Dr. Seuss and the Sad Tale of Two Mulberry Streets

Dr. Seuss: Photo by James L. Amos/Corbis via Getty Image

We live in a world turned upside-down in the year 2021.

Yesterday, it was announced that at least six Dr. Seuss children's books will no longer be published. 

In the crazy, often-offended culture of modern America, butter-cup citizens who get their feelings hurt easily think that Dr. Seuss's first-ever book for children And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, one of the six removed from publication, portray people in ways that are hurtful and wrong." The books have been criticized for how they depict Asian and Black people.

Under pressure from the "cancel culture" movement, the Dr. Seuss publishing company says the decision was made last year, in an effort to support "all children and families with messages of hope, inspiration, inclusion, and friendship."

Read these "harmful" words from And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street. It's about a child who sees a "circus" on Mulberry Street in his hometown:

"I'll bet those wagons weigh more than a ton. 

That's really too heavy a load for one beast; 

I'll give him some helpers. He needs two, at least. 

But now what worries me is this.

Mulberry Street runs into Bliss.

Unless there's something I can fix up, 

There'll be an awful traffic mix-up! 

It takes Police to do the trick, 

To guide them through where traffic's thick – 

It takes Police to do the trick.

They'll never crash now, 

They'll race at top speed. 

With Sergeant Mulvaney, himself, in the lead. 

The Mayor is there, And he thinks it is grand, 

And he raises his hat as they dash by the stand.

 The Mayor is there and the Aldermen too,

 All waving big banners of red, white and blue. 

And that is a story that NO ONE can beat

 When I say that I saw it on Mulberry Street!"

This morning I read an online front-page article from my hometown newspaper called The Enid News and Eagle. 

Damage at a railroad crossing in Enid, Oklahoma

The article tells of police pursuing a stolen vehicle near Mulberry Street in Enid, Oklahoma It seems a 20-year-old  suspect stole a vehicle then drove eastbound at 80-mph in westbound lanes, directly at oncoming traffic. Curious as to the identity of the young man who showed no regard for human life, who disrespected police in such a dangerous fashion, and who damaged tax-payer property when he crashed his vehicle near Mulberry Street, I went to the young man's Facebook page. 

What I found was a list of reading material, video games, and songs. 

The video game highlighted on the suspect's Facebook page was Grand Theft Auto (ironic?). The first song highlighted was a rap song called OPPS by rappers Yungeen Ace and JayDaYoungan. Here are the words (Warning: Graphic language). 

We looking for opps
Young niggas letting off shots
They don't give a fuck 'bout the cops
We clutchin' them opps
Bitch if you lack at the trap
We taking whatever you got
We catch him, he drop
They're aimin' straight at your top
No dissing, we told them to stop
Hop out on his block, oh with the stick or a Glock
Don't matter somebody get shot

Fuck all the cops

I know they hope we gon' stop
But the way that I'm living I'm not
We stomping this block
Catch him, hop out with the Glock
And put that lil' bitch in a box
You think you gon' plot
He gotta be out of his top
The stick knock 'em outta his socks (bap)
I'm tryin' to turn a bitch nigga head hot
Brand new stick came wit' a red dot

We in that field
I do this shit for real
Bitch I'm tryna catch me a kill
Don't come where I live
Young niggas slinging that steel
You play wit' yo' life and get killed (play wit' yo' life and get killed)
Shit gets real
Won't check you when I come to your city
You and all them bitch niggas gon' get it
This Draco weigh more than twenty
So when I aim at your head I won't miss it (yeah bow!)

My conclusion about this sad tale of two Mulberry Streets is in the form of two couplets.

If the United States cancels Dr. Seuss,

We'll wake up one day with no excuse.

For if we go silent during this stupidity

Our nation will grow full of putridity. 

Live Not by Lies of the U.S. Clean Energy Initiatives

I'm going to make this post simple. Without intending to offend, I am writing it like those "For Dummies" books that you see in the book store.

This post is designed for those who know little about Clean Energy Initiatives and the United Nations' desire to control the amount of carbon dioxide gases in the air by shutting down oil, gas, and coal exploration, production, and transmission. 

Ask anyone in Texas about energy this week, and you'll probably get an earful. The Texas power grid failed, and Governor Greg Abbott blames green energy.  Governor Abbot is correct in blaming the Clean Energy Initiatives for the problems in his state this past week. 

The most abundant, affordable, reliable energy sources are natural gas, oil, and coal. Any society that loses access to abundant, affordable, and reliable energy will never rise out of poverty, or in the United States case, will quickly fall back into poverty.

Green Energy advocates are killing the United States - literally. Green energy advocates tell us that wind, solar, and electric energy must take over for oil, gas, and coal energy in the United States because "using oil, gas, and coal energy is releasing too much carbon dioxide into the air and making the world's temperature increase!" 

Advocates, like President Joe Biden, say "clean energy will save the planet." 

That is both absurd and deceptive. 

More CO₂ is needed in our atmosphere, not less. Adding more CO₂ to the atmosphere enhances plant growth around the world, making more food available for everyone, helping the world's poor more than others, lifting nations from poverty into prosperity. 

Don't take my word for it. Thousands of scientists, meteorologists, physicists, and other professionally-degreed climate experts deny there is a problem with global warming and say the United States will move into third-world status if we lose our ability to use the abundant, affordable, and reliable oil, gas, and coal resources we have in our nation's land. They say that the earth gets warmer and cooler during natural cycles that superimpose on one other.  Warming and cooling periods on this planet happen in varying quantities naturally, and "anthropogenic" (man-made) production of CO₂ is helpful, not detrimental.   

Crazy, is it not, how scientists disagree over the climate change issue? lt is a little like how they disagree over the Covid-19 issue. 

Those scientists who deny "global warming" include the American-born Austrian physicist Fred Singer (1924-2020). Dr. Singer is the author or editor of several books including Global Effects of Environmental Pollution (1970), The Ocean in Human Affairs (1989), Global Climate Change (1989), The Greenhouse Debate Continued (1992), and Hot Talk, Cold Science (1997). He also co-authored Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years (2007) with Dennis Avery, and Climate Change Reconsidered (2009) with Craig Idso.

Before his death in 2020 at the age of 96,  Dr. Singer taught that the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, from 350 ppm (parts per million) in 1950 to 414 ppm in 2021, was a natural and welcomed event. He held that any increase in atmospheric CO₂ through the burning of fossil fuels was healthy for the environment because of increased plant production (photosynthesis). With increased plant production, the world's food supply greatly increases, and the ability to use abundant, affordable, and reliable fossil fuels lifts nations out of poverty into prosperity.

Relying on Green Energy takes a prosperous nation into poverty, said Dr. Singer.  Therefore, nobody should ever apologize - ever - for advocating for MORE exploration, production, and transmission of oil, gas, and coal energy in the United States. 

China, of course, which wishes to dominate the world, is building hundreds and hundreds of coal-fired energy plants. The United States through Clean Energy Initiatives is getting to the place where states can't even keep the power on at residential homes. 

I listen to Green Energy advocates. I read what they write. I listen to them talk. The more I hear from them, the more absurd I realize they are in their thinking. For example, James Hansen is the father of the theory of "Global Warming." I have listened to James Hansen's TED Talk on why he speaks out about "climate change." Dr. James Hansen said in his talk - I kid you not - that the increased heat energy on the earth due to climate change over the past  (.04 watts per metric square)  is "equivalent to exploding 400,000 Hiroshima bombs on earth per day, every day, for the last 70 years." 

Dr. Hansen, our church ministers to the Marshall Island people, an ethnic group who had 67 atomic bombs dropped on them in the Pacific by the United States government. That's right, 67 atomic bombs were exploded in the Marshall Islands from 1946-1951. We've been to the Marshall Islands. We've seen the awful and permanent damage from exploding 67 atomic bombs. Your allegation that Global Warming has released the equivalent energy of 10,220,000,000 atomic bombs on planet earth since 1950 tells me that you need to get out of your Ivory Tower and start walking around the real world. 

Computer models may predict, but Nature produces. If what a scientist is predicting in a laboratory isn't observed in the field, then the scientist has made a modeling error.

The Global Warming computer model is a farcical scientific predictive error.

The MAJOR Problem with Clean Energy Initiatives 

From the 1800s until 1950, the International Meteorological Organization served as a forum for exchanging weather data and climate research. The IMO was NON-GOVERNMENTAL, meaning scientists collaborated, often disagreed, but persuaded the world and nation's governments about any climate issues by their research and convincing argumentation.

On March 23, 1950, the United Nations established the World Meteorological Organization. The WMO is GOVERNMENT-CONTROLLED. That means governments financially penalize businesses and cooperations that refused to abide by  WMO energy mandates, while financially rewarding (tax-incentives) those who do. The United States Environmental Protection Agency works with the WMO to enforce penalties and give incentives for world-wide Clean Energy Initiatives. 

The WMO is very similar to the World Health Organization (WHO), another entity of the United Nations. Dr. Fauci is the official for the United States who dictates government-mandated medical policy in conjunction with the World Health Organization.  Dr. Fauci is the highest-paid government official in the US federal government. 

What does it say when your nation's Chief Medical Officer is paid more than your Chief Executive Officer (the President of the United States)? It says that a WORLD ORGANIZATION is deemed more important than an individual nation. 

The United Nations also operates the World Trade Organization (WTO). 

HEALTH. ENERGY. TRADE.

All controlled by a one-WORLD-government initiative. 

As we have seen throughout 2020 and Covid-19, any scientist who disagrees with the official proclamations of the World Health Organization (WHO) is censured and silenced. Any scientist who disagrees with the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is censured and silenced. Any person who disagrees with the World Trade Organization (WTO) is censured and silenced.

Any President who puts his nation before the world is censured, impeached and silenced. 

Here is the major problem with any WORLD-mandated health, energy, or trade proposal:

"Any WORLD initiative on health, energy, or trade requires a one-WORLD government to enforce it."

The advocates of a one-world government desire a "re-distribution" of wealth, forcing the end of capitalism and the rise of socialism, uniform conformity from the masses to the government elites, and the complete end of "harmful nationalism."

Nationalism Will Never Go Away Because God Won't Let It

The Bible is quite clear that the Creator made the earth and the universe. Mankind, the Creator's highest creation, is charged by God with stewardship over the earth. 

Biblical stewardship of the earth is the opposite of secular environmentalism. The broader environmental movement is either pantheistic, agnostic, atheistic, naturalistic, or sometimes spiritualistic, but never built on a worldview that there is a God who created the earth, and He rules over the people who are charged to care for it.

All secular environmentalists make no distinction between the Creator and the creation. Mother Earth 
is god, and when environmentalism worships the creation, we wind up with stewards in rebellion to their true Master.

For example, the Bible teaches that God established the nations and their boundaries:

"From one man God created all the nations throughout the whole earth. He decided beforehand when they should rise and fall, and He determined their boundaries." (Acts 17:26).

When the Messiah returns for the coronation of His eternal Kingdom on this earth, the nations will bow to Him:

"All the nations you have made will come and worship before you, Lord; they will bring glory to your name." (Psalm 86:9)

"Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.” (Revelation 15:4)

The attempt at a one-world government is predominately led by the communist Peoples' Republic of
China. In a foreign policy initiative called "One Belt, One Road," Chinese communist leaders wish to rule the entire world by 2049, the hundredth anniversary of Mao Zedong declaring the new Marxist state (October 1, 1949). 

Ask yourself why communist China is so heavily involved in World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the World Trade Organization (WTO)?

HEALTH. ENERGY. TRADE.

China hid Covid-19 from the world. China rapidly went to work to protect its people from Covid-19, but allowed international planes to leave China to other countries. Domestic flights IN China came to a halt. It seems there was little concern for the "world." 

China is also pouring trillions of dollars into oil, gas, and coal energy, while the rest of the world is diverting from fossil fuels. 

Finally, China wants to determine favorable trade status for itself and will refuse any trade agreement that doesn't benefit China. Ask former-President Trump. He knows a deal when he sees one, and the U.S. - China trade agreements over the last few decades only benefited China, and Trump sought to put America first.

China is doing all those things that keep China prosperous while advocating other nations do all those things to keep those nations in poverty, and in the case of the United States, move us from prosperity to poverty ("Houston, we have a problem").  China advocates all the governmental-policies of the WMO, the WHO, and the WTO for "other nations," but does just the opposite themselves. 

Amazing. 

And to make matters even worse, inside communist China, any believer in a God who is above the state is being kidnapped, imprisoned, and re-programmed, and if the prisoner doesn't come to an understanding that the communist state government of China is theri god, then they are executed.

This week, President Biden excused the genocide of Muslims in China by calling the capture, imprisonment, and execution of Uyghurs "a Chinese cultural norm." In China, even Christian foreigners are being asked "to leave" and have recently been told, "don't ever come back."

China is attempting to control the world. And they are using health crises, energy crises, and trade crises to get it done - all through the WHO, the WMO, and the WTO. 

How It All Ends

I am a positive person by nature. I also believe in the Bible. God's on His throne, and the nations will one day all bow to Him. 

Tiananmen Square, 1989

In 1989, forty years after the founding of the Peoples' Republic of China, government dissidents in Tiananmen square attempted to stop the government's increasing encroachment into individual liberties. The Tiananmen Square demonstration was put down by government soldiers who massacred the protestors, and it is now illegal to discuss the protest from 1989 in China. 

But the Chinese people are not done. Over 300 million Chinese people are Christians who understand the principles of freedom, liberty, and proper governance.  

Either the Chinese people will overthrow the communist government internally, or soon the world will be at war with the communists of China who are using the WHO, the WMO, and the WTO to advance their agenda of a one-world government. 

The attempt at world-governance by one government leader will come to an end. 

It's only a matter of how and when.

What you can do as a United States citizen is to keep yourself informed on the bigger issues, stop believing everything you hear from the WMO, the WHO, and the WTO, and help others to become informed. 

Dr. Calvin Beisner, Cornwall Alliance

When it comes to the false claims of global warming, sign up to receive emails and information from the Cornwall Alliance. These 70 scholars - scientists, policy-makers, and theologians - will help you understand the issues.

Peruse their website for some excellent information and articles, and don't forget to sign up for their newsletter. 

Dr. Calvin Beisner was our guest in Enid, Oklahoma, last night. Dr. Beisner is the founder and head of the Cornwall Alliance, and he makes a compelling argument for why every citizen of the United States should understand that the political agenda behind so-called "Clean Energy Initiatives" is far more damaging than imaginable.

SUMMARY

More carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is the elixir of human life. Less government intrusion on the ground is existential to human life. 

Live Not by Lies.

Help in Writing "The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin"

Iris Chang's Graveside

I am writing a book entitled The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin. It is a book designed to assist family members and friends who are dealing with the painful aftermath of a loved one's suicide. 

I am placing the FOREWORD to The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin below for you to read. 

I would like to hear from you. Tell me your story of enduring the pain of a loved one who took his or her life. I know this might be the first time you've penned your thoughts, your feelings, and your questions. Tell me of your experience. Let me know what you think I should focus on and what I should avoid. I only ask that you allow me to use what you send if I choose (I'll change your name if you desire). You may leave a comment on this blogpost, or if you'd like, you may email me at wwburleson@gmail.com or istoriaministries@gmail.com. I am not sure when The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin will be finished or published, but I think you could be a resource of help to others. 

___________________________________________________________________________________

The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin

Searing Questions from Those Left Behind by Suicide

Deep in the archives of Yale Divinity School, New Haven, Connecticut, is the diary of an American woman who served as a Christian missionary to China from 1912 to 1940. She lovingly served the Chinese people for twenty-eight years and is credited with saving over 10,000 Chinese women from rape, torture, and certain death by invading Japanese Imperial soldiers in what historians call “The Rape of Nanking.”

Her name was Minnie Vautrin.

 As is the archivists’ custom, a biographical/historical summary precedes the diary to familiarize the reader with the author. Yale wrote an eight-sentence summary of Minnie’s life and placed it in the microform manuscript. It is the last sentence of the biographical summary of Minnie Vautrin that took away my breath when I read it for the first time:

“She committed suicide in 1941 at the age of 54.”

That sentence will evoke little emotion in those who know nothing of Minnie or her work among the Chinese. “She committed suicide” is a phrase that ought to grieve all humanity when we hear it, but sadly, a nameless suicide evokes no sympathy.

But “she committed suicide,” when first heard after Minnie’s suicide, tore a hole in the hearts of the 10,000 women that Minnie personally saved from torture and death during the Rape of Nanking.

I wrote The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin for the person living through the consequences of a loved one's suicide. Your loved one’s life mattered; to you, others, the world at large, and God. It is discouraging when “she committed suicide” or “he committed suicide” becomes a phrase that others use of your loved one, defining your loved one's life by how it ended and not the scope of its influence.

This book is for those who have heard the words “he committed suicide,” or “she committed suicide,” and – at that moment – it felt like you died too.

Any suicide is an awful experience for humankind, but the suicide of the one you love leaves a searing scar that feels as if it will never heal.

I understand how you feel, and I may be able to help you heal.

The questions you have about suicide, including how you go about life absent your loved one and where you can turn for some safe emotional, psychological, and spiritual healing, are questions I will address. They are essential questions, and the answers on paper will take time to process into your life.

Suicide kills far more than the one who dies physically. A suicide by your loved one saps your strength and slaps you with excruciating suffering that numbs the positive emotions you once enjoyed. At times, you may have even wished it was you who had taken your life, not your loved one.

I am not an expert on preventing suicide, but I do know something about coping with suicide.

 
For several years I served as a chaplain for the Tulsa Police Department. I cannot count the number of times dispatch called me to a suicide. The TPD assigned me to notify the victim’s next of kin, but only after going to the scene to answer any questions that loved ones would later ask me after I informed them of the suicide.

Nothing surprised me after working years in the field. The gruesome means of death chosen by a loved one may feel original and horrible to family members, compounded by where the suicide of their loved one took place, how people discovered it, and when and how police informed loved ones. I have learned a principle from my four decades of experience serving as a chaplain and a pastor:

Every suicidal path is unique, but all suicidal pain is ubiquitous.

That means no suicide is the same for anyone, but all loved ones feel the same pain after suicide.

I kept copies of all the suicide notes discovered at the scenes of the suicides I worked. Something is gripping and mesmerizing about one’s final words on paper. I learned a great deal about life through reading and re-reading notes about death. We will talk about some of the lessons I learned from those notes later in this book.

But, as a few of you already know by experience, some suicides will leave no note behind. Those were the hardest for me to work. I had no answers for loved ones who screamed at me, “Why?”

Sometimes families openly wept, and on rare occasions, the victim’s loved ones would attack me physically after I told them the news. I never judged anyone who hit me in the chest or screamed at me to “Get out!” or cursed me and went into a rage. Early on, I learned that emotional outbursts are often unexpected and uncontrolled – particularly when surprised by the devastating and shocking news that someone you love has taken his or her life.

I will be weaving in some narratives of my experiences during my forty years of serving as a police chaplain and pastor, but this book’s focus will be Minnie Vautrin.

Why Minnie? Minnie once said, “Had I ten perfect lives, I would give them all to China.” Minnie’s life wasn’t perfect. Nobody lives a perfect life. But Minnie will provide some profound lessons from her imperfect life for those of us who have struggled with the painful aftermath of a loved one’s suicide.

The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin is not a history book about China, nor do I write to encourage the reader to enter the mission field. This book isn’t even a biography of Minnie Vautrin.

You may have picked this book to read because someone recommended it to you.

Or it could be that the title or subtitle grabbed your attention as you scrolled through a list of books on suicide. I don’t know what made you pick this book, but I understand why you chose it.

You want answers because the one you love is gone, and the aftermath is painful.

Minnie Vautrin served in Nanking, China, the Republic of China’s capital, running a school for young women called Ginling College. She started as a missionary to China in 1912 and served during World War 1 (1914-1918), during the Chinese civil wars between revolutionary communists and the Republic of China (1927-1937), and during the awful start to World War II in the Far East when Imperial Japan invaded China and destroyed the Chinese capital of Nanking (1937-1940).

During the Rape of Nanking, Minnie Vautrin hung an American flag in front of Ginling College and declared her school a “safe zone,” and sheltered 10,000 women and children from death by gunfire, sword, and tortuous rampage. Minnie held her ground when Japanese soldiers aimed rifles at her, slapped her face, and threatened her with death.

Her diary from 1937 to 1940 provides a gripping account of how she managed to save 10,000 Chinese women from Japanese soldiers’ treachery. We’ll examine excerpts from her diary as we look at the psychological and emotional turmoil in Minnie’s life during the Rape of Nanking.

Minnie left China in the spring of 1940 for the United States, intending to return to China after a year-long leave. After speaking to the International Convention during the first week of May 1941, Minnie went to stay with Miss Genevieve Brown, a United Christian Missionary Society secretary in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Unexpectedly, on May 14, 1941, Minnie sealed the small apartment where she was staying and turned on the kitchen stove’s gas jet. She left a note stating that she believed her life “was a failure.”

I didn’t know that Minnie committed suicide until I read Yale Divinity School’s summary of her life in the archives. I learned about Minnie’s heroic efforts to save thousands of Chinese by reading Iris Chang’s 1997 gripping non-fictional book The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World II. That book opened to wide acclaim, appearing on the New York Times Bestseller List for ten weeks, selling hundreds of thousands of copies.

Iris Chang devoted one chapter in the Rape of Nanking to Minnie Vautrin and her heroic courage in saving thousands of Chinese lives in Nanking. When I read Chang’s book, I overlooked the short portion about how Minnie died by suicide in America in 1941.

That’s why I caught my breath when I read that last sentence of Yale Divinity School’s short biography of Minnie Vautrin's life. I knew what she'd done; I didn't know how she died.

Chinese author Iris Chang would have been the best author to write The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin. She was a meticulous historical researcher and a woman who deeply admired Minnie Vautrin.

But on Thursday, September 9, 2004, Iris Chang pulled her small car onto an access road off California Highway 17, just outside San Jose, California. As her car sat parked and idling, Iris Chang took a loaded revolver and shot herself in the head. A passerby found her inside the car the following morning.

Iris left a suicide note that said:

“When you believe you have a future, you think in terms of generations and years. When you do not, you live not just by the day — but by the minute.” 

I hope The Suicide of Minnie Vautrin will help you turn minutes into days, days into months, and months into years – productive years of living, especially in the painful aftermath of your loved one’s suicide.

© Istoria Ministries, 2021. The contents of this website is copyrighted by Istoria Ministries. It may be downloaded or printed for personal use, but it may not, except with expressed written permission of Istoria Ministries, be distributed for any commercial use. 

The Great American Tale of the Fishless Fisherman

This tale was given to me by my friend Gerald Polmateer, who had someone else give it to him. The origin of the tale is unknown. It is a story about a group of fishless fishermen.

And lo, it was true that there was much fish in the waters all around. In fact, the whole territory was surrounded by streams and lakes filled with an abundance of fish. And the fish were very hungry.

 Year after year these who called themselves fishermen met in meetings and talked about their divine call to fish, the abundance of fish, and how they might go about fishing. 

They surely appeared to be professional fishermen and were outfitted in the most up to date fashionable fishing dress. Continually they searched for new and better definitions of fishing. They often studied fishing guides taken from various translations and commentaries on fishing. Many searched the world for other books that might contain hidden meanings about fishing. They sponsored costly nationwide and worldwide congresses to discuss fishing, promote fishing, and hear about all the ways of fishing. 

These fishermen built large and beautiful multi-million dollar buildings called "World Fishing Headquarters." Weekly thousands of fishermen gathered to hear the senior fishermen's passionate plea that everyone should be a fisherman and that every fisherman should fish. Sadly though the knowledge of fishing seemed to make everyone feel as though they were in fact fishermen already even though they did not fish. 

So they organized a committee to do more research on fishing. This committee recommended the formation of an oversight board to send out fishermen to other nations where there were many fish. The board was formed by those who had the great vision and courage to speak about fishing, to define fishing, and to promote the idea of fishing in faraway streams and lakes where other fish of different colors lived.

This board often spoke of a particular area of latitude and longitude that had never seen a fisherman and where the largest gathering of fish was. The board hired staffs and appointed other special committees who held many more meetings to define fishing, to defend fishing, and to decide what new streams should be thought about.

But, sadly again, the staff and committee members did not fish. 

Expensive, friendly, comfortable, and contemporary training centers were built to teach the next generation of fishermen about fishing. Many wrote and sang songs about fishing. Others wrote books and made tape series that could be played about the "Art of Fishing", "Positive Confessions of a Fishermen", "How to be a Prosperous Fishermen", "Debt Free Fishing", and "Faith for Fearless Fishing." Those who taught had doctorates in fishology, except, sadly again, the teachers themselves did not fish. They only taught fishing. 

Year after year graduates were sent to do full-time fishing, some to distant waters filled with fish. Most were only gone for a short while. Often returning back to the training center with stories of the difficulties of fishing in hard territories. Further, the fishermen built large printing houses to publish fishing guides. A speaker's bureau was also provided to schedule special speakers on the subject of fishing. Seminars and conferences were scheduled throughout the country with minimum entrance fees to encourage greater attendance on fishing. 

Many who felt the call to be fishermen responded, and were sent to fish. But like the fishermen back home they never fished. Others said they wanted to be part of a fishing party, but they felt called to furnish fishing equipment. They didn't really have the time to fish. Others felt their job was to relate to the fish in a good way so the fish would know the difference between good and bad fishermen. 

After one stirring meeting on "Fishing, The Great Commandment," a young fellow received a mighty breakthrough. He left the meeting and to everyone's surprise, actually went fishing. 

The next day he reported that he had caught two outstanding fish. News spread throughout the fishing network in minutes. Wow! All that training had paid off. The young man was honored for his excellent catch and quickly scheduled to visit all the big fishermen meetings throughout the country to tell how he did it. He was also invited to appear on many fishing television shows. He was so popular with the fishermen that he started his own television program called "To Catch A Fish" and invited others as his special guest to talk about fishing. He became so busy that he quit fishing in order to have more time to tell about his experience to the other fishermen.

Now it's true that many of the fishermen sacrificed and put up with all kinds of hardships and difficulties. Some lived near the water and bore the smell of dead fish every day. They received the ridicule of some who made fun of their fishermen's clubs and the fact that they claimed to be fishermen yet never fished. 

The committed fishermen wondered about those who felt it was of little use to attend the weekly meetings to talk about fishing. After all, were they not following the Master who said, "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men?" 

Imagine how hurt some were when one day a non-fisherman suggested that those who didn't catch fish were really not fishermen, no matter how much they claimed to be. 

Yet what he said seemed to be correct: "Is a person a fisherman if year after year he never catches a fish?" 

The Tragic Murder of Missionary John Birch (Pt. 3)

When Imperial Japan's Emperor Hirohito went on national radio in Japan at 12:00 noon, August 15, 1945, and unconditionally surrendered his country to the Allies, World War II fighting came to an immediate end. 

The race for who controlled China then began. 

Japan had invaded Manchuria, a province of China, in 1931. The Japanese military had desired the oil and natural resources of northeast China for the ever-expanding Japanese empire. China sided with the Allies during World War II in their battle against Japan, Germany, and other Axis Powers. 

When Japan surrendered, the communist-led Soviet Union raced into northern China to gain control of China. The Russian Republic had been overthrown by communists during the 1917 Russian Revolution, and Joseph Stalin and his USSR communist-led government desired to make China a communist nation.

On August 15, 1945, a four-year Chinese civil war broke out in China between the Republic of China's national forces led by General Chiang Kai-Shek and the Chinese communists led by Mao Zedong. The United States publicly backed the Republic of China and Chiang Kai-Shek while the Soviet Union backed the Communist Party and Mao Zedong. 

The four-year civil war in China lasted from August 15, 1945, to October 1, 1949, when Mao Zedong's forces defeated General Kai-shek's forces. Mao Zedong officially proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China at Tiananmen Square. Chiang Kai-shek, 600,000 Nationalist troops, and about two million Nationalist-sympathizer refugees retreated to the island of Taiwan.

Taiwan became the Republic of China.

China became the Peoples' Republic of China.

One little word - PEOPLE - separated the titles of these two nations.

Mao declares the Peoples' Republic on 10.1.1949

But it is the Chinese people who have suffered the most in communist China. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) of China, which leads the Peoples' Republic of China, put to violent death between 3,000,000 to 8,000,000 Chinese people during the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution. More unknown millions of Chinese people have died violent deaths at the hands of communist leaders before and after the Cultural Revolution.

The number of dead is a state secret. 

And the violence in China will not stop. There are no more Christian missionaries in China. They've all been expelled. Besides, if the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) suspects that you served as a Christian missionary in China at any time during your life, you are now forbidden from re-entry into China. 

The Communist leaders in China mean business. They intend to rule the world, and there is no room in their utopia for a creational Deity, individual liberty, or social non-conformity. 

In the most underreported story in the world during 2020 - and now the early portion of 2021 - the Chinese Communist Party is tearing down Muslim mosques, separating Muslim families, and sending Muslims who believe in Allah to concentration camps indoctrination. Hundreds of thousands of Muslims have been kidnapped, imprisoned, tortured, and killed by the Chinese Communist Party. It's like we are watching a 1930s form of fascism rekindle, but because it's communism and China, the world remains silent.   

Missionary John Birch, b. 1918 - d. 1945

Christian missionary John Birch was the first murder by the post-World War II Chinese communists. Chinese communist troops murdered Birch on August 25, 1945, ten days after World War II. 

The fact that the United States covered-up Birch's murder and eventually withdrew U.S. support from Chiang Kai-Shek, allowing the communists to seize control of China, is one of the blackest marks in American foreign policy - with lingering effects on Americans during 2020/2021. 

Americans need to understand that revolutions of countries and empires occur all the time. Communists desire a revolution inside the United States. 

That revolution is coming. It's part of a communist agenda, and you should be warned by the death of Christian missionary John Birch of what's coming to you and your family if you do not resist the evil empire of communism.

The Tragic Murder of Missionary John Birch

As explained in Part 1 and Part 2 of this series, missionary John Birch went to work for the United States Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the forerunner to the Central Intelligence Agency. Birch had helped rescued the Doolittle Raiders who had crashed landed in China. Colonel "Jimmy" Doolittle had recommended the OSS's Chinese office to recruit John because of his bravery, local knowledge, and expertise in the Mandarin language. 

John had served the OSS with distinction for over three years, saving countless American and Chinese lives through his dangerous intelligence work for the American government, all the while continuing his missionary work. John Birch would be posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Medal and the Legion of Merit.

His last mission occurred after Japan had surrendered. General Wedemeyer, commander of United States forces in China, had ordered Captain John Birch and a team of American and Chinese soldiers to Suchow, China, to make sure any Chinese or American prisoners held by the Japanese there would not be systematically murdered as had happened in the Philippines.   

John Birch decorated by Gen. Claire Chennault

John Birch went on this last mission in full American uniform with the American Flying Tigers' well-recognized patch on his uniform. On August 25, 1945, Captain Birch and his party of eleven, including three American soldiers, six Chinese Nationalists, and two Korean Japanese-speaking, were stopped by a communist force in a small town on the railroad just west of Suchow, China. The communists ordered Captain John Birch to surrender his revolver. John Birch refused, explaining that the Chinese and the Americans were allies in the war against Japan. He was under orders from General Wedemeyer to go to the Japanese military base at Suchow to ensure any American or Chinese prisoners' safety. The communists didn't like how John Birch refused to take orders, and they particularly didn't like the fact he was unwilling to give up his revolver. Orders were given, and missionary John Birch was shot first in the leg while his sidearm was holstered, and then after Birch fell to the ground, he was shot in the head and then bayonetted throughout his body. A Chinese Nationalist aide named Tung Fu-Kuan was also shot and left with John Birch to die. The rest of the party was taken prisoner and eventually released (two months later).

The communists eventually won the civil war against the republicans in China. The Chinese Communist Party has continued its efforts to rule the world through their brand of communist philosophy, which means: 

1. Government control of all things.

2. A denial of any god but the government god.

3. Obescience from the masses for the good of the state.

John Birch's death has been called “the first casualty in the Third World War between Communists and the ever-shrinking Free World.”

The Chinese national soldier shot by the communists on that day in , Lt. Tung Fu-Kuan survived, but only after local doctors amputated his leg. He is the one who gave the report of the murder of John Birch by Chinese communists. Three of the Americans with Birch and taken prisoner by the communists also made out a joint report that substantiated Tung's account of what happened.  

John Birch's burial site in Chuchow, China

Birch's body was recovered from a shallow grave, and after a Catholic service, he was re-buried with military honors on a hillside near Suchow. A 10-page report on the incident, submitted to Gen. Wedemeyer by the judge advocate for the theater and dated November 13, 1945, relied substantially on Lt. Tung's eyewitness accounts. 

It concluded that "the actions taken by the Chinese Communist Army personnel fell short of according the rights and privileges due even to enemy prisoners of war and constituted a murder?" 

The report added: "The shooting was done maliciously . . . the killing was completely without justification."

General Wedemeyer wrote to Mao Zedong on August 31, 1945, and asked for a prompt investigative report of Birch's death. Mao eventually responded that the Chinese communists shot at John Birch "in self-defense," an outright lie since Birch's gun never left its holster. 

Sadly, the American government covered up Captain John Birch's death from everyone, including his own family. The official file was stamped "Top Secret," and nobody had access to it until the 1970s. 

The American government did not wish to offend the Chinese government by making public the murder of John Birch.

In fact, when the official American military records of the murder of John Birch were finally released in February 1972, they were held up a few additional so that their disclosure would not bring embarrassment during President Nixon's trip to China (February 21-28, 1972). 

America has a history of catering to communist China. 

And in the end, such catering will bring death to more Americans than just one. 

COVID-19: A Chinese Communist Party Act of War

On January 27, 2021, Dr. Steven Quay issued a 187-page report on the origin of Covid-19.  Dr. Quay writes: 

"It is beyond a reasonable doubt that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a laboratory. My final conclusion is that it is a 99.8% probability SARS-CoV-2 came from a laboratory and only a 0.2% likelihood it came from nature."

Dr. Quay has written over 350 professionally published medical articles. He has been cited over 10,000 times in academic, scientific, and medical journals, making him one of the top 1% of published scientists worldwide. Dr. Quay holds 87 United States patents and has invented seven FDA-approved pharmaceuticals, which have helped over 80 million people.

To call it "a conspiracy theory" for Dr. Quay to say that Covid-19 is a weaponized coronavirus in the face of Dr. Quay's overwhelming scientific evidence is to perpetuate the lie that Covid-19 comes from nature. People lie because it is more comfortable than telling the truth. As George Orwell once said: 

"In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act."

Dr. Quay is convinced by the science that the Chinese military created the Covid-19 virus in the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Chinese government biological warfare laboratory in Wuhan, China.  

A coronavirus from nature is extremely contagious but typically not deadly. The common cold is a coronavirus. The unique nature of coronaviruses is that they are almost impossible to stop in terms of their spread.  The Chinese military tapped into the "mechanism" whereby a deadly biological disease can be delivered. 

According to Dr. Quay, the Chinese military weaponized a coronavirus with a "spike protein" and turned it into a deadly respiratory disease.

But why would China release a new and deadly disease on the world?

In 2003, the Chinese Defense Minister,  Chi Haotian, spoke to high-level Communist Party members and gave some revealing insight into CPC plans for the world. Specifically, the Chinese Defense Minister discussed a Chinese national survey conducted by the Chinese Communist Party. The CPC had asked Chinese citizens if they approved of the Chinese government "killing non-combatants" to obtain Chinese national superiority. Chi Haotian's summarized the reasons for this survey:

"The purpose of the CCP Central Committee in conducting this survey is to probe people’s minds. We wanted to know: If China’s global development will necessitate massive deaths in enemy countries, will our people endorse that scenario? Will they be for or against it?"

Most Americans still believe the Covid-19 pandemic was caused by a virus moving from the animal kingdom (bats) to human beings. People living in the western civilized world cannot imagine that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) would intentionally spread Covid-19 to gain superiority over the West.  Whether the "release" was accidental or intentional is not yet determined. Two Chinese reporters in Wuhan investigating the origin of the virus have disappeared. Dr. Shi Zhengli, the biological virologist and scientist who ran the Wuhan laboratory has also disappeared. 

It seems the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese military knew exactly what they were doing.

On January 19, 2020, the Chinese Communist Party announced that the Covid-19 virus was transmitted from person to person. Wuhan was closed at 10 o 'clock on January 23, 2020. All the city's buses, subways, ferries, and long-distance passenger traffic were suspended, and Chinese domestic flights to and from Wuhan were suspended. Chinese citizens were not allowed to leave Wuhan without special reasons.

Yet, flights from Wuhan to other parts of the world remained open, allowing the new coronavirus to spread worldwide, but not in China. According to the International Aviation Organization, about half a million people from the affected areas of Wuhan made their way to the United States, Europe, Asia, and other continents. 

The Chinese Communist Party seemingly used the virus to accelerate a global pandemic that would help create global terror. The CCP  runs by an authoritarian system of government and only extreme measures are able to contain a new coronavirus global pandemic. For western countries built on individual liberty, informed consent, and general freedom - countries like the United States - the ability to control an epidemic quickly is constrained. As a result, Americans turned against Americans, neighbors against neighbors, and political parties against each other. The best way to take down a powerful nation is to destroy it from within. That is the premise of Marxism. The Chinese Communist Party firmly believed that the virus would help bring down the political, economic, and military strength of western countries like the United States. 

If China is intentionally using Covid-19 as a way to spread its power around the world, then we must ask, "What is the goal of the Chinese Communist Party for the world?"

The answer seems clear. 

Communism desires a "one-world order" with police states that demand uniformity, conformity, and docility from the masses, removing all faith in God and demanding full submission to human government.

There is no other term for governmental COVID regimes than nascent police states. Governors and bureaucrats, without any legislative authority, have demanded that people remain in the homes at their personal whim for a disease with a 99.9% survival rate.

A Muslim concentration camp in China

In the most underreported story in the world during 2020 - and now the early portion of 2021 - the Chinese Communist Party is tearing down Muslim mosques, separating Muslim families, and sending Muslims who believe in Allah to concentration camps for indoctrination. Hundreds of thousands of Muslims have been kidnapped, imprisoned, tortured, and killed by the Chinese Communist Party. It's like we are watching a 1930s form of fascism rekindle, but because it's communism and China, the world remains silent.   

I love the Chinese people. Some of Rachelle's and my best friends are Chinese nationals. A great revival of Christianity is occurring on the mainland of China. There are more evangelical Christians in China than there are people in the United States. To say that the China virus is a biological weapon is not racist; it is calling out the Communist Party in China for their nefarious desire to rule the world. 

American Christians in the west better care for Chinese Muslims in the east. When you see a mosque destroyed in China, or a Muslim family detained in China, or a Muslim man incarcerated for indoctrination in China, you better recognize Christians in China are next. A bio-medical emergency blamed on nature is a perfect excuse for a government to demand absolute conformity from the masses. Other nations will fall like dominos to the same governmental authoritianism for "the good of society."

If we are willing to give up some of our individual liberties for the promise of a little personal safety, we will eventually lose all of both. 

The United States better wake up to what is happening in China and stop acting as if the Chinese government is friendly. When we get in bed with the Chinese Communist Party, we are sealing the death warrant of millions. 

Government authoritarianism is the mother of communism. The more the United States government demands citizen conformity, uniformity, and docility, the more the United States government is becoming like the Chinese Communist Party. 

But the threat of ever-expanding government overreach is not just a problem in the United States. 

An article from Libertas Bella (translated, "Liberty is beautiful"), highlights Australia as an example of a country that has moved very firmly and decisively into police state territory. 

Zoe Buhler, a 28-year-old pregnant mother was arrested, handcuffed and had her electronic devices confiscated for the crime of posting about an anti-lockdown protest on Facebook in a town with four active cases. The name of the crime? “The planning and encouragement of protest activity.” The punishment? Mrs. Buhler is looking at 15 years in prison.

You can watch the video of Mrs. Buhler’s arrest here. It should make your stomach turn. The Premier of Victoria (equivalent to the governor of this Australian state) allowed and encouraged BLM protests of up to 10,000 that summer.

President Joe Biden hasn’t ruled out making the Covid vaccine mandatory. Bill Gates has called not only for mandatory vaccines, but also mandatory tracking of people who have received them. The notion that people who don’t know they’re sick are passing the disease around - something called “asymptomatic transmission,”- is patently false. Authoritarian government control of the movements of its citizens is patently real. 

A number of academic journals and medical institutions are suppressing the freedom of speech in the name of peer review. The corruption of American academia is no less real than that of the mainstream media. Several prominent medical journals, including The Lancet, The New England Journal of Medicine, Science, and Nature Medicine went on the record denying the laboratory origin of CCP virus and the effectiveness of Hydrocloquine, Ivermectin, and other low-cost treatments - before the completion of any scientific research,

For a scientific journal to draw a conclusion and publish it before the research has taken place may be called "an agenda," but it can't be called science. 

Dr. Steven Quay has now given us the scientific research needed to understand the origin of Covid-19.

If he is correct that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) created the Covid-19 virus, and I am correct that the CCP has the intention of destroying the political, material, and social fabric of western countries, then the CCP  is not only the enemy of the Chinese people, it is the enemy of mankind. 

The CCP  Virus has ravaged the world for over a year. Human beings are dying, and more will die. Xi Jinping, head of the CCP defined this battle against Covid as "the ultimate battle." He meant what he said. To the Chinese Communist Party, the ultimate battle is for the control of the world.

Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said it well: 

"If the free world cannot change Communist China, then Communist China will change the world."

The Tragic Murder of Missionary John Birch (Pt. 2)

The wreckage of Col. Jimmy Doolittle's Plane

The average American today knows little of the dangers of communism. My wife recently told me of a survey that stated "49% of recent American college graduates believe that communism is a better form of government than America's current form of government."

Sigh.  

Sadly, even some Christians think that there are similarities between communism and early Christianity as described in Acts 2. But there is a FUNDAMENTAL difference between Christianity and communism. The latter is a form of government that requires dictators to force the masses to do things against their will "for the common good" of the country. Of course, the "common good" is always defined by the dictator or governmental leaders, and disobedience leads first to loss of personal liberties, and if eventual uniform conformity is not achieved, then individual deaths. Communist dictators have killed over 150,000,000 people worldwide for non-conformity. 

The Christians in Acts 2 shared all things in common voluntarily (Acts 2:44-48). Demands of uniformity and conformity by government coercion,  regardless of the intended or stated societal good, always means the loss of individual liberty and safety. 

Death follows communism like thunder follows lightning.

In Part 1 of this series I introduced you to John Morrison Birch (1918-1945), the American Christian missionary to China (1940-1945) who was murdered by Chinese communist government soldiers (CPC) on August 25, 1945, 10 days after the end of World War II.  John Birch's death has been called “the first casualty in the Third World War between Communists and the ever-shrinking Free World.”

I would like for my follower of Jesus friends to see that Kingdom people like John Birch will sometimes make a choice to defend liberty for the sake of the health and safety of a nation, believing that this defense is a call from God Himself for the protection of others from physical suffering and death. 

Missionary to China John Morrison Birch

John Birch was born in 1919 to Christian missionaries living in India (George and Ethel Birch), but when John was two years old, the Birch family moved back to the United States due to George's ill health. First settling in New Jersey with Ethel's family, the Birch's would eventually migrate to Georgia where George Birch had inherited a 500 acre family farm. Teenage John Birch and his older brother worked on the farm all summer to get it ready for the Birch family to live. 

An aunt who recognized the intellectual acumen of John offered to pay for his high school education at a the school in Gore, Georgia so that John could be afforded a better education than the one room church school in the woods near Birchwood Farm. John graduated with honors from high school and then enrolled at Mercer University in the fall of 1935. After graduation from Mercer with honors, and a year of training in Fort Worth, Texas, John Birtc went to China. 

John Birch in the rice paddy fields of China

John Birch arrived in Shanghai China in July 1940. The coast land of China and all of northern China had been invaded and occupied by the Japanese in 1936. John began an intensive study of Mandarin Chinese in the Japanese occupied territory of China. After a few months, John went to to Hangzhou China to begin his ministry of witnessing to the Chinese farmers and their families about the Good News of Jesus Christ. He was an outstanding Christian missionary. He spoke Mandarin fluently, dressed in the rural Chinese every-day clothes, and grew his hair long, dyed it black, and pulled it back just like the rice paddy farmers did. 

Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the President of the United States ordered a surprise attack on Tokyo. In April 1942, the famous and successful Doolittle Raid struck terror in the hearts of the Japanese who thought their island impenetrable to attack, and it lifted the morale of the American people. Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle and his crew bailed out in China after the Tokyo raid because they had not enough gas in their tanks to return to the aircraft carrier.  They had flown from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet (CV-8), bombed Tokyo, and bailed out of their planes before crashing on the Chinese mainland. The American air crews rendezvoused and then tried to figure out a way to get out of Japanese-controlled China. A local farmer put them in the bottom level of his fishing boat.

John Birch was eating a cheap bowl of rice in a restaurant that overlooked the Ch'ien Tang River. James M Scott in his superb book Target Tokyo: Jimmy Doolittle and the Raid That Avenged Pearl Harbor explains what happened next:

A Chinese officer came inside and spotted the missionary, striking up a conversation in the hope of practicing his English. The officer commented that there were several Americans on the general’s boat tied up below. Birch protested that he must be mistaken, prompting the officer to point out the policeman in a black uniform standing guard on deck. Birch decided he had to check it out for himself. 

“Have you any Americans on this boat?” the missionary demanded of the guard. 

“No,” the policeman answered in Chinese. 

“Are there any Americans in there?” Birch repeated, this time shouting. 

Doolittle and his men crouched inside the cabin, listening to the exchange. “Well, Jesus Christ,” Paul Leonard blurted out.

 “That’s an awfully good name,” Birch answered. “But I am not he.” 

The door sprang open, and Birch spotted several bearded faces inside. “Come in here!” came the chorus. Birch climbed inside the cabin and came face-to-face with Doolittle and his men. The aviators were thrilled to meet Birch, whose language skills and knowledge of the area would be assets. Doolittle briefed the young missionary on the operation and asked whether he would travel with them and help interpret. “Of course, I was glad to,” Birch later said. “The first time I’d associated with celebrities.” 

Birch traveled with Doolittle to Lanchi, relating stories of the Japanese atrocities. The missionary confessed to Doolittle that he wanted to help American forces. Doolittle bade farewell to Birch, assuring him that he would recommend him up the ladder and asking him to remain ready to help other raiders.

Scott, James M.. Target Tokyo: Jimmy Doolittle and the Raid That Avenged Pearl Harbor (pp. 276-277). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition. 

Order of Merit

When Doolittle arrived in Chongqing, he told Colonel Claire Chennault, leader of the Flying Tigers, about Birch's help. Chennault said he could use a Chinese-speaking American who knew the country well and he commissioned Birch as a first lieutenant on July 4, 1942 to work as a field intelligence officer, though Birch had expected to work as a chaplain.

Lieutenant John Birch would eventually be promoted to Captain John Birch and he would be a highly decorated field intelligence officer, including being awarded the Legion of Merit for his distinguished service in China. General Claire Chennault would later say of John Birch, "I loved like my own son." 

It was on August 25, 1945, 10 days after the official end of World War II that Chinese communist soldiers shot and killed Captain John Birch in cold blood.

John Birch died defending China against insurgent communists. He died wearing an American soldier's uniform. The United States government covered up John Birch's murder for five years. In one of the blackest stains on American foreign policy, the American government pulled its military and financial support from Chiang Kai-Shek and the Republic of China and allowed the country of China to fall into the hands of the communists led by Mao Zedong. 

Millions of Chinese died under the butchering hands of Mao Zedong. 

A fight against communism is a fight for lives. 

How the communists killed John Birch and why it's important to understand the goals of communism will come in Part 3 of this series. 

The Tragic Murder of Missionary John Birch (Pt. 1)

Missionary John Birch in China (c. 1940)

This is the first of a three-part series on the extraordinary life and tragic murder of an American Baptist missionary to China named John Birch.

His cold-blooded murder by  Chinese communists on Saturday, August 25, 1945, should serve as a warning to all Americans who believe in liberty, individual responsibility, and government accountability.

Many have heard of the John Birch Society. 

But few people know about the man John Birch (1918-1945) after whom the organization is named. 

John Birch, the son of missionary parents to India, would spend his school years in Georgia. God called him to be a missionary at the age of eleven. A superb student, Birch graduated from Mercer University with top academic honors at age twenty. At twenty-two, John Birch took a ship to Shanghai where he studied Chinese at a prestigious language academy. John picked up the difficult language rather easily and he became fluent in both speaking and writing Mandarin Chinese, able to imitate the local tonal dialects with precision.

A young John Birch telling the Christmas Story

John Birch served as a model Christian missionary to the Chinese people. He dressed like the Chinese people, ate rice and the local Chinese cuisine. He easily made friendships with Chinese families as he shared the Good News of Jesus Christ to the Chinese people of northwest China. John refused to marry a British missionary woman with whom he fell in love because he felt having a wife would deter him from his mission in China. 

When World War II began, John didn't abandon his missionary post. Japan had already invaded China
in 1937, so when World War II broke out for the United States in 1941, the Republic of China was our ally, but the Empire of Japan was our enemy. John Birch continued his missionary efforts among the Chinese, moving away from the coastal areas to avoid the Japanese occupying troops. 

By God's providence, it was missionary John Birch that guided Jimmy Doolittle and the Doolittle Raiders out of China (a story I will tell in Part II). Upon Jimmy Doolittle's recommendation, General Clairee Chennault made missionary John Birch a lieutenant in the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of America's Central Intelligence Agency.

John Birch decorated by Gen. Claire Chennault

John Birch's fluent Mandarin, his knowledge of the land and people, and his ability to get close to the Japanese without being identified as an American made John Birch the perfect spy for Allied forces. From 1942 to 1945, John Birch saved countless lives through his dangerous intelligence work for the American government, all the while continuing his missionary work. John Birch would be posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Medal and the Legion of Meritt. 

After World War Two ended on August 14, 1945, John Birch recognized the dangers facing the Republic of China. Communist revolutionaries, desiring to overthrow the Republic of China in order to turn China into a Marxist country like the Soviet Union, attacked their Chinese brothers and the Republic of China.

John Birch knew the fate of Chinese people was at stake.  The Communist Party of China (CPC) led

The Communist Emblem

by Mao Zedong sought to destroy the Republic of China (ROC), led by Chiang Kai-Shek through riots, destruction, murder, and mayhem. 

On Saturday, August 25, 1945, just ten days after the conclusion of World War II, the Chinese communists murdered John Birch in cold blood - a story I will tell in detail in Part II.

Even worse, the United States government covered up John Birch's murder for five years. In one of the blackest stains on American foreign policy, the American government covered up John Birch's murder by the communists, pulled its military and financial support from Chiang Kai-Shek and the Republic of China, allowing the country of China to fall to the communists.

Chiang Kai Shek and the Nationalist Party for the Republic of China withdrew from the mainland after

Taiwan - The Republic of China (ROC)

their defeat to a Chinese island. There, Chiang Ka Shek and the republicans established The Republic of China (1949), what Americans call Taiwan. For over seven decades now, the government of Communist China (CPC) has threatened to invade Taiwan, even if it brings about a World War. 

The common purpose of socialism/communism/Marxism is a unified, one-world government where control of the masses for the "collective" good is orchestrated through social conformity and a Big Brother mentality (e.g. "you can only do what the government allows you to do.") 

John Birch's death has been called “the first casualty in the Third World War between Communists and the ever-shrinking Free World.”

Burial Site of John Birch in Soochow, China

Every American should know about the missionary John Birch. Every lover of liberty should respect the John Birch Society's objective. The three-fold goal of the JBS is: 

1. Less government. 
2. More individual responsibility.
3. By God's grace - a better world.

Robert Welch (1899-1985) founded the John Birch Society on the cold Monday evening of December 9, 1958, in Indianapolis, Indiana. 

Welch,  who was fifty-nine years old at the time, had three decades earlier become wealthy from his candy empire that began with his invention of a caramel-bar-on-a-stick that he called Sugar Daddy.

Welch invited eleven other well-known American businessmen from around the United States to join him in Indianapolis. These twelve men became the founding members of the John Birch Society. Among them were Harry Lynde Bradley, co-founder of the Allen Bradley Company and the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation; Fred C. Koch, founder of Koch Industries; and Robert Waring Stoddard, President of Wyman-Gordon, a major industrial enterprise. 

Five years earlier (1954), Welch had written a book entitled The Life of John Birch: In the Story of One American Boy, the Ordeal of His Age. The candy maker was no dummy. Welch began reading at age two, tackled algebra at age six, read all nine volumes of John Clark Ridpath’s formidable History of the World at age seven, and entered the University of North Carolina at age 12, graduating at 16. He was a true “Renaissance Man,” a world traveler, conversant in several languages, and an avid lifelong student of history, language, philosophy, economics, mathematics, science, geography, chess, poetry, classical literature, politics, and other subjects.

But it was the American Baptist missionary to China, John Birch, that captured the mind and heart of Robert Welch. 

At an age when most people are enjoying their retirement, Robert Welch decided to forego a life of leisure and create an organization (The John Birch Society) to promote what Welch believed to be ideals of Americanism in order to battle the overwhelming wave of communism he saw taking over numerous countries. He had already seen communism’s prominent influence in America throughout his lifetime.

Fast-forward to 2021. On Presidential Inauguration Day, it was my privilege to have lunch with Marty

(L to R) Marty, Wade, John, Clark

Ohlson, the President of the John Birch Society, Clark Curry, the Chairman of the Board for the national Board of Directors for the John Birch Society, and John Dwyer, the historian par excellence for Oklahoma. 

All three are friends of mine. They're sharp, successful businessmen, who cherish the principles of less government, more individual responsibility, and by God's grace, a better world. 

Fred Trump, the father of former President Donald Trump was a member of the John Birch Society, and Fred ingrained into his son the principles of liberty, responsibility, and government accountability. 

It's no wonder Donald Trump had so much opposition.

National socialism, Marxism, and/or communism  have the following three-fold objective:

1. A powerful, expansive, and all-controlling government.
2. Minimal individual responsibility and a collective (social) responsibility.
3. A utopian world by the government's control of the masses with no need for God.

Missionary John Birch saw the dangers of communism in China and throughout the world. He is an example to me of a person who is primarily interested in the Kingdom of Christ, but was willing to lay his life on the line to ensure a country remained free.

John Birch died, tragically murdered by the communists, but the message he conveys lives on.

More to come.