Pastoral Bible
Institute News
PBI Annual Report "For we are laborers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building."—1 Corinthians 3:9 The Institute this past year has continued to cooperate with the work of the Lord in the edification of his children. Our main tool is The Herald. After careful consideration, the editors decided to maintain the same thematic format for the journal. Comments from our readers indicate that they are receiving benefits from the subjects we have selected. Care has been given to balancing these topics to include devotional, doctrinal, and prophetic subjects. We have continued our regular News and Views feature with short excerpts from the media about what is happening in the world. Many of our readers enjoy this connection between biblical prophecy and current events. The Herald continues to be available on cassette tape at a reasonable cost and will be furnished free to the blind. Each issue may also be found on The Herald web page along with many other articles on the Bible. In an on-going effort to increase circulation, a full-page ad was placed in the magazine Bible Review. We intend to pursue other ways to enlarge our subscription base in the coming year. Present circulation is roughly 1000. Although this is a small number, we do appreciate the loyalty of our readers and encourage their comments. We continue to supply most booklets free, sometimes including one with the magazine itself. We have adopted a policy of limiting the number of booklets offered to those we deem best in each subject area. These selections are made not only from our own publications, but from those produced by other Bible Student groups as well. We will also continue to tell our readers about new books we think would be of interest. They will be available from us only while our initial supplies last. We will reprint our own booklets only if we believe they are the best in that subject area. Reprinted booklets will be pocket size and have a four-color cover. Those scheduled for printing this year are "What is the Soul?", "Israel and the Middle East," and "The Resurrection of the Dead." The Pastoral Bible Institute is now the distributor ofa computer CD ROM entitled Bible Students’ Library. It contains some eleven translations of the Bible, virtually all of the writings of Pastor Charles Russell, and a large selection of other materials including over 300 articles from past issues of The Herald. A second included disk contains three videos, numerous hymns sung by the Bible Students, and a reading of the complete Divine Plan of the Ages. This set of two disks is still available at a price of $25, postpaid. We are looking forward to the coming year and will attempt to provide thought-provoking material for the Lord’s people. We earnestly desire your comments and participation, and especially your prayers that all may be done to the glory of our Heavenly Father. The Directors, Pastoral Bible Institute Newly Reprinted Booklet The booklet "What Is the Soul?" has just been reprinted in a fresh new format with a four-color cover. We are so pleased with its appearance we enclosed one in this issue of The Herald. Please contact us if you want to obtain this booklet in quantity for your witness activities. Temporary Closing of the PBI Office Our California office will close for one month beginning in mid-July. Orders and inquires received after July 15 will be processed beginning in mid-August. We regret any inconvenience this may cause. Letters I am reading in your web site, with more pleasure to my spirit, the articles about the Shadow of the Cross. I must congratulate you as they are very instructive, edifying, and biblically balanced. I am kindly requesting information as to how to subscribe to The Herald as I am in Mexico. Thank you so much for the information. May God bless your ministry. —Pastor Eduardo Paulin, Mexico I am so pleased by the material in each Herald that I am sometimes saddened that others may find it unacceptable. This is just speculation on my part, but it may be that [some are] unable to accept the prediction that Israel will become the earthly center of Christ’s kingdom, perhaps thus rejecting all of therest of The Herald’s most timely and wonderful messages as unworthy of their attention. Many thanks for the articles being selected and organized. Each issue is fresh and inspiring. Also, as an old-timer, let me thank you for the occasional reprints of articles out of the past. You may chuckle at this, but I can remember the sound of the authors’ voices as I read their words! Bill Seikman, Wisconsin (Bill is the son of Will Siekman who devotedly served the PBI and our brethren to the end of his earthly life.) Around the World Few places in the world can rival Sudan for misery. Africa’s largest country in land area, it is also one of the most war-torn on a continent with more than its share of wars. Civil conflict has gripped Sudan for most of the past 16 years. The toll, from war and war-induced famine, has been staggering: in a population of 30 million, nearly 2 million dead and another 4 million forced from their homes, according to the U.S. Committee for Refugees. The ranks of the displaced are larger than in any other country; the number of deaths is greater than from conflicts in Kosovo, Bosnia, Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Algeria combined. —International Herald Tribune, 5/8-9/99 As the wave of refugees floods out of Kosovo, Western states and institutions are scrambling to support the fragile economy of the only unconditional Balkan ally in the fight against Serbia: Albania, an impoverished, unstable country of 3.3 million whose population has grown by a crushing 10% in a month. Five decades of repressive communism and a nightmarish post-communist experience emptied the Albanian treasury and left most Albanians distrustful of officials and institutions. Already, Albania’s main opposition party alleges that corrupt officials siphoned off humanitarian aid now being sold in market stalls. The huge number of Kosovar refugees may drown out the hopeful signs of progress. Some believe that unmonitored aid could be like pouring water into sand. "Here corruption is like a game without rules," said Vebi Velija, president of VeVe group and one of Albania’s biggest businessmen. "They are just waiting for new loans from the World Bank and the IMF." —Wall Street Journal, 4/19/99 Israel President Ezer Weizman stated that the Russian sale of missiles to Syria poses a greater threat to Israel than the Chinese sales to Iran. The president made his comments at the end of his trip to China during which time several agreements were signed between the two countries. The president and his wife led a contingent of over 40 prominent businessmen on the trip. During his visit, the president admitted to discussing the Iranian issue with China’s President Jiang Zemin, but declined to give details of the talks. Despite this, Weizman insisted that the Russian ground-to-ground missiles that are stationed in the Syrian capital are a greater threat than the missiles deployed in Iran. —Israel Wire, 4/29/99 A $60 million project is underway to recreate the city of Nazareth. When construction is finished, a village of 35 one-room stone houses, inhabited by actors and storytellers in authentic garb, will illuminate the life and teachings of Jesus. A parable walk, museum, study center and restaurant are also planned for the park in southwestern Nazareth. The project, dubbed Nazareth Village, is set to open with the new millennium, when millions of tourists are expected to visit the Holy Land. —Biblical Archaeology Review, May/June 1999 Up to 110,000 Russian Jews may immigrate to Israel each year, almost twice the current number, a Jewish Agency official was quoted as saying recently. Felix Decktor, press secretary of the Moscow branch of the agency, told the Interfax news agency that Russian Jews have been showing more interest in immigrating since the government in Russia devalued the ruble and defaulted on its loans. —Israel My Glory, April/May 1999 Islam Hard-line newspapers in Iran have been building up momentum against Ataollah Mohajerani, a liberal Islamic thinker and the most important minister in the cabinet, because of his contribution to the vision of a democratic civil society, publishing bitter comments voicing concern over the "cultural chaos" befalling the country. "This poisonous cultural atmosphere created by the minister’s tolerance has allowed dissident writers to write against the system and Islam" said Mohammad-Hassan Jamshidi, one of the conservative deputies. Minister Mohajerani is among a generation of Moslem intellectuals and philosophers advocating a compassionate approach toward religion and politics. Recently he came under fire for authorizing secular writers to form an independent guild and awarding some of them prizes for works he said contributed to the revolution. —Reuters, 4/30/99 Christendom The National Conference of Catholic Bishops has produced a document called "The Holy See and the Middle East." The document’s purpose is to proclaim the Holy See’s interest in the Holy Land.* "The Holy Land, as the popes love to call the Middle East, should be a sort of workshop for inter-religious dialogue, with Jerusalem, the Holy City par excellence, as its symbol. This explains why, and with what perseverance and intensity, since 1947, the popes have made themselves the defenders of the preservation of the unique and sacred character of that City. The Holy See therefore strictly favors a special internationally guaranteed statute for the most sacred areas of the City, in order in the future to preserve and protect the identity of the Holy City in its entirety and in every aspect: The historical, material, religious and cultural characteristics; the equality of rights and treatment for those belonging to the three religious communities; the rights of freedom and access to the shrines for residents and pilgrims alike. . . . This request of the Holy See regards the most religiously significant part of the City, namely the Old City. But such a formula would have to be extended to other shrines outside the Old City and beyond Greater Jerusalem, in Israel as well as in the West Bank." (Emphasis supplied.) —National Conference of Catholic Bishops web page, 3/10/99 Economics The financial crisis that hit most of the world’s emerging market economies and prompted the leading industrial countries into emergency interest rate cuts over the past year "seems to be over," Michel Camdessus, the managing director of the IMF said. The painful social consequences of the crisis in many countries will take a while to be resolved however, he said. The general tone of the IMF seems to be a combination of modest satisfaction that the world has regained a measure of stability, and a strong desire to press ahead with reforms to the global financial system to prevent a repeat of the events of the past year. —Washington Financial Wire, 4/26/99 Members of a new financial stability forum have expressed concern that an apparent easing of the global financial crisis may be slowing efforts to reform weak financial systems. Andrew Crockett, the chairman of the forum, said that there was some concern that reforms are not proceeding as planned because of improvement in the currency crisis. "As somebody put it," he said, "as the crisis appears to have receded, maybe the pressure to strengthen financial systems and restructure corporate and banking sectors becomes somewhat less." —Financial Times, 4/19/99 Science The DNA of 40 people from around the world is to be mapped in a global effort to determine how infinitesimal modifications in the genetic code underlie the basic differences between individuals. The two-year project could have value for medicine, enabling doctors to individualize therapies by adapting them to fit a patient’s unique genetic profile. The project is the latest step in decoding DNA, the double-helix structure of which was discovered by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953. Dr. Paul Herring, head of research at Novartis, a Swiss pharmaceutical company, said that knowledge of genetic predisposition could revolutionize medicine. Diseases are usually caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors, but it is not always easy to identify or modify them. —Bloomberg News, 4/15/99 Book Review Fear No Evil, Natan Sharansky. Translated by Stefani Hoffman. New York: Public Affairs, 1998. It is difficult to imagine life in a totalitarian and corrupt "police state" like the old USSR where every aspect of everyone’s life is controlled. Example: a Jew who wanted to emigrate to Israel would apply for an exit visa, would immediately lose his job, and then often be refused. These were called "refuseniks." Natan Sharansky, an intellectual, a dissident, and well-known by western journalists was one of these. On March 15, 1977, under orders of the KGB he was arrested, tried, and convicted of crimes against the state because he had passed to journalists the names of refuseniks and examples of violations of the Helsinki human rights accords that the USSR had signed. This book describes his experiences during a long period of detention. Suppose we were imprisoned because we wanted to practice our religious beliefs. Where would we draw the line between what we would and would not do to cooperate with the government? Sharansky not only refused to speak to anyone from the KGB about anything, he even refused their offer to expel him to Israel due to failing health (caused by an extended hunger strike) which depended only upon him formally asking them to do so. Not everyone drew the line this way. Another dissident reasoned that cooperating with the KGB was justified if it would lead to his release. "If I can get out, imagine how useful I can be [to the dissident movement]." Sharansky writes: "Watching him I clearly understood . . . that without firm moral principles it was impossible to withstand the pressure of the KGB. If you’re a captive of your own fear, you’ll not only believe any nonsense, you’ll even invent nonsense of your own to justify your behavior." Sharansky identifies two things that emotionally supported him: a photograph of his wife and the Book of Psalms in Hebrew which he received a few days before his arrest. Naturally he was initially deprived of both. But he found a way to get them back without ever cooperating with them. He writes about the psalms: "I felt both the joy and the suffering of King David. His words lifted me above the mundane and directed me toward the Eternal. I especially liked Psalm 23: `Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me.’ . . . Psalm 27 was a particular comfort to me: `Do not forsake me, do not abandon me, O God, my deliverer.’" When the KGB eventually capitulated to tremendous pressure from the west to release him, it abruptly whisked him away from prison. In front ofairport photographers he laid on the ground until someone retrieved his Psalm book from the belongings he could not take with him. He describes his thoughts on the plane taking him to freedom: "Now I took the Psalm book and turned to Psalm 30, which I had long ago decided to recite at the moment of my release. . . . `I extol You, O Lord, for You have lifted me up, and not let my enemies rejoice over me.’" What a wonderful legacy both Jew and Gentile has in the Book of Psalms. Even after several millennia it continues to be a support and a comfort to those who seek to please God and do what is right. —Michael Nekora |
