Christians in politics

A question I keep dealing with, struggling with, etc. etc., is just how involved should Christians be in politics, government and authority. Should Christians strive to take over the government and introduce laws that support all our beliefs, should we run away into the desert or is there a true third way?

NPR’s Speaking of Faith hosted a discussion between Chuck Colson, Greg Boyd, Shane Claiborne to discuss the role of Christians in government.

“The U.S. currency says ‘In God We Trust’ but our economy reeks of the seven deadly sins.” – Shane Claiborne

The show has a lot of great discussion between the three as well as additional notes and such on their website. Check out the site to listen, watch and discuss.

Encourage the prisoner/the persecuted

Got this via e-mail today…

On May 11, 2005 Evangelist Girmay Ambaye, was arrested by security police in Eritrea for witnessing about Christ to people on a city bus. It is the third time Ambaye has been imprisoned for his faith in the last few years.
Please send a letter of encouragement and let Evangelist Ambaye know that you are praying for him and other persecuted believers in Eritrea. Let your friends know about the suffering Christians in Eritrea and encourage them to pray and write to Ambaye.
Your letters make a difference sometimes resulting in shorter prison sentences. Write to Ambaye today and let him know you are praying for him.

According to PrisonerAlert.com there are a number of other Christians being held for their faith in countries around the world.

China – 8
Eritrea – 4
North Korea – 1
Uzbekistan – 1
Vietnam – 2

I’m sure these aren’t the only ones, but they are the ones PrisonerAlert.com (Voice of the Martyrs) is aware of and highlighting. Take a moment and send some encouraging words to our brothers and sisters around the world.

Strangers bring us closer to God

Sara Miles didn’t grow up in the church – she just walked in one day – and now she runs a food pantry right out of the very sanctuary she came to know God in. She shared her story on NPR’s “This I Believe” segment.

That first communion knocked me upside-down. Faith turned out not to be abstract at all, but material and physical. I’d thought Christianity meant angels and trinities and being good. Instead, I discovered a religion rooted in the most ordinary yet subversive practice: a dinner table where everyone is welcome, where the despised and outcasts are honored.

I came to believe that God is revealed not only in bread and wine during church services, but whenever we share food with others — particularly strangers. I came to believe that the fruits of creation are for everyone, without exception — not something to be doled out to insiders or the deserving.

Listening to the story and reading along gave me chills – especially when she came to the ending:

But I learned that hunger can lead to more life — that by sharing real food, I’d find communion with the most unlikely people; that by eating a piece of bread, I’d experience myself as part of one body. This I believe: that by opening ourselves to strangers, we will taste God.

listen to the full story

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ – Matthew 25:35 & 36

McDonaldization, Wal-Martization and Fundamentalism

I think I was able to read two paragraphs this morning while listening to the encounter band practice before church this morning.
Two paragraphs but both quite powerful.
I really enjoy how some of the recent writers I’ve been reading from take “modern day terms” we’re familiar with and put them into context with the Gospel. For instance, rather than an Insurgency in Iraq (meaning a sudden increase in the number of soldiers) these writers would suggest an Insurgency of Love. They challenge me to think of the “third way” that I believe Jesus often told us to live by.

So here’s what grabbed me this morning, in between the band playing Praise you In This Storm and Now My Lifesong Sings

The fact is, all religions of the world are under threat– from fundamentalist Islam, but more, from the McDonaldization and Wal-Martization of the world, from global consumerism, from forces that emanate not from Arabia or Afghanistan, but from New York and Hollywood– forces that make all religions equally superflous, trivial compared to the lust for a new car or a new pair of jeans.

Granted, as I told Laurie, I Twittered about this paragraph on my brand new Blackberry.

How hard it is…

Forging another way

Not sure who said this, but I thought it was a great point brought up in the 1st episode of The Homebrewed Christianity Podcast (around 36 min in):

“The church has been deeply resistant to accept it’s own failures…”

“The people who have had privilege, in this culture particularly, are whining miserably because they’re losing. And part of what you’re teaching is that the old system is that if you disagree with me over these major doctrines than it’s not just that we disagree, there’s a flaw in your character and I can’t talk to you because you will corrupt me if I spend anytime with you. The ability to say there’s another way of talking about this. We must forge another way…”

From the show description:

This is the first of two episodes taken from a conversation between Bill Leonard, Doug Pagitt, Tim Conder, Zach Roberts, and myself. I mostly just listened in to Bill Leonard, the Dean of Wake Forest University’s School of Divinity and professor of church history, have a fascinating conversation with Doug Pagitt and Tim Conder about the Emergent movement and American religion.

UPDATE: And for those of you who aren’t iTunes fan – you can listen to the file here.

Jeremiah Wright’s entire sermon

Jeremiah Wright medic

Well everyone I know has an opinion on Rev. Jeremiah Wright now and what they know or don’t know about “Black Liberation Theology.”

Jeffrey Weis over at the DMN has links to the entire “God damn America” sermon (as a side note – notice he’s not swearing, he’s actually saying, “God condemn America”).

To the many of you who have weighed in here on whether or not Rev. Wright is on target or a hatemonger, I strongly suggest that you personally experience the entire sermon about “Confusing God and government.” There is a lot more to it than you’ve heard or read. More to make you angry, if you are in that direction, and more to make you think, no matter where you sit on this. The overarching theme of the sermon is that governments lie, change, and fail. But that God and Jesus do not.

I haven’t listened to the entire message yet – hope to do so soon. But here’s a couple interesting nuggets that Weis pointed to:

Here’s a nugget to make you mad: “Our money says In God we Trust, and our military says we will kill under the orders of our Commander-in-Chief if you dare to believe otherwise.”

And here’s a nugget that turns the thought that he’s simply anti-white on its head: “Long before there was a red, white and blue colonization, the Egyptian government was doing colonization. They colonized half the continent of Africa, they colonized parts of the Mediterranean. All colonizers ain’t white. Turn to your neighbor and say “oppressors come in all colors.” Hello, hello, hello.”

Listen to the full sermon. Read the sermon.

See what Mike Huckabee had to say.

I have to wonder, is this simply an act of the national media trying to show they’re not absolutely infatuated by Barack Obama as Hillary Clinton’s campaign (and Saturday Night Live) have suggested? Were they desperate for dirt so they simply found a great sound bite they could use to discredit Obama’s campaign?

Share your thoughts (after you read everything in context)….