Jesus Loves the Little Children

Here's an article regarding Taiwan having the lowest birthrate in the world.



Here's an article about the longest practicing pediatrician in the world who retired at age 103 years, Dr. Leila Denmark of northern Georgia. She turned 112 this year. Judy wrote an infant care book based on the advice of my aunt with 11 children and their pediatrician Dr. Denmark, and Judy's book is not only helping to reach families with the Gospel but also helping to encourage families to have more children.

Click on the following to hear the testimony of one of Judy's book readers who became a Christian and then joined our Taipei church plant in 2009:





PRAYER REQUEST: Please pray for Judy and me as we plan to write a follow-up child-training book later this year. (Many of these families have been asking for one, and so we plan to write a book explaining what God has taught in His Word regarding how to train your children.) There are almost no Mandarin-language books from a Biblical perspective on the subject whereas there are some helpful English books out there, among them, To Train Up a Child, which gives very good practical illustrations about how discipline and training work out in many real-life situations.

Here is my sermon on Proverbs 13:24. I recently preached this passage at a church in Alabama.

Something to be encouraged about...

Brit Hume, a well-known and respected Fox News anchor, professes his faith on one of the most highly rated and watched news programs in the USA.

On the way to church

Enjoying the car ride one wintry Sunday morning on the way to a worship service in Alabama.


... and while we're at it... another ride closer to home:

Merry Christmas 2009

Our dear friends and family, partners for the Gospel.

We want to wish you a merry Christmas. Thanks for all of your support. As we write this, our New Hope church plant in Taipei seems to be going strong and heading in a good direction with three elders and two men training to become pastors. My coworker, Rev. Daniel Cohee has been raising support this fall. He hopes to go out to Taiwan as soon has he raises full support and to serve at New Hope while our family is away in the United States on home assignment.

We were busy in Taiwan almost non-stop this fall, and felt like we were barely hanging on after a long sprint when our Thanksgiving departure date for America arrived. Saorsa broke out with roseola and a high fever three days before we left. The fever broke just in time, but she was very uncomfortable the entire airplane flight. When we arrived we had a tough adjustment with jet lag, and then, one after another, all of our girls and Judy got a five-day flu, so we are even now just hardly coming out of that phase of existence. We have not yet gained enough energy to celebrate our first Christmas in the U.S. after four years.

However we are recovering. We've begun enjoying singing Christmas hymns. We really love the Christmas carols we sing this time of year. Some of our favorites are "Of the Father's Love Begotten" and "How Lovely Shines the Morning Star." To think about the Son of God adding to Himself human nature to be our representative, live a perfect life in our place and also die in our behalf still astounds me. I am reminded of 1 Peter 1:12 sharing that even the ancient and brilliant angels serving before God's throne long to look into these things. Everything God plans and carries out is very good indeed! Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

We have so much to enjoy in this world God created. Today I tried a little experimenting in a divergence from my tried and tested chocolate chip cookie recipe. And according to the family, it succeeded. I made a new recipe today with red and green in the cookies to celebrate Christmas. Yes, cranberries and spinach. Please try it out and enjoy.

Merry Christmas, from the Lintons
Joel, Judy, Faith (9), Charis (7), Ashlyn (6), Saorsa(1)


-- Joel's Cranberry - Spinach Christmas Cookie recipe


preheat oven to 375ºF (190ºC)

mix
1 cup (2 sticks ) butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup honey

mix in
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon - vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon - almond extract
2 tablespoons (100 percent peanuts) peanut-butter

gradually mix in dry ingredients

1/4 cup oatmeal (add more as desired)
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 cup coarsely chopped almonds (add more as desired)
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1 cup coarsely chopped cranberries
1 cup finely chopped spinach

for a slide edge, add 1/4 cup finely chopped dark chocolate

use heaping teaspoons to place cookie dough on greased cookie sheet
cook for 9 minutes or until golden brown




taiwanchurch.org/linton

Sèng-tàn-cheh Khoài-lo'k ! Merry Christmas.

Kám-siā, ta'k-ê.


("Bo'k-su, ài ta'k-kang liān-si'p kóng Tâi-gí.")


Sèng-tàn-cheh Khoài-lo'k !
Merry Christmas.



(Some of the church members at New Hope make a Christmas video message to remind me to practice my Taiwanese language and to come back soon.)

New believers and new church members

In recent weeks I've had the privilege of participating in several baptisms.

Traditional Taiwanese culture places great significance on rituals. [You can listen to a sermon I preached in January of 2008 about how Christian rites are different from those of traditional Taiwanese religion.]

As new Taiwanese Christians come to faith, we spend time explaining to them about Christian baptism, how the water is not magical, but instead simply acts as a sign that points to the fact that we are all called to look in faith on Jesus Christ who died to cleanse us of our sins. In celebration, we often sing the song "Nothing but the Blood of Jesus" when we have baptisms at New Hope.

One young mother, a reader of Judy's infant care book, began coming to New Hope and she professed her faith and was baptized on October 25, 2009. She is the first Hakka believer whom Joel has had a chance to baptize.

You can hear her testimony here, or click below:



Carol Huang was baptized by sprinkling with water.

Sprinkling with water points to the perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ, and the sprinkling of His blood to purify us from all sin. The mode of sprinkling is probably the most attested to in Scripture, e.g. in Hebrews 9:10 referring to the temple ritual washings (in the Greek - "various baptisms"...) in which things were sprinkled with blood or water mixed with the ashes of a sacrificed heifer.

"The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!" Hebrews 9:13-14

Through the prophet Ezekiel, God uses the imagery of these temple purifications to teach us about how our hearts can be clean of sin by God's work of grace, sending the Holy Spirit to give us a new heart to come to repentance and put our faith in Jesus Christ.

"I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws." Ezekiel 36:25-27 (NIV)

We are so delighted that God gives us a part in bringing new believers into the church to begin a life of serving the living God.

One young doctor, Thomas Chu has been coming to New Hope for about a year now. You can hear his testimony by clicking on this link, or simply playing the following:





I baptized Thomas Chu on November 1, 2009. He requested the pouring mode of baptism. Using the method of pouring reminds us of justification by grace through faith, and particularly points to the "washing of rebirth and renewal of the Holy Spirit," the fact that our faith was brought about by Holy Spirit's work as God poured out His Spirit on us to apply the redemption accomplished by Jesus Christ. Joel 2:28, Titus 3:4-7

On that Sunday, during the middle of the worship service, most of the New Hope congregation joined us out in the courtyard to witness Thomas' baptism before heading back in to listen to the sermon.



During Thomas' baptism, it started raining so the rest of us got wet as well.

Children are a blessing from the Lord.

Judy meets many moms because of her infant-care blog and some of them have come to New Hope church in Taipei. On the last Sunday of October, Joel got to baptize one of the mom's who had begun coming to New Hope and became a Christian and joined the church. Please pray for that many more parents will become Christians.

We are so happy to also get a chance to show how much children are a blessing and valuable in a nation that has the lowest birthrate in the world (because children are often thought of mainly as trouble).

After reading Judy's book on infant care, some of the parents have been encouraged to go on to have their second or third child.