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An interview with career planning professional, Marcia Harris
Marcia Harris is the Director of Career Services at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. With 20+ years of experience and a Master's Degree in Education Guidance and Personnel Services, she retains a wealth of information that can be helpful to any parent with a college-bound child.
In addition to her background, Ms. Harris co-authored a book entitled "The Parent's Crash Course in Career Planning" (VGM, 1996), which offers advice to parents and their children regarding the early years of college, choosing a major, and the post-college employment challenge.
Emphasizing parental involvement, Ms. Harris says that parents "should have been encouraging their child all along to strive to be the best student that they are capable of being." In the following interview, she provides additional insight.
Give us a little background on yourself. Where did you go to college and how did your career as a counselor start?
I grew up in Scranton, PA and went to a private boarding college prep school in Kingston, PA – Wyoming Seminary. My college degrees are from Vassar College (BA Psychology) and North Carolina State University (M Ed Guidance & Personnel Services).
Just prior to completing my Master's degree, I accepted a job as Assistant Director of Career Services at Meredith College in Raleigh, NC (1975). I worked there for a little over a year and then went to North Carolina State University as Assistant Director; and later as Associate Director of the career services office. I moved to the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill in 1982 as Director of Career Services.
As a counselor dealing with students and parents, what are some problems, challenges, or misconceptions you often stumble upon?
Parents are often unaware of the importance of students' doing summer internships that relate to their career goals. They also don't realize that many internships are unpaid and require students to go out of state for the summer, but in the long run these sacrifices definitely pay off.
Many students put off making career decisions and preparing to be a strong job candidate until close to or after graduation. By that time, they are far behind their classmates who have acquired leadership skills and several internships and have much stronger credentials to offer employers.
How important is the role of the parent in the educational process and why?
Studies show that parents are the single greatest influence on a student's career selection. It is important for parents to give students support and encouragement to explore many options and to find the best career fit for them (the student) as opposed to trying to live out their own unfulfilled career dreams through their child.
How can parents help their child to pick the school and program that will best suit them?
Parents should consult the high school guidance counselor, since that individual is trained on helping students make wise college selections. Of course parents must consider a variety of factors, such as their budget, the student's competitiveness for admission, distance from home, size, and most importantly, whether the college or university has the program that their child is interested in.
If their child has not yet selected a major or career area, they should ensure that they are considering colleges with programs of study that are likely to be of interest to the student. For example, a student with technical interests should consider universities that offer majors in computer science and engineering, while a student with broad interests in the social sciences or humanities could choose either liberal arts colleges or large universities, since both will have departments of interest.
If a student has a low GPA, how can the parent deal with that? What can they do to prevent their child from having a low GPA?
Parents should have been encouraging their child all along to strive to be the best student that they are capable of being, with the acceptance that not everyone is cut out to be an academic scholar. If the student has made an appropriate college choice, achieving a 3.0 GPA should be a realistic goal if they make grades a priority.
Parents might suggest that their child visit their college career office once they are accepted to hear from the career counselors the importance that employers place on grades. Knowing that their future employment prospects may depend on the grades they make may provide motivation.
Should parents encourage their child to go after specific skills, and if so, what are some examples of those skills?
Employers request skills such as science and lab skills, finance and accounting, computer science, sales, demonstrated leadership and teamwork, sales and persuasion, communication, and foreign language. Students should strive to develop strength in at least two skill areas.
Should parents encourage their children to develop leadership skills, and if so, are there any particular activities they should be encouraging their children to take part in?
Parents should most certainly encourage students to be involved in activities and to take increasingly more responsible leadership roles. The particular activity is not so important, although involvement in an organization related to the student's career interests is an advantage. The organization can be a campus political, social service, business club, etc. as well as an off-campus organization.
Employers want to see experience on a resume. Should parents encourage their children to take advantage of internship opportunities, even if it means not coming home for the summer?
Parents should understand the need for students to gain at least one summer of career-related experience, usually through an internship, and be supportive and encouraging of the student's going wherever necessary to get this experience.
There are pro's and con's to both early graduation and late graduation. Many parents may be concerned about this topic. How should parents handle this?
Parents need to discuss their concerns with their child. While there may be a cost-saving to early graduation in terms of tuition, the student may graduate with less experience and a weaker resume, resulting in a longer job search or less attractive job opportunities, thus negating the benefits of early graduation.
On the other hand, for a student looking at many years of continuing education to pursue a law or medical degree, for example, early graduation may be a wise choice.
Interviewed by Doug Schmitt, CollegesUSA.com Staff Writer.


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JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (Sept. 21, 2009) - The ETSU volleyball team will look to increase its win streak to three games Tuesday at 7p.m., as the Bucs head to Boone, N.C. to take on former Southern Conference rival Appalachian State in a non-conference match.
The Bucs (5-7, 4-1 A-Sun) picked up two big conference wins this past weekend defeating Kennesaw State 3-1 and Mercer 3-0 on the road to move into third place in the Atlantic Sun. The Bucs are led by Amanda Youell (Middleburg, Fla.) who is third in the A-Sun with 406 assists.
ETSU is 16-37 all-time against the Mountaineers, but won the last meeting between the two teams 3-2 at home.
Appalachian State (3-10, 0-0 SoCon) has lost its last four matches after going 0-3 at the Black and Gold Challenge at Wake Forest this past weekend. The Mountaineers are led by senior Maja Jechorek who has a team leading 128 kills.
For more information on Buccaneer volleyball and all other athletic news, please visit www.ETSUBucs.com.

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Water SA
On-line version ISSN 1816-7950
Print version ISSN 0378-4738
Water SA vol.34 n.5 Pretoria Oct. 2008
Comparing available rainfall gridded datasets for West Africa and the impact on rainfall-runoff modelling results, the case of Burkina-Faso
Gil MaheI, *; Sabine GirardI; Mark NewII; Jean-Emmanuel PaturelIII; Agnes CresI; Alain DezetterIII; Claudine DieulinI; Jean-François BoyerI; Nathalie RoucheI; Eric ServatI
IHydroSciences, Case MSE, University Montpellier 2, 34095 Montpellier Cedex 5, France
IISchool of Geography, Centre for the Environment, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QY, England
IIIInstitut de Recherche pour le Developpement, BP 2528 Bamako, Mali
Monthly rainfall data in Burkina-Faso, West Africa, over a period of 77 years are extracted from three different gridded data sets, available either on the web: CRU (Climatic Research Unit, Norwich, UK), SIEREM (HydroSciences Montpellier, France), or from the National Meteorological Center of Burkina-Faso. With a view to modelling the runoff-rainfall relationship at the monthly time step, these data are used at the 0.5°*0.5° scale. Despite mean, minimum, standard deviation and inter-annual variability being very similar for the period 1922 to 1998, the three gridded data sets used show an important spatial variability of values with time, and some differences are observed which lead to significantly different runoff-rainfall simulations. Comparison of the rainfall grids has shown that differences between the precipitation grids are more pronounced during years when the rainfall is lower; this also applies to areas where the rainfall is lower. The three different rainfall grids produce differences in mean rainfall of 4 to 11%, depending on the grids that are compared. While these results are obviously specific to the station networks and interpolation method used, they provide an indication of the differences that can arise.
It is recommended that as many stations as possible are used to better assess areal rainfall. These biases have a strong influence on the results of the runoff-rainfall modelling (using the GR2M conceptual model): the Nash criteria show differences of about 20% and calculated flow of 30% to 40%. This study illustrates the levels of uncertainty when using available rainfall gridded data sets, for rainfall-runoff studies in West African developing countries, which is important in the context of predicting water resources for the future from the GCM outputs for the 21st century.
Keywords: Burkina-Faso, database, runoff, rainfall, rainfall-runoff modelling, West Africa
Accurate simulation/estimation of river flows is important for numerous applications in water resource planning and management. If we exclude the problem of gathering runoff data from African countries, where the observations within the national networks were often interrupted during the 1980s (Mahe and Olivry, 1999), in most catchments there are two major sources of uncertainty that limit accuracy: hydrological modelling (structure and parameterisation) and climate data (especially precipitation) used to drive hydrological models. The latter is a particular problem in most developing countries where meteorological networks are relatively sparse in time and space. For large-scale hydrological modelling, a common approach is to use gridded climate data as input to a gridded rainfall-runoff model, where the hydrological grids are linked to a drainage network. For example, in West Africa Ouedraogo et al. (2001) suggest a semi-distributed conceptual modelling of rainfall-runoff at the monthly time step to study climatic variation and its impacts on hydrological variability (Paturel et al., 2003a; 2003b). Such an approach allows the prediction of the depth of runoff from latitude/longitude grids of rainfall, potential evapotranspiration and soil-water capacity. Many publications on this topic have appeared about Southern Africa, among which Hughes (1995) or Lee and Oh (2006), which use different kinds of rainfall-runoff models for water resource assessment purposes. In West Africa rainfall-runoff models are most sensitive to rainfall, and it is therefore important to understand biases of rainfall data before their use in a water resource model (Paturel et al., 2003b), and the effect of these biases on predicted runoff and river flow (Lee and Oh, 2006; Rubarenzya et al., 2007). But accessibility to data is a serious problem limiting research performance.
This paper is not about the relationships between rainfall distribution and runoff modelling (others like St-Hilaire et al., 2003; Dong et al., 2005; and Lee and Oh, 2006 have done this) or about how well or not the existing data sets allow reproduction of the 'real' or most probable rainfall fields. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate data from three gridded rainfall data sets of monthly rainfall available for Burkina-Faso over the period 1922 to 1998, and to analyse the consequences of each choosing one of them on the simulated river flows in 5 basins across Burkina-Faso. The aim is to process the data as though we were in the situation of a non-specialist rainfall data-set user, who will use only one source of data, ignoring the consequences.
Data and rainfall grids
Access to rainfall data in West Africa
Raw data: Raw data are rarely available for free through the National Meteorological Services, and costs are sometimes very high, although the WMO 40th resolution asks for the free exchange of data for research and educational purposes (WMO, 2001). In their own countries, African researchers often have great difficulties to obtain access to rainfall data, and especially recent data (e.g. after 1990).
Several international institutions and laboratories have gathered raw data for internal research purposes, but they have not made these data available on the web, to respect the limitations placed on distribution by the National Meteorological Services, except the GHCN (Global Historical Climatology Network -NOAA) which provides web access to monthly climate data for synoptic station data supplied by the National Meteorological Services. The IRD (ex-ORSTOM) gathered raw data up to 1980 for a number of African countries, in terms of a contract with CIEH (Comite Interafricain d'Etudes Hydrauliques) and ASECNA (Agence pour la SECurite de la Navigation Aerienne en Afrique et a Madagascar), but is not allowed to release them. This IRD database served as a basis for the FRIEND-AOC dataset (Flow Regimes from International and Experimental Network Data UNESCO/PHI Afrique de l'Ouest et Centrale). The FRIEND-AOC dataset has been set up along with the FRIEND-AOC UNESCO program since 1994. This is a research network involving about 200 hydrologists and climatologists from West and Central Africa who can access the database via their research theme leaders (FRIEND-AOC, 2007). However, there are only a few data after 1990. This database is managed and updated by the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar (Senegal).
Another regional database for West Africa is located at the AGRHYMET Centre of Niamey (regional centre for Agro-Hydro-Meteorology), Niger. This database has been compiled for the CILSS countries (Comite inter-africain de lutte contre la secheresse au Sahel), with the contribution of each CILSS country, but it is basically not accessible outside AGRHYMET or CILSS purposes, even to African researchers.
Gridded data sets: Research Laboratories like CRU (Climatic Research Unit, UEA, Norwich UK) or HSM, or international institutions like NOAA, through local and restrictive partnership research contracts, release 'elaborated' data sets, like gridded rainfall, most often at the 0.5°*0.5° scale. Gridded data sets, most of them covering the world at the monthly time step, are available for research purposes, free of charge via the internet, like NCDC-GHCN (Peterson and Easterling, 1994) or CRU (New et al., 1999, 2000) or SIEREM (SIEREM, 2007; Boyer et al., 2004, 2006; Dieulin et al., 2006) data sets. They are often the only way for researchers to obtain rainfall data for remote areas of the world.
Satellite-derived rainfall data sets: The techniques for deriving rainfall amounts from satellite data are improving (Rouault et al., 2001); however, the quality and the reliability of these data have yet to improve with respect to compatibility with data derived from ground measurements (Hughes, 2006; Grimes and Diop, 2003).
The data sources
The three databases used to describe the monthly rainfall between the years 1922 and 1998 in Burkina-Faso are (Table 1):
CRU: gridded data extracted from the CRU global climate dataset (New et al., 1999; 2000), 2003 version.
SIEREM: station data from the IRD 'SIEREM' database, which covers a large part of Africa, especially Francophone Africa (Mahé et al., 2001). The data include Burkina-Faso National Meteorological services data published under an agreement between CIEH, ASECNA and ORSTOM (CIEH, a; b), updated after 1980 with data extracted from the National Meteorology Service database, checked for main errors. Data are interpolated to a 0.5° latitude/longitude grid using kriging (Delhomme, 1976), and are available on the HSM website (SIEREM, 2007).
METEO: the Burkina-Faso National Meteorological database was used for free for creating the METEO gridded data set with the same kriging method than for the SIEREM one.
Each dataset has a different network over Burkina-Faso (Figs. 1 and 2). The CRU dataset has the lowest number of stations. The number of stations increases over the western part of the country over the period 1950 to 1980 (Table 1). This dataset has a markedly unequal distribution over the Burkinabe territory, with a much lower density in the eastern half of the country. For the rest of the study, we distinguished between the western and eastern parts of the country, divided along longitude 2°W, because of the great difference of density of the CRU network on either side of this divide.
The SIEREM and the METEO datasets contain the same stations as CRU, but they also include a number of stations with shorter time series, apart from the national protected areas of the extreme eastern and south-eastern regions that are not very well covered. This provides a more even spatial distribution over the Burkinabe territory. The differences between SIEREM and METEO are primarily due to a few station-years between 1970 and 1990, where SIEREM has improved coverage from various sources, and to greater quality control leading to the removal of several highly unreliable data series.
We analysed the spatial and temporal distribution of annual rainfall amounts for each of the 86 grid points located in the Burkinabe territory, during the period 1922 to 1998. We calculated, mesh by mesh and year by year, the deviations between grids according to the following simple but robust formula:
val_grl = value grid 1
val_gr2 = value grid 2
ABS = absolute value
We then analysed the differences between the grids all over the entire territory and through the period of record.
Results of the comparative analysis
The main sources of error in the construction of gridded climate data from station records are partly due to the quality of the data (instrument and information management errors in the databases), the interpolation method used and the network density and distribution (New et al., 2000; Willmott et al., 1996; Briggs and Cogley, 1996; Wahba, 1990). According to the number of stations and the geometry of the station network, the resolution of 0.5° is a good choice for the majority of countries in West Africa to correctly represent the monthly rainfall fields. In the sections that follow we quantify the differences between the 3 gridded datasets, and make an assessment of the relative contribution of station density and interpolation method to these differences.
Annual rainfall
Annual rainfalls calculated from each data set CRU, SIEREM and METEO are very similar (Fig. 3). Mean, standard deviation and minimum values are very close (Table 1), and only maximum values show some differences between SIEREM and the two other grids. It is therefore surprising that the study found that there were a number of other differences arising from the use of these three grids.
Time-evolution of differences
We first look at the time-evolution of differences between grids over the study area as a whole. Figure 4 shows the area-averaged differences between grids for annual rainfall; for each of three possible grid-pairings, grid-point differences (Eq. (1)) for annual rainfall were calculated, and the mean of all 86 grid-point values was then determined; the three area-averaged annual values were then combined into a single mean annual difference. The mean differences show marked inter-annual variability, as well as an increase after the mid-1970s, coincident with the Sahelian drought. In general, drier years are associated with larger differences between grids. There are only slight differences between pair of grids SIEREM and METEO while the differences of SIEREM and METEO values with CRU are much greater (Fig. 5).
The temporal evolution of the differences between the grids CRU and SIEREM in the western part of Burkina-Faso clearly shows the influence of the number of stations (Fig. 6). Similar results arise from other combinations of grids. As might be expected, differences remain small when the network is similar (up to 1980), and are lowest when the network is both similar and relatively large (1960 to 1980). From 1981, differences are larger, a reflection of the reduced network density in CRU (while SIEREM and METEO remain relatively constant).
Spatial patterns of difference
Figure 7 shows the spatial distribution of the mean differences calculated from monthly rainfall. The CRU grid shows some large differences to SIEREM, up to 20% at grid points in the border areas. The large differences in the borders are a reflection of the different network. CRU also show larger differences in the eastern parts of the territory, where the network of stations used by the CRU is less dense than SIEREM or METEO. The SIEREM and METEO grids show only minor differences to each other (less than 4%) except for 5 grid points in the south-eastern part of the country where the network is less dense. These observations are confirmed by grid-point Student's t-tests for differences in the mean, showing no differences between SIEREM and METEO data but several grid points with differences between CRU and SIEREM databases (Fig. 8).
Mean differences over Burkina-Faso
Table 2 shows, for the period 1922 to 1998, mean percentages of differences between the grids over the western and the eastern parts of the country, defined by the 2°W meridian. SIEREM and METEO are only slightly different from each other, with a mean difference of 1.1% and 2.1% in the west and east, respectively. The CRU grid shows much larger differences from both the SIEREM and METEO grids, with 4.3% in the west and between 10.2 and 11.2 in the east, where the density of the networks is different.
Increasing the number of stations from 34 (1998 version of the CRU dataset) to 65 (this study; 2003 CRU dataset version), distributed only in the western part of the basin (see Fig. 2) leads to a reduction of 30% of the difference between rainfall values of CRU and other data sets (results not shown). This is not the case in the eastern part of the basin, where the recent CRU dataset has not incorporated more stations. These differences are higher than those cited by Ali et al. (2005), who refer to studies in southern Niger which assess the effect of station network density on precipitation estimates. They report a bias of 10 to 15% when using a degraded network of 5 stations over 10 000 km2, compared to a network of 10 stations over the same area.
It is most probable that the rainfall data of SIEREM and METEO grids are more representative of the ground truth than the data of the CRU grid. This means that in the study area at least, it is better to use as many stations as possible to compute rainfall grids. The runoff-rainfall modelling we use hereafter in this study has two objectives. Firstly, it assists in assessing the significance of increasing the number of stations, assuming that the rainfall data which are closer to the ground truth will lead to better runoff simulations, described by higher Nash criteria (all other variables being identical). Secondly, it is used to assess the impact of using different gridded-rainfall data sets on runoff simulation accuracy, in the context of water resource availability estimation.
Impacts on the river flow modelling
We have shown that different existing precipitation grids, nominally describing the same surface climate element, vary significantly across the study area, depending on the station network used to generate the gridded data. This is a confirmation of what has been found in other cases, but it is important to emphasise this point before evaluating the effect of such differences on river flows simulated with a hydrological model.
Data and method
Previous work has evaluated two different hydrological models (GR2M described by Makhlouf, 1994 and WBM described by Vorosmarty et al., 1989 and Conway, 1997) over 50 river basins in West Africa, using several different sets of data for potential evapotranspiration (PE) and soil-water holding capacity (WHC) (Paturel et al., 2003a; Dezetter et al., 2008). For West African river regimes the results indicated that the best combination of model, PE, WHC and calibration/optimisation was:
GR2M hydrological model (better than the WBM)
Standard Penman PE formulae, better then reference crop PE, calculated after Shuttleworth (1993)
WHC, calculated from the FAO digital soil map of the world, (FAO, 1981; Girard et al. 2002), and considering the maximum value of the range given by the FAO (better than the Dunne and Willmott (1996) WHC dataset)
Calibration using the series of Rosenbrock methods (Guilbot, 1971; Servat, 1986) and Nelder and Mead (Servat, 1993).
We chose 5 catchments in Burkina-Faso (Fig. 9 and Table 3). These catchments are between 7 500 to 20 000 km2 in size, and distributed over Burkina-Faso such that they encompass the North-South gradient of rainfall, which varies from 400 to 1 100 mm. The mean annual runoff coefficient varies between 2 and 8% and runoff is not perennial, except for the Nwokuy River, in the Mouhoun basin (71% of runoff in July to October period, Table 3).
We simulate runoff in each catchment using each of the three rainfall grids: CRU, METEO, SIEREM. A split-sample procedure is followed, running a calibration on two-thirds of the available time series of flows (18 to 30 years depending on the specific catchment) and a validation on the last third part of the time series. Our comparison covers data from the calibration period and the performance of the model is evaluated using the Nash criteria (Nash and Sutcliff, 1970; Perrin, 2000), which compares simulated flow (S) against the mean of observed (O) discharges, and is effectively a standardised MSE, with a maximum possible value of 100%:
Results for the validation period are similar to those of the calibration period, but with lower values most of time, and are not shown here. In addition, for each combination of grids, we compared the differences between the monthly flows, expressed in both percentage (Eq. (1)) and absolute values. As before, we distinguish between the eastern and western parts of the country, on each side of the 2°W meridian.
Simulations using the METEO and SIEREM grid produce the best results for the Nash criteria for 3 catchments (Folonzo, Wayen and Nobere), and the mean of the Nash criteria is 57% over the 5 catchments (Fig. 10); the Nash criteria are higher for simulations using SIEREM or METEO than the CRU precipitation grid, between 50% and 80%. For the two other catchments (Nwokuy and Dolbel), the Nash criteria are similar with the 3 grids, around 40%. Table 4 shows, for each pair of grids, the percentage difference between the Nash criteria (calculated according to Eq. (1)). The relative differences in the criteria for the METEO and SIEREM grids are very low (<1%), but are highest between both the METEO/SIEREM and CRU, and are twice as high for the catchments of the eastern half of the country (9.2 to 9.9%) than for catchments in the western half (5.9 to 6%). The differences in the Nash criteria are comparable to the mean differences in the rainfall data, which are about 4% in the west and from 10.7 to 11.2% in the east (Table 2).
When the actual flows simulated in the 5 catchments are compared (Fig. 11), the largest differences are observed between simulations using the CRU and SIEREM/METEO grids: up to 90% between CRU and SIEREM/METEO. The smallest differences are between the SIEREM and METEO grids, as would be expected from the similarity of the precipitation data in these two grids. As seen in Table 5, the highest differences are for the catchments located in the east (about 70%) where the measurement network is less dense. The differences between the rainfall grids are amplified in the hydrological response, with differences four times higher in the East than in the west in absolute values (m3·s-1).
Figure 12 shows the difference in mean monthly flow using CRU and SIEREM. Relative differences are largest during periods of low flow (up to 80%), but have relatively low absolute values (less than 1 m3·s-1). Conversely, during high-flow months (from July to October), which represent between 70 and 97% of the annual discharge, the relative differences in flow are smaller (less than 40%), but with a greater impact on absolute values up to 5 m3·s-1. The eastern catchments show the greatest percentage differences, particularly in the dry periods. This is due to the combined effect of the rainfall grids varying too much in the east, and to lower rainfall amounts in the eastern catchments, compared to the catchments in the west. For the Wayen catchment, which is in the centre of the country, with half of the catchment in each of the western and eastern parts of the country, the results for the simulated runoff are between those observed in the eastern and western parts (Table 5).
Synthesis and conclusions
Our analysis has enabled us to investigate the sensitivity of river flows simulated by gridded hydrological modelling, to the quality of available gridded monthly rainfall data sets.
Despite mean, minimum, standard deviation and inter-annual variability being very similar, the three gridded data sets used show an important spatial variability of values with time. The three different rainfall grids produce differences in mean rainfall of 4 to 11%, depending on the grids that are compared. While these results are obviously specific to the station networks and interpolation method used, they provide an indication of the differences that can arise.
Comparison of the rainfall grids has shown that differences between the precipitation grids are more pronounced during years when the rainfall is lower; this also applies to areas where the rainfall is lower. These differences have several causes including the quality of the data (instrumental errors, recording error, point or systematic errors) and the interpolation method which are not discussed here. This study has focused on the differences related to the variability in the density of the measurement network and its impact on the calculation of the hydrological balance. Our comparison has provided insight into the relative influence of these biases on the quality of the grids. The improvement of the data quality (SIEREM grid compared to METEO grid) has not had a significant influence on the quality of the grid, but the improved coverage in the east in both SIEREM and METEO has produced quite large differences from CRU, about 4% in the west where the networks are more similar, and about 11% in the east where the CRU network is much sparser.
The maximum differences observed between the CRU and SIEREM/METEO grids, of about 11%, represent about 60mm of annual precipitation in northern Burkina-Faso and about 120mm in the south. These differences in precipitation input are amplified in the hydrological responses simulated by the GR2M model.
The impact of differences in the rainfall grids on simulated river flow is considerable: a mean difference of 10% between grids induces variations of the Nash criteria of about 10% and calculated variations of flows of about 30% during the flood period and about 60% for the rest of the year. Comparisons between the west and east of the country show that precipitation network density is very important for accurate flow prediction. In the eastern part of Burkina-Faso, where the number of stations are reduced, the differences between Nash criteria are about twice those in the west, and differences between simulated flows are 5 times higher in the east.
Ideally, the better rainfall gridded data sets should include as many stations as possible, while a quality review (SIEREM) of the raw data from National Services (METEO), seems to have little effect on the results of runoff-rainfall modelling, despite the fact that there is a significant difference between grid-point rainfall values of SIEREM and METEO.
These results show the major impact of the quality of the rainfall dataset used for further purposes (runoff-rainfall modelling in this study) in countries where data are scarce, not fully quality controlled and difficult to access. It is of particular interest to be aware of these differences when considering the prediction of future runoff from GCM outputs. The hydrological models are calibrated and validated on existing gridded rainfall datasets. The model parameters that are obtained are used to run the model with future rainfall and PE data from GCM outputs (Ardoin-Bardin et al., 2006). This increases the uncertainty on the runoff prediction for future decades.
It would be a great help, in particular for the scientific community, if one reference rainfall gridded data set could be updated for West and Central Africa, and be made freely available via an internet website. The Agrhymet Center (CILSS) and the FRIEND-AOC network of hydrologists (UNESCO) could collaborate for this purpose, for example on the basis of the FRIEND-AOC rainfall database which is coordinated by UCAD in Senegal. For now, the SIEREM gridded database has been put on the web for the purpose of African rainfall studies and will be maintained and updated as well as possible, with the help of all willing national services, guaranteed by the fact that only gridded data are available through this database. Quick communication of monthly data for synoptic rain gauges would allow rapid updating of rainfall indices as presented by L'Hote et al. (2003) over the Sahel.
The authors wish to thank the Direction Nationale de la Meteorologie and the Direction Generale de l'Inventaire des Ressources Hydrauliques of Burkina-Faso for providing data.
ALI A, AMANI A, DIEDHIOU A and LEBEL T (2005) Rainfall estimation in the Sahel. Part 2: Evaluation of Raingauge Networks in the CILSS Countries and Objective Intercomparison of Rainfall Products. J. Appl. Meteor. 44 (11) 1707-1722. [ Links ]
ARDOIN-BARDIN S, DEZETTER A, SERVAT E, DIEULIN C, CASENAVE L, NIEL H, PATUREL JE and MAHE G (2006) Application of climatic scenarios in hydrological modelling: using GCM outputs. IAHS Publ. 308 436-441. [ Links ]
BOYER JF, SERVAT E and DIEULIN C (2004) A specific method of modeling and designing environmental information systems. The example of SIEREM, an environmental information system for water resources. Proc. BALWOIS Conf. May 2004, Ohrid, Macedonia. [ Links ]
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text:
If you will I'd like you to turn your Bible this morning to 1 Corinthians chapters 5 and 6.
I had an occasion last night to spend some time on the telephone with a pastor - former pastor, who through some indiscretions in his own moral life has fallen from the pastorate. And he asked me could I have people go to you as a reference should some church want to consider me as a pastor? "Would you give me a reference?" And my answer to him was, "No, I will not." He said, "What about forgiveness?" I said, "This is not an issue of forgiveness. I don't have a problem with forgiveness." He said, "What about restoration?" I said, "This is not an issue of restoration. I pray that you're fully restored to a place of usefulness to the Lord." He said, "What is the issue?" I said, "There is an issue of example. There is an issue of setting the standard for the kind of holy life that the church people are to be called to. And when you have forfeited that publicly you no longer can stand in the position of that exemplary individual. That's the issue. It isn't that God won't use you. It isn't that God won't forgive you and bless you. It is that you are no longer qualified for the role of modeling what Christian character is all about in the position of an elder or a pastor."
Well that was sort of the latest healing with that issue up until yesterday within the last two weeks five other pastors' names had come to my attention who had defaulted from the ministry because of immorality. Over the last six months or a year I have been recognizing that what we are now facing in Christianity is a epidemic of sexual immorality. And the church, instead of holding up the standard, seems to be widening it's tolerances to embrace anybody and everybody who wants forgiveness, restitution, and restoration, and placement back in positions of leadership.
I had a occasion last week to speak with several wonderful Christian women whose husbands had been very active in the church, leaders in the church, teachers in the church, and after 20-25 years of marriage had decided to run off with another woman. And in the cases of these women the church had done nothing about it. In fact, one lady went to her pastor of a very significant Bible teaching church and they have chosen to do nothing at all about it.
There is, obviously, you well know, among "famous" Christians an epidemic number of divorces and scandals of one sort or another. There has been one person in the country who has been highly critical of me, a pastor. In fact, has said much against our ministry here. He is now trying to defend himself in a court of law in a rather severe and far-reaching morals charge. There almost seems to be a head in the sand approach to some of this. Churches have become far more tolerant of it. Institutions and schools and seminaries, which at one time in their history would never admit men to study for the ministry who did not have an impeccable record as a Christian, have now widened their permissiveness to embrace anyone who will pay the tariff, as it were. And sometimes in the name of Grace, and there is a place for Grace, in the name of love, overlook some things that would disqualify a man for ministry.
And what I see happening in the church, I believe is at an epidemic proportion. And I just feel that perhaps to set the record straight and get the focus clear it would be well for us to look again at what the Apostle Paul has to say about sexual purity in the church. Obviously, society around us puts pressure on us. We live in a debase society. We live in a society that panders the lusts of its populists. Immorality is totally acceptable with our society, but totally unacceptable with God and it must be as unacceptable to the church as it is to the Lord of the church. Finding that one-woman man fit for leadership, finding that one- man woman fit for service in the church is becoming more and more difficult. And instead of the church holding it's standard against the tide it seems to be lowering it's standard to accommodate the shortage of qualified people.
Society is jaded about purity and the church is becoming jaded along with it. We tolerate people who are proclaimers, in one way or another, of the Gospel, whose lives, as someone said, "Would make a black mark on a piece of coal." Tolerance has become the norm. Constant overexposure to sexual sin has dulled all of our sensibilities to it. And we are very much like the Church of Corinth, which was victimized by pagan immorality, and the church, I believe, has to fight against that, just as the Corinthian Church needed to fight against it in its own time. I don't need to belabor the issue and read you throughout the Old Testament the words of the Lord against these sins. You can read Deuteronomy 22, 23, and 24. You can read Leviticus 19, Leviticus 21. You can read Proverbs 5, 6, 7, and 9. You can read many New Testament passages, 1 Corinthians 6 being one of them. Ephesians 5, 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 and many others, Revelations chapter 2, many, many places in the word of God where this matter of sexual sin is spoken to.
Those who commit this sin, and just two days ago a letter crossed my desk giving testimony to someone in our church whose been here for a long time and apparently off and on during that time engaging himself in fornication to one degree or another. I don't think it's at an epidemic level in our church but I am confident that it is present in our congregation. And I am confident that the enemy would do everything he can to make it as widespread as possible to discredit the name of Christ and the ministry of the church.
So it's well for us to take a good look at this issue in reference to 1 Corinthians. And I want to treat it in two ways: first, how do we deal with sexual sin on a personal level, secondly on a corporate level? And this message this morning brief and abbreviated is by way of reminder from the study we had many years ago in 1 Corinthians 6. A fuller explanation even than I can give would be found in the commentary and written on this epistle.
Let's look together at chapter 6 then, verses 12 all the way through verse 20 and deal a bit with the personal aspect of dealing with sexual sin; the personal aspect. Here Paul speaks to the sinner, "To the one who would engage himself or herself in sexual immorality." And here his word is a very direct word. On the Corinthian situation it's best understood by a look at the little slogan at the beginning of verse 13. If you look at verse 13 you will notice a verbalist slogan, "Food for the body and the body for food. Food for the body and the body for food." Now what is the significance of such a slogan? Well, the slogan is emblematic of an attitude that became a philosophical justification for immorality. And what the slogan is intended to say is, "Food was made for your stomach and your stomach was made food." There's certainly nothing wrong with eating. Eating is biological. In a sense this is a euphemism for sex. It implies sex for the body and the body for sex. It's just like eating, drinking, sleeping. It's biology. Don't latent it down with any kind of moral connotations. The sexuality and sexual activity is nothing more or less than shear biology. It's just physiological activity. We are animals, the body was made for sex, men are men, women are women. The obvious intention of that is to bring them together in that physical biological act. Why are we so concerned about it? "Food for the body and the body for food." Food was made for stomachs, stomachs were made for food; it's just biology. The implication being sex is for the body, the body is for sex. It's nothing more than biological function.
And that is precisely the justification that we face today; that man is nothing more than a biological animal with certain added mental capacities. His basic biological physiological functions are moral and he may engage himself to any degree he chooses. Anything is right. Anything is optional. Anything goes. That is the mentality of our day. To point out what a change this is, in 1969 there was a national survey done on the suitability of extramarital or premarital sex. The survey indicated that over two-thirds of the population of the United States felt that premarital and extramarital sex was wrong. The same survey was given in 1985, 16 years later, and over two-thirds of the people in America now believe it is right; a reversal of moral standards of rather massive proportions in a period of 16 years, a direct result of the onslaught of a decadent media and a tolerant society. The church necessarily, because it is made up of people in this society, is bound to have to fight that battle. But the way to fight the battle is not to accommodate the system, and that is precisely what has happened.
I grew up in the church. In fact, when I was 17, on my 17th birthday I was living in my 17th house. My mom liked to move and fix up houses. And so when I look at my childhood I don't think of the house I think of churches. We were involved in pasturing all my lifelong. And I cannot remember in the life of growing up in the church ever hearing about a divorce, sexual immorality among Godly people, among leaders in the church. That just was not part of that world. I'm sure there were those occasions when such a thing did happen or would happen. It was something very, very secretive and anyone who fell in that way was forever banished from any public ministry.
So much as changed but nothing in the word of God has been altered at all. And so it is incumbent on us to look together at the word and see how these things can be dealt with. Now remember that the Corinthian's were basically a vile society. The verb in the Greek to Corinthianize means basically to have relations with a prostitute. The whole city was associated with prostitution. And when people came into the church and named the name of Christ they brought a lot of immoral baggage with them. Certainly, they were cleansed by the work of the Savior in their life but there was an awful lot of leaven from that past society still permeating their new life, and therein lies the problem.
Beginning in verse 13, "The Apostle then begins to deal with the perversion of sexual immorality." And this, again, as I said, relates to it on a personal level. Here is how we must see it personally. He wants to point out how harmful, how controlling, how dominating, and how perverting this particular sin is. Notice what he says then in verse 13, "Food for the body and the body for food: but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for pornography, fornication, sexual sin, but for the Lord: and the Lord for the body. And God hath both raised up the Lord and will also raise up us by his own power." The first point he wants to make is that sexual sin, that is a sexual relationship outside the man/woman marriage bond is a perversion of God's intention, first of all, because the body was not made for sex, the body was made for whom, for the Lord, for the Lord. Your body is not your own to do with what you will. You body belongs to the Lord.
They were using this little slogan trying to celebrate the fact that sex, like eating and drinking was nothing more than a natural function without spiritual meaning. And here the Apostle Paul says, "You cannot treat your body in such a way. Food for the body. Look at it, or stomach and the body for food, but God shall destroy both it and them." What does he mean? God will destroy food and God will destroy stomachs. The point is the biological process will stop. Yes, eating is a normal biological function. Food and stomachs do go together but God will destroy both food and stomachs. In other words, in the future, they'll be a time when we have a glorified body, not dependent on food and not dependent on a biological digestive system. That's temporary, that's transient. God will do away with that, but the body is not for pornaya, but for the Lord and the Lord is for the body as proven in verse 14 by the resurrection.
"For as God raised up the Lord he'll raise us up also. And as he had a glorified body recognizable to be the very form in which he was before his death so will we have a glorified body also recognizable." And what he is saying here is that while food and stomachs are temporary, bodies of believers in a glorified state are eternal. So what you do with your body is a very grave concern to God because your body is not for sexual sin but for the Lord. If you want a slogan then let your slogan be the body for the Lord and the Lord for the body. The body is to be set apart under the Lord. It has a very special purpose.
On a far higher plane than the stomach and food biology will cease. That's a temporary function, that the body has a permanent future. Food and stomachs are on a horizontal level. Bodies and the Lord are on a vertical level. "What I do with my body is very important because my body belongs to the Lord," Romans 12:1, Present your body as a what, living sacrifice holy and acceptable under God, which is your act of spiritual worship. My body doesn't belong to me. My body is far more than just an animalistic biological physiological functioning organism. My body is the possession of the Lord Jesus Christ. For a Christian then to commit sexual sin breaks and destroys that vertical relationship. It violates that vertical relationship. For me, as a believer, to look at the body as if it were nothing more than some physiological animalistic tool to be used in any way I wanted is to ignore the fact that the body is for the Lord.
Your body was not made for sex; your body was made for God. And God has a specific design for it. That's why verse 14 says, "As he raised up the Lord he'll also raise us up by his own power." Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, "We'll put on incorruption. This mortal will put on immortality. Death will be swallowed up by life. We will enter into a new and glorious existence. We shall have an exchange of this vile body." Philippians 3, "For a body like unto his glorious body." In other words, you've got to realize that your body is sanctified as a vessel onto God. It's a powerful point. So don't run around saying, "Sex is nothing but biology," and feel you have a right to do anything you want because it's nothing more than a physical function. It is far more than that. Your body belongs to God.
A second point that he makes is very very important. "Is that it is one with Christ. It not only belongs to God but it is one with Christ." The whole trinity's gonna get involved in this. It belongs to God; secondly it is one with Christ. Verse 15, "Don't you know that your bodies are the melee - that's the ordinary word for limbs and members of a human body - don't you know that your members or your bodily members are members of Christ?" In other words, your link to Christ. Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of a prostitute? Now this makes the thought of sexual sin almost as sickening. He appeals to common knowledge, "Don't you know that your bodies are members of Christ?" You are not united him you're in Christ and the closest most intimate way. We are one with Christ. It would be unthinkable to use Christ's body for sexual sin. No would knowingly take the body of Christ and put it with the body of a prostitute. And yet, that's exactly what you do when you commit sexual sin. You have to see the picture the way it is in the word of God.
I hear people who say, "Well, but you know, I'm unhappy with my wife and she doesn't understand me." And, "oh, this is such a wonderful love and we have -" This one lady said to me one day, "I just love his caresses." Well just get the prospective will you, that you have indulged Christ in your illicit affections? You cannot separate yourself from him. Now just know this that if you choose to do it you violate the fact that your body belongs to God and has an eternal destiny and, secondly, you indulge the Lord Jesus Christ in your illicit sin. He is untainted by it, but nonetheless, you have drawn him in. And so he says in verse 15 at the end, "God forbid. May genna way ta, may it never happen." Strong negatives saying, no, no, no, impossible, unthinkable. And somebody would say, "Well, yeah, I would never join Christ to a harlot but we're in love." Do you know what a harlot is, a prostitute? Do you know what a prostitute is, anyone who prostitutes the intended use of sex for personal purposes. Everyone who engages in an illicit relationship is a prostitute by the simple definition of the term.
Sexual union is two becoming one. Thus in a Christian's immorality there's the most gross profaning of making Christ one with a prostitute. That's unthinkable, absolutely unthinkable. And that's the prospective that Paul wants us to have.
Verse 16 he follows on what? "Do you not know that the one who is joined to a prostitute is one body?" And then he quotes from Genesis 2:24, "Two shall be one flesh." When you enter into a sexual relationship to become one flesh, by definition of God in Genesis, you become one. And that is primarily speaking of the sexual union. So if you are a member of Christ and you become one with a harlot, you have made Christ one with that harlot.
Verse 17 follows up even the same idea, saying it another way, "He that is joined onto the Lord is one spirit." The word for joined; columinized means bonded or glued. It isn't some passing thing. You are literally glued to the Lord and being stuck, as it were, to the Lord, glued to the Lord, bonded to the Lord. You engage yourself in an illicit sexual relationship and you have dragged him and desecrated him by that. And I would say that if you have done that to the Lord you have forfeited a right to be his representative in many ways. He doesn't need such representative. You have become one spirit. You're one with the Lord. So God is involved. When a person engages in sexual sin they are denying that their body belongs to God. They are joining Christ in this prostitution.
Because of such seriousness notice what he says in verse 18, "Flee pornaya." Present imperative, make it a habit to continue running. The best defense is to run. Remember Genesis 39? Joseph, Potifar's wife came after him and he did a smart thing, he ran. She grabbed his cloak and tried to use it as incriminating evidence but he ran. And that's the right thing to do. You don't stay around and say I'm going to stay here and get the victory. It's the same thing in 2 Timothy 2:22 where Paul says to Timothy, "Flee youthful lust. Run away from the source of temptation." You know this is very important for even young couples who love the Lord and are planning for marriage and find themselves in a compromised situation because they can't control their physical desires. The best thing to do is stay apart. Stay apart. You don't want to put yourself in a position where you're going to join Christ in a prostituted relationship. And it's a prostituted relationship even if there's a covenant of marriage coming along in the future because it's outside that covenant itself. Don't flirt with it, run from it. Watch what you see, watch what you read, watch what you hear, watch what you look at, watch what preoccupies your mind. I mean people it's just so basic as controlling what goes into your mind.
In verse 18 he further says to show us the seriousness of this sin, "Every sin that a man does is outside the body. And he that commits fornication sins against his own body." It's very difficult to know precisely everything Paul has in view here. But what he seems to be saying is that every other sin approaches from the outside, but this one rises from within. Other sins have external stimulus. This seems to have an internal one. The cause of other sins may be outside. The cause of this is inside. It is a strong consuming impulse and drive and has the capacity to corrupt more deeply and widely than other things. Personally, I believe it's more destructive than drugs, more destructive than alcohol, more destructive than patterns of crime, and, very often, all those go together with it. But something deep within a person is affected by this sin, so that he sins against his own body in a very, very serious way.
He may have in mind venereal disease. Some people think that all venereal disease is a reaction of God's wrath against sin. I'm among them. I think all venereal disease is a divine reaction against sin. I don't think all the victims of venereal disease or AIDS or the other ones are necessarily the sinners. I think there are some people who in one sense or another may be innocent bystanders who acquire the disease through means other than sexual sin. But surely it is a judgment of God on a sinful society. There is in this physical sin something so deep and compelling in a person - and I have seen this through the years, that it holds people in it's grasp in ways that other sins do not seem to do.
I have, for example, in the years of church discipline and grace noted that, at least, 9 out of 10 or more church discipline situations, maybe 99 out of 100, I'm not sure, but somewhere beyond 90 out of 100 of church discipline situations are related to sexual infidelity. And the reason is because that's the sin that people can't seem to stop. If you confront a person about gossip or about lying or about cheating or whatever it might be, about an unfair business practice, they would usually do the best they can to shape up if they have any desire to follow the Lord. But there are people who get engulfed in this sin, and it is so driving and so compelling, that literally they behave as if they were nothing more than mindless fools.
You watch a person after 25 years of marriage and a wonderful family and serving the Lord, Jetusin the family, the Lord, the church, their friends, everything, down the drain for one absolutely uncontrollable and compelling urge for someone they have no right to be with. It blackens their thinking; it twists and perverts any semblance of wisdom, and leaves a tragic imprint on their own person.
There are sins that men do that are from the outside that seem not to be so compelling. This one seems deeply compelling and it seems also to be a sin committed, as he says at the end of verse 18, "Against the body in ways that other sins are not. It brings about terrible bondage, terrible debilitation." Even David cried out about being sick after he had committed adultery with Bathseba, about being weak, about all of his life's juices drying up within him. Cried out about his loneliness, and his sadness, and his brokenness, and his grief. And spent his whole life really never being able to come out from under the fullness of that grief. It destroys deep inside, it shatters relationship, it devastates trust, it is a profound and penetrating sin.
"So, would you joint Christ in a sin like that?" That's the question Paul asks. The third issue takes us from God to Christ to the Holy Spirit. Verse 19, "What, again incredulity marks his words. He can't believe that they wouldn't know that their body is also the maos, the shrine, the sacred dwelling place of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God as a gift, and you're not your own. You have been bought with a price." So he is saying, when you enter into sexual sin you violate the fact that the Lord is the one to whom your body belongs. That the savior is the one with whom you are one and that the Holy Spirit is the one whose temple you are. Literally, then, as David said it so well in Psalms 51, "Against thee, the only have I sinned." And this sin, in particular, and that's the sin of which David spoke, is a sin against God of massive proportions implicating the whole trinity in its sinfulness. "Can you, Paul says, ignore the fact that God has an eternal plan for your body and it belongs to him? Can you ignore the fact that in your sin you are uniting Christ to a prostitute? Can you desecrate the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit?" "You have to see the sin for what it is," that's what Paul is saying. It is not simply a mistake. It is not simply some small indulgence. It is not simply some biological act. It is not merely a biological event. It is a desecration of God himself.
Therefore the conclusion is in verse 20, "Glorify God in your body and your spirit, which are God's, glorify God." "Fornication, Ephesians 5:23 says, "Let it not be once named among you." Hebrews 13:4, "Marriage, let it be honorable, the bed undefiled, but fornicators and adulterers God will judge." What if you've done it, will you be forgiven? Yes. Will you be harmed by it? Yes. Can you be enslaved by it? Yes. Will you be perverted by it? Yes. There are people who go in saying, "It's forgivable." What they don't count is the harm, the enslavement, and the perversion. There's no escape from the consequences. Personally, run from it. Consider your body belonging to the Lord. Unite it to the Savior and containing the Holy Spirit. And with that sacred view of yourself, if you have any love for God and any concern for his holy nature, you'll not violate his word in this area.
Now let's go back to chapter 5. And as we come to the conclusion briefly this morning I want to draw your attention to the thought of what the church is to do about this. This is the corporate aspect. The personal aspect we saw in chapter 6, the corporate aspect comes in chapter 5. What do we do about this as a church when we know about it? This dear lady cheerfully talked to Patricia and I, and she said, "I can't get my pastor to go to my husband. My husband has left me. My husband is living with another woman. I can't get my pastor to go to him. I've asked him, I've asked the associate pastors, no one will go. No one will confront him. What do I do to try to demonstrate to him the consequence of his sin?" There are those who are advocating a softness. Those who think that the Lord just forgives and restores and he'll do it in his own time and we shouldn't get involved and it's none of our affair, etc. What is the church to do? What is the stand of the church? Well, we find that in chapter 5. Paul is very clear about it and you'll see it, I'm sure, quite evidently as we look at the text.
The first thing in guidelines for the church dealing with this sin is recognition of it. Verses 1 and 2 deal with the recognition. Paul writes, "It is generally reported." In other words, it's just the common knowledge. It's just something everybody's aware of. It's well known. "That there is pornaya, sexual sin prior to marriage among you. And such sexual sin, perhaps could also involve an adulterous situation used in a broad sin. As is not even as much named among the pagans." In other words, you have a reputation for sexual sin that goes beyond the unregenerate, namely that one should have implied an ongoing sexual relationship with his father's wife.
The church, if you can get this, is shocking the world. And I'll tell ya the world must be fairly well convinced of the church's lack of integrity and lack of difference if they're looking at the scandals that are going on, and on, and on, and on in today's church. The church is shocking the world. And Paul is even more shocked that the church isn't doing anything about it.
It is commonly being reported (present tense) everybody knows it, that you have a kind of sexual deviation that even the pagans don't practice, namely incest. His father's wife is an indication of a stepmother and by Greek definition, according to the writings of Checksalice, Cicero, and Yuripides, this was considered to be incest, even though it was a stepmother. It was incest just as if it was a birth mother. It may have been that this woman was still married to the father and the word pornaya is used in a broad sense embracing adultery. It may have been that this woman was divorced from the father and the fornication is used in its more exact and technical sense and now the son was having a relationship with his father's former wife. Whatever the marital status, and I don't know that we can be conclusive on that, there are several things about that relationship that I want you to know. Number 1 it was an incestuous relationship by definition of Leviticus 18, Deuteronomy 22, as well as the Greek culture. Secondly, it was an ongoing, continuous, lasting, permanent relationship, as indicated by the verb that one has his father's wife. Has, in the sense of continually. Furthermore, the woman was likely not a Christian. Because there is no word given here relative to any discipline directed at her. The discipline is directed at the man who is a part of the assembly.
So here is a man who claims to be a Christian, he's in the church, he's involved there, he is having an incestuous, ongoing, sexual relationship with his stepmother who is not a believer. If that doesn't shock you then get to verse 2. "And you are arrogant he says." "You are arrogant about it. You haven't mourned that he that has done this deed might be removed from among you. Your continual arrogant pride in the midst of gross sexual vice has caused you to overlook this thing." They were so puffed up about their imagined wisdom and so proud of their respective factions and their pride had blinded them, perhaps, to the cancerous sin that invaded their body. It may also have been that they were even proud of the sin as an expression of what some of them thought was Christian liberty, able to be dealt with by the grace of God, and, therefore, they were tolerant. Whatever their specific thoughts he says, "You're so proud and so puffed up that instead of mourning of the corruption of these evil among you, you have done nothing." An easygoing attitude toward this sin is dangerous - very very dangerous.
Personally, it's been something in my own life that I watch closely in our church fellowship and if ever I see anything that even begins to approach this kind of compromise, if there's a way in which that can be sensed, it must be dealt with with alacrity and severity immediately for the sake of everyone involved. And by God's grace he has preserved us from that kind of scandal. The church cannot tolerate this. Our dear Lord is so explicit in saying that in many ways but, perhaps, as directly as any in the message to the church at Fiatyra, where he condemns fornication and calls for judgment of great severity on those who do that. "They want to be in bed." He says, "I'll put em in bed alright. It'll be a bed of judgment."
He says, "There is something that needs to be done," in verse 2. "This person needs to be removed." You should be mourning over your sin, not tolerating it. Mourning over it and excommunicating the person, putting them out. Putting them out of the church is defined for us in detail in Matthew 18. We've gone over it before. We won't go over it now. Beginning in verse 3 Paul tell them the method. He's kind of given them the scene in the first two verses, discovered it, and now in verses 3-5 the method. He says, "For I truly, though absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already as if I were present concerning the one that did this deed." Paul says, "I've already passed my judgment. I've already had my court and my tribunal, made my verdict. I know what ought to be done, now why don't you do this? When the word came to me I made my judgment. And what you wanna do, verse 4, "In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ when you are gathered together as a church and my spirit is there -" And he's not talking about some mystical presence of his spirit. What he means by my spirit is the echo of my teaching. "The echo of my teaching, the residual knowledge of the things that I gave you from God when you are together as a church and you recall the instruction and the power of our Lord Jesus Christ is there, then deliver that person to Satan for the destruction of the flesh."
What does he mean by that, "Put him out of the church?" What do you mean deliver it to Satan? Satan is the prince of the world, the ruler of this world, this _____________. "Put him out of the church," which is the dominium of the Lord. "Put him out from under the protection of that and turn him over to Satan." Just like 1 Timothy 1:20: Hemineous and Alexander, who were delivered to Satan to learn not to blaspheme." "Put them out. Take them out of the isolated protectiveness of the church. Put them out. Deliver them to Satan. The world which was his dominium will have its effect on them." "What will it do for the destruction of the flesh?" he says. It is apparent that this man was given to Satan to receive some bodily evils, some bodily afflictions, and his flesh was to be debilitated, maybe a physical suffering, maybe venereal disease, maybe some other kind of physical aliment. "Turn him over to the devil who can destroy his flesh." But it says that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. I believe you have a believer here and the promises that his spirit is secure, because he belongs to the Lord and he will receive the Grace of Salvation. Spiritually that is God's promise to him, but physically his sin puts him in a position to suffer greatly.
That is the method of discipline. The church comes together, lead by the elders in the authority and with the intended power of Jesus Christ and by the teaching of the word of God, excommunicates the immoral person so that Satan can afflict him, and in such affliction there will be a remedial effect. Hopefully, drawing him back to holiness. That's the desire.
"So, you see the need?" He says. "You need to act. The church must act in it's own defense in the matters of purity." Why? Verse 6, "Your boasting is not good." And, again, they may have been proud about things when they should have been in abject humility. Whether they were overlooking this evil in their pride or whether they were proud about this evil, as some way in which God's Grace could operate, either one was bad. It's not good. Don't you know that a little leaven - leaven, of course, kept from dough, keep in water, then used to start and permeate and provide yeast effect to a new loaf, speaks of permeating influence.
In the Old Testament when the Children of Israel left Egypt they had to eat unleavened bread, which meant that there would be no leaven put in that bread. That was symbolic of the old life. They were to bring nothing of Egypt into their new life. They were to start brand new. And what are you saying to the Corinthians is the same thing. He says, "Look, Christ - verse 8 "Purge out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, unleaven, no influence from the past, or even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us." So the death of Christ we enter into new life. In that new life we start fresh. We don't bring the permeating influence of our prior immoralities to infiltrate our new life. You can't have that in the church. You can't tolerate that in the church. It can't be there.
And that's why I say when a man in leadership defaults in this area to put him back into leadership is to say, "Well, it is tolerable." That communicates something to people that you really don't want to communicate. "Don't you know," he says, "That a small portion of unbaked dough kept back and preserved in water from the last batch and uses as a starter for the next batch is gonna permeate that? And don't you know that immorality in your church is gonna permeate and a tolerance for that, at one level, becomes a tolerance for it at other levels, the old story of one rotten apple spoiling the barrel? It only took a worm to destroy Jonah's gourd? It only takes a small cancer cell to metastasize and destroy a life. Get a little and the whole church can be absolutely corrupted."
So in verse 7 he says, "Purge it out. Christ wants a new loaf, unleavened. He sacrificed himself to make that a reality. So let us keep the feast," verse 8, "That new feast, as it were - eluding to the Old Passover. Let us keep that New Passover feast, not with old lifestyle - old leaven. Not the way we used to. Not the leaven of evil and wickedness. Don't let that be a part." The word evil seems to be directed at malice and attitude. Wickedness seems to be directed at action. Let us not carry on the attitudes and acts of our former life, but rather let us enjoy the uninfluenced pure breed of sincerity and truth, sincerity and truth.
God says, "I want a one-woman man." And implied also God wants one-men women. He sets up men in the church to be the model of that kind of virtue so that everyone knows what the standard is. And I really believe that we have a tremendous battle on our hands to maintain that in days ahead. If you have sinned in that are, yes, God will forgive you. But there is harm, there is a certain amount of control that that sin may exercise over you because of your past sins. There is a perversion, the effect of which may, to one degree or another, still be with you. But God will forgive and God will put you in a place of usefulness. It may restrict the office, the function you can hold in the church. But we cannot lower the standard. It must be constantly left at the level where God has put it in his word. We're not trying to be unleven; we just want to be consistent to set the standard where God would have it for the sake of his people.
I can only think about my own children and my own grandchildren in the days ahead and your children and grandchildren and hope that a generation from now there are still people holding the standard of purity consistently with the word of God, for their sake and that for the sake of the Lord's honor, as well.
Let's bow together in prayer. I want you to just spend a moment in silent prayer and I want you to ask the Lord to work in your life in this area of purity and thought and deed that you might be faithful to this, his command. And that you might do so, not just in the negative sense of restricting yourself, but in the joyous privilege of being obedient. Just covenant in your heart and ask that the spirit of God will enable you to live a pure life.
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Adding 'fudge' to your passwords
Many end users easily have half a dozen passwords to access the various Web apps they need to do their jobs. With this tip, you can enforce strong password policies -- and allow your users to write down their passwords.
The challenge of enforcing a secure password policy is that the passwords can be difficult to remember. Most users will write them down. But that's not the problem — the problem is where the passwords are stored. Too many people store passwords in an unencrypted file or in unprotected places. If you are not going to require users to use an encrypted password safe, you should at least instruct them on how to mix some "fudge" into their passwords to provide an extra layer of security.
Fudge characters are characters that the user randomly inserts into every password that he/she writes down, so if anyone discovers the password list, they still won't have the real passwords.
Let's look at some examples. Assume you are using the following REAL passwords:
(you do use strong passwords, don't you?)
Also assume that your fudge characters are 8 and *. When you write down these passwords, you insert your fudge characters and write them like this:
When you log in to an application or a Web site, mentally drop the fudge characters as you type the password. You'll get used to it after you do it a few times.
Tell users to vary the locations of fudge characters in their passwords, and to mix and match the fudges so that they appear random. Don't always put them at the beginning or the end of passwords, and don't fall into any patterns. If a user always puts an asterisk at the beginning of each password and an intruder cannot get any of the passwords to work, he might try dropping the asterisk – and be successful.
How do you pick which 'fudges' to use?
To pick fudge characters, tell users to choose letters, numbers and symbols that they rarely use in passwords anyway, simply because they don't like typing them. When those characters appear in the written passwords, they tend to stand out, which makes it easier to remember why those characters are there.
You should require at least two fudges, but I'd recommend three – one fudge in each of the character types (letters, numbers and special characters). Three fudge characters give users more to mix and match. More than three tends to foster confusion.
Users that already have a large number of passwords written down might find that some of their newly-picked fudge characters already appear as part of a real password. They can either change those passwords or just enclose those written passwords in parentheses (5S,c,r,*ty) to remind them that fudges don't apply to these passwords — type them exactly as written.
I am not suggesting that fudge characters will give your users the freedom to post passwords in plain sight. Nor am I suggesting that fudge characters are cousins to cryptography -- they're not even related. I'm just suggesting that your users add a little noise to their written passwords so that if they're found, they don't fall freely at the finder's feet.
About the author
T. Martin Brown is a security officer for a Fortune 500 company and a contributing writer of The Certified Security Professional Online Magazine, a free resource dedicated to an open exchange on security and certifications. Contact Martin at www.certifiedsecuritypro.com or at tmart500(at)hotmail.com.
For other dos and dont's regarding passwords, see Writing Down Passwords Right.


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BEIJING (Reuters) - Faster isn't necessarily better for China's telecom carriers as they prepare to roll out high-speed 4G mobile phone networks at the expense of their profitability for years to come.
China Mobile Ltd, which has the most subscribers in the world, is investing billions of dollars to upgrade its infrastructure so clients can enjoy speedier Internet and data access once the government awards 4G telecom licenses before the end of the year.
Its rivals China Unicom Hong Kong Ltd and China Telecom Corp Ltd are being forced to follow suit, especially as China Mobile is in talks with Apple Inc to carry its latest smartphones, which require 4G to function at their best.
While the pressure is strong to keep up with international standards, China's mobile carriers will, like their peers in other emerging markets, struggle to recoup their investments.
"In a best case scenario, it would be no less than four to five years to turn profitable," said Juan Jose Rio of Delta Partners, a global telecoms, media and technology advisory and investment firm based in Dubai.
Chinese mobile subscribers are notoriously frugal, which means any 4G package must be attractive enough to lure users away from the slower data plans they currently use, a factor likely to eat into profit margins.
The upgraded networks also enable subscribers to better utilize technology that makes classic revenue-generators like SMSes and calls obsolete, further eroding revenues.
"Chinese carriers may price contracts at a level that's profitable straight away but it probably won't go down very well with Chinese consumers because of the higher price point for plan," said Teck-Zhung Wong, a Singapore-based analyst at information technology consultancy IDC.
The network upgrades in the world's biggest mobile phone market are a boon for equipment vendors like Shenzhen-based Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and ZTE Corp, which already each won over 25 percent of China Mobile's $3.2 billion 4G tender.
Huawei expects revenues of $2 billion from 4G investments in 2013, and a 10 percent year-on-year increase in its 4G revenue over the next two years. ZTE also sees growing income as carriers continue to invest in 4G at least until 2015.
"A nationwide 4G network is a huge undertaking - the cost of building system equipment alone is conservatively estimated at more than 100 billion yuan ($16.4 billion)," said Gu Xiang, ZTE's deputy general manager for wireless products.
Faster mobile Internet allows subscribers to use apps like the hugely popular WeChat from Tencent Holdings Ltd for messaging as well as voice and video calls. China Mobile has blamed such apps for diminishing revenues, leading to a lower-than-expected third-quarter net profit.
While all three networks must make substantial investments, the road to 4G is likely to be easiest, and cheapest, for China Unicom which only needs a simple update to its current 3G network to achieve the globally popular FDD-LTE standard.
China Telecom is the worst off.
The smallest of China's carriers has the most 3G subscribers, and its third quarter net profits are up 20 percent on the same period last year in what is its third straight quarter of double-digit growth.
It neither has the cash of China Mobile, nor the easily upgradable network of China Unicom, and now faces the choice of sticking with 3G and hoping it will keep its subscribers, or shelling out for the more expensive jump to 4G.
"There is always an inherent conflict between spending more or optimizing the assets you have already used on the ground," said Delta Partner's Rio.
"They could still utilize their network for five years without having to introduce any new technology, however this new technology is available and there is pressure from the market and consumers for them to invest in this technology."
($1 = 6.0840 Chinese yuan)
Additional reporting by Yimou Lee in Hong Kong and Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Miral Fahmy


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The shift in North Carolina political control from Democrat to Republican in the 2012 election prompted a change Tuesday in the makeup of every county board of elections in the state.
The shift in North Carolina political control from Democratic to Republican in the 2012 election prompted a change Tuesday in the makeup of every county board of elections in the state.
The three-member boards in Craven, Pamlico and Jones counties were no exception, all getting a new GOP member to replace one of the two Democrats. Most were sworn in at noon sharp and all will elect a chairman.
In Craven County, reappointed Republican member Gary Clemmons was elected as temporary chairman of Craven County Board of Elections, which bid farewell to chairman and Democrat Ray Wood.
Wood, who has served since 2006, stepped down with kind words for and from Clemmons and accepted a distinguished service award.
Clemmons said, �I did not know Ray personally when I came on the board but we have been through mid term and presidential elections and I now know Ray is an exceptional person of high integrity. He never buckled under stress ... and was always accommodating� as he served the citizens of Craven County through seven years of elections.
Republican board member Julia Capshaw was sworn in along with Clemmons by Chief Superior Court Judge Ben Alford.
Capshaw is a Beaufort County native who has served on the Craven County Republican Party Executive Committee for four years and in several positions in the Republican Women organization.
Married to retired Marine and Lockheed Martin employee Robert Capshaw, she was a 30-year employee of the Department of Defense. The couple lived around the world, then in Maryland for 27 years before retiring back to Eastern North Carolina and Craven County.
Democratic board member Zeda Trice was reappointed but was away Tuesday on a long scheduled trip, Clemmons said. She will be sworn in and participate in formal elections when the board meets again July 24.
In Pamlico County, the new chairman is Jennifer Roe of Oriental, who was already an elections board member after being appointed to fill the unexpired term of Judy Smith in April 2012.
She, new Republican member Gene Lupton of Lowland and returning Democratic board member Delcine Gibbs of Oriental were sworn in by District Court Judge Walter Mills, Lupton has worked as a precinct official in the past and was elected secretary.
Jones County Board of Elections swore in two of its members at 5 p.m. Tuesday including new Republican member Lynn Driver of Pollocksville and returning Democrat on the board and current Chairman Will Brock of Trenton. Returning Republican member Mike Jenkins of Trenton will be sworn in when the board meets again at 5 p.m. July 23, when the board plans to elect officers.
Sue Book can be reached at 252-635-5665 or firstname.lastname@example.com. Follow her on Twitter@SueJBook.


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Jenna Starr necesitaba un nuevo diseño de impreso o envases y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 39 diseños de 12 diseñadores freelance.
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Up until now we have used the same type of adverts in consumer press as we have trade press, so we want to test a new advertising concept to recruit customer's from publications, such as Homebuilding & Renovating, Grand Designs, Selfbuild & Design, Built It etc
I have provided some imagery, you don't have to use it - please be as creative as you. Again, with the main message mentioned - its your interpretation, you don't have to use my copy.
See http://www.ironmongerydirect.com for more info.
These are hybrid magazines and they attract tradesmen and selfbuilders alike. Serious DIY'ers, property developers, property owners, interior designers working on refurbishment and new build projects.
Adverts in this type of publication are aspiration with a lifestyle approach, demonstrating high quality products often using insitu imagery or a stylish montage - see hoppe example image.
What do we want to say to them:
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Secondary message:
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What is the Call to action?
Request your FREE catalogue today (catalogue image in folder).
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Other information
>Double winners 'Outstanding Customer Service' and 'Niche Trade Supplier' by ECMOD (European Catalogue & Mail Order Days).
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