We need to learn from the African-American church how to pursue justice precisely because we understand and live the gospel. And we need to learn from the African-American church that justice and liberation are not idols to worship, or themes to supplant the gospel. Black Church history has enough in it to teach both sides of the issue, to keep us from falling off either side of the horse.
I ran across this poem in Mark Dever's chapter entitled "2 Corinthians: Weakness" in his book The Message of the New Testament: Promises Kept. It was written by a Congregational minister named Edward Shillito during World War I.
If we have never sought, we seek Thee now;
Thine eyes burn through the dark, our only stars;
We must have sight of thorn-pricks on Thy brow;
We must have Thee, O Jesus of the Scars.
The heavens frighten us; they are too calm;
In all the universe we have no place.
Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?
Lord Jesus, by Thy Scars we claim Thy grace.
If when the doors are shut, Thou drawest near,
Only reveal those hands, that side of Thine;
We know today what wounds are; have no fear;
Show us Thy Scars; we know the countersign.
The other gods were strong, but Thou wast weak;
They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne;
But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak,
And not a god has wounds, but Thou alone.
Dever comments, "If you stop and think about these words, you will begin to be deprogrammed from the world's lies and you will begin to be reeducated about what it means to be a Christian."
Kelly paints the Earth while Jupiter awaits its turn1 1/2 cups butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 cups brown sugar
4 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
4 1/4 cups flour
4 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/3 cups oatmeal
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups granola: use any kind you'd like
1 1/2 cups chopped pecans
1 1/2 cups Craisins
1 1/2 cups apricots
Today is Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday.Stand with anybody that stands RIGHT. Stand with him while he is right and PART with him when he goes wrong.
...I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord's side.
Self-Esteem and the Fear of ManShame and low self-esteem are both rooted in Adam's sin. They both are governed by the perceived opinions of others, and the both involve "not feeling good about ourselves." The only difference is that our word "shame" still retains the idea that we are ashamed before God as well as before other people, while self-esteem is seen as strictly a problem between ourselves and other people, or a problem just within ourselves.One of my favorite parts of that quote is the word "perceived." How often do you (and I) look at others and assume what they are thinking about you? Just recently I had an experience when someone told me what they thought my husband was thinking...and they couldn't have been farther from the truth. But their statement exposed their shame in that moment, assuming that David was thinking the worst of them when in fact he was trying to help them in a practical way.
They found themselves standing on the very edge of the Wild Wood. Rocks and brambles and tree-roots behind them, confusedly heaped and tangled; in front, a great space of quiet fields, hemmed by lines of hedges black on the snow, and, far ahead, a glint of the familiar old river, while the wintry sun hung red and low on the horizon. The Otter, as knowing all the paths, took charge of the party, and they trailed out on a bee-line for a distant stile. Pausing there a moment and looking back, they saw the whole mass of the Wild Wood, dense, menacing, compact, grimly set in vast white surroundings; simultaneously they turned and made swiftly for home, for firelight and the familiar things it played on, for the voice, sounding cheerily outside their window, of the river that they knew and trusted in all its moods, that never made them afraid with any amazement.
As he hurried along, eagerly anticipating the moment when he would be at home again among the things he knew and liked, the Mole saw clearly that he was an animal of tilled field and hedge- row, linked to the ploughed furrow, the frequented pasture, the lane of evening lingerings, the cultivated garden-plot. For others the asperities, the stubborn endurance, or the clash of actual conflict, that went with Nature in the rough; he must be wise, must keep to the pleasant places in which his lines were laid and which held adventure enough, in their way, to last for a lifetime.
