{mosimage}Thanks for asking!
- Please pray for us. The Lord has blessed us greatly and we believe that one of the reasons for that is that many people have prayed for us faithfully for many years.
- You can give to our support through the UK office of AIM International . If you are a British tax payer you can very easily increase the value of your gift to us by designating it as 'gift aid'.
Paul has the privilege of preaching reasonably often in our home church. Since the church now records messages digitally and makes these available via the BSEC website, you can listen to some of them. Recently he has preached on:
Unfortunately you will need to work out when to advance the PowerPoint slides yourself, but it may help keep you awake  and should help you to follow the message. You can get a free PowerPoint Viewer from here if you don't have the program on your machine.
With six in the family living on a missionary income, we have to keep a tight reign on what we spend, but sometimes God sends money from unexpected places. I just switched to a new insurance company for my house contents insurance. The new premium was £65 and I should recieve £125 commission. Yes it is completely legal. Will it work? Well it worked when I switched my car insurance to a different company and got paid £230 commission. Would you like to know how?
Collecting comission on web transactions is a wonderful way of saving money, and in this case I should actually get back more than I spent. It seems that insurance companies make lots of money out of us so they can afford to pay massive commissions to anyone who brings traffic to their websites. If you would like to recieve the commission on lots of your web based expenditure, then I heartily recommend you try the cashback cooperative called Quidco . Before you ask – no there is no commission in it for me, but don't forget this posting next time an insurance renewal drops through your letterbox.
Most commissions are a small percentage of the transaction value, but insurers and utilities often pay fixed amounts when you switch to them. You can even get small commission amounts just for visiting some websites without even buying anything. Quidco keep the first £5 of commission you earn in a year, but after that it all eventually comes back to you via paypal or direct into your bank.
{mosimage}
We heard from Eliezer that the UN forces are due to begin withdrawing from the buffer zone in Ivory Coast today to be replaced by a new united force combining government and rebel soldiers. The country seems to be moving rapidly towards reunification. Great news after so long.
It is good also to hear people talking about forgiveness. Rebel leader Guillaume Soro is asking forgiveness for the war he waged: "In signing the Ouagadougou peace accords with president
Laurent Gbagbo on 4 March 2007, we insisted that forgiveness is the
price we have to pay for peace, so as to make reconciliation and the
joy of living together again, possible."
I have been reading this book together with others in our church as we have followed the "40 Days of Purpose" programme which is based on it. Before we began I read a lot of reviews which were full of praise or full of scorn. You may have already made up your mind, but here is my perspective as one who came to it with a degree of scepticism.
The book is a bestseller, probably due to its centrality to the whole
Purpose Driven approach to church life developed by Saddleback church.
The marketing of their approach and materials has been phenomenally successful with
many other churches purchasing and using them. Their approach does seem
to have had a significant impact in churches who have used it in full
or in part, but it has also been heavily criticised as man-centred and
market driven rather than God-centred. This book certainly does follow
somewhat the self help guide formula, but I think the way in which it
has been criticised has not always been fully justified.
The book is divided into forty chapters and the reader is encouraged to read just one chapter a day.
Warren says in his introduction that 'whenever God wanted to prepare someone for his purposes he took 40 days'. He also states that by reading the book the reader will know
God's purpose for his life. Then 'this perspective will reduce your
stress, simplify your decisions, increase your satisfaction, and, most
important, prepare you for eternity.' These exemplify the way in which
he sometimes makes bold statements in inappropriately absolute terms.
Each chapter begins with a couple of quotes, mostly scriptural, but occasionally from another Christian or secular writer or philosopher. The main text of each chapter averages six pages in length and is completed by a point to ponder, a memory verse and question to consider. There are six sections beginning with What on Earth am I here for? and continuing with five purposes – Worship, Fellowship, Discipleship, Ministry and Mission.The book implies that these are God's purposes for everyone and the first week's studies lead to a challenge to believe that God has a purpose for you and then receive Jesus forgiveness and the Holy Spirit's empowering for fulfilling that purpose. Repentance is not mentioned. Neither is due consideration given to bible passages indicating that God's purposes are also accomplished in punishing some for their own sin. The heading of chapter 7 quotes Proverbs 16:4 "The LORD has made everything for its own purpose" from the New Living Translation, but the whole verse actually says "The LORD has made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for punishment." This is but one worrying example of an alarming hermeneutic approach. The text contains nearly 1000 scripture quotations, but sometimes the way they are quoted gives a sense other than the sense they have in their biblical context. Warren also uses 15 different versions. In an appendix he defends his use of so many versions. His statement that using unfamiliar versions can restore their full impact has merit, but such a widely eclectic approach might be very confusing without understanding of the differences between translation philosophies. Also very revealing is his justification for quoting phrases out of context: he says that Jesus and the apostles quoted the Old Testament in this way without even noting the difference between his writing and inspired scripture. Too ensure good interpretation of Scripture, an understanding of its context is vital. In this way Warren is setting a bad example to the reader.
Despite the weaknesses mentioned, the content is not heretical. I have found the presentation of God's purposes for believers and suggestions of how to go about living our lives for those purposes both challenging and helpful. There is nothing profoundly radical in what is recommended to the reader, but the focus on intentional living is at least potentially life-changing. My sense is that the book's success is mainly down to the synergy produced by the forty days programme, which involves the whole congregation and all church activities in seeking to understand and follow God's purposes. God has graciously used it to bless us in our church and many who have read it before us, so I would recommend it and the "40 Days of Purpose" programme to others with certain reservations and advice to weigh what is taught in the light of God's Word carefully interpreted. I would love to see whole church programmes developed around better books such as John Piper's Future Grace.
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