Ponnatee - Sponsoring Pastor

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This month’s featured article

A word about immigration

Ponnatee Nittayapume (pronounced ‘pon-a-tee nit-a-ya-poom’) is our sponsoring Pastor. He has started churches in the USA and in Thailand. He is currently the Pastor of Thai International Baptist Church of Dallas-Ft. Worth.

Ponnatee used to be a diamond dealer. The report below is a beautiful testimony to the effect that Ponnatee has on other people.

“Thoughts About Diamonds”

One day I met a diamond merchant. He was looking at my tiger-eye ring, which I had purchased in Mexico. My ring was made of silver with a tiger-eye stone inset. It had not cost me much money and was not my favorite ring, but I wear it from time to time. Anyway, the diamond merchant took some interest in this ring and I took it off so he could look at it. He pointed out a defect, which made him question the authenticity of the stone, but it did not matter much to me because I felt that I had received my money’s worth from this ring having paid perhaps twenty-five dollars for it. Because it was a ring of little consequence, I pondered in my mind why the diamond merchant would spend so much time to study and discuss this ring and its stone.

Then the diamond merchant asked if I would like to see two loose stones from Asia that he referred to as cat eye. These were impressive stones indeed. They glowed like the eye of a cat and seemed to follow you as you turned them in your hand. He pointed out various aspects of these beautiful stones, but also let it be known that such stones are easily damaged in the working and mounting of them. These were expensive stones, showy and might make their owner proud and boastful, but they were also stones that might not survive a wrong blow or a high temperature.

Then we began to discuss diamonds. The diamond merchant knew a lot about diamonds and he spoke freely, sharing with me his knowledge of grading, of clarity, cut, color and origin of diamonds, which are formed deep within the earth by extreme forces of nature. Diamonds are very hard to find, but where they are more plentiful, the mining of them is controlled by a small group of companies. The distribution, cutting and retailing is also tightly controlled so the pricing is set at a high level making the best, highest quality diamonds affordable to only the richest people. There are also man made diamonds which are forged in the heat and pressure of industrial processes and while intended mainly to be used in an abrasive format in manufacturing processes such as glass cutting and grinding, these diamonds may also find their way to the retail market. “How can you tell a natural diamond from a man made diamond?” the merchant asked me. I puzzled over this question at length and gave a series of answers none of which turned out to be correct. “Was it anything to do with color, weight, cut, ability to scratch glass, hardness?” I asked. “No, none of those,” said the diamond merchant. “Does it have to do with refraction of light something like a prism?” I asked. “You’re getting close,” said the diamond merchant.

Finally, by now out of ideas, I asked the diamond merchant to tell me the answer to the riddle.

He said, “ If you draw a line on a piece of paper and hold the natural diamond over the line and you also hold the man-made diamond over the line, you will see the line through the man-made diamond but you will not see the line through the natural diamond. For the natural diamond is a stone, a rock if you will and it does not act like a prism.” It then struck me that the difference between items of highest value compared to similar items of lower value could be quite subtle and perhaps determinable by the basest of tests such as a line drawn on paper.

Later that night, I wondered what the diamond merchant had really told me. While we had talked of gems and diamonds on one level, we had carried out a different conversation on another level. Perhaps we had been talking about transient values and things of little value to which we humans often are attracted by virtue of their beauty and low cost as compared to things of the highest value, including ideas and beliefs, which also come with a high cost, but are enduring.

Several weeks later, my wife and I went to get her forty-four year old wedding ring set repaired at a jeweler and he found it necessary to apply heat close to the diamond. “Won’t the use of high temperature damage the stone?” I asked. “Not at all,” he replied, “This is a diamond of course.”

Enduring values, enduring marriage and symbolic natural stone, so perhaps that was what the diamond merchant was trying to tell me. Love is the highest value and greatest gift and it is a diamond without parallel in a world full of competing ideas and showier and less expensive stones, including man made gemstones.

Later I thought about how the diamond in its natural state is indeed a stone, a “diamond in the rough” and how it takes the shape of a gemstone according to the insight, desire and skill of the human diamond cutter. So is it true of relationships and of the life we are given to shape as we see fit and in accordance with our values.

Steve Sackmary

7-26-06


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