The Voice of the Christian Community, serving Yuba, Sutter, and Butte Counties
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••• The Want of God ••• by Paula McBride The aging missionary sat before me in his wheelchair, though his body was weak and his mind skipped circuits every once in a while, his face was radiant with remembered accounts of his service in the Belgian Congo. I was enthralled as he told of ongoing battles to save his home from driver ants or termites. He told of preparing for the one day a year tall grasses could be burned off. Another story told of the day his middle daughter was born. Her nurse was delayed because a cobra blocked her path. On another trip to the hospital, his car hit a cow and stalled on top of it. In addition to getting the car on the road again, the owner had to be found and paid. Very exciting was an evacuation to Uganda due to the Simba rebellion. There were military checkpoints that were concerning the refugees, but God miraculously had them follow curious Volkswagen tire tracks that led them to safety without encountering a single checkpoint. These stories entertained me, but one story took hold in my heart. As Al Miller spoke of ministering to the people in their language, he recounted that they had no word for love. The closest word that translated is the word “want”. In a gloriously resonant voice, Al began to quote John 3:16 in English, substituting the word “want” for the word familiar to
INSPIRATION San Francisco Bans Official Travel to Pro-Life States by Michael Foust ChristianHeadlines.com Contributor
us. “For God so WANTED the world,” he intoned, “that He gave His only begotten Son.” I was transported as we discussed the nuance of a love that wants us. God wants us! God wants me! How casual I become toward the love of God because the term is so familiar. May it not be so! How do we know God wants us? The closest I come to relating to this want is in considering my son and daughter. I want them because they are part of me. Part of my image is in them. I want them and I love them. In the same way, we are created in God’s image and His Spirit lives in us. We are wanted by creation, even though we didn’t want Him. Look what happens if we substitute ‘want’ for love in I John 4:10: “This is want: not that we wanted God, but that He WANTED us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice
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San Francisco employees on official business won’t be permitted to travel to states with restrictive abortion laws under a new law passed Tuesday. The city’s 11-member board of supervisors voted to ban city-funded travel to states with such laws, Courthouse News reported. It also prohibits the city from contracting with companies headquartered in states with restrictive abortion laws. “It will expand the existing ordinance to states that have waged war on our constitutionally protected right to an abortion,” San Francisco Supervisor Vallie Brown said. It passed unanimously. “Let’s put our money where our mouth is,” Brown said. Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi and Ohio are among the states that have passed strong pro-life laws this year. “As we’re seeing this moving forward, I’ve felt like we should be pushing something that makes a difference,” Brown previously told San Francisco Weekly. “We feel protected, but when the health of women across
the country are in jeopardy, us women in San Francisco need to stand up and say, ‘No.’” The city already had a law prohibiting official travel to states it says discriminate against LGBT individuals. Ten states are currently on that list: Alabama, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee and Texas, according to Courthouse News. “States that are having these horrific bans, I’d like to see them hurt financially,” Brown said. “That is a universal language of economic health. If they’re going to put women in a situation that could hurt their economic health – like having children when they’re not ready – then we should hurt their economic health as a state.” Planned Parenthood of Northern California supported the new law, according to San Francisco Weekly. “It’s a really tough battle, and until the next election in 2020, it’ll continue to be,” Brown told the publication. “It’s terrifying and I’m worried we’re going to keep going back. Are we going to have our right to vote taken away next? I see them just tearing apart our rights in the next year. We need to stop them now, before they completely shred them.”
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