December 10, 2001
TOGETHER:
Christmas: Good news for all people
___A diverse group attended the Christmas party. Pastors and wives from Iran, Eritrea, Sudan, Nigeria, Kenya, Liberia, Korea, China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Philippines, Brazil and other places around the globe gathered at the Baptist Building to celebrate our joy in Christ and our fellowship with one another in the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
___Some shared Christmas songs from their cultures. Others told Christmas stories.
___Pastor Hue Nguyen described the five Christmases he spent in a North Vietnam POW camp. The first year, he got one bag of rice from his wife, which he shared with five fellow prisoners, all of them Montagnards, the mountain tribe people. This dear Vietnamese brother told how they shared the stories of Jesus and his birth and felt the presence of Christ in the prison with them. He was severely punished in an inner cell for this breach of rules, but God protected him, and today he remembers it with no bitterness in his heart. His church, Faith Vietnamese Baptist Church in Dallas, is growing, and recently he baptized 32 new Christians.
CHARLES WADE
Executive Director
BGCT Executive Board
___Patty Lane is the director of the BGCT office of intercultural initiatives. This was our first Christmas party for the leaders in our multicultural churches. It was such a success that next year we will have another one, probably in the Houston area, so that more of our ethnic brothers and sisters can be involved, she told me.
___The Asian population in Texas continues to grow at a rapid rate. Today 562,000 Asians live in Texas, an 80 percent increase over the past 10 years. Our convention has helped add 1,887 new congregations during this time. Since 1990, we have helped to start or add 662 Hispanic churches, 604 Anglo churches, 431 African-American churches, 112 Asian-American churches and 78 other ethnic congregations.
___The Christian gospel never has been just a "Western gospel." From beginning to end, the Gospel of Matthew is a missionary book. Early on, "magi from the East" came to worship Christ. And Matthew closes with the Great Commission of Christ to "go into all the world."
___Matthew also records that when the newborn Jesus was under threat, Joseph took his little family to Africa for safekeeping. Christians of Egypt make up about 5 percent of the population there today--the largest Christian population in the Arabic-speaking world. And they love to celebrate the story of the refugee Savior who found a place among them in Egypt. These Christians, most of them Coptic, are determined in their homes and churches to still make room for the Holy Family.
___Years ago, Rosemary and I went on a mission trip around the world. Among the many blessings of that trip was the sense of what it must be like for God to experience a Sunday morning. Songs of praise begin early on Sunday in Japan, while it is still Saturday in America. Moving around the globe, they continue non-stop as Christians gather to worship. Finally, the songs of Christians in America rise like incense unto heaven, and Christians in Hawaii and the South Sea islands give the evening benediction to a day of praise and celebration.
___Look around. See all the people. Know that Jesus is for us all. Share the good news of Christmas with everyone in your life. Jesus has come. Let the whole world sing.
___We are loved.
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