Michael & Tricia Lee

Richard Fernandez at Belmont Club commenting about John McCain's speech Thursday evening writes, 

"McCain’s speech was the declaration of someone with nothing left to prove.  Any man who can admit that he was broken and afraid under interrogation is describing a kind of endurance, which while any intelligent person might understand, I think only men who have themselves been afraid can truly empathize with. There are places on that dark path which you know you could not have crossed through your strength alone. And whether you owe your emergence to luck or to God might be a matter for debate. But you know you do not wholly owe it to yourself. And this realization makes you less willing to blame others; less ready to stand in judgment of those who failed the test. It doesn’t make you lower the bar. But it makes you aware of how high that bar is.

There is a site on the internet that claims that if we don't make radical changes to the way we live that the climate of the earth will be forever changed.  Simply amazing.  See it here.

Dear Friends,

Thank you for praying for us during our stay in New York City. 

The purpose of MTW's Pre-field Training is to help prepare your missionaries for the real changes in culture we'll surely experience as we immerse ourselves into our new countries.  In addition to this, as American's with American views of business, politics, religion, family, and so many other things, we have to be careful not to confuse what is American with what is Biblical.  In light of this, some of our preconceived ideas about foreign culture and ministry are the result of prejudice and need to be challenged and changed for the glory of Christ and His kingdom. 

For example, one thing I learned early on in my stay in NYC is that New Yorkers, in spite of what we've been told, are by and large quite friendly, and very helpful.  Boom!  One bias destroyed. 

So please continue to pray that the Holy Spirit will continue to be faithful to expose these our prejudices and would completely, though mercifully rid them from us.

It's Saturday morning, and I feel like I've been in a blender for two weeks.  We spent the past week developing language acquisition skills (PILAT).  The material is excellent. Although to watch from a distance you'd think we were learning to speak to babies.  We sounded like the old Police tune,  do,do,do,dah,dah,dah.  Tricia keeps reminding me to "Keep *  the * Coca * Cola * in the * Cold * Can."  It's been great fun. However, to go from 8:30 in the morning till 5:30 in the afternoon really wears you out.  Add to that the fact that we're are working several days a week in our assigned church plants around the city, along with the additional requirements to journal, do cultural interviews and ethnographic observations weekly.  There's hardly time to relax.

But last night the four of us hoped on the R to Times Square.  Wonder is the best word I can use to describe my being when we popped out of the subway station on Broadway in the middle of Times Square.  There were throngs of people everywhere, going in every direction.  Giant LED billboards mounted to the facades of every building, glistening in brilliant hues of cherry red, cobalt blue and emerald green.  The cacophony of sounds; of cabs honking their horns and of the sirens from ambulances. It really is very, very cool! 

The kids wanted to get a few t-shirts, so we stopped at the MTV store.  Not my favorite, but the shirts they selected were in good taste.   We then headed east toward 5th Ave. and stopped at a pizza joint for some refueling.  After that, we headed up 5th toward the famous glass Apple store (see photo of the store above).  As we were approaching the store, there again were throngs of people around the entrance .  It wasn't to be this night.  The new 3G iphone debuted Friday, and there were thousands of people waiting in line to get in.  We'll have to return another day.  

A brisk hike back to the R and in less than a half an hour we were back in Astoria.  Back home.  I fixed the Choralier website for my friend Jay Forrest.  And then, quite tired from the days activities, fell asleep. 

We'll be working on team building this coming week.  Continue to pray that God will expose the hardness and idolatry in our hearts, but be gracious and merciful to us as He does so.

In Christ,

Michael

It's Independence Day weekend.  ID is a time for the joyous celebration of American liberty, liberation from the colonial tyranny of Europe which also contained in it a religious tyranny.  So not only was there political liberation, there was religious liberation as well.  The tension between these two ideals in America has been maintained for the last 232 years by an incredible document called the US Constitution.  Even as we have wrestled with evolution and darwinism in this country, there has been historically a point that the US Supreme Court was unwilling to exceed.  And so Christianity as well as a host of other religions continues to flourish in this great bastion of liberty.  

But this is not so in Europe.  And the socialistic/entitlement culture to which many political and academic elites in this country look to as "the" model of government is in fact sowing the seeds of cultural suicide and the extinction of European culture as we know it.  The handwriting in on the wall, and Al Mohler has an excellent review of the New York Times Magazine article Childless Europe.  

We might think too bad - so sad and believe they have brought it on themselves.  And surely they have.  But the most ominous thing about this is that America is susceptible to the same sentiments as its older sister.  As Christians, our desire should be for not only revival in America, but also in Europe as well.

As I often end these things....    Pray for Revival!

In Christ,

Michael

Dear Friends,

On Weds. night we had the opportunity to sit and talk with two young men from Serbia.  Amber and I were sitting out on the steps of our Apt when this young man went into our bldg.  We exchanged niceties as he passed.  He came back out a few minutes later, and I used this as an opportunity to introduce myself and Amber.  His name is Mirza.  I asked where he was from.  And he replied that he was from Serbia.  I found out that he is university student in Serbia studying Sports Management, and that he would like to manage a football team (soccer).  A few minutes later another young man came up.  I have to confess that I never quite got his name.  I believe I said it one time accurately because he seemed impressed that I had said it.  But alas I just cannot recall it at the moment.  

We sat there on those steps on a beautifully cool Summer evening talking about all kinds of things.  The second young man, I’ll call him Lemonious or Lem for short was very fascinating.  His father owns a grocery supply business in Belgrade and when he completes his studies in Finance, he plans to take over the business.  Another very interesting thing about Lem is that he know quite a bit about every US President. We laughed quite a lot as we asked him question after question.  He didn’t miss one!  Adams, Mckinley, Cleveland, Truman, Nixon it was amazing.  Oh, and by the way… He was wearing a “Vote for Obama” t-shirt.  Of course I couldn’t resist.  So we began talking presidential politics.  He was very well informed; not only about the two current candidates, but the entire process.  A very impressive young man.

Mirza on the otherhand seemed more about wanting to have a good time, and he winked at my daughter Amber quite a few times.  Although she said he was cute, she wasn’t impressed with an older guy hitting on a teenager.

We’ll we were sitting there waiting for our pizza.  The delivery guy had come and gone and the pizza was getting cold.  So we bid farewell.  I did offer to have a beer with them at some point and they seemed genuinely interested.  I’m sure we’ll see them again.  I’ll keep you posted.

In Christ,

Michael L.

Hate speech as a criminal offense has always been where I expected persecution of the Church to begin in the West.  However, our enemy, though not omniscient, nor omnipotent is highly intelligent and motivated.  He ever lives to find ways to tear down the church and to prevent the spread of God's kingdom.  I have to admit that I did not see this coming. In Germany you can now be jailed for homeschooling your children.  Who most often homeschools?  Answer of course; Christians!!!!!!  See article at World Net Daily