Barney Wiget's Blog, page 17

Character vs Consumerism

“When Milton Bradley introduced The Game of LIFE in 1860, just before the Civil War, the goals of the board game were to attain virtues like honesty, honor, and bravery and to avoid vices such as crime, disgrace, and idleness. Since rebranding in the 1960s, the goal has been simply to get rich by amassing houses, cars, and perhaps a family along the way, with personal character and morality playing no role whatsoever toward winning the game.”

Inalienable by Eric Costanzo, Daniel Yang, and Matthew Soerens (I highly recommend the book)

“PRO-GOD, PRO-GUN, AND PRO-TRUMP”?

Three mass shootings ending 39 lives and wounding 67 in the last 7 weeks! Come on, America. Let’s get a grip! I don’t know about you but I’m sad and mad at the same time.

Of course, there are a number of contributing factors involved here: bad parenting, mental illness, an American culture of violence as encouraged on gruesome online platforms… But our American gun culture is alone among developed nations in its adoration of its firearms. We have more guns than people in the U.S. (120 guns per 100 Americans). The country with the next highest ratio is Yemen at 52 guns per 100 citizens. Our neighbors to the north have less than 35 per 100. Tell me we don’t love our guns as much as the NRA (NOTHING RATIONAL ALLOWED) tells us to.

The recently passed bill in Congress from both sides of the aisle is encouraging, albeit, in my opinion, not nearly enough. It’s a good start though. Case in point, had “Red Flag Laws” in Illinois possessed enough teeth in them to keep Crimo (the latest gunman) from buying four (not one, but four) guns just before using them to shoot into the crowd at the July 4 parade in Highland Park he would’ve had to remain in his basement and maim virtual people on his computer screen instead.

Crimo attempted suicide in April of 2019. Five months later police responded when he threatened to kill people in his home, leading them to temporarily confiscate 16 knives, a dagger and a sword! Just four months later, per his father’s co-signing, he got his firearm owners identification (FOID) card that permitted him to buy guns.

He also put out dozens of gruesome threatening social media messages. Obviously, his parents bear much of the responsibility for their complicity in the slaughter, as they failed to alert the authorities to their son’s violent threats.

Oh, and don’t get me started on AR-15s! Crimo used a Smith & Wesson M&P15 semiautomatic rifle with three 30-round magazines to fire a total of 83 shots into the July 4 crowd.

It doesn’t make any sense to me that such a firearm belongs in the hands of civilians. 83 shots! He aimed in the general direction of the crowd and pulled the trigger 83 times, only pausing to switch out magazines! How is it that in an allegedly “developed” nation, anyone twenty-one or over can walk into a store, lay down a credit card, and walk out with a weapon with the capability to murder a bunch of people in a minute or two? The shooter dropped the rifle at the scene, but not to worry, he had another one in the car, ready for the next murder scene. He was arrested before he got the chance.

I’m not against guns per se. Target practice, hunting, and when absolutely necessary, self-defense, are all legitimate uses of firearms. The aggressive American gun rights movement is adamant about that and more. But with rights come serious responsibilities. It’s a no-brainer that one ought not to casually own or carry a firearm. After all, they’re sort of dangerous when aimed and fired at humans imprinted with the divine image!

I agree with David French: “The threat is gun idolatry, a form of gun fetish that’s fundamentally aggressive, grotesquely irresponsible, and potentially destabilizing to American democracy.” We see it not only in our plethora of mass shootings, as well as homicides and suicides by gun. We far outreach other countries in all of those categories. 

Is it not disturbing to you that guns are elevated far above their proper place in American life when a leading candidate for Senate runs on a platform that’s “Pro-God, Pro-Gun, and Pro-Trump”? Have you seen the popular t-shirts and signs that declare the wearer “Pro-life, Pro-God, and Pro-gun”? Rep. Brian Babin recently told Newsmax: “The United States of America has always had guns. It’s our history. We were built on the Judeo-Christian foundation and with guns.” I don’t know about you, but I don’t trust him (or anyone else) to be able to know exactly which part is God and which is the gun!

The sign outside a Florida church says:

“Welcome to The River at Tampa Bay Church – Right of admission reserved. This is Private Property – WARNING – Please know that this is not a gun-free zone – We are heavily armed. Any attempt will be dealt with by deadly force. Yes, we are a church and we will protect our people. – The Pastors.”

A bunch of packing church-goers is supposed to make one feel secure while singing “Safe in the Arms of Jesus” ?

PRO-GOD, PRO-GUN, AND PRO-TRUMP! Seriously?

The wicked draw the sword and bend the bow to bring down the poor and needy, to slay those whose ways are upright. But their swords will pierce their own hearts, and their bows will be broken. (Psalm 37:14-16)

“Put your sword back in its place, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.” (Matthew 26:52)

5-Minute Meditations on the Sermon on the Mount (Chapter 9 of WHAT ON EARTH? a book by Barney Wiget)

Suggestions for Personal Reflection, Group Discussion, and Taking Action for:

Chapter 9 of WHAT ON EARTH? / “Blessed are the Broken”

• Merton says, “humility alone can destroy the self-centeredness that makes joy impossible.” How does that work?

• “To a social order that worships strength and decries weakness, where the rich and famous loom over the poor and obscure, this notion of spiritual poverty is utterly nonsensical.” Give an example of this in our culture today.

• What does this mean to you? “Until we recognize our common moral disease, the chasm between classes, races, parties, and nations will only widen.”

Keep an eye out for Chapter 10! Talk soon.

5-Minute Meditations on the Sermon on the Mount (Chapter 8 of WHAT ON EARTH? a book by Barney Wiget)

Suggestions for Personal Reflection, Group Discussion, and Taking Action for:

Chapter 8 of WHAT ON EARTH?  /  The Utterly Upside-Down Attitudes

We contend that there is an “intentional sequence” of Beatitudes. Do you agree?  In which of the Beatitudes do you see “vulnerability”?“Since most of their legislative decisions have moral implications, we must, in good conscience, support those candidates whose values are most aligned with Christ’s and whose policies benefit the common good and not just our own personal agendas.” Agree or disagree and why?

Keep an eye out for the next chapter. Talk soon!

Trading Our Testimony for a Bowl of Stew and a Few Federal Judges

“We should pray for presidents, critique them when they’re wrong, praise them when they’re right, and never, ever impose partisan double standards. We can’t ever forget the importance of character, the necessity of our own integrity, and the power of our prophetic witness.” (David French)

I wrote this three years ago and IMHO it applies today as much, no, more than it did then. That was before his two impeachments and January 6!

Here are my “closing arguments” on Chris Buskirk’s article on the “American Greatness” site. He claims that by supporting Donald Trump’s presidency our Christian testimony is not at all compromised. I beg––even plead––to differ! Please see my last two posts for context.

Can Christians Support Donald Trump Without Risk to Their Witness? Are Donald Trump’s Sins Worse Than Other Presidents?

I hate it when people misuse the Bible and to justify their preconceived political notions. It’s up to you to decide whether or not my interpretation of Scripture falls into the same category.

Buskirk says that some people, “wrap themselves in pious, Christianist rhetorical flourishes and scriptural references. But by conflating the role of the secular and the sacred, by attempting to immanentize the world which is to come, they misrepresent orthodox Christian teaching about the role of Church and the practice of secular politics to the detriment of both.”

In English he’s saying that they use the Bible to back up their view that we are supposed to actually be used by God to change make the world a better place. And that’s a problem?

His $50 words notwithstanding, if we’re not here to improve the world, then why are we here? Jesus said, “Greater works than mine shall you do…” and that the world will “see our good works and glorify the Father in heaven…” We’re “ambassadors for Christ” says Paul. And Jeremiah says, “Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jeremiah 29:7).

By the way, to “immanentize the world” means to bring the contents of heaven here on earth. Is that not what Jesus meant when he told us to pray: “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”? If our kingdom priorities don’t impact our political ideology then I doubt they’re truly kingdom.

Buskirk says, “Voters have both a right and an affirmative obligation to prioritize public virtue. And that’s exactly the calculation that Christian Trump voters made in 2016 and are almost certain to make again in 2020.”

Are you kidding me? In what universe does Donald Trump serve as an example of “public virtue”? I don’t know what faith to which Buskirk ascribes, but for a man who quotes the Bible and tosses around grandiose theological terms, I can’t begin to imagine his version of “virtue.”

He rails on Nancy French for referring to Isaiah 5:20, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” He claims that she takes the verse out of its context, which he says is, “the redemption offered by the Gospel to which Isaiah was pointing.” All you have to do is skim that chapter to see that it contains nothing about redemption or the gospel. The whole chapter is about God’s judgment for his people Israel for their sin, and in my view very much applies to the values and policies of Donald Trump.

I can only imagine that Buskirk is banking on his readers either being unfamiliar with Scripture or won’t check up on his use of it. He’s definitely got his own preferred “alternative facts” method of biblical interpretation!

Then Buskirk has the audacity to say, “Using gratuitous, out-of-context quotes from the Bible to support one’s preferred political program is an abuse of scripture.” I couldn’t agree more, but isn’t it exactly that which he does throughout his article?

For example, he uses Bible characters Joseph, Daniel, and Esther in the most bizarre way:

“Did Joseph undermine his public witness as a prophet of God by serving Pharaoh even as he held the Israelites in captivity? What about Daniel, who served the fantastically pagan Nebuchadnezzar? Or Esther, who married the murderous, libertine emperor Xerxes?”

I don’t get his point at all since those three served in their posts with integrity. Plus, Pharaoh didn’t, as he suggests, hold the Jews in captivity during Joseph’s lifetime. They were guests of the Egyptian leader who deeded them choice property. They weren’t slaves in Egypt until Joseph was dead and the next Pharaoh took power. And what about Daniel and Esther? That they served pagan kings has nothing to do with his argument that Mr. Trump’s sins don’t disqualify him as president. It’s a weird mix of non sequiturs.

He seems to think that if he throws out a bunch of Bible names and stories that people will swallow what he’s serving without testing it first. He must not think much of either the Bible itself or of Christians’ knowledge of it.

As though it lends him credibility, he quotes a seminary professor: “Scripture says nothing specifically about the concrete decisions that Christians must make about voting, party affiliation, details of public policy, or political strategy. These are decisions of moral gravity, but they are not decisions that one Christian can impose upon the conscience of another Christian.”

I agree that the details of policy and strategy aren’t spelled out in Scripture. It is, however, our job to hold lawmakers and law-enforcers accountable to set the nation’s course in the direction that best benefits ALL of its citizens. Tell the African slaves and their progeny plus the citizens of Flint, Michigan that the Bible doesn’t speak to their plight and that God doesn’t expect specific action to be taken to fix it through voting, advocating for justice, and applying as much pressure as is needed to get our elected officials to do the right thing.

So, when Christians advocate for President Trump do they risk eroding the integrity of their testimony, and by association, our collective witness? To my mind, absolutely!

John Fea writes: “Too many of its leaders (and their followers) have traded their Christian witness for a mess of political pottage and a few federal judges.* It should not surprise us that people are leaving evangelicalism or no longer associating themselves with that label—or, in some cases, leaving the church altogether.”

*In case you’re not familiar with the reference…

Well? What do you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts…

Pay attention to what you hear!

“Pay attention to what you hear.” (Mark 4:24)

I’ve watched or listened to each of the House Select Committee’s January 6th Hearings in their entirety so far. It’s been time-consuming as well as an emotionally grueling exercise. It was worse than I imagined, and I imagined it would pretty bad! Nevertheless, I feel it’s a necessary one for someone who cares about our country and the Church that resides in the middle of it all. While I already had a profound distaste for our former president’s performance, these hearings have done nothing but corroborate my view that Mr. Trump was the most contemptuous and unqualified for the job of any of the other forty-five to hold the office.

I’m aware that millions won’t follow along with the evidence to this effect, and instead let Tucker Carlson or some other talking head do their thinking for them. Others will argue that the hearings are a setup by the “libs” who “hate America” and all it stands for. Some, with their heads in the sand, consider politics an evil business incompatible with their “spirituality.” Like the tree falling in the forest, if they don’t hear it, it didn’t happen. It’s one thing to have no interest in social or political issues, and another to avoid it as so much “worldliness.”

So far, these hearings have relied almost exclusively on the testimony of conservative Republicans and members of then-President Donald Trump’s inner circle. While all but two on the committee are Democrats, the lion’s share of the evidence about the case are coming from inside his own party. Witnesses include former Attorneys General (remember, he had a bunch of them!), members of the Trump re-election team, Trump staff members, and his lawyers. Even his own children are quoted from their emails and texts on January 6th as having urged him to put a stop to the violence brewing in the capitol.

The plethora of evidence of his egregious mendacity is too much to recount here. You can watch the hearings in their entirety on your own on YouTube. My point is that anyone who pays attention to what they hear should simply and swiftly find the nearest trash can and toss in their MAGA attire! Their “Jesus is my Savior and Trump is my President” yard sign belongs in there next. It’s time to let go of this man. Though, for his riches and power, he’ll never be justly held accountable for his crimes against America, it’s time to put him in our rearview mirror and wave good-bye forever!

I speak specifically to my sisters and brothers in Christ. Pay attention to what you hear, to what you know in your heart is true. No matter how many false prophets predict his resurgence to the White House, no matter how many ridiculous Tucker commentaries you watch, or how many times Trump bloviates his Big Lie––it’s time to pay attention to what’s true about him and his malicious agenda. You know that he is a twice-impeached, narcissistic serial liar whose leadership style is impetuous, adversarial, petty and ineffective. These hearings put him on display for the man he is and always has been.

It’s time to let go of all the “what-about” excuses you’ve made for him for the last six years. Comparing his sins to the previous and present leaders of the country is a fool’s errand. You know that he’s unfit for the office and is a danger to all Americans. Like Brian McLaren said, “There’s no shame in admitting you were conned. The shame is in refusing to see it so the con continues.”

Everyone is born with something called a “conscience,” a moral compass. Keep in mind that it only works if you don’t shut it out in order to believe and do anything what you want. Having watched Trump for all these years, it’s my opinion that he functions without the benefit of such a compass. If he has one, instead of pointing to truth, reality, and the divine, his compass, like a boomerang, only points back at him!

I know I sound terribly critical, but as Mort Sahl once said, “If I criticize somebody, it’s because I have higher hopes for the world, something good to replace the bad.” I believe that the example and teaching of Jesus is that something “good.” While I don’t expect any elected officials to act like Christians, I do expect them to display at least a modicum of simple decency. We should all know by now that Mr. Trump possesses little to no sense of what is good for anyone but himself.

If, in order to get conservative judges on the Supreme Court and overturn Roe v Wade, you voted for Trump once, or God-forbid––twice, news flash, he did it, and they did what you had hoped. So move on. You don’t need him anymore!

So many Trump-drunk evangelicals (White ones in particular) subordinated their faith to partisan loyalties and political power, ravaging our Christian reputation in the process. Trump apologists’ deal with the devil has profoundly damaged our efforts to point people toward our Jesus, not an Americanized Jesus or a partisan hood ornament Jesus, but the Lord Jesus Christ of our Bibles!

My concern is not so much what Mr. Trump has done to the presidency, but rather what we as a nation have allowed him to do to us. We have sunk low with him and allowed our discourse to be stripped of truth, civility, and a commitment to the common good.

I challenge you to pay attention to what you hear, to think outside your bias and party loyalty, and proceed into the future aiming to be more like Jesus. You certainly don’t have to agree with me or think like me, but I challenge you to be more like him with “the same mindset as Christ Jesus…” (Philippians 2:5).

[You might (or might not) be interested in my 6-part series called, The Danger of Donald Trump: https://barneywiget.com/2020/09/24/the-danger-of-donald-trump-part-1/%5D

I Still Love Her

Someone said: “Church history is a beautiful melody poorly performed.”

If you’ve read much of the stuff I’ve written in the past decade or so, you’ve undoubtedly noticed that I’m pretty hard on the Church. It’s true. I have been. I can’t help but notice how far from the mark many of us are, let alone big swaths of those of us who identify as Christ followers who don’t seem to be actually following, but leading apart from our Leader. And then there are whole churches that in their dogged loyalty to political party or conspiracy theories seem to have lost their way, if not their minds. Nevertheless…

With all her flaws and frailty, I still love her. She may have members who appear nearly as fundamentalistic and as her Muslim counterparts. (Have you heard how you can tell a fundamentalist? He only has two colors in his box of crayons: black and white!) She may be nationalistic and proud of it. (Remember 01/06/22?) I often become discouraged, if not depressed about her racist and materialist tendencies, but I still love her, and doing my best to love the individuals who display these.

How am I doing, you say? Haltingly and, most of the time, kicking and screaming.  

She’s pocked and pathetic by her own doing, but she’s family, my tribe, and I love still her.

Moreover, the Lord of his Church loves her. Of all persons, he knows well her blemishes and hypocrisies yet still adores her. And because he does, I do. She’s his bride, his lover. And if he can love her, so can I.

I still love the Church for all she’s done for me. It began when I first turned myself in to God. I was a drug-taking seventeen-year-old that found my way into a church, limped down the aisle, knelt at the altar and wept till I emptied my tear ducts. That very conservative body of people, predominantly composed of my grandparents’ generation, loved on me like I was their very own. In spite of our dissimilarities, they became family.

Skipping over a few years, the churches I attended were ones I planted and pastored. Though tempted to playing hooky, attendance was compulsory! (I used to say, “They pay me to be good, you guys are good for nothing!”) As chief cook and bottle washer I was privy to all their defects, and unfortunately, I always felt compelled (by my own sick inclination) to fix them myself. It made pastoring more difficult for me than it had to be. But the friends I made over the years in those churches made it all worth it. Many of them showed me an insightful love for God that I would come to emulate, at least in part. Their generosity, sincerity, and love for the least, last, and lost inspired me to continue.

After my pastoring days came to an abrupt end, I went to serve the unhoused in San Francisco for eight years. I took it upon myself to sample churches, not just ones whose traditions or theology mirrored my own, but houses of worship of all shapes, colors, and size. It was a learning curve to be sure, one that expanded my thinking about God and his Church. I was often in tears experiencing God’s presence in places I never thought I would go.

These days, I love my local church here in Santa Cruz. Is it blemished? Are all the pastors and people perfect? Of course not! But I see Jesus there. And I have friends there. I feel the Spirit when I go there to worship. I learn about God from pastors much younger and less experienced than me. As a mere attender, I’m not privy to all its flaws. Thank God! Some of the defects are obvious, but so much the more, the strengths and commendable traits. I still love the Church.

I love her enough to stay close to her, to be part of her. And I love her enough to correct her, to exhort her to be better. I love her too much to let her languish in her lukewarmness without telling her so. I know I often sound like a contrarian, a curmudgeon (defn: a bad-tempered old fart). But I just want us to be better, not for our own sake. Not so we can boast about how great we are in comparison to other churches. But so we can live for the mother of all goals: the glory of God and the good of people!

In the meantime, I’ll do my best to overlook some of her blemishes and soiled wedding dress. And love her for what she does for me and whatever good she does in the world. We may disagree about theology, culture, and how to go about mission. But we are family. We belong to one another like body parts, where one part would be unwise to say to another, “I don’t need you!” Where the weaker parts are “indispensable.” Where when one suffers, the rest suffer with it and gives honor to the parts that lack it.

“The Church is not the hope of the world; its purpose is to be a witness to the hope of the world, even if that witness is often imperfect. But those of us of the Christian faith do seem to be overdoing the imperfect part. (Peter Wehner)

In spite of all her imperfections, I still love the Church. Do you?

5-Minute Meditations on the Sermon on the Mount (Chapter 7 of WHAT ON EARTH? a book by Barney Wiget)

Suggestions for Personal Reflection, Group Discussion, and Taking Action for:

Chapter 7 of WHAT ON EARTH? / The Inconvenient Politics of Jesus

Give an example when Jesus communicated with authorityGive an example when he comported himself politicallyGive an example when he confronted power fearlessly

Keep an eye out for the next chapter. Talk soon!

Are We Ready for the End of Roe?

For decades, many, including myself, have prayed and voted for lawmakers to overturn Roe. Tiny humans inside the womb bear the Maker’s image and deserve to live with all the care and love that he intends. So, in that sense, I’m ready for Roe to end, and the law of the land to run parallel of the law of God.

But there’s another way in which we as a country might not be as ready for Roe to be toppled as we think. You may or may not be “ready” personally, but collectively we’re not prepared, especially in communities and states that are the most adamant about their “pro-life” stance and most poised to ban abortion. How so, you say?

Most of the women having abortions aren’t privileged, liberal femi-nazis. They’re women who feel like they don’t have another option as a result of meager resources. The hard truth is that poor women are four times more likely to have unplanned pregnancies, five times more likely to have unintended births and three times more likely to have an abortion than their higher – income counterparts. The financial component isn’t everything, but it does impact the abortion rate in America and the quality of life for children. If we fight for babies before they’re born and do not work toward solving our vast social inequities afterward and for the rest of their lives, we may be pro-birth but we’re not truly “pro-life.”

“What we’re facing as a country is hundreds of thousands of births, probably disproportionately located in the states that have been most limited in what they do for pregnant women, infants and children,” said Sara Rosenbaum, a health law and policy professor at George Washington University. Not to say that there are any regions with an adequate safety net for the oncoming onslaught of pregnant women of meager means giving birth.

You’ve undoubtedly heard that our national foster and adoption systems are woefully deficient and unprepared for the mounting number of new babies coming to full term while Roe is still in place, let alone after. I’m not suggesting that it’s a bad thing that Roe gets the boot, but that we have to do what we should’ve been doing for decades to shore up these programs and provide them with better funding so that, to coin a phrase, no child (or mother) gets left behind. We’re going to need to vastly improve our child welfare system, that is, if we who call ourselves “pro-life” care about image bearers from womb to tomb.

According to a report by the March of Dimes in 2020, more than 2 million women of childbearing age live in counties that have no hospital offering obstetric care, no birth center and no obstetric provider. That should shock us one and all! You’ve heard of “food deserts” in poor neighborhoods making it difficult if not impossible for people to access enough healthy food for their families. The reality is that there are also “maternity care deserts” where women feel they have little choice but to abort their babies. And with that soon to become illegal in most states, they’ll either have to scrape together the money to travel to another state or get life-threatening abortions as they did prior to Roe.

Where does the Church fit into this scenario? For decades we’ve marched, protested, and voted for what we call “pro-life” policies and candidates. What we’ve neglected (in general) is to address the lives of the mothers and babies beyond the maternity ward, when there is one to neglect.

I’m not condoning the abortion choice, but providing some context for most of the pregnant women who tend to make that choice. And if we don’t address the social and economic conditions that facilitate that decision, our pro-life moniker is just something we put on a bumper sticker or t-shirt instead of a genuine heartfelt conviction.  

Of course, I’m not saying that all individual Christians have entirely dropped the ball. I have several friends who have adopted babies whose mothers either opted to adopt or whose children were removed from them, usually for good reason.

I’m not suggesting that the Supreme Court should delay until we’re ready. But we need to get ready, and fast! And the Jesus-following pro-life community needs to act consistently pro-life and wield its biblically informed conscience to influence the state toward a more just and mercy-filled approach to what’s coming. The hard work of activism that many have performed for many years must be reallocated to collectively support candidates and policies that provide health care and better educational opportunities in marginalized communities. “The best way we can celebrate the children who will be born of Roe’s demise,” says Timothy Dalrymple, President of Christianity Today, is to love the mothers who raise them.”

I know of one church where the members adopted over 100 children in the past 13 years. There’s a ministry called “Promise686” named for Psalm 68:6 that says God “sets the lonely in families.” They’ve supported nearly 500 adoptions through grants and other assistance. There’s another ministry called, “Every Mother’s Advocate (EMA) in Florida poised to care for women in crisis pregnancies. Their founder says, “When a mom is advocated for, families are preserved; fostercare statistics plummet; and the foster care system’s pipelines to poverty, prison, addiction, and homelessness begin to slowly fade.”

We can volunteer to serve at domestic abuse shelters or share our wealth with expectant but under-resourced families or work with “adoption” ministries or organize for better education in underserved communities or work on initiatives for childcare or create “Parent’s Night Out” programs at our churches or mentor young mothers or teach youth about chastity and birth control, and take young pregnant women into our homes to carry their babies full term. 

We mustn’t think our work for the unborn is finished just by the reversing Roe. The time, energy, and finances many of have put into changing the law for decades must be turned into what might be even more arduous to selfishly serve our communities in a number of ways, beginning with fostering, adopting, and taking women in crisis pregnancies under our wing. Crisis pregnancy centers, foster care and adoption programs will need to be exponentially multiplied.

Local churches must, while standing in ovation for the Supreme Court, quickly get to work carving out time, manpower, and funds to create indigenous and contextualized programs to address the crisis that’s coming. We’ve traditionally been a day late and a dollar short acting on social problems well after they’re thoroughly entrenched in the culture. This time we have a heads up on what’s just around the corner. Rather than waiting till we’re overwhelmed, we can actually prepare ahead of time by “doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God” (Micah 6:8).

We must “Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow” (Isaiah 1:17).

WHAT ON EARTH? On A More Personal Note

I thought it might be good at this point to be a little more personal and tell ya’ll what’s going on with my health and share some of my future writing goals. If that would be of no interest to you, you have my blessing to skip this (not that you needed it) and go on to the next chapter in my book: WHAT ON EARTH? Considering the Social Implications of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.