Volume XV, Issue XIa
Building Bridges
One of my favorite scenes in the movie: 'Remember the Titans' is the one where Gerry Bertier and Julius Campbell realize that they are indeed brothers. Though they are of different cultures in segregated Virginia, they come together as teammates and develop bonds that are far deeper. The film is one we should perhaps dust off in these difficult days and pause as well at the scene where the team runs at dawn to the battlefields of Gettysburg.Coach Herman Boone speaks:
Anybody know what this place is? This is Gettysburg. This is where they fought the Battle of Gettysburg. Fifty thousand men died right here on this field, fightin' the same fight that we're still fightin' amongst ourselves today.
This green field right here was painted red, bubblin' with the blood of young boys, smoke and hot lead pourin' right through their bodies. Listen to their souls, men:
I killed my brother with malice in my heart. Hatred destroyed my family.'
You listen. And you take a lesson from the dead. If we don't come together, right now, on this hallowed ground, we too will be destroyed -- just like they were. I don't care if you like each other or not. But you will respect each other. And maybe -- I don't know -- maybe we'll learn to play this game like men."
Indeed, upon learning of the death of the Reverend Honorable Clementa C. Pinckney and eight of his congregation, I read his biography on the church website. I grieved a brother. The man and I held dear the same things. He died loving the people of G-d and building the Unseen Kingdom. Reverend Pinckney and his little circle were co-laborers in my most cherished work.
Surely that would be a brief thought, only to be lost in the onslaught of politicized news to come in the days to follow.
But I had made a fatal miscalculation. I underestimated the G-d that Reverend Pinckney and I serve (the present tense in intentional, for I believe he stands in the Presence of our shared Master today). To know the true greatness of a man, look at his pupils! As the members of the congregation who had just lost loved ones at the hands of a depraved gunman stepped forward to extend forgiveness to him, I recognized the hand of the Divine in their lives.
As thousands lined the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge, arms and hands joined,to remember and pray; the Divine was at work! Dr. Henry Blackaby tells us to look for G-d at work and join him in that work. That call is clear today.
Magic Garden Morning.
Once, I looked up and I saw Heaven, a world above me brightly shining. My heart cried for wings. I looked around me and saw pain and suffering. The world was grey. I looked down and I saw a child with tear stained cheeks I reached out and grabbed his hand he looked at me and smiled. I saw a flower bloom red and full of life. The child picked the red flower and turned to his mother. She stood alone sad and cold. The child gave the red flower to his mother and her hard face softened I looked and saw a blue rippling stream. The mother saw an old crippled man, who could not move his legs to get a drink. She carried the man to the stream and gave him water to drink. He cried tears of joy. I saw a yellow bird sing. The old crippled man learned the yellow bird’s song and shared it with all he could see and everyone who heard it would feel happy. I saw rainbows shoot across the sky. I went on my way reaching out, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, caring for the sick, seeing for the blind, hearing for the deaf, befriending the friendless, singing to bring happiness, and loving the loveless. Then one day I looked back and realized I had wings all along. My wings had been the love reached out to heal others who were broken. My heart burst with joy.
-- Kristina Elaine Greer
Rainbows Over the Magic Garden.
Builders and Blessed Peacemakers
There is much news in these days. Not all of it is good, yet I firmly believe that beyond all the distractions there is great reason for hope. We have faced dark and troubling times before, yet we have seen the hand of the Divine work through ordinary people... and history was changed by it. So please join me in praying for the hand of the Divine to "give us wings," as my friend Kristina says, to do His bidding. We can, inspired by the Spirit of G-d, build His Kingdom! Here are some stories to spur us on.
Cultural Transformation
Has Isaiah 1:18 Ever Actually Happened?
By Herb Reese
[click to read]
Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” – Isaiah 1:18
I memorized this wonderful and amazing verse as a child. At the time, I was told that it referred to my personal salvation; that when I placed my faith in Jesus Christ, God wiped all of my sin away and sees me as righteous in Christ Jesus.
Unfortunately, Isaiah 1:18 is not talking about my personal salvation – or anyone’s for that matter.
Of course, the Bible teaches in other places that at the moment of our salvation, God forgives us of all of our sin. “To the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness,” Paul writes in Romans 4:5. But personal salvation and forgiveness is not what Isaiah 1:18 is talking about.
What Isaiah 1:18 is talking about is cultural transformation. The reason we know this is from the context. “Woe to the sinful nation!” God says to Israel in verse 4. In verse 7, God again addresses his litany to the entire nation: “Your country is desolate, your cities burned with fire.” Then He turns his anger on Israel’s political leadership: “Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom,” (verse 10). God’s disdain for Israel even includes it’s religious leaders: “The multitude of your sacrifices, what are they to me? says the Lord. I have more than enough of burnt offerings, of rams and the fat of fattened animals” (verse 11).
In reality, what God is doing in the first sixteen verses of Isaiah 1 is making a case for judging Israel. God, as prosecutor, is about to haul the nation into court for judgement. But in verse 18, He’s saying, It’s not too late. We can settle out of court: “Come now, let us settle the matter.”
So what does God want Israel to do in order to settle out of court? In an extremely important statement that all believers need to pay very close attention to, God gives us His conditions:”Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.” (read more)
Daryl Davis.
Daryl Davis's Unique Work
By Benny Johnson
[click to read]
There are many headlines in the news today about fighting white supremacy and the Ku Klux Klan with violence.
However, decades ago 58-year-old Blues musician Daryl Davis learned the most effective way to get a Klansman to give up his hood: friendship.
Daryl Davis has a unique hobby.
In his spare time, he befriends white supremacists. Lots of them. Hundreds. He goes to where they live. Meets them at their rallies. Dines with them in their homes. He gets to know them because, in his words, “How can you hate me when you don't even know me? Look at me and tell me to my face why you should lynch me.” (read more)
Thoughts on Civility
America is at a crossroads, and I believe we should take every opportunity to stand up for the things of God and His Word.” –Franklin Graham
Franklin Graham has traveled to all 50 states in 2016 to hold prayer rallies, to preach the Gospel, and to challenge believers to take a stand and take action. He’s be urged Christians to vote, to live out their faith in every part of their lives, and to pray for our nation just as Nehemiah cried out to God to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem and restore hope to His people.
Sadly, we live in an age of ugliness. We have much rebuilding to do. Many people see the ugliness of our time and for them the answer is simply to respond with more ugliness. Surely ugliness must be opposed, but do we really want our response to leave all of us blind and toothless? We do not want this ugliness in our places of leadership. We cannot tolerate it. We want better from those we choose to represent us.Some of us really want to leave a better world to our children and grandchildren.
All of us have become desensitized to a coarseness our elders would not have tolerated. Our society is very much the poorer for it. Not surprisingly, history tells us that men and women of Faith have lifted decadent cultures before. It happened in ancient Rome where Christians fished the discarded babies from the Tiber River and nurtured them.
It happened during the plague, when Christians cared for the sick when others would not go near... a phenomenon seen again in Philadelphia during the 1793 yellow fever epidemic where two free black men; Absalom Jones and Richard Allen [1.] volunteered to nurse the victims of the fever. In 1794 Allen would become one of the founders of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. It is easy to see that our present culture needs to be lifted. It is quite a challenge to step forward in the calling to lift it.
Yet history teaches us that it can be done, and the effort and risk are well worth it for the sake of our sons and daughters. Here are some thoughts on how our culture has declined, what we have lost, and how we might indeed begin to restore true dignity to the America we love.
Billy Graham Evangelistic Association Photo.
“Let thine ear now be attentive, and thine eyes open, that thou mayest hear the prayer of thy servant, which I pray before thee now, day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants, and confess the sins of the children of Israel, which we have sinned against thee: both I and my father's house have sinned.” -- Nehemiah 1:6
Billy Graham Evangelistic Association Photo.
The Decline of Civility
[click to read]
By Walter Williams
One of the unavoidable consequences of youth is the tendency to think behavior we see today has always been. I'd like to dispute that vision, (read more)
Visions
[click to read]
by Paul Greenberg
Albert Speer, the technocratic master of Adolf Hitler's war machine, busied himself churning out custom-made excuses for his war crimes as that conflict ground on to its bloody end. But what if, in his rush to misjudgment about himself and his motives, he had accidentally stumbled on a truth?
If only he had had a good classical education, Herr Speer sighed, and had paid more attention to each citizen's responsibility for what was being done in the name of We the People, the Reich!, he might have avoided his sad fate. Yes, he might have found himself a martyr to conviction in any case, but that conviction would have been based on something more worthwhile than his own self-promotion.
Is it possible, in today's shrunken little world of American politics, even to imagine such ideals? In the tiny universe bordered on the right by Donald Trump's egotism and on the left by Hillary Clinton's career-long history of dissembling, is there room at all for seriously weighing the merits and demerits of any course of action?
Too many of us are reduced to being watchers, not actors. The worst of it is that, in the end, there is no end in sight. Of course there would be a modern word for this endless emotional boredom: anomie, or the absence of any emotion at all. Depression, the shrinks call it, but it is something much more: a soul-sickness that doesn't even recognize the existence of the soul. (read more)
8200 people gathered in Richmond, Virginia's Capitol Square to pray for our nation. Franklin Graham led them.
Make ready the way of the Lord
Make His paths straight
Every valley will be filled
Every mountain and hill brought low
The crooked will become straight
And the rough roads smooth
And all flesh will see the salvation of God
– ISAIAH 40:4,5
Billy Graham Evangelistic Association Photo.
Praying for our nation in Richmond, Virginia.
The World Trade Center
Remembering September 11, 2001
Where Were You (When The World Stopped Turning)
Alan Jackson
Where were you when the world stopped turning on that September day?
Were you in the yard with your wife and children
Or working on some stage in L.A.?
Did you stand there in shock at the sight of that black smoke
Risin' against that blue sky?
Did you shout out in anger, in fear for your neighbor
Or did you just sit down and cry?
Did you weep for the children who lost their dear loved ones
And pray for the ones who don't know?
Did you rejoice for the people who walked from the rubble
And sob for the ones left below?
Did you burst out in pride for the red, white and blue
And the heroes who died just doin' what they do?
Did you look up to heaven for some kind of answer
And look at yourself and what really matters?
I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell
you the difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith, hope and love are some good things He gave us
And the greatest is love
Where were you when the world stopped turning on that September day?
Were you teaching a class full of innocent children
Or driving down some cold interstate?
Did you feel guilty 'cause you're a survivor
In a crowded room did you feel alone?
Did you call up your mother and tell her you loved her?
Did you dust off that Bible at home?
Did you open your eyes, hope it never happened
Close your eyes and not go to sleep?
Did you notice the sunset the first time in ages
Or speak to some stranger on the street?
Did you lay down at night and think of tomorrow
Or go out and buy you a gun?
Did you turn off that violent old movie you're watchin'
And turn on "I Love Lucy" reruns?
Did you go to a church and hold hands with some strangers
Did you stand in line and give your own blood?
Did you just stay home and cling tight to your family
Thank God you had somebody to love?
I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell
you the difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to G-d
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith, hope and love are some good things He gave us
And the greatest is love
Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day?
Lower Manhattan, New York, New York. Photo by Detective Greg Smedinger
Arlington, Virginia.
Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
The America I Love
Light and Glass, Richmond,Virginia. Photos by Bob Kirchman.
A Common Voice
[clck to read more]
By David Karaffa
A Common Voice is designed to be a place for a thorough discussion of issues that go beyond the agenda in today’s political discourse. We all get tired of the same topics and 30 second sound bites because nothing ever changes. Many of us go to the polls every year and pull the lever for the “R” or the “D.” Anything else we are told is a waste of our vote.
I don’t agree, we are all free-thinking people and to believe that we have to agree with one party on everything is just not true. We are capable of having a civil discussion about what we believe and forming ideas for the future. We should be sharing those thoughts and solutions on various topics that very rarely are explored below the surface.
This website does that. It is a thoughtful sharing of ideas. Many you may agree with; some you may not, and that is just fine. The point is to stimulate thought and encourage an exploration of issues beyond those 280 characters and one-phrase bumper stickers.
Welcome,
David Karaffa (read more)
