The book describes social business and how it is different from a profit generating business, or a non-profit that pretty much focuses on charitable endeavors. A social business is run to make money, but all of the money generated is used to cover costs and build the business.  The products are those which benefit society.  The investors are those who want their money to make a difference in the world.  In time, the investors receive the exact amount that they invested (regardless of inflation), though there is no 100% guarantee.  An example of a social business would be a tree-planting business. Trees would have to be sold as the business needs to be sustainable. Profits would pay for the laborers, for new product, and to pay the investor back over time. The investor feels good about her/his investment because of the trees that help to protect the environment, provide shade, provide employment, etc.  Yet another example would be establishing a business that makes mosquito nets to aid in preventing malaria, or a water purification plant to produce clean water.  Note, the nets or water is not provided to the customer freely; it needs to be purchased so that sustainability is achieved.

The book is available on amazon.com and can be purchased new, used, or in electronic format.  I borrowed the book, but may purchase one because the idea is definitely worth chewing over.

Then in 1973 (and also in 1976) I went to the Urbana Missions Conference where Stott was the Bible lecturer.  His lectures were fantastic!  In 1974 Stott helped write (he actually did most of the writing) the influential Lausanne Covenant.  He wrote commentaries and he wrote books on missions.

The September 2011 issue of Christianity Today paid tribute to John Stott, and I wanted to share a quote from the article by Tim Stafford.  Stott “relished the world around him in all its variety. Perhaps nothing showed this so obviously as his lifelong love for birdwatching, which biographer Timothy Dudley-Smith says bordered on an obsession. In his later decades, Stott spent a great proportion of his time traveling, much of it in third-world (he called them “majority world”) countries. Time for birds was always included.” One of my favorite books is the one written by Stott on birds and the Bible.

Stott was a proponent of holistic mission.  He did not separate the Great Commission from the Great Commandment.  They go hand in hand.  To do one without the other is to ignore much of the Bible.

Rest in peace, John Stott.

Another aspect of the business was the publishing of a cookbook, entitled Cooking with Poo.  The book has been published and was recently launched in Bangkok with an autographing session.  Many books were sold, 300 I believe.  In addition, T-shirts had been made, saying, “I cooked with Poo and liked it.”  Some 60 T-shirts and aprons were sold.

A local press correspondent from Australia invited the international press corps in Bangkok to a gathering where the book was  highlighted.  Anji and her husband Ash were there and Ash got to share with the press corps about the plight of the poor around the world.  After his short talk, he and Anji were asked many questions by the press.  What a great opportunity to highlight ministry to the poor.

Good job Poo, Anji and Ash!  Check out their website  www.unoh.org and google Urban Neighbors of Hope for other stories.

The articles are stimulating; as are the responses.  Each issue includes book reviews.  I discovered the journal when I was asked to submit a book review.  When you look at the book review, you can actually hit a button and purchase the book (from amazon I suppose).  The journal is in color on your screen.

The editors deserve our thanks for the effort they put into this journal.  I hope you will take a look. You do not need to subscribe, the issues are free to read on-line.

When I got my Kindle at Christmas, I went to the Amazon website and found that there are free books that can be downloaded.  Many of the ones highlighted were literary works.  I downloaded  several: Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Edwin Drood, and one by Upton Sinclair.  All of these books were written years ago, so their copyright has expired.  Hence, they are free to download.  I also purchased a few current books for the Kindle and have been reading those as well. Several were on microfinance since that is something I need to know about related to CMF ministries and some writing I will be doing.

I’ve returned several times to Amazon’s webpage about free e-books, and noted that there are several sites that also offer free books.  The Gutenberg Project has a site, there is another one called Many Books, and another one, archive.org. I looked at Gutenberg and Many Books, but was not too interested in some of the books.

But then I started exploring archive.org and hit a gold mine.  The site has a search engine of the thousands of books that have been scanned and are available for free downloads.  I typed in the word “anthropology” and there were 1000 entries.  Again, these are not current, they are old.  But the discipline of anthropology relies a lot on the theories and field work of the earlier anthropologists.  I think I downloaded about 12 books.

Then I typed in the word “missions.”  Up popped thousands of entries, but a lot of the entries had to do with government missions.  It looked like a lot of work to sift through looking for the gems.  So I typed in the word “missionary,” and there were 4600 entries.  “That’s more like it,” I said to myself.  I began scrolling through the pages, each with 50 entries per page.  I began to realize that there were lots of materials to be had right at one’s fingertips.  Over the next few days I would look at a few pages at a time.  By the time I finished, I had downloaded some 50 books.  I could have downloaded hundreds!

Most of what I downloaded were missionary biographies, many of these I had run across in my work on getting Alan Tippett’s material published.  Tippett was an expert on missions in the South Pacific; he was a scholar, researcher and historian.  I found book after book of the people he referred to in his own writing.

What are the other sorts of things to be found?  Many mission agencies have journals that have been scanned.  There are  annual reports of the mission agencies.  Lots of biographies from all areas of the world.  As I said, a gold mine at one’s fingertips.  The implications for research are mind-boggling.  One need not necessarily travel to distant libraries. One need not buy books.  One need not photocopy materials.  From the ease of one’s office, a ton of valid research can be done.  Many of these sources are primary sources, not secondary sources.

A nice feature on archive.org is that once you are reading the book, you can search the book.  So, if you are wanting to research cannibalism, you just type in “cannibal” and you will see the places in the book where the word is mentioned.  If your book is a missionary biography, think what a time savings it would be to not have to read the entire book just to find the few places where cannibalism is mentioned.  A lot of these books had no index, so research on the subject would take a lot of time.

The difference between what can be done today as opposed to what could be done when I was in school is hard to comprehend.  It reminds me of the old, “when I was a boy, I had to walk six miles through the snow to get to school” sort of comment.

Good reading!

But since you cannot have your Kindle on for take-offs and landing, the hard copy book I will have at the ready is 4) Faces of Jesus in Africa, by Robert Schreiter.

And if I just want to read something light, I also have 5) Confessions, by John Grisham.

Here it is, twenty- five years later, and I still have those cards.  I have never used them (well maybe once or twice).  I still read and highlight, but I am not so disciplined in copying quotes.  I suppose if I preached on other than missions topics, I might have occasion to use some of the quotes.

So I thought it would be interesting if I just went to a letter (T, in this case) and pulled out the cards I have and share some quotes with you.  At least then I will feel like I have used them!

Teams:  Intelligent people, when assembled into an organization, can sometimes do dumb things collectively.

Technology: The sound of the second industrial revolution is clicking keyboards.

Temper: You certainly are an even-tempered person. You are always mad.

Theology: The task of theology is to maintain the integrity of the faith.

Truth: If there is no truth, then there are no lies.

Please comment and tell me if you want me to do this again; there are 25 more letters.  I promise to only pick out the shortest and most interesting quotes.

The first book slated for publication, “The Jesus Documents,” was edited by missionary recruit Shawn Redford. This book is an anthropological look at the four gospels, and will be available in March. The second book, which I co-edited, “The Ways of the People,” is a reader in missionary anthropology. It is slated to be published in June.

Two more books on mission history in the South Pacific have been prepared and sent to William Carey Library. One is a missionary biography of John Hunt and the second is an autobiography of Fijian evangelist Joeli Bulu. Another volume of Tippett’s best writing in ethnohistory is close to completion.

Since these books were all written before computers, they must be scanned and then digitized, followed by the lengthy process of correcting and editing the scanned copy.