James Watkins: author, speaker, threat to society

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1.03.07

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aiding zambia 1.26

martin luther king day 1.15

survivor: zambia 1.13

influential christians 1.12

stem cell debate 1.11

hiv/aids crisis 1.03

pat's prophecies 1.02

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3 PM EST January 26, 2007
world hope aids caregivers in zambia

Lois and I are back safe and sound from Zambia where I was reporting on the HIV/AID crisis there and the ophrans this tragedy has created. (I'll post pics in a couple days. Right now, after 31 hours of travel and a seven-hour time difference, I'm going to take a nap in my own bed.)
• Blogging from trip

January 15, 2007
martin luther king day: commemorating the dream

"Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time—the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression."
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Noble Prize acceptance speech
• Nobel Prize acceptance speech
• King's "I Have a Dream Speech"
• Keeping your dreams alive
• My soul brother James Robert Watkins

January 13, 2007
thanks for your prayers for survivor: zambia

As we prepare for our trip to Zambia, Lois and I will be trying to compress our lives down to seventeen pounds each. That's the carry-on weight limit since we've been warned that checked baggage is regularly lost in transit. So, we've been told to only bring one carry-on and one purse/computer case each. We're trying to make a game of it, jokingly referring to the trip as Survivor: Zambia. Just how little clothing and toiletries do we need to survive ten days?

We have so appreciated the many emails promising prayer for my reporting on the HIV/AIDS crisis there. Thanks! I'll give a full-report Monday, January 29. (We return Friday afternoon, January 26, but will need a couple days to recover from jet lag.)

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to pack my carry-on with those little hotel toiletry samples I've collected from previous trips.

• Trip details
• "Jim Shorts" on our 2001 trip to Africa

January 12, 2007
most influential christians in america?

The annual “50 Most Influential Christians in America” list is out for 2007 with Joel Osteen topping the list, up from number 2 in 2006. T.D. Jakes dropped from 1 to 4 while Rick Warren dropped from 4 to 16. Billy Graham moved up from 3 to 2.

But I seriously doubt that this is God’s list. Especially if Jesus has anything to say about it: "The first shall be last and the last shall be first."

• The Church Report's list
• My list
• Who's on your list?

January 11, 2007
amnionic stem cells answer to medical/moral debate?

Just as the U.S. Congress plans debate on embryonic stem cell research, a new study offers the promise of stem cell cures without having to destroy human life. Scientists at North Carolina's Wake Forest University School of Medicine took cells from the fluid which surrounds a baby in the womb and found "they have the potential to be grown into many different types of tissue, with the possibility that they could repair damaged human organs in the future."
• Google News listing of articles on this discovery [off site]
• "Jim Shorts" on placental stem cell promises (July 2006)
• Is embryonic life a "life" or "choice"?

January 3, 2007
on our way to zambia . . .

January will be a quiet month for blogging since it will be a busy month for getting ready to report on the HIV/AIDS crisis in Zambia. Lois and I fly out the 16th for the ten-day trip with our favorite charity World Hope.

Thanks for your prayers for a) safe travel to and from Zambia as well as in country, b) compassion and sensity as I shoot photos and

interview those working with the patients as well as the dying patients themselves and the orphans this disease has created (one in five Zambians are HIV/AIDS positive), plus c) emotional strength (I was a basket case after three weeks in India).

There's no Internet access in the villages so, unfortunately, no "live" updates. I'll write up a full-fledged report after we return. For now . . .
• Our itininerary
• World Hope's Web site
• World Hope's HIV/AID strategy video

January 2, 2007
pat's prophecies presumptuous

TV evangelist Pat Robertson is out with his predictions for 2007. Today, on his "700 Clubs" show, he "prophecied" a massive terrorist attack this year:

The Lord didn't say nuclear, but I do believe it'll be something like that—that'll be a mass killing, possibly millions of people, major cities injured. There will be some very serious terrorist attacks. The evil people will come after this country, and there's a possibility—not a possibility, a definite certainty—that chaos is going to rule.

Let's hope and pray it's as false a prophecy as was his May 2006 warnings that "the coasts of America will be lashed by storms. There well may be something as bad as a tsunami in the Pacific Northwest." Here's what God Himself warns against such false prophecies:

But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded him to say . . . must be put to death. You may say to yourselves, "How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the LORD ?" If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously (Deuteronomy 18:20-22).

Robertson should be grateful he didn't live in the Old Testament days!
• My predictions for 2007

January 1, 2007
last issue's hot topics

The season of "peace on earth" was marred with conflicts between Fatah and Hamas, "the Donald" and O'Donnell," and Hussein's Sunni supporters and his Shiite executioners.
• Click here to go back in time to December 19, 2006

December 2006
last month's top ten sites

I have in my right hand, direct from my home office, last month's top ten sites . . .

• 1 Home page

• 2 "Jim Shorts" on sex

• 3 "Jim Shorts" on spirituality

• 4 "Jim Shorts" on holidays

• 5 Top ten reasons I'm not divorcing my wife

• 6 "Adult site" for adults

• 7 "Jim Shorts" on miscellanea

• 8 Quips and quotes of encouragement

• 9 "Jim Shorts" on issues

• 10 "Jim Shorts" on health issues

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