YOU can help African children! (Kisses from Katie)

Ahoy from Amoy!
      In May, 2014, our youngest son Matt and wife Jessica visited Uganda to explore ways to use their medical interests and skills to help African children and the poor. They also saw the work of Katie Davis, who as an 18-year-old senior class president and homecoming queen in Nashville visited Uganda on a short mission trip during her Christmas break--and found her world turned upside down. Katie disobeyed her parents, who wanted her to go to college, broke up with her boyfriend, and moved to Uganda.
Whether you're interested in helping children at home, here in China, or in Africa...you will be encouraged at just what one person can do by reading Katie's bestselling book, Kisses from Katie. Now in her mid 20s, Katie's working on actually adopting 13 children! Her Amazima ministries now sponsors 400 children, and they feed lunch to over 1200 children every weekday, as well as provide basic medical care, health training and bible studies.

Dr. Zhang, Bethesda Ministries, Anshan, China

Katie's book may inspire you to help her work with African children. Or Click Here if you'd like to help children right here in China with CP Sapling, or the work of Nathan and Anna Fields here in Xiamen, or Bethesda Rehabilitation Ministries in N.E. China by Dr. Zhang--the "Chinese Joni" (and a male Joni at that!). Sue and I, in fact, are visiting Dr. Zhang's work in about 10 days.

Blessings,

Dr. Bill
Xiamen (formerly Amoy) University

Amazon eBooks

"Discover Xiamen" $2.99

"Fujian Adventure" $1.99

Matt & Jess' Uganda Blog


Bill Brown Xiamen University www.amoymagic.com

Why Worry is Agnosticism at Best, Atheism at Worst

Good Morning from Amoy!

When a friend or loved one is troubled, it is so easy to piously quote, "Be anxious for nothing," but when I'm facing a trial myself, I'd respond to that with,

"But Lord, this ain't nothing!" And certainly our Heavenly Father understands His children's doubts, fears, anxieties. After all, even Abraham, the man justified by faith, tried to shield himself from Pharaoh by lying about his wife and sending her straight to a harem! Most Biblical heroes, even those who saw Him face-to-face, had worries, despite Jesus' repeated admonitions to not worry--to "consider the lilies of the field, how they toil not, neither do they spin, yet not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these..." (Matthew 6:28, 29). Followed by the great promise of Matt. 6:33, "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and all these things [those things we worry about] shall be added to you."

Worry betrays our doubt that our Father can, or will, do anything about the issues facing us. But according to Lloyd John Ogilvie, worry is not only a lack of faith but also a "low-grade fever of agnosticism!" (in Ogilvie's 1980s devotional "God's Best For Our Life."--a powerful book with a cut-to-the quick sermon each day).

I can do no better than to simply quote part of that day's devotional, and trust you are as encouraged by it as I was (God's Best, by the way, has as a Kindle version, which unfortunately is a bit abridged, but still excellent).

Excerpt from Lloyd John Ogilvie's "God's Best for my Life," (1980)

August 12, Strangling the Soul 
"I say to you, do not worry about your life". (Matthew6:25)
"Worry is thinking turned toxic, the imagination picturing the worst. The word worry comes from the root “to choke or strangle.” Worry does choke and strangle our creative capacity to think, hope, and dream. It twists the joy out of life. Worry changes nothing except the worrier. It becomes a habit. At the core, it is a low-grade fever of agnosticism. When we worry, we express a lurking form of doubt that God either knows, cares, or is able to do anything. It is a form of loneliness—facing eventualities by ourselves on our meager strength."

Dr Bill's Amazon eBooks

"Discover Xiamen" $2.99

"Fujian Adventure" $1.99

Bill Brown
Xiamen University
www.amoymagic.com

Fujian Adventure eBook $2.99 special on Amazon! 魅力福建

With over 520 pages and almost 700 photos (doubleclick to enlarge), many by Fujian's top photographers, Fujian Adventure is now an eBook on Amazon for $2.99 promotional price ($5.99 regularly). Click Here to download a copy and if you enjoy it, please rate it and share the link with your friends!

If you (like me), don't have a Kindle, download  Free Amazon Reading Apps to read it on Android and Apple devices,or Mac and Windows computers.

Thanks so much for helping to get the word out. I hope to have some of my other 11 books online this summer. 

Enjoy Amoy! 

Dr. Bill 

Amazon description of Fujian Adventure.
Columbus' goal was not a New World but a shortcut to India and to Marco Polo’s fabled Zayton in Fujian, China. Columbus never made it to Zayton, but you can.

Over 500 pages and almost 700 photos, many by award-winning Chinese photographers, bring to life the people and places of Fujian (Fukien), the cradle of Chinese seafaring (200 B.C.), start of the Maritime Silk Route, port of departure for Marco Polo and ibn Battuta, and ancestral home of most overseas Chinese.

Meet Admiral Zhenghe, the "real" Sinbad; the ancient Southern Shaolin Kung Fu Temple’s youthful abbot; the Hui'an maidens who cover their heads, bare their bellies, and only sleep with their husbands 3 nights a year; the firewalkers who dance across the flames bearing heavy idols; melancholy Miss Mo who became the sea goddess Mazu; Zayton’s famous marionette makers; the Anxi farmers who produced the tea tossed overboard during the Boston Tea Party. Visit China’s first Protestant church and the planet’s last Manichean temple. Explore Gulangyu, the Roaring 20s’ “richest square mile on earth,” which even today has over 1,000 “Amoy Deco” mansions. Discover the secret of Hakka roundhouses that Nixon and the CIA thought were missile silos, and then visit the nearby Amoy tiger preserve. Enjoy scenic Sanming, with China's 4th largest gem beds, China’s largest sleeping Buddha, Ming Dynasty villages, enchanting caverns and underground lakes. Marvel at Wuyi Mountain’s 2,000-year-old Min Palace, and the Eden-like biological diversity that drew French naturalists in the 1700s to study the rare plants, king cobras and 33 foot pythons.

And of course there’s the Fujian food. Moliere said "Man should eat to live, not eat to live," but Dr. Bill says, "Moliere never ate Chinese food—especially Fujian food.”

Locals say Fujian is “8 parts mountain, 1 part water, 1 part field”. This torturous terrain not only gave rise to an innovative and tough people but also to more local dialects and greater cultural diversity—including cuisines—than any other province. Every hill, valley and river has a story behind it, and Dr. Bill invites you to explore them.

Author Bill Brown, Prof. of Organizational Behavior and Business Strategy at School of Management, Xiamen University, was Fujian's first foreign permanent resident and has driven over 200,000 km. around China,even through the Gobi Desert and Tibet,幸福福建),but still considers Fujian the most fascinating province for foreigners. In addition to textbooks such as Art of Business Warfare (Beijing University Press), he has written ten books about Fujian. He has also written and hosted several TV documentaries, including a 62-episode mini-series, "Fujian in a Foreigner's Eyes". In addition to teaching MBA, he hosts the weekly "Xingfu Fujian"《幸福福建》。
潘维廉/潘威廉,厦门大学管理学院福建省

 Bill Brown
Xiamen University
www.amoymagic.com