Quotable

“From an Old Testament perspective, the health of the land is the best index of the health or sickness of our covenant relationship with God.”—Ellen Davis, professor of Bible and practical theology at Duke Divinity School, at the annual J.J. Thiessen lectures, Canadian Mennonite University, “Live Long on the Land: Food and Farming in Biblical Perspective.” Addressing the rise of agribusiness that is replacing family farms in North America, Davis likened farmers to Jeremiah – as strangers in their own land. Quoting Wendell Berry, Davis said “economies begin to lie when they assign a fixed value to the land.” By tending to the needs of the land, she said, people can begin to see how everything we receive from God is interconnected.

—CMU release

“We just asked room service for extra mattresses.”—Emmanuel Ali El-Shariff, Family Life Network’s Arabic director, describing a makeshift radio recording session in his hotel room on a recent visit to Sudan. At FLN’s 60th anniversary celebration in Winnipeg, Emmanuel shared how he hired a Muslim translator to help with Darfur radio programs. Told simply to work, the translator insisted on discussing the programs, and eventually accepted Christ. Operating as an independent charity for the first time, FLN reached their one-time fundraising goal of $250,000.

—AS

“The other night they packed 40 of us into a small ‘Kammer’ where 10 men would hardly have enough room. We were there for several days.”—Abraham Regehr, 1931, from Siberian exile.

Twenty million were exterminated under Stalin’s rule. Master storyteller Jack Dueck has used the letters of exiled Mennonites as the basis for a deeply moving and disturbing multimedia presentation called “Mysteries of Grace and Judgement – A Journey of Story, Poetry and Song,” that reflect the experiences of the Mennonite sojourn in Russia – first presented at Lendrum MB Church in Edmonton. Harold Wiens led a choir for the event. A full-length DVD of the presentation is currently under production.

—from reports by J. Dueck