Common Delusions | C31 | Ten Tortured Words | More Money for Public Education will not Save your Children

The O�cial Magazine of the Oregon District UPCI June 2013

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Happy Father’s Day

Guest EditorialI wasn’t raised in an apostolic home, I thought I’d

never be anything for God because I didn’t have the lineage to get me anywhere…man was I wrong. My name is Becca East and I was putting God in a box.

At first when I started going to church I just went through the motions and acted like I was in church without really caring about church . Then one day something hit me, I asked myself, “What am I doing? What is all of this for?” So I tried to answer it and I couldn’t think of anything. I just sat there confused. After thinking about it for a while I came to the realization that I was not doing a thing for God. I was just going to church because I thought it was “the right thing to do”. I started to intently pray about it and one day I was given Esther 4:14 “If you keep quiet at a time like this, deliverance and relief for the Jews will arise from some other place, but you and your relatives will die . Who knows if perhaps you were made queen for just such a time as this?”

That made me realize I’m not just running this race so I can one day hear, “well done my good and faithful servant.” We were born to reach this lost and hungry generation . We are here to help other people find strength in something that they have no idea about. We were made to spread the Great Love of Jesus to all we meet. We were born for such a time as this.

For several years I have worked with the youth group in my church and have started doing music as well . This last year I was privileged to attend the AYC Trip to Portland and it birthed an even stronger desire to do something for God. I am currently interning with the Meyer family in Portland and helping with many different aspects of a church plant and outreach . In the fall I will head off to Urshan College and this is only the beginning of what I was born to do! I challenge you, step out and do what you were created to do!

Becca East Indianapolis, IN

Oregon District Apostolic AccentVolume 48, Number 1

www.ORUPC.com

Editor……………………..........…………….Kassie Meyerkassiemeyer@hotmail.com

(503) 689-3589

District OfficialsSuperintendent……………......……………Ted GravesSecretary/Treasurer……..........……..Dan Sargeant

PresbytersSection 1…………………......…..…………Gary GleasonSection 2……………………........…M. Dennis JohnsonSection 3………………………......……..Kevin GoodwinSection 4…………………………......Steven L. Johnson

Honorary Board MemberM. David Johnson

North American MissionsDirector…………………………….......…..Steve HansonSecretary…………………….……….....…Virgil Alldritt

Global MissionsDirector……………………………….......James Bigelow

Apostolic ManDirector……………………………..……......Mark Edday

Ladies MinistriesDirector…………………………......….Geanice LangleySecretary…………………...…….....…….Rachel Sparks

Sunday School Director………………………….…......…Darrell SparksSecretary…………....………………….....…..Joe Higgins

Oregon YouthPresident…………………………….......…Stan GleasonSecretary………………………………......……Kevin Neu

Spanish MinistriesDirector……………………………………......Fito Avenia

Life in Focus Coordinator…...........Bill TittsworthPrison Ministry Coordinator….....….Doug LethinMedia Missions Director……......David P. JohnsonA.C.T.S. President………...….......M. Dennis JohnsonSenior Quiz Coordinator.…......…..Brian HuffmanJunior Quiz Coordinator.…......…Jonathan Toews

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Inside this IssueArticles/Columns2 Guest Editorial BECCA EAST

4 Common Delusions STEVE JOHNSON

5 C31 STAN GLEASON

6 Ten Tortured Words JAMES BIGELOW

8 More Money for Public Educationwillnotfixour Children...Only God Can! DAVID REYNOLDS

Promotions 7 Missionaries in Oregon FOREIGN MISSIONS

10 Mother’s Memorial LADIES MINISTRY

June 2013 APOSTOLIC ACCENT 3

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Common

Did you ever think something was true, when it was not? I have heard people state that sincerity is all that counts. This cannot be true, for I have known of football teams who sincerely wanted to win, but lost the game. More than sincerity is needed in life. Some folks think that sincerity is all that is needed in religion. They ignore the ingredient of truth. In order for our religion to work, it must have the element of truth in it. We must know the truth about God, about sin, about ourselves, and about salvation. These truths can only be found in the Bible.

In the Bible we find that there is only one God, and that God is one. We find that God is loving, merciful, holy, patient, just, all-powerful, all-knowing, and ever-present, to name a few of His attributes. The truth about sin is that it is a violation of the law of God (1 John 3:4). If we sin, we are under the penalty of sin which is death (Rom 6:23). The truth about ourselves is that we have all sinned (Rom 3:23). The truth about salvation is that the only way we can be saved is through Jesus Christ (Acts 4:10-12). More than sincerity is needed to have a right relationship with God when dealing with sin.

Let’s look at some other

common delusions. Some folks assume that sin will give them a fuller life (Gen. 2:17). A man named Achan thought he could prosper in life by sinning (Josh 7:19-25). Some think that you can depend on family connections for salvation (Matt 3:1-9). Some depend upon their own ability, strength, and determination instead of relying on the power of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 26:33; Philippians 3:3; Zech 4:6). Another common delusion is to presume that we know what the future holds (James 4:13-14). Only God knows the future. Do not live beyond your income. Do not go deeply into debt, presuming upon future health and prosperity.

A final common delusion to consider is that there will always be more time (Acts 24:25). Too many today are listening to the lie from Satan that they will always have tomorrow. “Tomorrow you can repent”, “tomorrow you can apologize”, “tomorrow you can be baptized”, “tomorrow you can receive the Holy Spirit”, “tomorrow you can eliminate the sin out of your life”, is the message of Satan. He will often not deny the truth about the need for humanity to be saved. He just simply implants the thought of procrastination. He will not deny the need to repair

relationships; he will just get you to put it off for one more day. Satan will wholeheartedly agree with you that you need to get your priorities in order God’s way. However, his message is, “Just do it tomorrow, because after all, tomorrow always comes”. This is a common delusion. Tomorrow will never come for the soldier who dies on the battlefield. Tomorrow never comes for the business man who dies of a heart attack. Tomorrow never comes for the drunk who dies in a car wreck. Tomorrow never comes for the person who overdoses on drugs. Tomorrow never comes for the person who suffers a hunting accident. Tomorrow never comes for the fisherman who slowly sinks to the bottom of the lake due to a capsized boat. Do not believe the delusion that there is always tomorrow. No, you are not guaranteed tomorrow, but rest assured of this, someday you will face God.

Jesus said truth will set you free. Be free today from delusions that have eternal consequences. ◊____________________________

Steve Johnson is the pastor of True Gospel UPC in Bend, Oregon. He also serves as the section 4 presbyter for the Oregon District.

By Steve Johnson

Delusions

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C31... By Stan Gleason

Lately, Joe has been developing a greater thirst for God. He has been more expressive in worship, remained faithful in God’s service and increased his devotion to God.

During youth service a few weeks ago, Joe’s youth pastor was teaching on Matthew 5:6, which says, “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be

filled.” The youth pastor presented a challenge to the youth group to pray for 31 minutes each day for the next 31 days. This challenge was called C31. Joe was inspired and accepted the challenge.

A few days into it, Joe realized that it was getting steadily easier for him to concentrate. He realized that his time spent in prayer was disciplining his brain to get over the cultural ADHD that had been

created by trying to do multiple tasks at once and was instead teaching him to focus on the task at hand.

Joe was sold and decided that for the rest of his life he was going to make time for prayer each day.◊____________________________

Stan Gleason is an Evangelist from Oregon City, Oregon. He also serves as the Oregon District Youth President.

One day I’ll look up from my phone and realize my kids put me in a nursing home.

Whenever I delete an app from my iPhone, the shaking icons make me think they’re panicked over who’s being cut from the team.

I just turned the brightness all the way up on my iPhone & got a nice little tan.

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That is the title of a thought-provoking book given to me for my birthday last month by my brother-in-law, Phil Zoller. The sub-title is: “How the Founding Fathers Tried to Protect Religion in America… and What’s Happened Since.” Stephen Mansfield, the author, is of the opinion that most Americans today have difficulty appreciating the depth and grandeur of the religious passion that shaped the world of our founding fathers. He reminds his readers that in 1620 some 100 Pilgrims boarded a ship and sailed it for 66 days across the North Atlantic, arriving in New England during winter. Half of them died during a starving time so severe that not one family was untouched by the death of a loved one. Mansfield advances this question: Why did they embark upon that arduous voyage and struggle valiantly to survive? It was not to escape persecution in Holland, for they had lived in relative peace. It was not for riches, for they had no reason to expect wealth to come to them. The answer as to why they did it is rarely mentioned in textbooks and is ridiculed in scholarly publications. It lies in the fact that before these Pilgrims disembarked from the Mayflower, they signed a compact that said they sailed “for the glory of God

and the advancement of the Christian faith.” In effect, they came here as missionaries to bring the gospel of Christ to the New World. They were convinced that the best way for them to bring glory to God was to carry the good news of his kingdom to those who had never heard.A few years ago when my wife and I attended the General Conference of the UPCI in Richmond, VA., we visited Jamestown, which was founded on May 14, 1607. This first permanent English settlement in America is where the United States began. The words and pictures and monuments left by these original settlers can teach us something. They wanted their descendants to remember some important things that happened in this strange and wonderful new land. Accordingly, their first act was to erect a large cross to represent the tree upon which Jesus was crucified. The second action of these colonists was to pray and take the Lord’s Supper together. A bronze memorial stands at the place where those 120 settlers kneeled on the ground, receiving the Lord’s Supper from their chaplain, Robert Hunt. Their first church was under a sail tied between four trees and their communion rail was made of boughs of trees. Their Christian faith is shown by

their own words inscribed on the memorial to Robert Hunt. It says, “To the glory of God and in memory of the Reverend Robert Hunt, Presbyter, appointed by the Church of England, Minister of the Colony which established the English Church and English civilization at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607.”Engraved on a plaque that stands on the rear right wall of the original Jamestown church site are the words, “To the glory of God and in grateful remembrance of the adventurers in England and Ancient Planters in Virginia who, through evil report and loss of fortune, through suffering and death, maintained stout hearts and laid the foundations of our country.” Another plaque on the rear left wall quotes from Acts 2:38, “Repent, and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” California pastor and researcher Todd DuBord, who searched through archives in the Library of Congress and contacted various historians, found that the Jamestown settlers were commissioned through their Virginia Company not only to advance the company’s economic interests, but to spread the teachings of Jesus Christ on orders

Ten Tortured Words By James Bigelow

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JACOB & MANDY PALMAJuly 9-14 Uruguay

JONATHAN & MARIA STRICKLANDAugust 13-18 Greece

JOHN & SHERI HEMUSAugust 20-25 United kingdom

LIONEL & JOHANNA DABBSSeptember 17-22 Singapore

WAYNE & SOFIA MONDAYSeptember 24-29 Panama

PHILLIP & LINDA WALMEROctober 15-20 Brazil

Information on each missionary and country, plus many helps, can be viewed or downloaded at www.globalmissions.com Pastors can place their request for specific missionaries to visit their church by contacting James Bigelow at:

541.756.7141 or 541.217.4310 jamesLbigelow@hotmail.com

from King James I, who called for the “propagating of Christian religion to such people as yet live in darkness and miserable ignorance of the true knowledge and worship of God.”William Carey, a shoe cobbler who served as pastor to a local Baptist church, read Jonathan Edward’s Account of the Life of the Late Rev. David Brainerd, and became deeply concerned with propagating the Christian gospel throughout the world. At a ministers’ meeting in 1786, Carey raised the question of whether it was the duty of all Christians to spread the Gospel throughout the world. J. R. Ryland is said to have retorted: “Young man, sit down; when God pleases to convert the heathen, he will do it without your aid and mine.” Undaunted, in 1792 he published his groundbreaking missionary manifesto, An Enquiry into the Obligations of Christians to use

Means for the Conversion of the Heathens. Far from a dry book of theology, Carey’s work used the best available geographic and ethnographic data to map and count the number of people who had never heard the gospel. It formed a movement that has grown with increasing speed from his day to the present.The early settlers’ everyday lives were extensively shaped by their religious beliefs and practices and it is evident that this strongly influenced the writing of the First Amendment to the Constitution in later years, which states, “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The first part of that sentence forms the theme of Stephen Mansfield’s book: “Ten Tortured Words.” Since then, a gross misunderstanding and out-of-context application of a metaphor used by Thomas

Jefferson regarding “a wall of separation between church and state” led to the dismantling of our nation’s religious heritage. Another ten tortured words are, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel.” Sadly, many generations have not taken them seriously; to them, this establishment clause of the church lost its dynamic appeal; the urgency to fulfill the divine mandate lessened considerably over the years in some church organizations. May God help us who embrace the founding tenets of the United Pentecostal Church International to never allow the world to erect “a wall of separation” between us and his expressed will!◊__________________________

James Bigelow is the Global Missions Director for the Oregon District.

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More Money For Public Education

By David Reynolds

After 30 years in in the public schools I can assure you that the problem is not a lack of money. The problem is not poor teachers, or poorly trained teachers. There are many caring and kind teachers in the public educational system. If there is a problem with the modern teachers it is that they just reflect the values and norms of our humanistic society and culture. Their training has a void of absolute moral principles. Higher salaries will not fix

them.The problem in education is that our children are coming to

school with many emotional scars and a lack of discipline and structure. The cause is that the family’ unit is breaking down and the government is trying to fill the void.

Will Not Fix Our Children…Only God Can!

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During my tenure in the schools we attempted to heal these wounded children by adding a multitude of special education programs --it has not worked.

We added English Second Language, Remedial Reading and Remedial Language classes. We added Special Education classes for the slow learners and ‘Gifted’ classes for the fast. We added Emotional Handicapped classes. We added counselors and social workers—once placed only in the High Schools, now they are down in the primary grades. These all cost money and take finances from the classroom.

We added Kindergartens to get children ready for first grade and when that did not solve the problem of children not being ready for school, we added Head Start.

When we saw that children where not eating properly we added lunch programs –then a breakfast program. To keep the children safe going and coming to school we added buses and then because parents where not home after school we started ‘after school’ child care. Much or most of the above is the responsibility of parents –not the schools.

When all of the above failed our government decided we needed to initiate set standards, goals and Behavioral Objectives.

We now have had to lower these standards in order that the ‘average’ student can graduate.

How can the schools be responsible for a quality product when they have no control of the input? The problem is sin and selfishness. The problem is that our families and our marriages are

not stable. The problems are too big for any government!

An editorial in the USA TODAY [Feb. 21 2013] targeted President Obama plan to start educating all children before kindergarten. He feels that the poorest children are being left out of this benefit—the very ones who need it the most. The editorial agrees that it would be a benefit but feels that society is not addressing the most important issue, which is that family structure is breaking down. Here is some of what USA Today said:

A few small high-quality programs have shown the enduring benefits for at-risk kids. But intensive study of Head Start, the nations largest and oldest preschool program, finds that the benefits, which are real, wear out after the third grade.

The probable reason is not hard to deduce. Children are most likely to succeed in school when pushed by parents who provide stability, help with schooling and instill an educational and work ethic. But for decades now, the American family has been breaking down.

Two-thirds of the children born in the USA are born to unmarried mothers, an eight-fold increase since 1960. Many succeed thanks to the heroic efforts of strong, motivated, single parents and other relatives. But, research shows that children of single parents suffer disproportionally high poverty rates, impaired development and low performance in school.

A typical pattern in these “fragile families” looks like this: When a child is born, most fathers and mothers are in a committed

relationship. By the time the child reaches 5 many fathers have disappeared. As the mothers move on to new relationships the children face more and more instability, often with new siblings and different fathers. Boys without strong male role models are more likely to turn to gangs and crime.

Single mothers read less to their children and are more likely to use harsh discipline and are less likely to maintain stable routines such as regular bedtimes. All these behaviors are important predictors of children’s health and development.

ConclusionThe core problem of social

advancement has always been the family-- and it is breaking down. God designed families to be founded on the principles of the Word of God. God’s plan is that every child have a father and a mother. It is God’s plan that parents be responsible [not the government] for the teaching and training of their own children. When society deviates from the plan—children hurt.

Make a Difference --Save Our Families!◊____________________________David Reynolds has been the Minister of

Discipleship at Portland Pentecostals since 2007. He is a graduate of Conquerors Bible College, Cascade College, Portland State University and post graduate work at the University of Oregon. He served as a teacher,

assistant Principle & Principle. Since retiring from public education he has traveled extensively to over 37 countries preaching & teaching in Bible Schools and has written several books on Education, The Family & Parenting.

• TUPELO CHILDREN’S MANSION Children from dysfunctional families live in an environment with opportunity to grow spiritually, physically and emotionally..

•NEW BEGINNINGS MATERNITY Care for birthmothers considering adoption and child placement for adoptive couples.

•HAVEN OF HOPE A program for girls ages 13-16 with behavioral and emotional issues.

•LIGHTHOUSE RANCH FOR BOYS Healing broken and hurting lives of teen boys. Ministering in a spirit of love and care.

•WWW.MYHOPERADIO.COM Apostolic gospel music all day on the internet at no cost to you!

•DIVISION OF EDUCATION Promotes Apostolic doctrine in schools, colleges, and chaplaincies. Seminars for educators serving in UPCI endorsed Bible colleges.

•GLOBAL MISSIONS Appliances, Christmas and children’s birthday checks for missionary families and support of Bible Schools.

•NORTH AMERICAN MISSIONS Bible studies, tracts, and family emergency assistance are provided.

•MULTICULTURAL AND PRISION MINISTRY Receives funds for needed literature from Ladies Ministries.

•URSHAN COLLEGE Ladies Ministries allocates annually to the Library fund.

WHAT MOTHER’S MEMORIAL SUPPORTS