Hello OCBC family,

​Let me share a passage with you.  “Therefore, through Him let us continually offer up to God a sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of our lips that confess His name” (Hebrews 13:15).
There is a lovely hymn that came from German that we do not know its author; this hymn is “When Morning Guilds the Skies.”

When morning gilds the sky,
Our hearts awaking cry:
May Jesus Christ be praised!
In all our work and prayer
We ask his loving care:
May Jesus Christ be praised!

This hymn was published for the first time in 1828 in Katholisches Gesangbuch with 14 six-lines stanzas.  After a few years, in 1854, Edward Caswall translated the hymn into English.  This hymn of worship to Christ encourages us to give praises not just in “church time” but every time and everywhere, “In all our work and prayer.”
To God, the Word on high,

The hosts of angels cry:
May Jesus Christ be praised!
Let mortals too upraise
Their voices in hymns of praise:
May Jesus Christ be praised!

When we raise our voices in an explosion of praises, we are singing together with angels who are
seeing God’s face at that right moment; we are making a harmony with the heavenly hosts.

Ye nations of mankind,
In this your concord find:
May Jesus Christ be praised!
Let all the earth around
Ring joyous with the sound:
May Jesus Christ be praised!

The whole creation worship the Creator, therefore we should follow its example.

Then let us join to sing
To Christ, our loving King:
May Jesus Christ be praised!
Be this the eternal song
Through all the ages long:
May Jesus Christ be praised!

Singing to the Lord psalms, hymns and spiritual songs while we are on this earth, is a rehearsal of what we will do for eternity.  Sing to the Lord, because it is good!

​In His service,
Israel

​Hello OCBC family.  Today is October the 7th and one day like this Lottie Moon reached China.  We are very familiar with this name, because every Christmas time we collect the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering to support our missionaries overseas.
Lottie Moon wasn’t always a dedicated Christian lady.  When she was young, her father passed away, and she became a rebel against God; she didn’t like to go church.  Until one day, when a friend invited her to attend a missionary meeting, and hear the gospel that transform lives.  That night she found out how ugly she was spiritually and the necessity to confess her sins.  She did, and her life was very different, and she decided to become a missionary.  She was very smart and finished her education with a masters degree.  Two years after, she started her journey to China, she arrived to this country on this day.  She worked in Tonchow, Northern China.
The Chinese did not respond well to her message at the beginning.  She prepared cookies to break walls, but people there didn’t trust her, thinking that those cookies were poisoned.  Very slowly, they finally trusted  her and in her message and in her Lord.
She spent 40 years in this mission field, with just three times of furloughs.
She was so devoted to her missionary life that she refused to eat when a severe famine attacked China.  She became very ill and people encouraged her to go to America for healing time, but she died in the boat before arriving home, on December 24th.
 "If I had a thousand lives, I would give them all for the women of China," said Lottie Moon.  She may not have given a thousand imaginary lives for China but she gave the one she had.
In His service.
Israel.