text:
Copyright © 2002-2012 The Open Group
Issue 1.1, August 2012
1. Introduction
1.1 Referenced Documents
1.2 Summary of Program
1.3 Summary of Web
1.1 Referenced Documents
1.2 Summary of Program
1.3 Summary of Web
2.1 Understanding the Program
2.2 Confidentiality
2.3 Preparing for Accreditation
2.4 Accreditation
2.5 The ACP Trademark License Agreement
2.6 The Accreditation Agreement
2.7 Submission of Supporting Evidence
2.8 Formal Assessment
2.9 Accreditation of your Organization
2.10 ACP Operations
2.1 Understanding the Program
2.2 Confidentiality
2.3 Preparing for Accreditation
2.4 Accreditation
2.5 The ACP Trademark License Agreement
2.6 The Accreditation Agreement
2.7 Submission of Supporting Evidence
2.8 Formal Assessment
2.9 Accreditation of your Organization
2.10 ACP Operations
3.1 Accessing the Web Certification
3.2 Submitting Initial Accreditation
3.3 Applying to become an Accredited
Certification Program
3.4 Completing Registration
3.5 Checking your Registration Status
3.6 Completion of Accreditation
3.7 The Appeals Process
3.1 Accessing the Web Certification
3.2 Submitting Initial Accreditation
3.3 Applying to become an Accredited
Certification Program
3.4 Completing Registration
3.5 Checking your Registration Status
3.6 Completion of Accreditation
3.7 The Appeals Process
4.1 The Renewals Process
4.2 Updates
4.1 The Renewals Process
4.2 Updates
5. Batch Uploading Certification Records
6. Checklist
The intended audience for this document is the
Certification Program Manager for an organization
seeking to have a Candidate Certification Program (CCP)
within The Open Group Certified Architect (Open CA) Program (referred
to in the rest of this document as the Program or the
Open CA Program).
This document is not intended for individuals seeking to
become certified within the Open CA
Program. Such individuals should consult the Guide to Certification
within the Open CA Program.
This document covers the following topics:
Certification and accreditation within the Program
use an online web system (see Section
1.3). This document provides a roadmap for the steps required for
and subsequently how to certify IT Architects certified through the
accredited program.
The Open CA Program is designed
to validate the existence of those qualities and skills in a
professional that enable the effective practice of architecture. The
program is skills and experience-based and goes beyond
validating the mastery of any specific knowledge base.
The Program includes a framework for accreditation of third
parties to establish IT Architect certification programs affiliated to
The Open Group. The framework of accreditation and certification is
specifically intended to standardize the process and criteria for IT
Architect professional certification and establish a foundation for the
required skills and experience necessary to achieve such a distinction.
The Program was designed to be flexible and extensible so that
the framework may be adopted by any industry, country, or
The Open Group supports two different routes to IT Architect
The Conformance Requirements for certification apply
equally to the direct and indirect routes to certification.
The Program is based upon four key documents:
All of these documents are applicable to the
audience of this document. At the end of this document is a Checklist to help you make sure that your
registration is complete.
You should also read the applicable Certification Guides to
The Open Group Certified Architect (Open CA) Program.
These are available from
Note: In the event of any conflicts, this informative guide defers
to the normative Program documentation.
The documents currently referenced for certification within the
Program are:
Open CA Program Documentation, July 2011, Open CA Certification
Version 1.5.1 (X071), published by The Open
Open CA Program Documentation, July 2011, Open CA Certification
Conformance Requirements (Multi-Level), Version 1.0.1 (X110), published
by The Open
THE OPEN GROUP® PROFESSIONAL CERTIFICATION PROGRAM: ACCREDITATION POLICY, VERSION 1.0 (X1818), published by The Open
THE OPEN GROUP® PROFESSIONAL CERTIFICATION PROGRAM: ACCREDITATION REQUIREMENTS, VERSION 1.0 (X1819), published by The Open
You should be familiar with the above documents prior to commencing
certification. See Section 1.3 for information on obtaining a copy
of the documents.
This section includes a list of all the Program documents and their
To become familiar with this Program, you should read the following
The Certification Policy
This document is the foundation of the Program, providing information
on the
policies and processes by which an IT Architect can become
certified, what it means to be certified, and how to remain certified.
Of particular interest to Accredited Certification
Programs is the definition of Indirect Certification.
See Section 2.1.2 for further information.
The Conformance
The Conformance Requirements should then be read to understand the
detailed requirements against which an IT Architect
can be certified. See Section 2.1.2 for further
The Certification Agreement
(This document does not apply to ACPs)
The Certification Agreement defines the certification service and the
commitment to the conditions of the service for individuals applying
IT Architect Certification through the Direct route.
The Guide to
Certification within the Program
(This document does not apply to ACPs)
This document is a high level guide for individuals who want to
register for direct certification within the Program.
It provides detailed information on the steps required
to take to achieve certification.
Certification Package
This document is provided by an IT Architect to support registration
within the Program.
It is a detailed description of the skill levels attained and
undergone, and provides the Certification Authority or Accredited
Certification Program with sufficient information to determine whether
IT Architect meets the Conformance Requirements. It is created by
filling the
Certification Package template provided by the Certification Authority.
IT Architect Trademark
License Agreement
To complete certification of an IT Architect, each individual must
enter the web system in order to accept the IT Architect Trademark
License Agreement. This sets out the
usage terms and conditions for the IT Architect Certification mark.
See Section 2.5 for further information.
The Accreditation Policy
This document provides information on the
policies and processes by which an organization can achieve
through which its own IT Architect certification Program becomes
recognized within this Program, and able to submit IT Architects for
certification through the Indirect route. This document defines what
it means to be accredited, and how to
remain accredited.
The Accreditation
If your organization is considering becoming accredited you should
read the Accreditation Requirements, in which the criteria that
must be met to become an Accredited Certification Program are
The Guide to
Accreditation within the Open CA Program
This document is a high level guide for organizations who want to
register an IT Architect Certification program for accreditation within
the Open CAProgram.
It provides detailed information on the steps required
to achieve accreditation.
The ACP Trademark License Agreement
If your organization is considering becoming accredited you will
need to sign the Accredited Certification Program Trademark License
This Agreement must be fully signed in
order for your organization to become accredited.
The Accreditation Agreement
The Accreditation Agreement defines the accreditation service and the
commitment to the conditions of the service for organizations
undergoing accreditation. It must be fully signed in order
to enter the accreditation process.
See Section 2.6 for further information.
A summary of the external web references is given below:
This section of the guide details the steps you are required to take
to achieve accreditation.
It provides information on how to perform each
of these steps.
The process involves:
To become familiar with the Program, you should read the following
The Certification Policy
The Conformance Requirements
The Accreditation Policy
The Accreditation Requirements
It is best to start with the Certification Policy, which is
the foundation of the Program. It provides information on the
policies and processes by which an IT Architect can become certified,
what it means to be certified, and how to remain certified.
These policies apply equally regardless of the path to certification,
and thus apply to IT architects certified in an accredited
certification program.
The Conformance Requirements should then be read to
understand the detailed conformance requirements against which an IT
Architect can be certified. These contain a definition of the mandatory
and optional criteria an
IT Architect must meet in order to be certified.
There is currently one set of Conformance Requirements against which
IT Architects can be certified.
The Accreditation Policy is the key policy for organizations
seeking accreditation. It provides information on the
policies and processes by which an organization can become accredited,
what it means to be accredited, and how to remain accredited.
The Accreditation Requirements define a set of
requirements that an organization must meet in order to gain
accreditation. This includes a definition of roles and responsibilities
and the detailed technical requirements.
You should review these documents and
check that you understand the requirements.
Your details when
undergoing accreditaion are confidential between you and the
Certification Authority.
This is effective once you sign the Accreditation Agreement,
which is a prerequisite to commencing the formal registration process
for certification.
Upon successful completion of the accreditation process, the
Accredited Certification Program will be included in the publicly
Accreditation Register at http://www.opengroup.org/openca/cert/acpregister.html,
unless an explicit request is made during the registration process to
hold the accreditation confidential
See Section 11.3 Optional Confidential Treatment of Accreditation
of the Accreditation Policy for information regarding keeping
the fact that accreditation was achieved confidential for a period.
You should read the applicable requirements in order
to identify those
you will need to meet.
If you have problems with meeting a requirement for accreditation,
please check the Frequently Asked Questions
file at http://www.opengroup.org/openca/cert/docs/.
If you still have a problem but are certain that you meet the
requirements, please check the Problem Report information database held
at http://www.opengroup.org/openca/cert/PR.
The online Problem Report database contains
known information on existing problems and interpretations for the
Program. The issue may already be resolved by an existing
Interpretation, by an existing Evaluation Process Deficiency
or by an agreed Certification System Deficiency. If it is
not, please raise a new Problem Report, see http://www.opengroup.org/openca/cert/PR.
For general questions related to accreditation, but not related to
the conformance requirements, you can email
email@example.com fully
describing the problem. Please note that the Certification Authority
helpdesk only handles general questions and is not able to
address interpretations of the Program Conformance Requirements.
Accreditation is a formal process.
By accepting the Accreditation Agreeement terms, you (as the
Certification Program Manager
for your organization) warrant and represent that your organization
meets all the conformance requirements for accreditation within the IT
Architect certification, and will operate your accredited program in
with the requirements.
The obligations, terms and conditions of accreditation are fully set
out in the following documents:
the Accreditation Policy
the Accreditation Agreement
the Accreditation Requirements
In addition you will need to understand the following
Certification documents since they will apply to the
IT Architects that you certify:
the Certification Policy
the Certification Requirements
These documents are available at http://www.opengroup.org/openca/cert/.
It is necessary to read these documents before you start the
accreditation process in order to fully understand the policies and
The ACP Trademark License Agreement is between your organization
and The Open Group and requires signature. The Trademark License
Agreement states the terms and conditions for
use of the Program Logo and Program name in relation to your
Accredited Certification Program.
It is recommended that you commence the process to
complete the ACP Trademark License Agreement as soon as possible to
save delays later in the accreditation process. A trademark license
must be completed before the accreditation process is completed,
and before your organization can be entered onto the Accreditation
You are required to complete and sign the Accreditation Agreement
you commence your registration.
The Accreditation Agreement is between your organization and
the Certification Authority. It defines the accreditation service and
legal commitment to the conditions of the service. This is also
where you warrant conformance to the Conformance Requirements.
The assessment process will not commence until the Certification
Authority receives the completed document.
To support your registration for certification you need to prepare
and submit supporting evidence. This includes
completion of a Conformance Statement, and submitting a set of
and a checklist.
You must produce a Conformance Statement to describe
your Candidate Certification Program and the way in
which it meets the Accreditation Requirements.
The Conformance Statement is completed within the web system.
A html sample is provided on the web site to enable you to see the
of the questionnaire that you will have to complete within the
You need to answer a series of questions that provide information about
your program.
This includes declaring the location for the on-site assessment,
and the name of the Certification Program Manager who is responsible
for liaison with the assessment team. It also includes naming the
of the program's Certification Board , whether the program has any
existing third party accreditation, and a description of any extended
attributes of the program, if any.
You should submit a full set of documentation that illustrate that
Candidate Certification Program meets the requirements
for accreditation. To do this you can upload documents
through the Supporting Documents link.
Since the exact form and number
of documents produced may vary between applications,
you are required to complete a documentation checklist. The Checklist
is completed within the web system.
A html sample is provided on the web site to enable you to see the
of the checklist that you will have to complete within the
For each document submitted, enter the name of the document in the
Document Title column. The Document Reference is a short, unique
identifier you assign to the document to enable shorthand references to
the document. This document reference will be used in the assessment
checklist when referencing a document. You may enter any relevant
comment concerning the document in the Comment column; its use is
Once a complete and well-formed submission for accreditation has been
by the Certification Authority a formal assessment is scheduled. The
Authority's designated assessor will contact you to begin the
telephone and on-site stages of the assessment. The schedule for the
telephone and on-site stages of the assessment shall be agreed between
and the assessor.
The assessment comprises
an inspection of your organization's processes, procedures, and
staff to determine the degree to which the Candidate Certification
Program is operating in accordance
with the Accreditation Requirements.
Once the Certification Authority is satisfied that your
has met all the applicable Accreditation requirements, they will issue
you written notice of achieving Accreditation.
Once your organizaton has achieved accreditation, your
account within the web system has additional features enabled to
support the operations of an ACP. These include:
The Certification Authority provides a web system through which an organization can apply for accreditation.
This is a workflow system that will guide you through the necessary steps for completing the process. The entry point to the system
is at https://www.opengroup.org/openca/cert/ (this is a secure server).
Prior to commencing a registration your organization should
submit a number of agreements in hardcopy to The Open Group:
Please mail two copies of each agreement to
Steve Nunn, The Open Group, Apex Plaza, Forbury Road,
Reading, Berkshire, UK, RG1 1AX. The Open Group will countersign
and return a copy to you. To expedite the signature process, in
addition you can fax the signature pages of the agreement to
+1 240 250 6102
To log into the web system you need a valid username and password on the Certification Authority's web server.
If you don't yet have an account, you may obtain one from the web system by selecting "New User" to create your
username and password. It takes approximately thirty minutes for a new account to become activated.
Once you have your username, from the secure web site, select "Login".
In order to apply to become an accredited certification program you
need to register information about your organization and its contacts
(including the Certification Program Manager), and give payment
Please take the following steps to register your organization and its contacts:
When the above steps are complete and the payment terms
have been confirmed, the Certification Authority will respond
to your designated Authorized Signatory with
notification that your registration has been accepted. Your Certification Program Manager and Alternate contacts will receive confirmation by
electronic mail from the web system that your company account has been activated.
At this point, your Certification Program Manager and Alternate contacts will be able to progress to the next stage which is accessing the web certification system to complete the registration for accreditation.
The next set of screens will then prompt for you to upload the Accreditation
Package documentation, which consists of a Conformance Statement, a
Checklist and Supporting Documentation. Template documents are supplied
on the web site that can be referenced to see the format of the
documents to be completed within the web system.
You should then login to the certification system and select the Home logo.
select "follow this link" under the Accredited Certification Program Route,
or if you have previously created a registration select the "Home Page" link and then "Start a New Registration".
You are then presented with
a form.
If you wish to send any notes to the Certification Authority about this registration you may do so on this form. Such notes are held confidential between you and the Certification Authority. You may also enter a URL for your ACP which would be presented on the Accreditation Register.
After you select the "Submit for Registration" button, you are then returned
to your home page where the ACP Registration status is displayed, which
includes status information on whether the document uploads have
occurred. You
should then select the Next link below the Registration ID field.
A form is then displayed for the User Submissions.
You need to complete and submit a Conformance Statement and
a Checklist. These are completed using an online document system, that
allows you to produce the document. If you are unable
to complete the documents in a single session,
you are able to save any edits in the document within the system, and resume editing at a later date.
Once you are satisfied you can select the Submit button
to submit the document to the web certification system.
You may also optionally select to upload one or more supporting
documents. These are recommended to be in html or pdf. You should
provide a document reference with each upload. This reference should
be referred to in the Checklist. You should select the button
to declare that your document uploads are complete.
If there are no supporting documents you should also declare the fact,
in the same way.
Once the above steps are complete the onus is then passed back
to the Certification Authority as noted in the next section.
The process to become an Accredited Certification Program takes place outside of the web system. Designated
contacts can log in at any time to the system to check on status. Once payment details are confirmed, the status will become
An initial review will occur to ensure the submission is complete and correct. If any errors or inconsistencies are found you
will be notified and have to correct them prior to the audit. A telephone assessment will be scheduled, and following that a face
to face assessment.
If for any reason the submission was not complete, you will be notified within 10 business days so that any corrections
can be made and resubmitted. Such a resubmission needs to be done within one month unless an extension has been granted by
the Certification Authority. The initial fee covers one set of corrective actions.
You will be informed of the outcome of the Audit by electronic mail. If successful, the details of your accreditation will then
be put on the Accreditation Register, which is a public document, unless you have requested that it remains confidential. To keep
the accreditation confidential, this option must be selected in the web system at the time your registration is submitted.
Once you have become accredited your web account will have some some additional features activated:
You should note that accreditation is valid for a defined period as stated in Section 8, Renewal of the Accreditation
Policy. At the end of that period if you wish to remain accredited you need to renew.
You may appeal decisions made by The Open Group Certification Authority as stated in Section 10, Appeals Process of the
Accreditation Policy. Any request for appeal should be sent by electronic mail to firstname.lastname@example.com . Receipt of such
a request will be acknowledged within 6 working days by the Certification Authority and the appeals process invoked.
An organization with an Accredited Certification Program (ACP) is
required to renew the accreditation every two years.
When a renewal is due the Certification Authority will notify you
around ninety days in advance (so it
is important to maintain your contact information). The Certification
Authority will notify you of the renewal requirements which
will include an updated Conformance Statement, and may include
additional documentation.
You must respond within 30 days of the notice indicating whether you
wish to renew. If you choose to renew, you must submit the renewal
information requested at least 45 days prior to the renewal due date.
You may renew your accreditation in
the web based system once you have received the reminder. At any time,
you may use the web based system to obtain your renewal date.
You can enter the web system to update key information about
your organization as defined in the Accreditation Policy.
This includes some contact information.
The certification system restricts changes to certain information, such
as change of organization name. If it does not allow you to make a
change, please contact the Certification Authority.
Please refer to the instructions within the web system once you have
become accredited.
The following checklist is provided to assist with completion of
your registration:
Revision History:


text: Share: Comments Print April 1, 2013 at 10:19 AM Stennis on way home from Afghan war to Bremerton Posted by Nick Provenza BREMERTON (AP) — The Navy says the USS Stennis stopped in Singapore Monday for a port visit on its way home to Bremerton. The aircraft carrier has been operating in and around the Arabian Gulf the past five months, mostly providing air support to allied troops on the ground in Afghanistan. Planes flew about 1,200 sorties from the Stennis with more than 7,400 flight hours. The Stennis has been replaced by the USS Eisenhower. The Stennis departed Bremerton in Aug. 27 on a quick turnaround after arriving in March 2012 from a seven-month deployment to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Kitsap Sun reports the Stennis will likely stop in Hawaii then head to San Diego to drop off its air wing. It's expected at Naval Base Kitsap-Bremerton in early May. Comments | More in Government, Military | Topics: Bremerton, USS Stennis

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Some club players chop at the ball when they attempt a sliced backhand approach shot and, as a result, knock it into the net.
For a smoother, more fluid stroke, imagine that you're moving your racquet head steadily down a playground slide as you swing to meet the ball. Start your racquet head above the level of the planned point of impact and let it slide down, hit the ball and finish below that point, out in the direction of your target.
This high-to-low forward stroking motion, combined with a good weight transfer to your front foot, will combine to produce a shot with underspin. Your opponent will be forced to hit a rising shot, which you can pounce on to end the point.
Click here to report inappropriate material on this site.
USPTA allows its members to publish their own material on their websites. The Association cannot guarantee the accuracy of the statements made on the websites, as they are the responsibility of the individual members. If you find material that you deem offensive, inaccurate or in violation of civil or criminal law on any member's website, please notify the Association immediately so that it can take the appropriate steps.
Click here to report inappropriate material on this site.


text:
Eastern Wake: Sports
Southeast Raleigh boys, girls cruise to victory in Greater Neuse River 4A track meet
The youngsters who run, jump and throw for Southeast Raleigh apparently aren't getting tired of winning.
On Saturday at Campbell's Irwin Belk track, the Bulldogs blew away the competition on both the boys' and girls' sides in the Greater Neuse River 4A track meet.
Kentucky-bound Jacklyn Howell won the 100 and both the 100 and 300 hurdles and ran the anchor leg of the 4x100 relay, earning girls' most valuable athlete honors as the defending state champion Bulldogs rolled up 227.5 points to 116 for second-place West Johnston.
In the boys' events, Jamaree Murray doubled with wins in the 200 and 400 as the Bulldogs scored 188 with defending state champion Knightdale at 131 and Garner 130.
Garner's Nyheim Hines won both the 100-meter dash and the 300 hurdles to earn boys' most valuable athlete honors.
West Johnston's Tori Strickland won the girls' long jump at 17-2 3/4 and the triple jump at 35-8 1/2, while the Wildcats' Kyle Christ also recorded an individual double with wins in the boys' 1600 and 3200.
It was Southeast's third straight double victory in a GNRC track meet, including both outdoor and indoor competitions in 2013. The league did not hold an indoor meet this season.
"We have great coaches," said Bulldog coach Liz Gray, a former All-American middle-distance runner at St. Augustine's who is in her 10th year at the school. "My middle-distance coach Robert T. Williams, my throws coach Daniel Adams, my hurdle coach Steve McGill, my jumps coach Chrishawn Williams and my sprints coach Jason Smoots. We're fortunate to have that many coaches, and we all help each other out.
"Jackie has been with us for four years, and she's definitely going to be missed by everybody. And so will Jamaree. He's special because he's always helping the other kids and is a great teammate."
Gray allowed Adams to claim the girls' coach of the year award and R.T. Williams the boys' award.
The senior Howell ran a 14.38 in the 100 hurdles and a 12.06 in the dash before recording a 43.23 in the 300 hurdles. She was on the anchor leg of the relay following seniors Brittney Anderson and Kayla Chavis and sophomore Asia Macon.
"My 100 hurdles was rusty, but I did what I needed to do," Howell said. "I wasn't supposed to run the 100, but it was a good experience and I got a personal best and was really proud of myself. We had a great 4x100 as a team, and then I had my best this season in the 300 hurdles."
Hasana Clark led Southeast's sweep of the top three places in the girls' shot with a put of 39-7, while Tameia Morrison's throw of 106-8 paced the Bulldogs' 1-2-3 sweep in the discus.
The Bulldogs' Saidah Hardwick won the high jump at 5-1, while Jasmin Allen took the 400 in 56.7 and the team also won the 4x200 and 4x800 relays.
Clayton's Bessie Thompson won the girls' pole vault at 6 feet, while the Comets' Carmen Tormey took the 1600 in 5:43.71 and Kaylin Amaya the 3200 in 13:23.5.
In other girls' results, Knightdale's Aleena Cruz won the 800 in 2:27.93, while West's Teri Strickland won the 200 in 25.36 and Garner the 4x400 relay in 4:16.9.
The junior Hines, one of the state's top running backs who said he currently has 19 offers, ran a 10.67 in the 100 and a 39.12 in his hurdle event.
"The 100 was not bad," Hines said. "I just trained for it. I know how to hurdle, so it wasn't too bad a double. I like the 100 better because I don't get tired. But I'll run whatever the coaches ask me to run."
Murray won the 200 in 21.60 to Hines' second-place 21.81 and the 400 in 46.83.
"I got a personal best in the 400," Murray said. "I could have done better in the 200, but a win is a win. I just want to keep getting personal bests and see how far I can go."
Christ ran a 4:31.74 to win the 1600, and then blew away the field with a 9:57.36 run in the 3200.
"My strategy was to keep the pace relatively fast, see who was there and try to kick to the end," the junior Christ said. "I had a relatively good idea of my pace in the 3200. This was a good day."
In other boys' results, Southeast's Ryan Adams pole-vaulted 10 feet to lead a 1-2-3 sweep, teammate Lamar Brewer won the 110 hurdles in 14.99 and the Bulldogs won the 4x100, 4x200 and 4x800 relays.
Knightdale's Kimani Hoffman won the long jump at 22-4, while the Knights' Jaime Brown won the high jump at 6-2, Corey Aikens took the 800 in 2:00.23 and the 4x400 relay won in 3:22.29.
West's Alex Porter won the shot at 49-7, East Wake's Damontay Rhem the discus at 153-3 and Garner's Michael Jenkins the triple jump at 45-1.
Clayton finished third in the girls' team scoring at 95, followed by Garner at 93, Knightdale 65, Harnett Central 35, East Wake 29 and Rolesville – a first-year school that has only freshmen and sophomores – 13.5.
West was third in the boys' standings, followed by East at 52, Central at 48.5, Clayton at 33.5 and Rolesville 18.


text:
migya wrote:Bold trade scenarios - As in being able to trade Baron or JRich OR MONTA as well, as he too is tradeable and noone should think he isn't! He is a combo guard and so Mullin has some leverage with trading either Baron or JRich if he wants
Yeah, I know what you mean... but Monta shouldn't be traded unless it's for a really big star (which means... it won't happen).
In fact, I'm quite happy with the way he's been playing with Baron out of the lineup. If he adapts well at the PG spot, maybe trading Baron in the future could be a possibility.


text:
4 x Rs232
1 x PS/2
1 x LAN
1 x Drawer
2 x RS485
The PCI PTS approved SP30 leads the market for secure PIN pads by adding payment terminal functionality to a PIN pad. The SP30 offers options for adding a contactless card reader, magnetic card reader, and/or IC card reader. In addition, the SP30 is equipped with a large 128x64 pixel LCD with four lines of display and three additional function keys located under the display to enable fast and user friendly payment options. Best of all, the SP30 is a sleek and compact device that easily fits in the palm of your hand. When connected to an ECR or POS terminal, the SP30 is the perfect device to streamline your electronic payment system.


text:
Chapel Hill: Sports
Auto racing returns Saturday at Rougemont
ROUGEMONT The weather looks good for Saturday's Orange Blossom Special – the kickoff of the 2014 season at Orange County Speedway, track director Terry Deal says.
The ninth annual Orange Blossom is a special start to the OCS schedule, featuring Pro All Stars Series racers in a 150-lap event for Super Late Models.
In addition to what already is a strong lineup, this year's race also is expected serve as the debut of a young driver with a distinguished pedigree at the OCS: Harrison Burton.
Burton's father, Jeff, was regular at the Orange County Speedway before going on to collect 21 Cup Series wins.
"Harrison is excited to be running at Orange County, for sure," Jeff Burton told Race22.com.
Practices at the Rougemont track start at 1 p.m. Saturday, and an autograph session is planned for 5:30 p.m. Racing starts at 6 p.m., beginning with Late Models and Legends.
Entry costs $10 per person or $25 per car-load for up to six people. (Kids 11 and under get in free.)
Racing will continue April 12 with the Sherry Love Johnson Memorial 100 for Late Models. That night's agenda also includes events for Limiteds, Pure Stock, Street Stock and Super Mini Trucks.
Several special touring series are also scheduled to make appearances at OCS in 2014.
The Rolling Thunder Modifieds will make four appearances in 2014.
The XR-1 Pro-Cup Series racers unofficially are expected to appear sometime in July.
The PASS South Series returns to the OCS on Oct. 18.


text:
Neymar Jr. Signed by PokerStars
Brazilian football star Neymar Jr. is now part of Team PokerStars. At the European Poker Tour Grand Final in Monte Carlo it was President Edgar Stuchly who announced this exciting news. Together with PokerNews.com's Editor in Chief Donnie Peters we talked about the gravity of this news.
- Share & Like:


text:
Pablo Francisco is trying to get the details right. And he's coming to Hampton Roads to do it.
Francisco is shaping the material that will comprise his upcoming comedy special, "Here We Go Again." He's got a lot of good stuff, plus a few new tricks to make it truly distinctive from his earlier specials such as 2011's "They Put it Out There" and his popular 2006 DVD "Ouch!"
He will be doing five shows at The Funny Bone in Virginia Beach this weekend – a venue he says he chose specifically for this task.
"We're working on this new one-hour comedy special, and Virginia Beach is the perfect place to work out the material," Francisco...


text:
Annual Reports Annual Reports 2011
Company Profile
A summary of key financial figures and strategic information.
- Company Profile (PDF | 17.5 MB)
- Facts & Figures (PDF 1.2 MB)
Annual Report – Credit Suisse Group AG
Consolidated financial statements, Information on the company, Operating and financial review, Treasury and risk management, Corporate governance and Compensation.
- Annual Report (PDF | 5.7 MB)
- Annual Report - Compensation (PDF)
Annual Report – Credit Suisse AG (Bank)
Credit Suisse Group AG owns 100% of Credit Suisse AG (Bank), the principal operating subsidiary. The Bank's annual report is combined with the annual report of the Group and includes the consolidated and parent company financial statements of the Bank.
- Annual Report (PDF | 7.1 MB)
- Consolidated financial statements - Credit Suisse (PDF)
- Parent company financial statements - Credit Suisse (PDF)
Our report shows how we assume our social and environmental responsibilities.
- Corporate Responsibility Report (PDF | 9.7 MB)
- Corporate Responsibility Chronicle (PDF | 9.7 MB)
- Facts & Figures (PDF | 2.6 MB)
- VfU indicators for in-house operations (PDF)
- Statement on Sustainability (PDF)


text:
|photo credit: Rosina ♫♪
So here's what went down after you logged off.
The world's most organized lizards: not only do members of the chameleon species Furcifer labordi all hatch at the same time – they also manage to always do so in November. They then live for only four months – making them the shortest-lived, four-limbed vertebrates.
Penguins are dying – sounding the alarm over the health of the world's oceans.
Scientists have compiled the first complete map of the human brain.
Today is the 150th anniversary of the formal presentation of the theory of evolution. Though it is often credited to Charles Darwin, NPR has an interesting story about whether his contemporary, Alfred Russel Wallace, deserves some of the credit.
In laser news: use a beam of light to tweeze your eyebrows; or, fire up a laser to clean a wound of medicine-resistent bacteria.
It's cheaper to fill your tank in space than in The Netherlands. Speaking of filling your tank, our own Claire was interviewed about how gas gets from the ground to the pump this morning in the Wiess Energy Hall.


text:
MIDDLEBURY — Pinecones hang like bells from a branch. A birch bark globe trimmed with sumac twists in the breeze. Other pieces of sculpture are tucked just off the Middlebury trail — a wrapped figure eight of grape vines, a discarded snack food wrapper garnished with a sprig of white pine.
And the whole walk is sprinkled with poems, paintings and photography hanging in in waterproof cases .
The full text of this article is only available to online subscribers.
Are you an online subscriber? Click to login.
Click here to learn more about our subscription options.
If you have a print subscription, you can now add an online subscription at no additional charge! Just email us with your name and mailing address to set it up.
BRISTOL — The Bristol selectboard approved two new fiscal policies at their Monday, Oct. 17, meeting: an amended purchasing policy and a set of conditions for town credit card use.
The credit card policy was approved on the heels of recent selectboard debate surrounding the issuance of town credit cards to department heads, a discussion triggered by a People's United Bank policy, which only issues credit cards to specific individuals. Simply put: The bank is unwilling to issue just one town credit card.
MIDDLEBURY — A different kind of vehicle has finally joined the Mack trucks, cement mixers, excavators and boom lifts that have been omnipresent at the Eastview at Middlebury retirement community construction site off South Street Extension for the better part of a year.
Moving trucks this month have been making their first of what Eastview officials anticipate will be many deliveries for new residents settling into the new development taking shape just south of the Porter Medical Center campus.
Ken Jenks is the physician's assistant at a medical clinic in Nucla, Colo.
Jenks, who appears in a compelling "New Yorker" profile of Nucla's druggist, Don Colcord, grew up in Salt Lake City. But he's become a connoisseur of small towns.
Living in a small town, he says, means giving people more latitude.
Not long ago, I received a free hand-me-down iPod Touch. I was thrilled, not only because it had originally retailed for about $200 but also because I had never owned such a sleek, technologically advanced gadget. (Keep in mind I think remote car starters are magic; I thrill easily.)
But once I got over the simple elegance of the smooth flat screen, I honestly couldn't think of a single reason to have it.
Are you ready for some free speech?
Well, within limits. I would like to keep my job, be it ever so humble and modestly paid.
Well, I could just about stop there, and that would sum up the kerfuffle earlier this month about ESPN's decision to remove Hank Williams Jr. and his trademark "Are you ready for some football?" opening from its Monday Night Football program.
Gov. Peter Shumlin's call for a Clean Up Day this Saturday, Oct. 22, is a well-conceived statewide effort to encourage Vermonters to lend a helping hand to neighbors who are still recovering from Tropical Storm Irene's destruction.
At the one-year anniversary of the opening of Middlebury's Cross Street Bridge, it's appropriate to reflect on its success — and on the controversy that preceded it.
The success comes from all corners of the community: from community leaders to town officials, business owners to commuters. Everyone not only thinks it has added an aesthetic beauty to the town (with its stately architecture, as well as opening up an even more spectacular view of the downtown, but the added convenience and safety features are crucial to the town's viability.
Subscribe to Online Edition
Online PDF Print Edition
Copyright 2011 Addison Independent | 58 Maple Street, Middlebury, Vt. 05753 | All Rights Reserved
Site Development by Surf New Media


text:
Pepperl+Fuchs offers a broad portfolio of electrical equipment and solutions for installation and control of machinery and electrical networks in harsh environments and explosion hazardous areas.
Various types of protection and enclosure variants along with a high level of flexibility allow the design of the most efficient control and distribution solutions for any application and industrial environment.
Experienced project engineers at the Pepperl+Fuchs Solution Engineering Centers - located worldwide - will support the user to find the most efficient solution for his specific requirements.
The whole range from small junction boxes to complex, configurable terminal boxes, is covered by the series GR, SLS, XLS, FXLS, and HVB. Enclosure materials include glass fiber reinforced polyester and stainless steel.
Optimal protection for any installation is achieved by the sturdy flameproof enclosures of the EJB and GUB series. Materials are aluminum and stainless steel.
Up to 4 operator elements from a wide choice of control functions can be integrated in the glass fiber reinforced enclosures of the LCP series and the stainless steel housings of the LCS series.
The EFD21 series allows the installation of 2 operator elements per unit in gas group IIC areas while 11 control and monitoring elements can be utilized in IIB+H2 areas by integration into EFDC unit.
Complex requirements for operation and monitoring are met by up to 68 operator elements in a glass fiber reinforced GR.CS* control station. The stainless steel FXLS.CS series can combine up to 81 operator elements in one unit.
Sturdy flameproof control stations can be flexibly equipped with appropriately certified operator elements and used in gas group IIB areas. The EJB series is available in aluminum and stainless steel.
Equipment not designed for use in hazardous areas can be safely protected by flameproof enclosures of the EJB and GUB series. Each solution is designed exactly to user specifications.
The combination of flameproof enclosures for equipment protection with Ex e certified control and termination units offers many benefits for installation, maintenance, and upgrades.
By utilizing Pepperl+Fuchs' range of Ex e switch disconnectors and safety switches, safe operation of motors, engines, and drives in hazardous areas is ensured. Enclosure materials include stainless steel and glass fiber reinforced polyester.
With switch disconnectors in types of protection Ex d and Ex tb you safely disconnect machines and equipment without the need for specially trained staff. Supporting a maximum current of 25 A, 63 A, or 100 A, these switches in aluminum enclosures are suited for gas and dust explosion hazardous areas (Zones 1, 2, 21, and 22).
Accessories for electrical explosion protection equipment are certified according to the appropriate types of explosion protection. These accessories can be combined with the respective enclosures and devices from the various product series to application-specific tailored systems. Modifications and upgrades at a later stage after commissioning are easily possible, too.
A wide range of flameproof enclosures in many sizes and materials form the basis for various explosion protection design solutions for any kind of equipment.
Pepperl+Fuchs offers a comprehensive range of high performance signaling products suitable for many industries and applications. These audible, visual and combination devices as well as call points have been certified for use throughout the world in gas and dust explosion-hazardous areas.
Pepperl+Fuchs has pioneered work in completely re-designing the GR series made of glass-fiber reinforced polyester in increased safety (Ex e) and intrinsically-safe (Ex i) type of protection ...
Use our online tool to quickly configure your individual terminal box.
You receive a tender within a business day!


text:
First Peter chapter 5 verses 1 through 4, let me read this text for you. "Therefore I exhort the elders among you as your fellow elder and witness of the sufferings of Christ and a partaker also of the glory that is to be revealed, shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight not under compulsion but voluntarily according to the will of God, and not for sorted gain but with eagerness. Nor yet as lording it over those allotted to your charge but proving to be examples to the flock. And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory."
Here is the beloved Apostle Peter instructing elders, pastors, shepherds. These are those responsible for the churches in Pontus, chapter 1 verse 1, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia. So this was written to numerous elders and pastors who had responsibility for large portions of the church in that part of the world. And Peter's primary command is in verse 2, "Shepherd the flock of God...shepherd the flock of God." The word shepherd is the word poimen, poimeno, which means to shepherd, or to pastor, as we most often translate it. It's the verb...the noun form, poimen, is the word we translate shepherd and often translate pastor. Pastoral ministry comes then from shepherding as a model. We have a conference here every year we call The Shepherds Conference." Everybody calls their conference Pastors Conference, so we borrowed the term Shepherds Conference because it's a biblical term. But when we talk about shepherding or when Peter writes to us about shepherding, we're a little bit at a loss to understand what that means, since I daresay there's not one shepherd sitting out here in this congregation today. You have not had any experience about shepherding so when somebody uses the word sheep for the church and for believers, you really don't know what's involved in that. The closest we ever get to sheep is to stuff little animals that we bring home for our kids or grandkids or some cute little sheep that show up in some kid's book or cartoon, or maybe we've been to a zoo or an animal petting environment where we've actually seen some sheep. But the whole process of shepherding we know very little about. And because of that, we need to sort of reconstruct that or we're not going to know what it means to shepherd the flock of God.
I had my experience with shepherding on two occasions, really. One when I was in high school and had a friend whose family was in the business of taking care of animals, both pigs and sheep. And I spent a few days one summer trying to chase some sheep around the desert. That was a minimal experience at shepherding, I might add. But my understanding of shepherding grew immensely when, along with my family, we had the opportunity to visit New Zealand. We visited various farms there and even went to a sheep farm in Australia. I purchased a book written by a man named Bowen, in fact we bought a lot of them because he is a championship producer of sheep, amazing man, also a Christian man who has written extensively about this whole matter of how to care for sheep. And I have read through what he has written. And this is what I basically gleaned, just so we kind of get an idea of why the metaphor of shepherding is applied to the church. You might ask yourself, "In what way am I like a sheep?" Well if you don't know what sheep are like, you might not be able to answer the question.
So, as I talk about sheep, just think in your mind this is how the Bible describes us. Okay? Sheep are the only animal in the world, or a sheep is the only animal in the world that can be totally lost when it's only a few miles from home. They have no instinct to get back to where they came from. Even the dog you're trying to get rid of and you dropped it off in several neighborhoods finally finds its way home. That dumb dog can get home, but a sheep can't. Sheep have no ability to find their way back. Within its closed range it has adequate skills. I knows its own pasture, it knows the place where it was born. It knows the place where it was suckled by its mother. It will rest in the same shade. It will sleep in the same fold. It will stay in the same home range, more than any other grazing animal in existence. But if that sheep is taken away or wanders away from the familiar territory, it becomes completely lost. It has no sense of direction whatsoever. It has no spacial orientation. It cannot find its way back.. It will inevitably walk around in circles, around and around continuing in confusion and unrest, even panic.
Now sheep are intelligent to some degree. They are perhaps more intelligent than we give them credit for. But to some degree they are intelligent, however, they have no factor in their intelligence to get them back to where they started. They go astray and they get lost and they become helpless and unable to find food or water. In fact, the over one billion sheep in the world would be very soon starved to death or die of thirst if it were not for thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of caring shepherds who make sure they protect them by keeping them in their pasture, by leading them to the place where they can eat and the water that they can drink.
When Jesus, you'll remember, saw the disoriented, confused spiritually hungry, lost crowd, He said of them in Matthew 9:36, "They are like sheep without a shepherd." And everybody understood what that meant because sheep without a shepherd are hopeless and helpless and lost. The prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 53 described lost people as sheep gone astray, everyone turning to his own way, wandering aimlessly astray. They are especially vulnerable when they go astray, or when they are purposely led astray. It is very, very easy to lead sheep astray.
When our family was at the sheep farm in Australia, the shepherd took us out and showed us many, many fascinating things about caring for sheep. But he introduced us to one particular sheep who is known as the Judas sheep...the Judas sheep. All sheep that are led to slaughter are basically led to slaughter by a Judas sheep. There are millions of sheep, of course, being slaughtered all the time every year and they are typically led to slaughter by a sheep called a Judas sheep. It is especially selected castrated male sheep who leads the unwitting sheep to the killing floor. It goes out first and it starts down a shoot and all the sheep follow and follow and follow. Sheep do have a capacity to follow and they follow to their own death. When they reach the killing place, a trap door opens and the Judas sheep is led away and the rest go in to be slaughtered. The Judas sheep goes around to get the next group. Unaware of what's happening, of course, the sheep blindly follow to their death. They need someone then to follow who leads them to life and not to death because they tend to follow anybody. They need to be protected. They need to be sheltered in their safe place. They need to be provided for. They have to be given pasture and led to water. They spend virtually their whole life eating and drinking, and they are thirsty and hungry often and cannot sustain themselves unless they have shepherds.
And by the way, I found out that sheep have to have clean, pure water, and it can't be too cold and it can't be too hot. They're picky about that. It cannot be moving water, rapidly moving water knocks them off balance and frightens them. And so they need still waters but not stagnant waters. The water must be close by so it's easily found and returned to since if they go very far they get lost. Furthermore, most animals are able to smell water on the wind at a great distance, not sheep. They know where they go for water but if there were another place nearby that was a water supply, they would never know it. If they wander more than a brief walk from their water hole, they will die of thirst even if there's water nearby. They have no capacity to sense that water.
Once they have devoured their grazing range where they feel comfortable, they will continue to eat the stubble and they'll just keep on eating until they're eating dirt before they'll find on their own a new pasture. They have to be led to water. They have to be led to pasture.
And by the way, they're not selective in what they eat. They don't distinguish between oats and hay and alfalfa and grass and noxious toxic weeds.
All of this points to the fact that sheep needs shepherds, shepherds who are careful and thoughtful and protective and who provide the guidance and the knowledge and the wisdom and the planning and the providing and the pasturing that sheep need. Left alone, they will die. The shepherd is the key to their life.
We also imagine sheep, I think, to be soft wooly little white things like we depict a new lamb might be. But I will tell you this, and this might be bad news for you, sheep are basically filthy. That's the word. In fact, they may be the dirtiest animal on the planet in some respects. They are rarely white. They are stained with all kinds of things. But the thing that makes them so dirty is that their wool and their skin produces lanolin and lanolin comes out everywhere. And you know what lanolin is, a sticky greasy substance. And because of that, everything sticks to them, everything sticks to them, even sticks stick to them. Dirt, weeds, vegetation, seeds, anything blowing in the wind, anything they rub up against sticks to them. And they are dirty unless the shepherd cleans them. Even worse, what often sticks to them becomes deadly because it sticks to them at their rear in the opening where they eliminate their food and closes it so that they literally will die because they cannot get rid of what is in their bodies. Periodically every month or so, we watched the shepherd do this, they have to literally be shaved at that point or they will die because they become so embedded from the collection of dirt. They have no capacity to clean themselves. You never saw a sheep turn his head back and lick himself, he doesn't go there. They don't do that. They are dirty unless the shepherd cleans them. They will die unless they are shaved at the appropriate place.
Furthermore, they can't feed well in soft wet grass or they become sick. It creates a condition that can even bring them to death. Flies kill sheep by laying eggs anywhere and everywhere they can in sheep. Wet ground produces foot rot. I mean, being a shepherd is a very, very challenging thing and it is a messy, dirty job. That's why the lowest people on the social ladder in Bible times were shepherds. That's what made the angels appearing to the shepherds in the field so remarkable that the angels would come and announce to the shepherds the birth of the Messiah, rather than to the elite of the society, was really an amazing thing because the shepherds were the lowest of the low, because they were generally so dirty and filthy dealing with these animals.
No animal in the world, furthermore, is as defenseless as a sheep. Ever hear of a sheep fight? I don't think so. Sheep don't fight. They can't fight. They have no defense against predators. They can't scratch. They can't kick. They can't bite. They're helpless and defenseless. Sheep define the term "dead meat." Am I getting through? Okay. Without a shepherd, sheep don't survive. They're most vulnerable to injury. And when injured, they are easily prone to give up. They are easily crushed when they have pain or injury. They lack a self-preservation instinct. They lack a will to fight and struggle for life. It is even true that a sheep with a full fleece can fall on its back and not ever get up, just stay that way until it dies. The shepherd has to come along, find a sheep, turn it over, pick it up. If it's been down for a long time, the sheep must be treated with great care because its circulation has been affected.
This business of shepherding is a messy and a very challenging business. This wonderful imagery is behind the usage of these pictures and metaphors in the New Testament. And again and again we read them, the Lord talked about us being His sheep and talked about what it is for Him to be the shepherd of His own sheep. It is wonderful imagery and if we're going to understand what Peter is saying here about the duty of being a pastor, we have to understand a little bit about the picture itself. We need to recapture what it means to be a sheep, or what it means to be a shepherd. It's in that context we come then to chapter 5 verse 2, and Peter says, "Shepherd the flock of God." This is a full-time relentless responsibility. Sheep have great needs. They can't protect themselves. They can't feed themselves. They can't get water by themselves. They can't even do things to heal themselves, they become so very discouraged over pain and injury. They are helpless, hopeless, easily led astray, they are dirty, they need us to be there to give attention to all these issues.
And I think, too, in hard times, in difficult times, in times of persecution, it becomes even more important that the shepherds take care of the sheep. And Peter is writing in just such times. He is writing to believers who are being persecuted, who are going through very difficult times. Chapter 3 verse 14 he talks about those who suffer for the sake of righteousness. Chapter 2 verse 21, "You have been called to suffer since Christ also suffered for you." It was a time of persecution. It was a time of suffering. It was a time of difficulty. Chapter 4 verse 1, "Christ suffered, arm yourselves with the same purpose." In other words, you're going to be facing the same issues of suffering and persecution that our Lord suffered. Chapter 4 verse 13 he talks about sharing the sufferings of Christ. Verse 14, being reviled for the name of Christ. Verse 15, suffering not as a murderer or thief or evildoer, troublesome meddler, but verse 16, suffering as a Christian. In verse 19, suffering according to the will of God and entrusting your soul to a faithful Creator. So, to make matters worse, it's a tough enough deal just to shepherd sheep, but if you add the fact that predators are everywhere and persecutors are everywhere trying to take the life of the sheep, trying to lead them astray, Judas sheep all around, the responsibility of shepherding becomes even more important. When the church is experiencing persecution, when the church is experiencing attack, when the church is experiencing deception, as it is even in our day, it becomes the toughest of times that demand the best shepherds. As you well know, this is one of the things that concerns me greatly at a time when the true sheep are under massive attack, the shepherds are irresponsible, have lost their vigilance, have given up their duty. And so, here comes Peter to remind us to shepherd the flock of God.
And by the way, it's not your church and it's not your flock, it's the flock of God. I view my own ministry as all of us should as having been given a group of people, a part of the flock of God, who belong to God as a stewardship. I discharge a responsibility not over my people or my church, but God's people, Christ's church. This is the highest stewardship possible. It is as if God said, "Here, these belong to Me, protect them, feed them, water them, purify them and you'll give an account some day for what you do." This is no lark. This is no walk in the park. This is immensely challenging.
Well let's look at that command a little bit there in verse 2, "Shepherd the flock of God." And there are just some basic elements of this text that I want to unfold. First is the exhortation, the exhortation. What is the command? Well the command is shepherd the flock of God....shepherd the flock of God. We've already looked at that. But behind that exhortation we go to verse 1, "Therefore I exhort the elders among you," therefore connects into the suffering, those who are suffering according to the will of God. It's a time of persecution. It's a time of difficulty. It's a time of challenge. It's a time that calls for the best shepherds to be the most faithful because this is a difficult time. Sheep are vulnerable. They're under assault. They're under attack. Therefore this is a time to step up and shepherd the way God wants you to shepherd. And so he exhorts the elders, or if you will, the shepherds. The elders are simply the overseers, the shepherds, the pastors. The word elder, overseer, shepherd, pastor all refer to the same persons, those who are responsible to lead the church, those who are the shepherds and pastors of God's people. They are called elders, which speaks of their age and maturity. They are called overseers which speaks of their leadership. They are called pastor or shepherd which speaks of their responsibility to feed.
This is really borrowed from an Old Testament pattern. In the Old Testament in Israel, elders ruled in the synagogues, the mature men, the men who knew the Scripture and who had experience in it. Each local congregation, each local synagogue had elders that led. In the New Testament, it's the same. The Lord has appointed in the churches those who are to feed and lead the flock of God. They are the shepherds, the overseers, the mature and godly men.
Qualifications for these men are given in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1, very specific qualifications are laid out. You will notice the word is plural here, the elders among you. Plural because in the church it is ideal, and it was the pursuit of the New Testament apostles to realize this, that there be a plurality of elders. It was important that there not just be one, but there be many who led in the church because that protected against one man going off into some doctrinal aberration. He was held accountable to the rest. It protected against imbalance. It provided a variety of gifts and ministries. A plurality of elders preserves against the undo elevation of one man which is so dangerous. It also protects against the dominance of one man and it provides continuity instead of discontinuity. One of the difficulties in a congregation with only one elder, one pastor is when he goes, there's no continuity, there's nobody to shepherd the sheep and they wander around a sheep without a shepherd and they very often don't know what to do. I've often said that churches that lose their pastor and have no remaining pastors or elders are in a horrible position, they are sheep without a shepherd and the sheep are wandering around trying to pick a shepherd. That is very difficult.
So we are called as elders, as a collection of pastors, to the serious task of shepherding the flock of God for which we have to give an account, according to Hebrews 13:17, we have to give an account. That's why James 3:1 says, "Stop being so many teachers, don't rush into this, theirs is a greater condemnation." The reward is great, and the potential discipline is great as well if we fail. So the primary task is to shepherd. And if you ask the question...what is the role that shepherd plays? The role that a shepherd plays is to make sure that sheep are fed and watered, to make sure that the sheep are fed and watered. He has to find the place, the ground the water, protect them from the predators, protect them from eating something that's noxious to them. This is what he does, but it all builds around the responsibility, the main responsibility, making sure they continue to be fed and watered so their life can be nourished and they can grow to maturity. That's the idea.
So the primary task is feeding. We protect them in order that they may continue to be fed the truth. We guide them into the truth so that they don't go astray into something that's harmful and bad for them. We insulate them from predators that would do harm to them in order that they might feed only on the truth and not by...not be deceived and led astray. And that's why when you look at a list of the qualifications for an elder or a shepherd or an overseer, there's only one skill, only one skill and that is didaktikos,skilled in teaching. Because we're called to feed, in John 21:15 to 17, Peter confronted with the Lord that day when he was in Galilee after the resurrection and Jesus remembering Peter's three denials says to Peter three times, "Do you love Me? Do you love Me? Do you love Me?"giving an opportunity to Peter to restore himself for each denial. And at the response of Peter, "Yes, I love You," Peter (meant to say Jesus) said, "Feed My lambs, feed My sheep, feed My sheep." Shepherd them. And shepherding and feeding are synonymous. The shepherd has the responsibility to feed the sheep, provide the green pastures, protect them from what harms them, protect them from predators who would harm them, protect them from Judas sheep who would lead them into devastation, provide for them not light meals of milk, but provide for them the nourishing truths, solid food so that they can grow.
So the command to shepherd, the exhortation to shepherd is a calling to the humblest of men, the lowliest of men, the not many noble, not many mighty. As Paul says it, the scum and the off scouring of the world, the lowest of the low to do the greatest task of all tasks in the world, and that is to shepherd the flock of God. If somebody asked me to be the king of a nation, nobody has, by the way, if somebody asked me to be the president of a great American institution, if somebody asked me to be the president of a great corporation, if somebody asked me to be the President of the United States, or anything else, I would not stoop to a lower task than the highest calling there is, and that is to shepherd the flock of God. That is the greatest task given to the humblest of servants who are unworthy but called and enabled and gifted and empowered to that duty. The sin of the shepherds in Israel, according to Jeremiah 23 and Ezekiel 34, is that they did not feed the sheep. Ministry is not about administration, it's not about programming, it's not about creativity and ideas and entrepreneurship, it's about feeding the sheep. There are all kinds of mega-churches exploding all over the place everywhere that are being run by now the new approach is to run all these churches by CEOs with Harvard MBAs. It has nothing to do with the flock of God. These are non-churches, in many cases run by non-shepherds. It's a big deception. It's not to say there aren't true sheep in those environments, those places probably have true sheep wandering around trying to find a true shepherd, easily led astray, easily led into eating weeds, starving for green pastures, thirsty for still waters and vulnerable to any predator that comes along. Our responsibility is to shepherd and we can shepherd only one way, and that is to make sure the sheep are nourished on the food and the water of life. Take up the task of shepherding and discharge it, Peter says, that's the exhortation.
And then he moves to what I'll call the authorization. Somebody might say, "Well who are you to tell us? Where did you come from?" And he says this, "I exhort the elders among you as your fellow elder." And first..the first aspect of his authority or authorization is common experience...common experience. I'm a fellow elder. I know what it's like. I'm with you in this. I understand what you're called to do. In some ways there's nothing worse than somebody who has never been a pastor telling pastors how to pastor, somebody who has never poured his life into a flock, somebody who has never gone down there to get messy with all the sheep, somebody who has never done that standing up and telling pastors how to pastor. Peter doesn't do that. He's not an out-of-town expert. He says, "Look, I'm exhorting you as a fellow elder." And that's a humble posture, it really is. I'm a fellow elder. He doesn't elevate himself at this particular point, very humbly he recognizes that he is one of them. There's modesty in this. There's a sense of sympathy in this.
And I've always said that. You know, I...I love to speak to people in any kind of environment. I've spoken to the fire chiefs of Los Angeles. I've spoken to groups of the policemen. I have spoken in my educational responsibility at the college, to congressmen for the United States Government. I've spoken before accreditation commissions. I've spoken in all kinds of environments in all kinds of places. But never am I as comfortable speaking to any group as I am speaking to pastors because I know what they do, I understand. I not only understand it from the standpoint of revelation in Scripture, but I understand it from the experience side. I come along as a fellow pastor, a fellow shepherd. I know what it is to do this. I know what it takes. I know the price to pay. I understand the challenges. I know the pain and the suffering as well as the joy and exhilaration.
So that's how Peter comes. He comes on the basis of his experience. And then he comes also, let's ratchet it up a little bit, as a witness of the sufferings of Christ. Now it starts to be a little more heavy, this authority. He's coming as a witness of the sufferings of Christ which puts him in the category of an Apostle. And it was very important to him that he was an eyewitness of the suffering of Christ. He was there when they arrested Christ. We don't need to go into all the details. You know the account of how he took out his sword ready to defend the Lord. He was there at the trial, though hiding in the background and denying Christ. He had fled at the cross but he was close enough to know exactly what was going on. He was regathered after that in the upper room and saw Him in resurrection glory, re-commissioned in Galilee, as I noted in John chapter 21, and told to feed the sheep. He was there. This is not secondhand stuff with him. And this...this aspect of the suffering of Christ was really important to Peter. He was a witness to Christ's suffering, to Christ's death and I'm sure included in that is the idea, of course, of His resurrection. You can put it this way, he was an eyewitness to the passion of Christ, which, of course, has to culminate in the glory of the resurrection. In fact, he talks about it a lot. In his epistle in chapter 1 verse 11, he talks about the suffering of Christ. In chapter 1 verse 19, he talks about Christ's suffering, giving His precious blood as a lamb unblemished and spotless. In chapter 2 verse 21 he talks about Christ's suffering for us. In verse 24, bearing our sins in His body on the cross. In chapter 3 and verse 18, Christ died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust. Again emphasizing the suffering, the substitutionary death and atonement of Christ. Chapter 4 verse 1, Christ has suffered in the flesh. Verse 13, as we noted earlier, we share the sufferings of Christ. He was an eyewitness to the sufferings of Christ by which our salvation was accomplished, including His resurrection.
So he comes as one having authority as an Apostle and an eyewitness of Jesus Christ. No one could be an Apostle of Christ's unless he was called by Christ and was a witness to the passion, including the resurrection. So Peter says, "Yes, I speak to you as a fellow pastor, I speak to you from the standpoint of common experience, but I also speak to you from the standpoint of apostolic authority. He's exhorting not only from a humble sympathetic perspective, but a position of authority as a representative of Jesus Christ, the risen one.
A third component is he speaks as one not only with common experience and apostolic authority, but personal revelation...personal revelation. The end of verse 1, "A partaker also of the glory that is to be revealed." Now this puts Peter a notch above the rest because not all twelve apostles, or eleven, leaving Judas out, not all eleven apostles experience this. What is he referring to? The glory that is to be revealed, we know what that is, Second Coming glory, the glory when the Lord returns, when as the writer of Revelation says, "Everything goes black, everything goes out, all the lights in the universe go out and then the blazing glory of the Son of Man fills the universe and He comes in blazing glory to judge the wicked and to bring the righteous into His Kingdom in the glorious return of Christ, in the glorious manifestation of the children of God, in the glory of the Second Coming, Christ will reveal Himself." Peter says I was, I am a partaker of the glory that is to be revealed. It is yet to be revealed, how could he partake of it? If it's something future, how could he partake of that?
You could say, "Well, he's a partaker of it in the sense that he will be there in that day." That's true, we'll all be there. When He comes in glory He'll come with His saints. We'll all partake in that sense, but that's probably not what he's referring to. When he says a partaker of the glory to be revealed, he is talking about the transfiguration. He's talking about that day when along with Peter...along with James and John he was taken up to the mount and there the Lord pulled back the veil of His Shekinahglory of God was manifest and they fell over as dead men under the power of that shining holy brilliance. He's not just saying I am one who is going to be there in the Second Coming, he is one who says, "I have seen the glory that is to be revealed, I have partaken of it." In 2 Peter chapter 1 verse 16, he says it another way. "We did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." He says, "Look, when I talk about the coming of Christ, when I talk about the future glory of Christ, this isn't something I made up...verse 16...we were eyewitnesses of His majesty." We meaning himself and Peter and John. "For when He received honor and glory from God the Father and an utterance such as this was made to Him by the majestic glory, a name for God, 'This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,' and we ourselves heard this utterance made from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mount." We were there when the glory shone. We were there when the majestic glory, God Himself, spoke out of heaven and said, "This is My beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. We were there when Moses and Elijah showed up. We were there, we saw a preview of coming glory."
Peter is saying, "Look, I'm telling you, shepherd the flock of God. I'm telling you that from the standpoint of common experience. I'm telling you that from the standpoint of apostolic authority. But I'm telling you that also from the standpoint of personal revelation." Christ is the one who died, He's the one who rose, but He's also the one who is coming again and in His coming again He's going to reward those who are faithful. Here is the promise then of that eternal reward. He said, "I saw it, I saw it, I was a partaker of that glory. I saw some of it, before he was obviously knocked into some kind of a coma by it, I saw a preview of Second Coming glory. I speak to you as one of you. I speak to you as one above you. And I speak to you as one who has seen the glory to come. And I'm telling you, shepherd the flock of God."
Motivated by sympathy, common responsibility...motivated by apostolic authority...and motivated by future hope. So the exhortation is followed by the authorization, and then comes the identification. He gets very specific about this flock. Verse 2, "Shepherd the flock of God among you...among you." This narrows it down. I mean, you can't shepherd all the flock of God. By the way, there's only one flock of God, right? Just one. God only has one flock, there's only one body of Christ, there's only one Lord, one faith, one baptism, there's only one church, one flock. And the Greek word is a diminutive word, little flock, precious flock. It has inherent in it the kind of an endearing element, the precious flock. And God has only one flock and you are to shepherd the flock among you, the flock that God gives to you. In fact, you can go down to verse 3 and you will see the phrase, "Allotted to your charge...allotted to your charge." It's as if God has taken the whole of the flock, broken it into parts and allotted the flock to us as shepherds. The flock of God for which I have responsibility is here. A flock of God that others have responsibility for is elsewhere. My responsibility is not to be responsible for the whole flock, but to be responsible for the one flock God has given to me. No matter what else I may do, you know, I mean sometimes I think I have way too much responsibility trying to be all things to all people, but everything could go away. I know I could be uninvolved at the college. I could give up responsibility at the seminary. I could give up responsibility for radio, or any of those things, tapes, or whatever else that consume me so much. And I would still not give up my calling because my calling is to take care of the flock of God allotted to me. Like it or not, that's you. As long as you're here, that's you. Now my responsibility is for you. I'm more concerned, beloved, with the occupied seats than I am with the empty ones, okay? I'm not driven by empty seats. My goal, you know, I was saying to somebody this week that self-styled Messiahs are always megalomaniacs. There's no limit to that. They want to win the world and win it now. And if you get in their way, they want to trample you. I just want the responsibility for those whom God gives me.
One young man came to Moody one time and he said, "My congregation's too small." And Moody said, "Well maybe they're as large as you'd like to give account for in the day of judgment." That's the right answer. "Please, Lord, no more." I'm not sure that I am going to be faithful to what I've got, let alone more. God has one beloved, precious little flock in this world. And I grieve that many people in that little flock are lost in these massive kind of new institutional groups of people who are quasi-Christian and they're wandering around trying to find food, trying to find pasture. We hear from them a lot as they want tapes or books, as they listen to Grace To You because it's their pasture and it's their water, they can't find it elsewhere. Every shepherd is called to his charge, his allotted portion and we will give an account to God for how we cared for that flock, that part of the flock.
So, we have seen an exhortation and an authorization and an identification of just exactly who it is that we are to shepherd. How about some regulation? How do we do this? How do we discharge this shepherding responsibility?
There are a couple of positive statements. Verse 2, "Exercising oversight." Exercising oversight, pretty simple, episkopeo, from which we get episcopal which is taken from that word, of course. It means to have scope over. You would think skiopeowould be the word scope, and it is, to have scope over, epi, to get the scope. Part of shepherding is to get the big picture, isn't it? Part of shepherding is to understand the threats, the opportunities, the strengths, the weaknesses. And that's the oversight. That's part of it. But there's another part of it as well. The first positive is exercising oversight in verse 2. The second positive is at the end of verse 3, "Proving to be examples to the flock." So on the one hand, you are responsible to get the scope, get a grasp on your area of responsibility, your realm of responsibility. That's the bird's-eye view, but on the other hand, you are to come down and mingle in and among the sheep in that you might provide your life as an example. Shepherding is not just the overview. It's not just studying statistics and moving people in groups here and there. It's getting down with the sheep so they can see your life and they can feel your touch and they can participate and see your example. The single truest quality of leadership is the power of exemplary life. I've said that in so many different places to so many different groups of people when I talk about leadership. The single truest quality of leadership is the power of an exemplary life. I don't care where you are, it's the power of example that in the end is what leadership is all about. It's not about a bunch of lists of these fourteen, and that thirteen. I said so many times on radio interviews recently in talking about my book on leadership, if you're in a crisis and you're leading people, you can't say, "Oh, what was number eleven, I can't remember number six...oh what do I do?" It's the power of your life that is essentially what leadership is. You can step back and see what it is, but it has to come naturally out of the flow of your personal living.
So as an overseer, as a shepherd, I have to get the big picture, and then I have to go down and get the small picture and move among the sheep and set an example. They need to be close enough to me to see my life. That's the positive.
The negative, three perils in this regulation of our shepherding. First peril, verse 2, exercising oversight...first peril, "Not under compulsion, but voluntarily, according to the will of God." You shouldn't be forced into this. Forced into it by a desire for pride, forced into it by peer pressure, forced into it by intimidation, forced into it for fear of failure or whatever, forced into doing what you do because of some professional duty, or because you have ambition and you want to succeed at one level so you can go to another level. It can't be under compulsion. In one sense you're under compulsion to preach the gospel, 1 Corinthians 9:16 and 17, "Woe is me if I preach not the gospel," but that's a compulsion that comes from the will of God. If you ask what drives a man to be a true shepherd? It is the will of God, so you're not under compulsion, you do it voluntarily because you know it's the will of God. I often say to young pastors, would-be pastors, or people considering it when they say, "Well how do you know if you're called?" And I will often say to them, "Well if you can't do anything else, you're probably called. If you can do anything else, do it because if you don't there are going to be a lot of days when you wish you had." This is something you do when you can't do anything else. People ask me, "You know, if you weren't a preacher what would you have been?" And my answer is, "I don't know." There is no second choice. I didn't make a list. Okay, I could be a preacher, or I could be this, or I could be that. No. There was only one thing I could be and that was a shepherd of God's flock. That was the will of God revealed to me. That was clearly indicated to me. It's been the will of God that's driven me. I'm not under compulsion by the...by any group of men. I'm not under compulsion by some ambition. I'm not under compulsion by some people are holding my feet to the fire. This isn't about building yourself up, building an empire. This is about an internal Holy Spirit-given motivation. I can't do anything else. There isn't anything else that interests me or compels me or drives me. This is how it should be, it should be willing, it should be spontaneous, it should be exuberant. Whether it succeeds or fails from a human viewpoint, it's just something you have to do.
Some of our people, Grace people, are down in South Africa this week and one of the groups down there is led by Rick Weimer who is leading the construction people who did our plaza out here and Rick's got a group of people in a section of Joberg, Johannesburg down there and they're building a house for a pastor, a Zulu pastor who has a congregation. But he's lived in a storage bin because he has no home...faithful pastor. Now what do you think compels him? What do you think makes him volunteer to do this? It's the drive of his heart. And so our people are down there this week building him a house that he can live in.
I received a letter on my desk this morning and I was just going through it from a California Highway patrolman up in the north part of the state. His wife actually was writing the letter telling me about him. He works for the state as a Highway Patrolman but he's just taken the responsibility to pastor a church of a hundred people. And in order to prepare himself to do that, he went to school and was trained on the side, taking some Bible classes at the same time sending his children to the Master's College that they might be trained as well. And now he has his responsibilities going in every direction, supporting kids, working for the state, taking classes, pastoring a church of a hundred...why would anybody do that? A church of a hundred, why would you do that? Because that's the will of God. That's the internal compulsion and it's voluntarily driven spontaneously and willingly produced by the Holy Spirit.
So he says negatively, not under compulsion. Secondly, not for sordid gain, the end of verse 2, "Not for sordid gain but with eagerness." Not for shameful gain, not for money. You're not in it to become rich. It's okay to pay the pastor, I want to affirm that. It's okay. Those that preach the gospel should live by the gospel. Those that are faithful in the Word and doctrine should be worthy of double pay, double honor, Paul says to Timothy. But this is not the motive. This is the motive of false teachers who do what they do. Peter says in 2 Peter 2, he says, "They teach destructive heresies, verse 1, and verse 3, in their greed they will exploit you." False teachers always do it for money. They always do it for personal aggrandizement. Jude 12 says, "They care only for themselves." But there's no desire for money in the heart of a true pastor. Even if you receive more than you need, this then becomes a stewardship responsibility and who can say? Some pastors live at a bare minimum. Some do much better than that. That's in the purposes of God, a stewardship that each of us has to discharge with faithfulness. Not in the ministry financially for financial profit or benefit, but with eagerness. Words like voluntarily and eagerness really do characterize the truly called shepherd. Even though it gets difficult and hard and challenging, you still do it and you do it with joy and eagerness and gratitude.
There's a third negative prohibition and it's in verse 3, "Nor yet as lording it over those allotted to your charge." Lording, katakuriontes(?), to completely dominate. Kurioo is to be lord, katais to be lord down, it's to come down on people. Autocratical impression, intimidation, domineering, dominating, this is a term that is used of people who are harsh and hard. They don't want to hear from you, they don't want your opinion, they just want you to get in line and do what they tell you. That's not how you shepherd the flock of God. The authority comes from the Word. And when you speak the Word, that's your authority. The rest of the time you don't have any authority. As soon as you stop talking the Word of God, you don't have any authority, then you become a servant. Your authority comes from the Word, all the rest of the time you come under and you serve the sheep. You can't dominate them. You have to treat them with tenderness and care.
It's so easy to push people around, intimidate people, create fear. That's not what a true shepherd does. There's none of that. In Matthew 20 Jesus said, "That's what the Gentiles do," Matthew 20:25, "they lord it over. But if anyone among you would be great or a leader...He said...let him be your servant." There's no place for petty tyrants, although a lot of them exist and always have in the church.
So how do you shepherd? You shepherd by spiritual leadership. You shepherd by example. You shepherd by a life of service, free from compulsion or greed or abusive domination. Peter wraps up his words with motivation in verse 4, "And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory." Ministry has its rewards, I promise you it does. It's really been unceasing joy for me. And maybe I've certainly gotten more than my share of what joy any man should have. But ministry has had its immense joys, and also its great challenges and even heartbreaks but immense joys. But still the best of the reward for the faithful shepherd is deferred. It's all deferred until the chief shepherd appears and we receive the unfading crown, literally in the Greek the unfading crown which is glory, until we receive eternal glory, until every man receives praise from God as 1 Corinthians 4 says it, until every one of us has our stewardship evaluated. The Chief Shepherd, or as He's called in John, the Good Shepherd, or as He is called in Hebrews, the Great Shepherd. He's going to appear. He's going to appear as the glorious shepherd and He's going to reward all His faithful shepherds in glory.
I've had my share of awards, you know, in my erstwhile and long past athletic days and even a few academic things thrown along. And I remember those things faintly, stepping up on a platform to get a medal, hearing some hollers from a crowd when you received an honor or a reward, being at a banquet and being given a plaque no one could find, and if they could they couldn't care about now. And, you know, all those things pass so rapidly, we can't remember last year's winners, we can't remember last year's champions. Who won what championship last year? It's a moment and it's gone and that's what it is. Can you imagine, however, being honored with an honor that lasts forever...forever? That is what an unfading crown of glory is, it is an award ceremony that never ends. It is an award event that never ceases. It is a crown that never loses its luster. It goes on forever and ever. It is the crown which is eternal glory. And this is that to which the faithful shepherd looks. Crowns in ancient times, as they are today, were marks of victorious achievement, but they diminish. Some of them were made out of plants and they died, and some were made out of tarnishing metal and they faded. But you could look at heaven this way, for faithful shepherds, heaven will be an eternal award ceremony at which the one receiving the award will give all the honor to...whom?...to the Chief Shepherd, to Christ. Shepherd the flock of God, shepherd the flock given to you, allotted to you. Feed them, lead them, protect them, purify them, set an example for them and some day when Jesus appears the Chief Shepherd will reward His faithful shepherds with eternal glory. What a calling. Let's pray together.
Our Father, how grateful we are for Your grace to us that we like shepherds in ancient times are nothing and no one, insignificant, in some ways, as Paul said, scum, the off-scouring, the lowest of the low. But You have called us to the highest duty to shepherd Your flock, the flock which You purchased with Your own blood. We thank You for this calling. We thank You for the instruction as to how to discharge it faithfully. We thank You for making us willing and eager. We thank You for protecting us from selfish ambition, love of money, or dominating and abusive authority. Continue, Lord, to make Your faithful shepherds servants who will live as examples among the sheep, some day receiving a true and divine assessment of their faithfulness. We look not for what this world may give us, it means nothing. We wait for the day when we hear praise from You and will return it to You forever, for whatever we are we are by Your grace. We are like Paul, the chief of sinners who have been made into shepherds by grace and grace alone. We give You gratitude in Christ's name. Amen.
This article is also available and sold as a booklet.
This sermon series includes the following messages:
Please contact the publisher to obtain copies of this resource.Publisher Information


text:
Bronchioloalveolar carcinoma
My father was diagnosed with bronchioloalveolar carcinoma with bone metastasis. He passed away very quickly. He was told that this type of cancer does not respond to chemotherapy. Can you tell me why this type of cancer is so unresponsive? Also, is this a rare type of lung cancer and what are thought to be the causes of this in a non-smoker?
Barbara Campling, MD, Medical Oncologist, responds:
Please accept our condolences to you and your family after your father's death. Bronchioloalveolar cancer (BAC) is a relatively uncommon lung cancer (about 3% of cases), and it is a type of "adenocarcinoma" (which as a group constitutes the most common category of "non-small cell" lung cancer). The behavior of bronchioloalveolar cancer can be quite unpredictable, ranging from a slowly growing indolent but progressive tumor to a rapidly growing cancer, which can be quickly fatal. In fact, it has more recently been shown that there are at least five distinct subtypes of bronchioalveolar cancer that each has a distinct prognosis, so the term BAC is no longer exists, and instead it has been replaced by the names for each subtype that has been identified. Although localized bronchioloalveolar cancers can be cured with surgery or radiation therapy, this tumor is generally considered very difficult to treat. This is partly because it may arise in multiple locations within the lung. Many oncologists believe that certain types of bronchioloalveolar cancers are more resistant to chemotherapy and radiation than other types of non-small cell lung cancer, although there is little evidence for this in the medical literature. The large published studies in non-small cell lung cancer generally do not analyze treatment outcomes according to the histologic subtype, and even if they did, BAC would likely constitute a small subgroup that it would make it difficult to make definitive comparisons.
Why would one type of lung cancer be less responsive than other varieties? There are a number of mechanisms by which tumor cells can resist the effects of drugs and radiation therapy. A few examples include the increased expression of certain membrane proteins which actively export chemotherapy drugs out of cells, increased detoxification of drugs, decreased expression of the drug target, or increased repair of drug or radiation-induced damage. The cause of BAC is not known, but unlike most other forms of lung cancer, it is not consistently associated with smoking. There is a type of lung cancer that occurs in sheep (called Jaagsiekte, or ovine pulmonary adenocarcinoma), which looks very much like human BAC under the microscope. This peculiar disease of sheep is known to be caused by a virus. However, there is no definite evidence that human BAC is caused by a virus, and there is no evidence that it is contagious.
In your father's case, the cancer had already spread to bone at the time of diagnosis. Chemotherapy is often used in the management of metastatic non-small cell lung cancer, and although it is not curative treatment, in some cases it may make patients feel better and live longer than they would without treatment. Nevertheless, response rates to chemotherapy in metastatic non-small cell lung cancer are not very gratifying, typically less than 30%. Furthermore, in patients who are very sick, chemotherapy has not been shown to be beneficial and can actually make them sicker. This may have been a consideration in why your father's physician did not recommend chemotherapy.


text:
2013 NFL Week 5 Preview — 5 Intriguing Storylines to Watch
Several undefeated teams in each conference have dominated the first few weeks of the 2013 NFL season. Here are five storylines we'll be watching this weekend:
Can the Lions Finally Win in Wisconsin?
Lambeau Field, Green Bay, Wis. — 1 p.m. (ET) on Sunday, Oct. 6
After last week's big victory over the Bears, the Detroit Lions (3-1) have an opportunity to assume the role of pace-setter in the NFC North by beating the rival Packers (1-2) on the road. However, Detroit hasn't won in Wisconsin since 1991 — a long, painful 22 game losing streak that pre-dates the Brett Favre era in Green Bay. The Packers have been inconsistent in 2013, relying on Aaron Rodgers' offense to outscore opponents, rather than stopping them. Lions QB Matthew Stafford, WR Calvin Johnson and RB Reggie Bush all seem like they'd enjoy taking a nice hearty bite out of the Cheeseheads.
Tom Brady Faces Geno Atkins & the Bengals
Paul Brown Stadium, Cincinnati — 1 p.m. (ET) on Sunday, Oct. 6
The New England Patriots (4-0) aren't as dominant when quarterback Tom Brady faces pressure from the middle of the defensive line. This week, the Pats' offense must protect its franchise passer from Cincinnati (2-2) and defensive tackle Geno Atkins. The Bengals' sackmaster will look to take Brady out of his comfort zone, and hope that New England's cast of no-names around him isn't able to break down the defense. If Cincinnati QB Andy Dalton doesn't start looking more like the passer he was in his first two NFL seasons, Atkins might decide to pressure him, too.
The NFC East Is Awful
MetLife Stadium, East Rutherford, NJ — 1 p.m. (ET); AT&T Stadium, Arlington, Tex. - 4:25 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 6
There are no good teams in the NFC East this season, but one of these sorry squads is still guaranteed a playoff berth. Philadelphia (1-3) faces the Giants (0-4) at the Meadowlands in a game featuring the league's worst defenses. Eagles' wide receiver DeSean Jackson and New York's Victor Cruz might score so often that the game will resemble a dance off between the two speedsters. Speaking of allowing big plays and an embarrassing number of points, Dallas (2-2) hosts Denver (4-0) in a game that figures to pad Peyton Manning's video game-like stats further. Washington (1-3) will have the best week in the division — they have a bye.
Will the 49ers or Texans Be Under .500?
Candlestick Park, San Francisco — 8:30 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 6
This week's spotlight game is the Sunday night clash between the Texans (2-2) and the 49ers (2-2). Both Houston and San Francisco were seen as Super Bowl-caliber teams before the season. After this game, one of them will be 2-3 and in danger of becoming the NFL's biggest disappointment of 2013. Quarterbacks Colin Kaepernick and Matt Schaub have taken the most blame for their teams' early-season struggles. Their performance against the opposing defense will once again most likely determine the fate of their team in Week 5. No pressure, or anything.
The Raiders and Chargers Late Show
O.co Coliseum, Oakland — 11:35 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 6
Game 2 of the American League Divisional Series between the Oakland A's and Detroit Tigers forced the NFL to move the AFC West showdown between Oakland (1-3) and San Diego (2-2) to an 11:35 p.m. (ET) start time. Fans who stay up late for the game will likely see the return of quarterback Terrelle Pryor for the Raiders. He missed last week's loss to Washington due to a concussion. Pryor's hiatus was just enough time for Oakland to realize how bad QB Matt Flynn is. Originally scheduled to be the Raiders' starter, Flynn has been demoted to third string, with undrafted rookie Matt McGloin rising to No. 2 on the depth chart. Hopefully Flynn rented instead of buying in Oakland. Unless the start time is past his bedtime, Chargers' quarterback Philip Rivers should have a big game against the Raiders' porous defense.