(Salutes) And I pledge allegiance to the.....

Is there anything for us to do about the state of the nation? With church change almost becoming chic, I wonder if we will lose touch with what everything is about in the first place. I hate that the images I see around me are almost high school-esque. Cool kids and cool churches, the not cool ones being the ones that aren’t listening to Jesus.

What the???

I don’t know when the heart of it all got left behind but it feels like it sometimes. I know it is difficult, so difficult sometimes, to not get caught up in ourselves, but if we start listening to Jesus I think we can make it. If we just read his word and follow his laws, not the laws of man, listening to our hearts conviction from the movings of the Holy Spirit, we will get by. I have been up and down, learning and growing. I have been cultivated, drenched, and starved. The drought never lasts long enough for death, and the rain and sun visit me often. There are blessings all around, there is God among us.

So our responsibility to our nation lies not in the duties of that nation, but rather to the one in which we were called most resemble.

Movements or allies, enemies and politics, why do we cling to you? Or…why do I? What am I looking for that Jesus does not already offer me? Nothing. That is why offering myself to others is the greatest way I can love Jesus. Simply one of the only ways we can love him here on earth. Yes, we honor him with our lives, and we honor him with our specified acts of worship. Yet how many times do we mess up, sin, live for ourselves, have our minds completely wander off to that new CD or where we will visit for lunch in our supposed “worship moment.” If we are serving others in the midst of our flaws and messups and hang-ups, is this not far better than having the same flaws and messups with a totally self-serving attitude. Belief that loving Christ is separate from how we treat others? He made us all. He MADE us ALL. The cross was for us all. Yes, it was for us all.

All: lovers and haters and fighters and Germans and and artists and Fascists and Socialists and Chinese and Buddhists and Catholics and Reformed whoevers and Eckists and saints and sinners and Jews and actors and the poor and the rich and the Gentiles and the Colombians and the Canadians and the hunters and the writers and the teachers and the Swiss and the chocolate lovers and the immigrants and the Americans and the George Bushes and the Tom Cruises and the minimalists and the anti-Semitics and the anti-Gays and the unionists and the Belgian and the Soviets and the lesbians and the Asians and the whites and the atheists and the Satanists and the crazies and the killers and the rapists and the child molesters and the young and old.

And in His way, let us not only love but reach out to and care for the poor, oppressed, the homeless and the widows. Lest we will stray too far from our calling.

The upside of truth and anger

Justice. How are Christ followers called to justice? How can we create a system of justice and seek justice in our own communities in the midst of strife and injustice inside our own walls. The world oppresses and in turn the church oppresses. In my lifetime and I believe probably since the Medieval church rose to power, the church, a large majority of the time, has accepted the status quo. The status quo being an acceptance of the systems that govern our societies. While we have always said our MORALS are different, giving us a certain air, we have not too often said our way of governing time, money, others, or our way of viewing the political and social system was defined as countercultural. Often subcultural in nature Christians will create a mirror image of society at large and call it Christian, because well, Christians are a part of it. Not that it is “Christ-like.”

How is it faith when it is not lived out and breathed out everyday. Are we really having faith or we living by fear? If we don’t know Jesus we have to know we will never desire to live like him. So if we are wondering where our compassion is, where our goodwill or right living is, we have only our relationship with Christ and others to examine.

The question is: Do we, as Christ followers, really want that? Or would we rather live from the fear of going to hell and continuously fulfill ourselves with empty pleasures and the extreme highs, lows and crashes that come with that. Do not misunderstand, everyone, regardless of lifestyle, will experience difficulty. But when you are going through these valleys, will you look out on desolation and gray sky, or will you be wrapped in the arms of your Father, seeing at least the hope of a light dawning?

I think my deep longing and question lies in not being able to penetrate this understanding into the Christians and so-called Christ followers surrounding me. There are sunny days I see hope. I believe that I am being granted a pure moment of joy when I discover other like minded people, but in the morning rain might be falling and the bombardments of worldly people, Christian or not, sits on my soul like a dark cloud.

How does the belief in justice change this? How does belief in Christ shape this belief? Examine the minute details that exist in your life that might accept the status quo. Houses being built on your street for $500,000 to keep diversity away…the political system that accepts and allows and desires minority groups to depend on the system. As long as you are dependent you lack the power to change things. Dependence causes a mindset, sometimes even subconsciously. Humanity, at least the ones who are aware, need to step up and step out of the shadows to raise awareness about the self interests everywhere, especially lying in the wake of American imperialism, that groups and peoples do not even know they have, because they do not even know it cannot be different. Well, it can. Jesus died, and with that he took away the division that the world still holds onto. What are we doing still grasping it like our security blanket?

What are you going to do about it??? Whatever you have conviction about, seek justice in that conviction. Seek the life giving justice that Christ so readily gives. And then thank Him for being able to…