Truth And Reconciliation Needed, Part 12

We need copious time to develop and celebrate fresh and familiar ways of lovemaking. Read my article "Hugs and Kisses" at http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2013/04/hugs-and-kisses.html.

A wife/lover says to her husband/lover in Song of Songs/Song of Solomon New Living Translation Bible 7:11-13, "Come, my love, let us go out to the fields and spend the night among the wildflowers. Let us get up early and go to the vineyards to see if the grapevines have budded, if the blossoms have opened, and if the pomegranates have bloomed. There I will give you my love. There the mandrakes give off their fragrance, and the finest fruits are at our door, new delights as well as old, which I have saved for you, my lover."

Spouses are supposed to be joyous friends and lovers who engage in creative and comforting sex. God is the Creator. Christians are to imitate God who lives inside of us. Creative people cultivate new things, fresh things and old things, familiar things. Matthew 13:52 Amplified Bible says, "He said to them, Therefore every teacher and interpreter of the Sacred Writings who has been instructed about and trained for the kingdom of heaven and has become a disciple is like a householder who brings forth out of his storehouse treasure that is new and [treasure that is] old [the fresh as well as the familiar]."

Have you put oils and lotions on your feet, so that your spouse can kiss, lick suck and massage your toes with delight? Is your butt in shape? Read my article "Touch Time" at http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2013/02/touch-time.html. Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virginia 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on http://www.Twitter.com/Michelelove30.

Sometimes people have different ideas about what is creative and/or comfortable. Read my article "Beautiful Butts" at http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2013/03/beautiful-butts.html.

Love is not suppose to hurt. Romans 13:10 Amplified Bible says, "Love does no wrong to one’s neighbor [it never hurts anybody]. Therefore love meets all the requirements and is the fulfilling of the Law."

Abortion hurts. Abortion kills unborn boys and unborn girls and even adolescents and adults. Abortion harms a woman's cervix and other body parts. Watch this video with Dr. Freda McKissic Bush http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60C87TaxpQQ.

Dr. Alveda King talks about abortion harming her cervix, how the method of delivering her unborn son permanently damaged his face, the birth control methods recommended to her by Planned Parenthood caused her health problems and the attack on elderly people. Watch her speak about her "family planning" experience in this Civil Rights and the Pro-life Movement speech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj4JAbHvw9U. Dr. Alveda King is the niece of Christian Minister and Civil Rights Activist Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Sterilization and rape hurt. A neighbor and North Carolina state raped Elaine Riddick. A neighbor raped Riddick at the age of 13 and threatened to kill her. North Carolina state raped Riddick by sterilizing her without her consent while she was giving birth to her son conceived through rape. Watch this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzYQLHHCxq8 of a CNN interview in which Elaine Riddick says about her North Carolina state-sponsored forced sterilization, "Later on because of my body was traumatized so severely I ended up having to have a total hysterectomy. But prior to that before I had the hysterectomy most of my life was I had to live in a whole lot of pain, hemorrhaging. When I got my monthly cycle ... it felt like someone had taken a knife and was gutting me .... My menstrual cycle ... wasn't normal because it lasted ... 12 to 15 days at a time, and this happened from the time ... after I had my son from the time I was 14 until I got into my 40s when I eventually did have to have a total hysterectomy."

Riddick said in the CNN interview regarding the psychological pain of her sterilization, "You will never recover from this because it's always there. Every time you wake up when you go to sleep it's there. You think about how you've been treated in this country here. You think about--well me myself I had been so severely damaged until I was on Prozac, Serentil and Haldol, and that's how I coped. I had to wean myself off these things in order for me to cope, and I have to cope, and I have to go on."

Marriage is not supposed to hurt. Elderly people enjoy marital romance and sex; they do not want to be denied food, water and medical treatment. Read my articles "Love Letters, Relationships and Political Activism" http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2013/04/love-letters-relationships-and.html and "Elderly, Disabled, Unborn, Strangers, Freedom, Love" http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2013/04/elderly-disabled-unborn-strangers.html.

Because God loves us, God does not will for us to have partner sex outside of marriage. Because God loves us, God wills for us to enjoy sex inside of marriage. God does not want any of us to be afraid of sexuality and try to stomp it out. God created sexuality. What God creates is good, beautiful and excellent provided we participate in God's creation according to His design. God designed sex to bond marital couples. Sometimes sex leads to reproduction. Read my article "Fearless Sex" at http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2013/01/fearless-sex.html.

Margaret Sanger of the American Birth Control League which became Planned Parenthood says in an interview with Mike Wallace, "I think the greatest sin in the world is bringing children into the world that have a disease from their parents, that have no chance in the world to be a human being practically, delinquents, prisoners, all sort of things, just marked when they are born. That to me is the greatest sin that people can commit" (Watch the interview here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsrOPDdbTzM in which Sanger talks about sexuality, coercion and other topics.)

Write about sterilization abortion, infanticide, "family planning" and the loving, Biblical rejection of Margaret Sanger style sexuality. In this interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doiWP2SQx2E Chen Guangcheng, who is blind, talks about his nephew, Chen Kegui who is the husband of Liu Fang and father of a young son named Chen Fubin, and he notes that Chen Kegui was put in the same jail shortly after Chen Guangcheng escaped China that Chinese authorities put Chen Guangcheng in after he filed the lawsuit against forced abortion and forced sterilization. Chen Guangcheng also encourages people to blog in this interview. "Numerous forced-abortion tragedies occur in China every single day," says Pastor Bob Fu, president of China Aid Association. A woman subjected to a forced abortion at nine months of pregnancy shares her story here http://www.womensrightswithoutfrontiers.org/blog/?p=1327.

China has implemented a new anti-rumor law. Read here http://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/access-09102013102331.html for more information about the new anti-rumor law which has impacted Chen Guangfu, Chen Guangcheng's elder brother, and others. Don't be intimidated. Ephesians 4:14-15 Amplified Bible says, "So then, we may no longer be children, tossed [like ships] to and fro between chance gusts of teaching and wavering with every changing wind of doctrine, [the prey of] the cunning and cleverness of unscrupulous men, [gamblers engaged] in every shifting form of trickery in inventing errors to mislead. Rather, let our lives lovingly express truth [in all things, speaking truly, dealing truly, living truly]. Enfolded in love, let us grow up in every way and in all things into Him Who is the Head, [even] Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One)."

God wants us to live the best possible life. Deuteronomy 28:13 Amplified Bible says, "And the Lord shall make you the head, and not the tail; and you shall be above only, and you shall not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you this day and are watchful to do them."

When Rafael, who has autism, and I go to restaurants we don't usually see persons with autism, Down's Syndrome, intellectual disabilities, cerebral palsy and other disabilities. Increasing the wage of service providers to the disabled would help the disabled enjoy restaurants with wait staff. Deanna Copeland is a service provider for Andrea Hood and only makes $1,400.00 monthly. Read their story here http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/08/disability_rights_advocates_fa.html.

Also as a society we need to embrace the behavior of people who act differently. Rafael eats with his hands. People in Ethiopia and other cultures eat with their hands. Read my article "Food, Love and Marriage" at http://michelefjackson.blogspot.com/2012/07/food-love-and-marriage.html.

Some don't want the disabled and others to have the best possible life. Don't let threats or pressure stop you from standing up for what's right. You are lovable to God, and God wants you to love yourself and other people.

Are you a victim of American state-sponsored sterilization? A Persian proverb says, "Opportunity should be grabbed." In North Carolina $10 million is to be split equally among those sterilized through the North Carolina Eugenics Board. Compensation claims must be filed by June 30, 2014, for victims to receive a one-time payment to be distributed June 30, 2015. North Carolina had a eugenics board from the 1930s through the 1970s through which social workers, family and others arranged for people to be sterilized. If you think you are one of the victims, you can ask the North Carolina Justice for Sterilization Victims Foundation to check the North Carolina Eugenic Board's records by completing and mailing them this form: http://www.sterilizationvictims.nc.gov/documents/FirstPartyVerificationform.pdf. Sometimes people are not able to speak up for themselves and need advocates. If you are not a victim, but are an advocate for a victim, you can ask the North Carolina Justice for Sterilization Victims Foundation to check the North Carolina Eugenic Board's records by completing and mailing them this form with required attachments: http://www.sterilizationvictims.nc.gov/documents/ThirdPartyVerificationform.pdf. These forms are verification and not a guarantee of compensation.

In South Africa Desmond Tutu retired as archbishop to head the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that exposed many of the evils done under apartheid, so that evil may be stopped and good promoted. North Carolina is not the only American state that did state-sponsored sterilizations.

Cindy Trimm says in her book Commanding Your Morning, "Think big and think detailed!.... Become a visionary--be creative. Take the limits off your mind! Think beyond where you are.... Ask God to enlarge your capacity for thinking, to take the limits off." Other American states besides North Carolina and other nations need to apologize to, financially compensate victims and erase all forms of "family planning" evil.

The door to evil has not been closed. US Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote in the 1927 Buck v. Bell case upholding American state-sponsored sterilization, "It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes.... Three generations of imbeciles are enough." Like Roe v. Wade which legalized abortion in America Buck v. Bell has not been overturned.

A Korean proverb says, "The fortunate man has bread and friends." If you have filed a North Carolina verification form, please share your experience and inspire others. Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virginia 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on http://www.Twitter.com/Michelelove30.

Covert Takeover?

In the Bible book of Jeremiah God tells His creyentes (believers) that they were doing many evil things in not worshiping God properly some of which were killing innocent people, mistreating employees and mistreating immigrants. God does not want well treated people or mistreated people to mistreat others. Galatians 5:14 Amplified Bible says, "For the whole Law [concerning human relationships] is complied with in the one precept, You shall love your neighbor as [you do] yourself."

Ebed-Melech was an Ethiopian immigrant, government worker and creyente. Even though he had been sterilized, Ebed-Melech helped save the life of the Jewish prophet Jeremiah by advocating for his release from a particularly bad prison. Leading government officials did not want to hear and heed the truth that Jeremiah spoke about impending trouble and a difficult but definite way of surviving; so they put Jeremiah in jail.

Angel Moya was put in jail because the Cuban government didn't want to hear what he was saying. His wife Berta Soler as part of the group Las Damas de Blanco (Ladies in White) helped to free him and other political prisoners from jail. Las Damas de Blanco (Ladies in White) is a Cuban human-rights organization formed by the wives and mothers of 75 dissidents jailed in a 2003 government crackdown on political opponents. They participate in a weekly march and in weekly attendance at Mass dressed in white to encourage the Cuban government to free all political prisoners.

Soler became the head of Las Damas de Blanco after the death of Laura Pollan. Pollan is Las Damas de Blanco's founder and head who died of injuries inflicted on her because of her advocacy for freedom.

Soler and her family did not accept the Cuban government's offer to some Cuban dissidents to move to Spain. Soler currently lives in Cuba and is fighting for the Cuban people's freedom and the end of communism. Communism is not compatible with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness because it is a system of government controlling people's lives rooted in the spirit of fear.

Love overcomes the spirit of fear. Cuba is a communist country. China is a communist country that has a one-child policy with government permission required for pregnancy, forced abortion, forced sterilization, huge fines for conceiving unauthorized boys and girls and other means of fear. Communist officials claim the one-child policy is good for people. A Chinese proverb says, "Pointing to a deer and calling it a horse," meaning, "Right and wrong are deliberately mixed up." Abortion is currently legal in America; until 2003 in North Carolina people the government deemed to be 'mentally diseased, feeble-minded or epileptic' could legally be forcibly sterilized. Do you think legal abortion and forced sterilization are attempts at a communist takeover of America? Write to:
Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virginia 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on http://www.Twitter.com/Michelelove30.

Life, Liberty And The Pursuit Of Happiness

1 Corinthians 11:11-12 Amplified Bible says, "Nevertheless, in [the plan of] the Lord and from His point of view woman is not apart from and independent of man, nor is man aloof from and independent of woman; For as woman was made from man, even so man is also born of woman; and all [whether male or female go forth] from God [as their Author]." God's ideal of working together in harmony under the leadership of God is not always implemented in reality. Where God's ideals are not implemented oppression is.

Young Molly Welsh was an employee in the late 17th century in Britain. Her employer said she stole a pail of milk. Welsh said a cow kicked over the pail and spilled the milk. The quarrel ended with Welsh's employer arresting her.

British law allowed for Molly to be hung for stealing. Instead she was sent to a tobacco farm in Maryland, which was a colony of Britain at the time.

For seven years Welsh worked as an indentured servant. Then she earned her freedom and rented a farm close to the city of Baltimore, Maryland. Within a few years she bought a small farm and two slaves one of which was a man with the last name Bannaka from the African country Senegal who said he had been a prince in his homeland.

Molly Welsh freed Bannaka and her other slave around 1696 and married Bannaka whose name changed to Banneky. They stayed on their farm because a marriage between a black man and a white woman wasn't legal.

Their eldest of four daughters, Mary, married a man named Robert who was from Guinea West Africa. Robert kept Mary's name of Banneky.

Mary and Robert Banneky had three girls and one boy named Benjamin born November 9, 1731. This Benjamin is the Benjamin Banneker famous in history as an astronomer, mathematician, inventor and writer. Molly Welsh was also very fond of her grandson who she introduced to the Bible and encouraged his love of learning.

An African Swahili proverb says, "The way you bring up a child is he way it grows up." Benjamin Banneker grew up in a family where women and men of different races loved each other. They also valued equality and freedom and were able to live and work together harmoniously under the leadership of God.

Benjamin Banneker was a free African American man who lived during the time of legal African American slavery in the United States. In 1791 Banneker wrote a letter to Thomas Jefferson who was secretary of state to President George Washington and had earlier drafted and signed the US Declaration of Independence, which says, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

The Chinese invented fireworks. Banneker's letter was fireworks comparing African American slavery to the bondage of the American colonies before they obtained independence from Britain. Banneker's letter to Jefferson advocating African American equality and freedom became famous and says:

"Suffer me to recall to your mind that time, in which the arms of the British crown were exerted, with every powerful effort, in order to reduce you to a state of servitude; look back, I entreat you ....You were then impressed with proper ideas of the great violation of liberty, and the free possession of those blessings, to which you were entitled by nature; but, sir, how pitiable is it to reflect, that although you were so fully convinced of the benevolence of the Father of Mankind, and of his equal and impartial distribution of these rights and privileges which he hath conferred upon them, that you should at the same time counteract his mercies, in detaining by fraud and violence, so numerous a part of my brethren under groaning captivity and cruel oppression, that you should at the same time be found guilty of that most criminal act, which you professedly detested in others."

The Brazo River in Texas was named Los Brazos de Dios which means In the Arms of God. God does not use His arms for criminal acts to oppress humanity. He has His arms open to a now and forever relationship with a wide variety of people. John 17:3 Amplified Bible says, "And this is eternal life: [it means] to know (to perceive, recognize, become acquainted with, and understand) You, the only true and real God, and [likewise] to know Him, Jesus [as the] Christ (the Anointed One, the Messiah), Whom You have sent."

God is the Author of freedom, equality, peace and all that is good and wants to share His goodness with many. Many Christians and Christian ideas are in America and elsewhere. Today in America Welsh and Bannaka would not have to hide from the law their interracial, marital love on a Maryland farm; African Americans are not subject to slavery, and Welsh would not be hanged for allegedly stealing in Britain. However, some people are still oppressed. "As long as there is one ... oppressed human being in this world the struggle la lucha continua," said Dr. Georgia McMurray, educator, writer, activist who had  the progressively degenerative muscle disorder Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease.

On July 4th America celebrates independence from Britain. The ultimate source of oppression is Satan. God is the Liberator. Is there a day you celebrate your liberation from Satan? Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virginia 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30.

Do We Believe In Proper Parenting?

"Honduras" means "depth" and is also the name of a country in Central America. Jesus Christ went to great depths to preach publicly and to practice good deeds publicly. He also went to great depths to get away from the public regularly to talk with God privately and to spend private time with his apostolic family.

God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is intensely good. Satan is intensely evil. Satan seeks to split families in various ways. Jesus Chris says in Mark 3:25 Amplified Bible, "And if a house is divided (split into factions and rebelling) against itself, that house will not be able to last."

What are some lies Satan tells to motivate employers to demand too much time from employees? Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virginia 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30.

We need copious time with God, family and friends.

Ephesians 6:4 Amplified Bible says, "Fathers, do not irritate and provoke your children to anger [do not exasperate them to resentment], but rear them [tenderly] in the training and discipline and the counsel and admonition of the Lord." If dad is rarely present in relationships, how can he train, discipline and counsel his children?

Satan working through the Iranian government put Pastor and US Citizen Saeed Abedini in jail for his Christian faith and works. Pastor Saeed would like to be present with his family and serving as a Biblical father. We can help him by praying and by doing deeds to pressure Iran to release Pastor Saeed Abedini from Evin prison in Tehran, Iran.

A Chinese proverb says, "It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness." Sign the petition and write a letter to Pastor Abedini at the website http://www.savesaeed.org.

Workplace flexibility, such as one-year or more of paid leave, and global freedom to parent properly are possible. Proverbs 4:23 Amplified Bible says, "Keep and guard your heart with all vigilance and above all that you guard, for out of it flow the springs of life." Saint Augustine, a North African bishop, said, "What can be hoped for which is not believed?"

Is Anyone Safe In China?

Reverend Desmond Tutu of South Africa writes in An African Prayer Book, "...we are made to live in a delicate network of interdependence with one another, with God and with the rest of God's creation. We say in our African idiom: "A person is a person through other persons." A solitary human being is a contradiction in terms. A totally self-sufficient human being is ultimately subhuman. We are made for complementarity. I have gifts that you do not; and you have gifts that I do not. Voila! So we need each other to become fully human."

One of the ways that Tutu is trying to complement humanity is by serving as Honorary Co-Chair of Freedom Now. Jared Genser, Freedom Now pro-bono counsel for Chen Kegui, sent an April 29, 2013, letter to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, seeking medical treatment for the appendicitis of Chen Kegui who is in Linyi Prison following a trial "that failed to meet international standards for due process" and an arrest close to the time that Kegui's uncle, human rights activist Chen Guangcheng escaped China.

In 2005 Chen Guangcheng filed a class action lawsuit against local government officials practicing forced abortions and forced sterilizations as part of China's one child policy. Guangcheng suffered time in Linyin Prison and house arrest before escaping house arrest. Then the United States and China negotiated Chen Guangcheng coming to America in spring 2012.

Speaking about China's one child policy in a video released in December 2012 to mark Human Rights Day Chen Guangcheng says, "It is a sin, because life is sacred."

China's one child policy is anti-life, anti-family as are all policies that permit abortion and involuntary sterilization. In addition to the baby boys and baby girls killed by abortion, Tonya Reaves, Christin Gilbert, Jennifer Morbelli, Denise Montoya are some American women killed by botched abortions. Maria Santiago is another woman recently killed at an abortion clinic. Read more about Maria Santiago and the abortion clinic she went to at http://www.lifenews.com/2013/05/29/hispanic-woman-dies-after-abortion-clinic-staff-had-no-cpr-training/. Some unborn babies survive botched abortions. Ana Rosa Rodriquez is a living girl missing an arm because an abortionist trying to kill her as an unborn baby sliced off her arm. Some other unborn babies who survived abortions are Gianna Jessen, who has cerebral palsy, and Gospel singer Fred Hammond, who has no physical damage from the attempted abortion.

Some people are trying to preserve and to promote life. Husband and wife Du Yiliang and Guo Yanling and their three children are refugees in Thailand who would like to live safely in their homeland China, but can't due to China's one child policy. Is anyone safe in China? In 1995 when Guo Yanling was eight months pregnant, she was forced to undergo an abortion. In 1999 she was forcibly sterilized. In 2006 Guo Yanling was imprisoned for not being able to pay a fine for having more than one child. Du Yiliang's and Guo Yanling's three children cannot attend school or receive government benefits because the unpaid fine is used as a block to obtaining household registrations for their three children. The household registrations allow children to attend school and to receive government benefits. Du Yiliang's and Guo Yangling's family experience is typical in China. What is not typical is that they have been granted refugee status in Thailand in 2011. For more on this family whose troubles are not over and others like them read http://www.chinaaid.org/2012/07/sister-guo-yanling-christian-in-guangxi.html.

Having the opportunity to live in equality, freedom, justice, safety and love are God's desire for us. God wants what is good for us. The devil (the thief) wants what is bad. The devil is the author, maintainer and promoter of China's one child policy and abortion and involuntary sterilization globally. Jesus Christ says in John 10:10 Amplified Bible, "The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows)."

Let's kick the devil off the planet. Embrace God and people.

Imagine Opening Our Arms To Immigrants And The Disabled

Kaldi and the Dancing Goats is a story from Ethiopia. Kaldi was a goatherd, who one day was grazing his goats on a mountain side, but by the end of the day he could not find them.

Kaldi searched, and he searched, and he searched. Finally, he found them dancing around a bush whose red berries they had been feasting on. Kaldi decided to try the berries and found himself inspired to dance.

Kaldi took the red-berry treasure to some monks in a nearby monastery. One monk felt the red berries were a work of the devil and flung them into the fire. The fire brought out such an exquisite aroma from the red berries that the monks rescued the berries, ground them and made the hot, black drink we know as coffee. What they at first thought was a work of the devil, they later decided was a gift from God because coffee kept people awake during their prayers.

Some people feel that allowing a short, easy path to citizenship without economic burden for immigrants is a work of the devil. However, many immigrants are Christians fleeing from places of persecution and/or poverty to places that treasure things like freedom, equality and economic opportunity. 

Religious freedom is not a reality in northern Nigeria. Also other parts of Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, have absorbed about as many people fleeing from northern Nigeria as they can help. Nigeria is about 50 percent Islam, 40 percent Christian and 10 percent other faiths.

One tradition says that the reason Abraham of the Bible had to immigrate from Ur of the Chaldees to Canaan is because he was being persecuted. God will use persecution and other situations to move us from one place to another for a good purpose. Genesis 12 records that Abraham coming to Canaan would be a part of his family being a global blessing to people.

The Brazos River flows through the middle of the American state of Texas. This river was originally named Los Brazos de Dios (In the Arms of God). Creyentes (believers) serve a big God whose arms are so big that they could never be too many people for Him to hug. Creyentes are God's physical arms on earth. Hugging immigrants is a blessing to us and to them.

Christian Minister and Civil Rights Activist Martin Luther King, Jr., says, "[People] often hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they do not know each other; they do not know each other because they cannot communicate; they cannot communicate because they are separated." Demonic fear is designed to divide and to destroy people.

An East African proverb says, "When minds are the same, that which is far off will come." If we stay in fear, we cannot unify and do the great works God said we are to do.

Demonic fear produces irrational thinking. Imagine the extensive psychiatric problems in China due to China's one child policy with forced abortion and forced sterilization. Inflicting psychiatric problems reduces productivity. Productivity is essential for people to survive and thrive.

The idea of killing people and/or disfiguring them for social advancement is ancient and modern. In America and in other countries abortionists kill unborn baby girls and baby boys. Sometimes abortionists also kill babies born alive after botched abortions, adolescents and women. Abortionist LeRoy Carhart killed Christin Gilbert, a 19-year-old who had Down syndrome, and her baby. Gilbert is not the only woman killed by Carhart, who does late-term abortions. People with disabilities are discriminated against in the womb and out of the womb. Robert Ethan Saylor, was a young man killed in a movie theater because people didn't understand someone with Down syndrome.

We must learn to distinguish among foreign invaders/enemies and the potential friends of immigrants and people with disabilities.

Share some stories of immigrants and persons with disabilities overcoming discrimination. Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, VA 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30. Recommend this article on Google.

Enjoy Memorial Day on Monday.

For with God, Nothing Is Impossible

"Blessed are the common people. God loves them: that is why he made millions of them," says Nnamdi Azikiwe, first president of independent Nigeria. Sometimes what God makes others destroy through abortion. Abortion kills baby girls and baby boys. Abortion also harms all members of a family.

A ChinaAid News March 24, 2013, "With ChinaAid's Help, Two Victims of China's One-Child Policy Granted UNHCR Refugee Status" article reports that in 1995, when Guo Yanling was eight months pregnant, she was forced to have an abortion. In 1999, she was forcibly sterilized. In 2006, she was imprisoned for not being able to pay a fine for having more than one child. The Chinese government also refused to issue household registrations to her and to her husband, Du Yiliang's, three children without which they are unable to attend school or to receive government benefits. Guo Yanling's and Du Yiliang's abortion, sterilization, educational and economic terror experience is typical in China. What isn't nearly as typical is that with ChinaAid’s help, Guo Yanling and Du Yiliang have been granted refugee status by the UN High Commission on Refugees. Notes of encouragement to Du Yiliang and Guo Yanling, requests for interviews and financial contributions to ChinaAid's Emergency Relief Fund can all be submitted to ChinaAid founder and president Bob Fu at http://www.chinaaid.org/2013/03/with-chinaaid-help-two-victims-of-china.html.

Bob Fu himself has gone through the refugee experience. Fu was born in China. When Bob Fu, and his wife, Heidi, were pregnant with their first child without a pregnancy permission card required by China's one child policy, they were facing a forced abortion if caught. So the couple left China, went to Thailand and then Hong Kong. In Hong Kong, their son Daniel was born as a refugee and later the family was granted permission to live in the United States.

That's pretty incredible, but creyentes (believers) serve an incredible God who likes to do extraordinary things for creyentes. Luke 1:37 Complete Jewish Bible says, "For with God, nothing is impossible.” 

Whether an abortion is forced or not anywhere in the world, a baby girl or a baby boy still is killed. Killing and kindness just don't go together. A comprehensive investigation of the abortion industry is needed.

Fifteen-year old Denise Montoya hemorrhaged and died after a 26-week abortion done by Douglas Karpen. "“When he did an abortion, especially an over 20 week abortion, most of the time the fetus would come completely out before he cut the spinal cord or he introduced one of the instruments into the soft spot of the fetus, in order to kill the fetus,” said Deborah Edge, who worked as a surgical assistant for Karpen for about 15 years until leaving in March, 2011;" read more at http://www.lifenews.com/2013/05/15/another-gosnell-report-shows-texas-abortion-doc-kills-babies-born-alive/.

Kermit Gosnell, another abortionist who performed abortions in all trimesters of pregnancy, killed babies born alive after botched abortions and killed women, is now in jail. Douglas Karpen is not. How many Douglas Karpen's and Kermit Gosnell's are there?

Nothing is impossible; abortion and abortionists can be stopped.

Pastor Saeed Abedini Out Of Solitary Confinement; Struggle for Freedom Continues

Matthew 25:34-40 Complete Jewish Bible says, “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you whom my Father has blessed, take your inheritance, the Kingdom prepared for you from the founding of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you made me your guest, I needed clothes and you provided them, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ Then the people who have done what God wants will reply, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and make you our guest, or needing clothes and provide them? When did we see you sick or in prison, and visit you?’ The King will say to them, ‘Yes! I tell you that whenever you did these things for one of the least important of these brothers of mine, you did them for me!’ Talking to God, writing to Pastor Saeed Abedini and signing the petition at http://www.savesaeed.org are having a beneficial effect. Pastor and U.S. Citizen Saeed Abedini has been released from solitary confinement and returned to the general prison population in Evin prison in Tehran, Iran. Ask someone today to pray, to write to Pastor Saeed Abedini and to sign the petition.

Solitary confinement is psychological abuse. In 1952 Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela spent time in solitary confinement. He nearly went mad having no one to talk to and nothing to read.

The fight for Pastor Abedini's freedom is far from over. His struggle shows a lack of religious freedom in Iran. Pastor Abedini had been helping to build Christian house churches and a secular orphanage when Iranian authorities decided to place him in house arrest and eventually in jail for threatening the national security of Iran! Oppressors fear things like love, equality, freedom, diversity and truth.

Christian Minister and Civil Rights Activist Martin Luther King, Jr., says, "Freedom is never given to anybody. For the oppressor has you in domination because he wants to keep you there."

Please share some unusual prayers and efforts to get people to write to Pastor Abedini and to sign the petition for him. Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P.O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virgina 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30.

Can Pastor Saeed Abedini be freed from Evin prison? Yes.

Can we overcome the fear of women, immigrants, people from the ghettos and barrios and others? Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of The National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, America’s largest Hispanic Christian Organization with more than 40,000 member churches, said in a Martin Luther King, Jr. service speech that we need a Joshua generation that does not acquiesce to or allow itself to be manipulated by the donkey or the elephant; we need a generation sold out exclusively to the agenda of the Lamb. Elizabeth Cady Stanton said in her Declaration of Sentiments at the first US women's rights convention, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men and women are created equal."

Can China's one child policy with forced abortion and involuntary sterilization be stopped?  “Anything is possible in this world,” said Chen Guangcheng, a blind, self-taught lawyer and human rights activist, to an audience at the Christiania Theater in Oslo, Norway on Tuesday regarding changing human rights abuses in China ("Chen Guangcheng: Chinese Government “In A State Of Madness”" May 14, 2013 article by Rosie Gray, BuzzFeed Staff.)

Fatherhood and New Chen Guangcheng Family Persecution

In the movie Selena, Selena's father, Abraham Quintanilla (portrayed by Edward James Olmos,) loves his daughter, family and life with enthusiasm, commitment and creativity.

Abraham is protective of Selena (portrayed by Jennifer Lopez) while also pushing her to be her best. What movies have you seen with inspiring, intimate father/daughter relationships? Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P.O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, Virginia 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on the social media Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30.

When Selena and Chris Perez fall in love, Abraham can't handle it, and in a fit of hot anger forbids the young lovers to see each other. Chris (portrayed by Jon Seda) is the guitarist for the band Selena and the Dinos. Selena and Chris meet secretly for a while. Then Selena proposes marriage. Chris accepts. They elope.

Chris waits in their Porsche get-away-car while Selena goes into her parents home first to tell Abraham about her and Chris' marriage. Abraham is not the erupting volcano they fear. He has cooled off and has become capable of acknowledging that Chris and Selena really love each other, that they are ready to be married and that he compelled them to elope. The happy couple don't need the Porsche get-away car.

But He Peirong and Chen Guangcheng needed their get-away car. He Peirong is a key member of a group of human rights activists who organize support for Guangcheng in China. Guangcheng, who became blind as a result of a childhood illness and now wears dark sunglasses, is a self-taught lawyer who in 2005 filed a class-action lawsuit against a local government for forced abortions and forced sterilizations practiced as part of China’s one-child policy.

Guangcheng's lawsuit was rejected, and he was placed under house arrest in Shandong, China, with guards surrounding his house, his cell phone service cut off, access to the Internet blocked and bright lights shinning on his house at night. His wife, Yuan Weijing, and daughter were living with him under house arrest. This family was prevented from meeting their wider family, including Chen Guangcheng's and Yuan Weijing's son, who lived elsewhere with an aunt.

Last spring He Peirong drove Guangcheng to the US embassy in Beijing, so that he could escape house arrest in Shandong, China. Were they traveling in a Corolla, the best-selling car of all time produced by the Japanese company Toyota?

After Peirong drove Guangcheng to the US embassy, the US and China worked out a deal and Guangcheng escaped to the United States. He Peirong didn't loose Guangcheng like Harriet Tubman didn't loose runaway slaves while helping them to escape slavery in American slave states to freedom in American non-slaves states and in Canada.

On April 9, 2013, Chen Guangcheng testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's and other people's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations.

God the Son Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) says in Matthew 7:12 Complete Jewish Bible, "“Always treat others as you would like them to treat you; that sums up the teaching of the Torah and the Prophets." A Twi African proverb says, "Love is the greatest of all virtues."

Abraham in the movie Selena came to love Chris as his son-in-law. Currently, Chinese authorities are not loving the Chen family and those who dare to defy China's one-child policy which includes forced abortions and forced sterilizations.

“They can’t do anything about Guangcheng, so they are taking revenge on me,” says Chen Guangfu, a brother of Chen Guangcheng, about an attack this morning where two unidentified men stopped him from riding his electric bicycle and beat him ("Exiled activist Chen Guangcheng's brother beaten in latest attack against family" South China Morning Post May 9, 2013, article by Verna Yu.)

The Chen family has been persecuted for a number of years.

Guangfu's son and Guangcheng's nephew, Chen Kegui, is currently in jail and is being denied medical treatment for appendicitis. Freedom Now, a human rights group, has written an April 29, 2013, letter to the United Nation's Special Rapporteur on Torture seeking to get Kegui to a hospital and out of jail. 

“They can do nothing to control what I say to the international community, so they are threatening and oppressing (my relatives) in order to shut me up,” Guangcheng told Verna Yu by telephone. He also told her, “I will always speak the truth, I will never hold back.”

Abraham lost his daughter's life through a troubled employee. With timely action, Chen family members can be protected. Pastor Bob Fu, Founder and President of China Aid, spoke with Guangcheng today regarding today's attack on his brother, Chen Guangfu. Fu said in a May 9, 2013, China Aid "Chen Guangcheng's Elder Brother Chen Guangfu was Violently Beaten" article, "To employ mafia style actions in order to silent a fellow citizen's voice represents a new low for China's leaders. It is time for President Obama to immediately intervene with this worsening situation. The US leaders and international community should hold the Chinese top leaders accountable for their miserable failure to deliver its own solemn public international commitment that was made a year ago to both Mr. Chen and Mr. Obama, which was to protect the safety and civil rights of Mr. Chen's family members and investigate years' of abuses and torture to Mr. Chen, his wife and other family members."

A Way To Help Family And Friends

1 Timothy 5:8 Amplified Bible says, "If anyone fails to provide for his relatives, and especially for those of his own family, he has disowned the faith [by failing to accompany it with fruits] and is worse than an unbeliever [who performs his obligation in these matters]." The Llamoca family may or may not be creyentes (believers). They are followers of the practice of provision advocated in 1 Timothy 5:8.

Nelson D. Schwartz writes in the May 6, 2013, The New York Times article "Wave of Immigrants Transforms a Small Town," "Fourteen years after she arrived from Lima, Peru, and started working as a baby sitter, Itziar Llamoca now owns Fiesta Place, which makes traditional decorations and balloon arrangements for family events like baptisms, weddings and the girl's coming-of-age party called the quinceanera. She earned her associate's and bachelor's degrees from colleges in Westchester and bought the store with her sister from its original owners several years ago.

Ms. Llamoca, who now holds American citizenship, did not rely on bank loans to make the purchase. "For us, it was easier to borrow money from the family," she said."

A Twi African proverb says, "Poverty makes a free man become a slave." Owning a business is one of the best ways to escape poverty and to live in the freedom of financial independence. Family can help family find a way to financial independence through financial contributions to get a business going, by working together in a business and by other ways.

Giving donations are better than giving loans. Romans 13:8 Amplified Bible says, "Keep out of debt and owe no man anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor [who practices loving others] has fulfilled the Law [relating to one’s fellowmen, meeting all its requirements]."

Booker T. Washington, an African American leader and head of Tuskegee Institute, believed in combining education and work training. He wrote in his book Up from Slavery, "Great men cultivate love ... only little men cherish a spirit of hatred."

Christopher Yuan, the son of Chinese immigrants, had to overcome hatred of Christians. At one time in his life he was an illegal drug abuser and dealer who had frequent sex with men. Time in prison and a HIV-positive diagnosis helped him to read a Bible. Christopher Yuan eventually co-wrote with his mother, Angela Yuan, the book Out Of A Far Country A gay son's journey to God. A broken mother's search for hope. In the book he writes, "As I continued to read the Bible, I came across Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 (NASB)--passages normally used to condemn gays and lesbians to a fiery fate. "You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination." But I realized that God didn't call lesbians and gay men abominations. He called it an abomination. What God condemned was the act, not the person. For so long, I had gotten the message from the Christian protestors at gay-pride parades that the God of the Bible hated people like me, because we were abominations. But after reading these passages, I saw that God didn't hate me; nor was he condemning me to an inescapable destiny of torment. But rather, it was the sex he condemned, and yet he still wanted an intimate relationship with me."

God wants an intimate relationship with all kinds of people. God also wants all kinds of people to love each other as much as they love themselves. Family and friendship are for everyone. A Korean proverb says, "The fortunate man has bread and friends."

What are some wonderful ways family and friends have helped each other to be financially independent? Write to:

Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, VA 22195

Follow Michele F. Jackson on the social media Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30.

Stirring Up Timely Trouble

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela's tribal name "Rolihlahla" means "to stir up trouble." He lived up to his name by becoming South Africa's first democratically elected president and ushering out apartheid, which treated blacks, Asians and other people of color as lesser than European-heritage people.

Chen Guangcheng is not from South Africa, but he has stirred up trouble in his native China. Guangcheng became internationally known for filing a 2005 law suit against a local government for forced abortions and forced sterilizations practiced as part of China’s one-child policy. Later he endured physical and psychological abuse in jail and in house arrest. Eventually he escaped to the United States through negotiations between the US State Department and Chinese authorities.

Chinese authorities are still upset about the trouble Guangcheng has continued to stir up. On April 9, 2013, Guangcheng testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's and other people's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations. Some testimony is still being translated from Chinese to English.

Pastor Bob Fu, founder and president of China Aid, also testified at the subcommittee hearing. He cited some cases of forced abortion and forced sterilization in China. Fu said:

"On March 13, a woman Henan province (Daxuzhaitown, Taikang county) who had had a forced abortion was found hanged at the local family planning office with suspicious injuries all over her body. On March 19, a mother of two in Hubei province (Tongshan county) named Shen Hongxia was forced by local family planning officials to have a tubal ligation against doctors orders that led to her death. On March 22, a woman in her seventh month of pregnancy in Anhui province (Chuzhou, Fengyang county) was kidnapped by family planning cadres and taken to a hospital where a lethal injection was given that killed her seven-month-old unborn baby and caused her to deliver a dead fetus. China Aid has interviewed the husband of this woman and has offered to help them."

In October 2012 Actor and Activist Christian Bale presented Chen Guangcheng with an award at the annual gala of Human Rights First. Bale said, "He [Chen] had exposed a program of forced abortion and sterilization in Shandong. A program of forced abortion means that women are being dragged from their homes against their will. They are being forced to have abortions, sometimes late-term -- imagine that -- with some women reportedly dying in the process. Now this is true horror. And in this insane world, this man, Chen, who was helping these women -- who was living by some of the most simple, brave and universally admired values -- values that we teach our children every day, and helping our fellow man -- for this, this man was imprisoned and beaten for over four years."

China does not operate by rule of law. Chinese authorities do what they like irregardless of laws. Guangcheng's nephew, Chen Kegui, has been in jail after using knives to fend off local officials who burst into Kegui's home after Guangcheng's escape. Kegui is married to Liu Fang. The couple have a young son, Chen Fubin. An April 29, 2013, letter by Freedom Now to the United Nation's Special Rapporteur on Torture says in part:

"Chen Kegui is currently suffering from appendicitis, and although prison authorities may have administered intravenous antibiotics, he is in severe pain, has been denied access to a doctor, and has not been taken to a hospital despite reports that his appendix has begun to rupture.

Chen Kegui, 33, was detained by Chinese authorities shortly after his uncle, a prominent human rights advocate, escaped from illegal house arrest and sought refuge at the United States Embassy in Beijing. On April 27, 2012, police, local party officials, and government thugs stormed the family's home and arrested Chen Kegui's father, Chen Guangfu, beating and interrogating him about Chen Guangcheng's whereabouts. Authorities returned to the home and savagely beat Chen Kegui and his mother, Ren Zongju. When Chen Kegui attempted to defend himself from the intruders, a local party official was injured. After disappearing Chen Kegui for a number of days, the government formally arrested him in early May and ultimately sentenced him to three years and three months in prison on November 30, 2012, after a trial that failed to meet international standards for due process."

Luke 1:37 Complete Jewish Bible says, "For with God, nothing is impossible.” God impregnated a virgin without using male sperm. Since God did this, surely He can answer prayers for Chen Kegui, the Chen family and for the end to China's one-child policy which includes forced abortions and forced sterilizations and for an end to abortion everywhere.

According to Financial Times, the Chinese Health Ministry reported that since 1971, 196 million sterilizations and 336 abortions have been performed in China. Many of these are involuntary. In the January 2011 document, “Abortion Statistics: United States Data and Trends,” National Right to Life Committee Education Director Dr. Randall K. O’Bannon estimates that there have been 54,559,615 abortions since the January 22, 1973, Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion based on data from both the Centers for Disease Control and the Guttmacher Institute, a former Planned Parenthood research arm. The analysis also found that the best estimate for the current number of annual abortions in the United States — involving both the surgical abortion procedure as well as the abortion drug RU 486 — is 1.2 million. Adding another year of 1.2 million abortions to the 2011 total National Right to Life estimated based on Guttmacher and CDC figures, there have been 55,772.015 abortions in America since Roe v. Wade. Another way to look at the statistics is to say that in America every 30 seconds a baby loses his or her life through abortion.

Former Mexican President Benito Juarez said, "The respect for the rights of others is peace."

The rights of the unborn and the born of all ages are not being respected in China or America. Don't agree to be silent and slack about fighting to end abortion, involuntary sterilization and other human rights abuses. A Japanese proverb says, "Do quickly what is good." The US negotiated a deal with China to get Chen Guangcheng out of China. The US can negotiate with China to get Chen Kegui to a hospital to treat his appendicitis and to free him from jail. Write to:

Secretary of State John Kerry
US Department of State
2201 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20520

Love Immigrants

An East African proverb says, "When minds are the same, that which is far off will come." When 3,000 Mexican soldiers faced 6,000 invading French soldiers, a Mexican victory looked far off.

But Mexican soldiers asked Mexican farmers called campesinos to help fight, and united they defeated the French on May 5, 1862, in Puebla, Mexico. Mexican President Benito Juarez, who was of Native American heritage, made the victory a national celebration called Cinco de Mayo (the 5th of May).

The French used defeat to renew their determination to fight and fought with Mexico while the Civil War was being fought in the United States between the Union and the Confederacy. France was interested in defeating Mexico, so that they could weaken the Union. France favored the Confederacy. Mexico was an ally of the Union.

Mexican President Benito Juarez and American President Abraham Lincoln both grew up in poverty and later on became lawyers and presidents of their nations; they were also political allies.

The Mexicans kept defeating the French and celebrating each May 5th. After the Union defeated the Confederacy, President Lincoln sent soldiers to America's border with Mexico to help Mexico fight off the French. Of the 30,000 US troops sent, 20,000 were African Americans. Finally in 1867, France had enough of war and left Mexico.

A free Mexico was good for Mexicans, the Union and African Americans.

In the Bible book of Joshua God gave the Hebrews the Promised Land. God also has a nation for various groups of people. Boundaries can be beautiful.

Sometimes people need to leave the nation of their birth or choice and join another nation. Today and throughout American history Mexicans and other people have sought to join America. The Bible way is to welcome strangers and to make them friends and family, not to shackle them with debt, a long path to citizenship and splitting apart families.

Proverbs 17:17 Amplified Bible says, "A friend loves at all times, and is born, as is a brother, for adversity."

During African American slavery many friends helped runaway slaves escape to freedom through the Underground Railroad. While many advocates of slavery practiced splitting apart African American families, many abolitionists found ways to keep families together. God put children and parents together.

May 5th is also celebrated in Japan as Children's Day. Parents honor children by flying carp-shaped kites or banners.

Happy May 5th! Share stories of U.S. citizens helping immigrant families. Write to:
 
Michele F. Jackson
P. O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, VA 22195
 
Follow Michele F. Jackson on the social media Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/michelelove30.

Even more wonderful than being a free citizen family in an earthly nation is to be one in an eternal kingdom family. Today is Resurrection Sunday for Orthodox Christians when the resurrection of Jesus Christ from His death is celebrated. Are you a family member of the eternal kingdom of God? Talk to God and allow Him to give you a new kingdom life. John 1:12-13 Complete Jewish Bible says, "But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God."

In China Qi means the foundation of courage, will and intention. Courage requires conviction in love. Immigrants and all people need love. 1 John 4:7-11 English Standard Version Bible says, "Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another."

Help To Make A Happy Birthday

What can I do to help someone? Matthew 10:41-42 Amplified Bible says, "He who receives and welcomes and accepts a prophet because he is a prophet shall receive a prophet’s reward, and he who receives and welcomes and accepts a righteous man because he is a righteous man shall receive a righteous man’s reward. And whoever gives to one of these little ones [in rank or influence] even a cup of cold water because he is My disciple, surely I declare to you, he shall not lose his reward."

Many individuals signed petitions over a period of time to have Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday become a federal holiday in the United States of America. On November 2, 1983, former US President Ronald Reagan signed a bill creating the federal holiday Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Will you sign a petition and write a letter to help free Pastor and U.S. Citizen Saeed Abedini from Evin Prison in Tehran, Iran, being coordinated at http://www.savesaeed.org? Join the more than 581,000 people worldwide from more than 180 countries who have signed the petition. Iranian authorities put Pastor Abedini under house arrest in July 2012 separating him from his wife, Naghmeh Abedini, and their two young children. In September 2012 they arrested him. In January 2013 Iranian authorities sentenced him to an eight-year prison sentence for  "threatening the national security of Iran;" Pastor Abedini had been involved in setting up Christian house churches in Iran and also a secular orphanage. Pastor Abedini is currently in solitary confinement, has been subject to physical and psychological abuse to pressure him to give up his faith and has not been able to receive medical treatment for internal injuries resulting from the abuse.

Un Dicho (A Proverb) says, "Una buena accion es la mejor oracion." ("A good deed is the best prayer.") Pastor Abedini's birthday is May 7th. Pastor Abedini and Naghmeh are both from Iran. They are also both Muslims who converted to Christianity and became US citizens. Naghmeh Abedini cannot surprise her sweetheart in person for his birthday because to do so might put her in jail too, but she and others can send a card and a gift by signing the petition and writing a letter to Pastor Abedini via http://www.savesaeed.org.

Asghedom Michael wrote a love poem "Asmeret" that says in part:
"Enthroned in love you are
You're as wise as you are beautiful
I'll spend my life with you if you'll let me."

Jesus Christ loves us and wants to spend the rest of life with us. This is Holy Week for Orthodox Christians. On a Friday more than 2,000 years ago Jesus Christ was crucified on a cross and died to make a way for God and believers to have a permanent relationship. Then Jesus Christ rose from the dead on Sunday. Thanks to the King of Kings believers have a spiritual birthday as eternal kings and queens.

In addition to parenting the Abedini children without their father's presence, Naghmeh has been speaking publicly to churches, the media and others about her husband's plight in prison for his Christian faith. The red-crowned crane is a symbol of long life and good fortune in China and in Japan. By signing the petition and writing a letter at http://www.savesaeed.org you are helping to free Pastor Abedini from prison and to allow a happy May 7th birthday and a long, happy family life together for Saeed, Naghmeh and their children.

Are Stereotypes Godly?

Sometimes people try to put people in boxes that the Bible does not place them inside. The Bible records that Deborah led the Israelites as a judge and prophetess, and that Sarah was a domestic engineer. God approves of women working in a variety of ways.

The universe that God made is full of variety. God likes variety, but He does not like vice. It is harmful behavior to reject the way God made us. God made us male, female, African, European, Asian, Latino and with many other qualities. Our biology is not an accident. Long before God created the earth, He planned everything about us the way He did because it pleased Him and because He loves us passionately. So when we reject our biology we hurt God; we also hurt ourselves.

The bodies God gave us are awesome and built for good treatment. Galatians 5:14 Amplified Bible says, "For the whole Law [concerning human relationships] is complied with in the one precept, You shall love your neighbor as [you do] yourself."

A Twi African proverb says, "Love is the greatest of all virtues." Love ensures that our relationships with God, self and others work well.

God is the source of the kind of love expressed in Galatians 5:14 giving us the power to celebrate who we are and to develop in a way that is also better for people around us.

Godly enhancements don't erase our Designer's creation. When Deborah became a judge and prophetess she never stopped being a woman. Some people are not satisfied with being a male or female and want to change their gender. Some feel that being another gender will free them to live a more fulfilling life.

Every society makes rules about what people are suppose to be and do, and these rules usually place some type of bondage on people that God doesn't. A Chinese proverb says, "Pointing to a deer and calling it a horse;" it means "right and wrong are deliberately mixed up." Some are deliberately trying to mix up God and the devil by falsely portraying God as an advocate of bondage. The truth is God desires us to live in maximum freedom, so that we can be of maximum service to God and people. Galatians 5:13 Amplified Bible says, "For you, brethren, were [indeed] called to freedom; only [do not let your] freedom be an incentive to your flesh and an opportunity or excuse [for selfishness], but through love you should serve one another."

God called creyentes (believers) who are reinas y reyes (queens and kings) to a dynamic life. Sarah left the country of her birth, traveled and ended up being the matriarch of a new nation of people. Sarah had an adventurous life. If a life of adventure does not appeal to you, then it may be that God has a different, equally valuable plan for you.

If you are uncomfortable in your gender or any other aspect of your humanity, talk to God about your discomfort. He is able to take our inner life and turn it into something good inside and outside. Today, the National Day of Prayer, is a good day to talk to God as is any day at any time. Sometimes family, friends and others are not available to talk to us, but God is. God is everywhere at all times, and He is always doing good.

While we cannot be everywhere at all times, God wants us to cooperate with Him to be doing good like He does. Imagine if most people loved God, loved themselves and loved other people and write to me about it at:

Michele F. Jackson
P.O. Box 2106
Woodbridge, VA 22195
Also share a tweet @Michelelove30 via the social media Twitter.

What Would You Do For Love?

A Kaonde African proverb says, "Husband and wife must be loyal to each other." Wife, Ellen Craft, and husband, William Craft, were reliable to make their relationship work with the benefits of freedom. Ellen was also so fair-skinned that she could pass for white even though she was of mixed European and African ancestry. William was of African ancestry. They were both slaves. Ellen cut her hair and posed as a white man traveling with her black slave. Traveling in this manner the married couple escaped slavery in Georgia and went to freedom in England.

True love inspires great actions. Romans 5:8 Amplified Bible says, "But God shows and clearly proves His [own] love for us by the fact that while we were still sinners, Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) died for us." 1 John 4:11 Complete Jewish Bible says, "Beloved friends, if this is how God loved us, we likewise ought to love one another."

"... In the Bible we are all considered brothers and sisters despite our race, color or nationality," wrote Pastor Saeed Abedini in a letter to his wife, Naghmeh Abedini. Pastor Abedini was setting up an orphanage and Christian house churches in Iran when Iranian authorities put him under house arrest in July 2012 separating him from his wife and their two children. In September 2012 they arrested him. In January 2013 Iranian authorities sentenced him to an eight-year prison sentence for threatening Iran's national security. The US State Department, US Secretary of State John Kerry and the European Union have all called for Pastor Saeed Abedini's release, and over 573,000 people worldwide from over 180 countries have signed a petition lending him support. A campaign to write letters to him for his May 7th birthday and to sign the petition is being coordinated at http://www.savesaeed.org.

Everyone can thank God for having a birthday to celebrate. God is author of  life, but not of discrimination. Acts 10:34 Amplified Bible says, "And Peter opened his mouth and said: Most certainly and thoroughly I now perceive and understand that God shows no partiality and is no respecter of persons." Please call Governor Mary Fallin at (405-521-2342) to ask her to sign into law HB 1403 The Nondiscrimination in Treatment Act of Oklahoma which protects the elderly, seriously ill and disabled by preventing medical providers from denying individuals life-saving treatment based on their quality of life.

Discrimination is deadly for the young too. Since China's one-child policy was implemented in the 1970s more than 336 million babies have been killed by abortion;that's more Chinese baby boys and baby girls have lost their lives to abortion than the combined total population of the United States of America and Australia; in America since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion 55 million babies have been killed.

When righteousness reigns, God is pleased. It's easier to receive a right relationship with God and people in free and open societies. China is not such a society.

One person trying to open up China and to eliminate forced abortions and forced sterilizations is Chen Guangcheng. Guangcheng is the husband of Yuan Weijing and the father of a girl and a boy. He became internationally known for filing a 2005 law suit against a local government for forced abortions and forced sterilizations practiced as part of China’s one-child policy.

Guangcheng's lawsuit was rejected, and he was placed under house arrest in Shandong, China, with guards surrounding his house, his cell phone service cut off, access to the Internet blocked and bright lights shinning on his house at night. His wife and daughter were living with him under house arrest. This family was prevented from meeting their wider family, including Chen Guangcheng's and Yuan Weijing's son, who lived elsewhere with an aunt.

Tejas is the name the Spanish gave to the area that became the US state of Texas. The Spanish chose the name based on a Native American word for "friend."

Guangcheng, who became blind as a result of a childhood illness and now wears dark sunglasses, had friends help him to escape from house arrest in April 2012. He Peirong is a key member of a group of activists who organize support for Guangcheng in China. He Peirong drove Guangcheng to the US embassy in Beijing. Were they traveling in a Corolla, the best-selling car of all time produced by the Japanese company Toyota?

A deal was worked out between China and the United States; now Guangcheng, a self-taught lawyer who also helped the disabled win public benefits and aided farmers fighting illegal land seizures, lives in New York with his wife, Yuan Weijing, and their two children.

On April 9, 2013, he testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's and other people's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of 130,000 Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations.

Wherever evil exists, so do fear tactics. 2 Timothy 1:7 Amplified Bible says, "For God did not give us a spirit of timidity (of cowardice, of craven and cringing and fawning fear), but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of calm and well-balanced mind and discipline and self-control."

What are some ways love is winning over fear?

Freedom-Loving Friends

Some Southerners spread rumors that Frederick Douglass was never a slave because he spoke so well. Partly in response to these rumors, Douglass wrote his autobiography Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass that gave specific information about slave owners, slaves and places where his time in slavery happened. Under the Fugitive Slave Law Douglass, who left a slave state for a free one, could be returned to slavery. So Douglass left the United States and went to England.

In England he gave speeches against African-American slavery and in favor of Irish freedom, women's rights and world peace. Douglass made a lot of freedom-loving friends, but his heart was to be in America fighting primarily for the freedom of African Americans.

Proverbs 17:17 Complete Jewish Bible says, "A friend shows his friendship at all times — it is for adversity that [such] a brother is born." Douglass' English abolitionists friends purchased his freedom, so that Douglass would be safer from the Fugitive Slave Act.

We all need to welcome and live in a wide variety of relationships. Chantal Sicile-Kira categorizes relationships in her article, "The Transition To Adulthood: Planning Ahead," for the magazine, Autism File, that is applicable to all people. She describes four circles of relationships:

1) The Circle of Intimacy includes those with whom we share our secrets, dreams and values. These are our best friends and are usually family members, but can and should also include others. We know and share a lot about what is going on in each others lives, our thoughts and feelings. We feel safe enough in these relationships to support each other spiritually and emotionally. Jesus encouraged intimate relationships beyond biology. Mark 3:33-35 New Living Translation Bible says, "Jesus replied, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?” Then he looked at those around him and said, “Look, these are my mother and brothers. Anyone who does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

2) The Circle of Friendship includes friends or relatives whom we see for occasional social activities, such as for a movie or to eat a meal, but who are not our closest friends. The Bible records that Epaphras and Paul shared some time in jail and time spreading the Gospel, but not with the intensity and intimacy of the relationship between Timothy and Paul.

3) The Circle of Participation includes people who we participate with in our life, such as on the job, business or ministry, our place of worship, schools, sports teams, social clubs and other organizations. This circle contains people who may eventually be in the Circle of Friendship or even the Circle of Intimacy. We can socialize with members of our church, other churches and other groups. Luke 9:49-50 New Living Translation Bible says, "John said to Jesus, “Master, we saw someone using your name to cast out demons, but we told him to stop because he isn’t in our group.” But Jesus said, “Don’t stop him! Anyone who is not against you is for you.”"

4) The Circle of Exchange includes people who are paid to be in our lives, such as medical professionals, teachers, counselors, governmental officials, sales associates, auto mechanics, etc. These people can also be cultivated to move into the Circle of Participation, Circle of Friendship and even the Circle of Intimacy. Everyone is a potential friend/disciple. Matthew 28:18-20 the Message Bible says, "Jesus, undeterred, went right ahead and gave his charge: "God authorized and commanded me to commission you: Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then instruct them in the practice of all I have commanded you. I'll be with you as you do this, day after day after day, right up to the end of the age.""

Like Frederick Douglass had abolitionist friends who purchased his freedom, Chen Guangcheng has friends who helped him to obtain his freedom.

Chen Guangcheng is the husband of Yuan Weijing and the father of a girl and a boy. He became internationally known for filing a 2005 law suit against a local government for forced abortions and forced sterilizations practiced as part of China’s one-child policy.

Guangcheng's lawsuit was rejected, and he was placed under house arrest in Shandong, China, with guards surrounding his house, his cell phone service cut off, access to the Internet blocked and bright lights shinning on his house at night. His wife and daughter were living with him under house arrest. This family was prevented from meeting their wider family, including Chen Guangcheng's and Yuan Weijing's son, who lived elsewhere with an aunt.

Tejas is the name the Spanish gave to the area that became the US state of Texas. The Spanish chose the name based on a Native American word for "friend."

Guangcheng, who became blind as a result of a childhood illness and now wears dark sunglasses, had friends help him to escape from house arrest in April 2012. He Peirong is a key member of a group of activists who organize support for Guangcheng in China. He Peirong drove Guangcheng to the US embassy in Beijing. Were they traveling in a Corolla, the best-selling car of all time produced by the Japanese company Toyota?

A deal was worked out between China and the United States; now Guangcheng, a self-taught lawyer who also helped the disabled win public benefits and aided farmers fighting illegal land seizures, lives in New York with his wife, Yuan Weijing, and their two children.

On April 9, 2013, he testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's and other people's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of 130,000 Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations.

Being able to spend the rest of life with a spouse is a privilege that can be plucked away at any time whether we are a US citizen or a citizen of another country. Guangcheng's nephew, Chen Kegui, has been in jail after using knives to fend off local officials who burst into Kegui's home after Guangcheng's escape. Kegui is married to Liu Fang. The couple have a young son, Chen Fubin.

"He (Chen Kegui) must be heavily injured, I'm worried about his physical state," Liu Fang said to Reuters reporter Sui-Lee Wee for her May 24, 2012, article "Brother of blind China activist flees village." Liu Fang also said about her husband and Guangcheng's nephew, "Inside, he might be subject to beatings."

Torture and other reprisals by Chinese authorities are happening to family and friends of Guangcheng since his escape from China to the US.

On April 24, 2013, Chen Kegui's mother, Ren Zongju, and Chen Kegui's uncle, Chen Guangjun, were told by Chinese authorities to answer questions about whether they “harbored a criminal” by helping Chen Kegui before his capture. Chen Guangjun is a bother of Chen Guangcheng

Chen Guangfu, another brother of Chen Guangcheng, told Chris Buckley of The New York Times for his April 24, 2013, article, "Chinese Officials Order Questioning of Exiled Activist’s Relatives, “I think that this is really about Guangcheng;” “I’ve heard that he spoke at the U.S. Congress and leveled accusations against officials. In my view, that infuriated them.”

Iranian authorities are infuriated by the Christian faith and works of Pastor and U.S. Citizen Saeed Abedini. Pastor Abedini was setting up an orphanage and Christian house churches in Iran when Iranian authorities put him under house arrest in July 2012 separating him from his wife, Naghmeh Abedini, and their two children. In September 2012 they arrested him. In January 2013 Iranian authorities sentenced him to an eight-year prison sentence for threatening Iran's national security. The US State Department, US Secretary of State John Kerry and the European Union have all called for Pastor Saeed Abedini's release, and over 573,000 people worldwide from over 180 countries have signed a petition lending him support. A campaign to write letters to him for his May 7th birthday and to sign the petition is being coordinated at http://www.savesaeed.org. In a February 18, 2013, letter to his wife, Pastor Abedini wrote about physical and psychological abuse inflicted on him to compel him to deny his faith in Jesus Christ. He also wrote of plans to persevere in his relationship with God and to share it with others: "There are empty containers who are thirsty for a taste of the Living Water and we can quench their thirst by giving them Jesus Christ."

In another letter to his wife, Naghmeh Abedini, Pastor Saeed Abedini wrote, "... In the Bible we are all considered brothers and sisters despite our race, color or nationality."

Even though we have many Christians in America, not everyone is treated like a brother and sister. Please call Governor Mary Fallin at (405-521-2342) to ask her to sign into law HB 1403 The Nondiscrimination in Treatment Act of Oklahoma which protects the elderly, seriously ill and disabled by preventing medical providers from denying individuals life-saving treatment based on their quality of life.

God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost welcomes all kinds of people and calls creyentes (believers) friends. Jesus Christ says in Matthew 8:11 English Standard Version Bible, "I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven." He says in John 15:14 Amplified Bible, "You are My friends if you keep on doing the things which I command you to do."

Not Famous But Fundamental To The Kingdom Of God

Not all of Jesus Christ's 12 apostles have the same level of fame. For example, Peter is more recognized than Bartholomew. Matthew 10:1-4 New Living Translation Bible says, "Jesus called his twelve disciples together and gave them authority to cast out evil spirits and to heal every kind of disease and illness. Here are the names of the twelve apostles:

first, Simon (also called Peter),
then Andrew (Peter’s brother),
James (son of Zebedee),
John (James’s brother),
Philip,
Bartholomew,
Thomas,
Matthew (the tax collector),
James (son of Alphaeus),
Thaddaeus,
Simon (the zealot),
Judas Iscariot (who later betrayed him)."

Being less famous does not mean that someone is not fundamental to the Kingdom of God.

Many have heard of Civil Rights Activist Rosa Parks, known as the Mother of the Civil Rights Movement. Few have heard of Civil Rights Activist Jo Ann Robinson. Both were essential to the Civil Rights Movement. Before Rosa Parks many black men and women had been asked to get off the bus because they were black including Jo Ann Robinson and two teenagers named Mary Louise Smith and Claudette Colvin.

It was Jo Ann Robinson and her teacher friends and fellow activists who wrote the following letter and distributed it through 52,500 leaflets in black neighborhoods igniting the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott to end racial segregation:
"This is for Monday, December 5, 1955

Another Negro woman has been arrested and thrown into jail because she refused to get up out of her seat on the bus for a white person to sit down.

It is the second time since the Claudette Colbert (sic) case that a Negro woman has been arrested for the same thing This has to be stopped.

Negroos (sic) have rights, too, for if Negroos did not ride the buses, they could not operate. Three-fourths of the riders are Negroos, yet we are arrested, or have to stand over empty seats. If we do not do something to stop these arrests, they will continue. The next time it may be you, or your daughter, or mother.

This woman's case will come up on Monday. We are, therefore, asking every Negro to stay off the buses Monday in protest of the arrest and trial. Don't ride the buses to work, to town, to school, oranywhere (sic) on Monday.

You can afford to stay out of school for one day if you have no other way to go except by bus.

You can also afford to stay out of town for one day. If you work, take a cab, or walk. But please, children and grown-ups, don't ride the bus at all on Monday. Please stay off of all buses Monday." (Freedom Walkers The Story of the Montgomery Bus Boycott by Russell Freedman)

Not only did African Americans and others stay off the bus on Monday, they stayed off for more than one year, which helped the US Supreme Court and Montgomery, Alabama, government to end racial segregation on the public buses and other areas of life.

Chen Guangcheng is the husband of Yuan Weijing and the father of a girl and a boy. He became internationally known for filing a 2005 law suit against a local government for forced abortions and forced sterilizations practiced as part of China’s one-child policy.

Guangcheng's lawsuit was rejected, and he was placed under house arrest in Shandong, China, with guards surrounding his house, his cell phone service cut off, access to the Internet blocked and bright lights shinning on his house at night.

Tejas is the name the Spanish gave to the area that became the US state of Texas. The Spanish chose the name based on a Native American word for "friend."

Guangcheng, who became blind as a result of a childhood illness and now wears dark sunglasses, had friends help him to escape from house arrest in April 2012. He Peirong drove Guangcheng to the US embassy in Beijing. Were they traveling in a Corolla, the best-selling car of all time produced by the Japanese company Toyota?

He Peirong, a human rights advocate and blogger, is also a key member of a group of activists who organize support for Guangcheng in China.

A deal was worked out between China and the United States; now Guangcheng, a self-taught lawyer who also helped the disabled win public benefits and aided farmers fighting illegal land seizures, lives in New York with his wife, Yuan Weijing, and their two children.

On April 9, 2013, he testified before a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee On Foreign Affairs about his family's and other people's persecution in China and other ongoing human rights abuses in China. Guangcheng gave Congress a list of 130,000 Chinese officials involved in forced abortions and forced sterilizations.

He Peirong is in China.

How many human rights activists will seek to leave China? Eva Pils, an associate professor of law in Hong Kong told Mark McDonald of the International Herald Tribune, the global edition of The New York Times in his May 7, 2012, article "In the Chen Case, Collateral Damage," that for activists to leave China is “a hugely difficult decision, even for those who have been badly tortured.”

Chen Guangcheng said, "Recently, many friends and neighbors who I have been in touch with by phone have been taken into custody by the authorities for questioning. They have been threatened and made to describe what our conversations have been about," (January 29, 2013, Reuters article entitled "Blind dissident urges global pressure on China over rights" by Paul Eckert.)

Nevertheless, some risk going into undemocractic countries and pay a high price for it. Pastor and U.S. Citizen Saeed Abedini was setting up an orphanage and Christian house churches in Iran when Iranian authorities put him under house arrest in July 2012 separating him from his wife, Naghmeh Abedini, and their two children. In September 2012 they arrested him. In January 2013 Iranian authorities sentenced him to an eight-year prison sentence for threatening Iran's national security. The U.S. State Department, US Secretary of State John Kerry and the European Union have all called for Pastor Saeed Abedini's release, and over 570,000 people worldwide from over 180 countries have signed a petition lending him support. A campaign to write letters to him for his May 7th birthday and to sign the petition is being coordinated at http://www.savesaeed.org. In a February 18, 2013, letter to his wife, Pastor Abedini wrote about physical and psychological abuse inflicted on him to compel him to deny his faith in Jesus Christ. He also wrote of plans to persevere in his relationship with God and to share it with others: "There are empty containers who are thirsty for a taste of the Living Water and we can quench their thirst by giving them Jesus Christ."

An African proverb from Kenya says, "On the way to one's beloved, there are no hills."

What are some hills you have climbed on the way to your beloved?