Tag: Shane Claiborne

Tuesday Briefs

tuesdaybriefs

highlight(s) of the week ::
We completed the Tour of Dallas Saturday, riding 20 miles in roughly an hour and a half.

Laurie impressed me throughout the race. She smoked me everytime we went down hill and was often several lengths ahead of me as she weaved in and out of the other riders.

Also, turns out she had a busted gear shift so her gear was stuck in a high gear the whole race. So every time we were heading down hill she went to town while I struggled to find a gear that kept me from simply spinning my pedals.

bike

We’re considering another ride in Lancaster on Saturday – but I think we’ll hold off till we see what the weather does.

quote i’m digging ::
“Jesus wasn’t a king who ruled with an iron fist but ruled with a towel – washing people’s feet.” Shane Claiborne

work update ::
Still waiting to hear back on my job interviews. Expected to hear something on Friday or Monday but nothing as of 5 pm today. We’ll just keep waiting.

cars cars and trucks::
Had to take my truck to the shop yesterday. Knew I’d need a new fan clutch which was covered under warranty ($100 deductable) but found out in the process that my left front wheel hub bearing was going out as well. They replaced it as well and while the ticket was well over $900 – I still only paid $100 – making the warranty investment worth what we paid on it.

Unfortunately I’m typing this blog post on my BlackBerry while we wait at Firestone to get a new belt for Laurie’s car. It’ll cost $50 more than what we paid for the work on my truck! Doh!

looking forward to ::
Getting Friday off. Wasn’t expecting it at all but found out yesterday that we get Good Friday off. Should be a nice day to do whatever I feel like.

44/365 a revolution

44/365

44/365
Originally uploaded by Jonathan D. Blundell


a revolution

“‘What a strange way to start a revolution… and a strange way to finish a world tour.’ We worship the seed that died. The revolution will not be televised. It will not be brought to you by Fox News with commercial interruptions… It will not be sandwiched between ads to accelerate your life or be all you can be. There will be no reruns. The revolution will be live. The revolution will be in the streets. The revolution will be cleaning toilets and giving another blanket to Karen. The revolution will not be talking about poverty in hotel ballrooms. It will be eating beans and rice with Ms. Sunshine and watching Back to the Future with our neighbor Mary. Get ready friends… God is preparing us for something really, really — small.”

-Shane Claiborne as quoted in Tom Sine’s book The New Conspirators

—
note: wish i had some mustard seeds on hand, but went with celery seeds instead.

The youth of a nation

Rene Marshall shared a great reflection on the recent violence in Jos, Nigeria and the youth that were involved.

Isaiah - a youth being cared for by ECWA in Jos
Isaiah – a youth being cared for by ECWA that I met while in Jos

“The spiritual decision I made this year in camp was not to steal, no fighting, and no lying. May God give me understanding and love to people, not to be bad to any people in this community.” –Jos ECWA Camp Youth Alive Camper
Two youth campers
Two youths at ECWA Camp

As I read over this evaluation the other day, I could not help but wonder about the camper who wrote it. Was he involved in the recent Jos crisis? Did he have an opportunity to retaliate and involve himself in violence? Did he choose not to in the name of love and Christ-like humility? Has he been an agent of peace and comfort to those in his community now in the wake of the crisis? All of these questions started swirling around in my head and I started to have a new perspective of the situation we’re living in.

Like the rest of the Jos population, the events of late November 2008 set me back on my heels and made me take another look at the city and community I live in. As someone who has devoted her life towards working with youth, specifically, Nigerian youth, my heart ached when I heard that youths were the ones carrying out many of these atrocities.

Rene wonders how different the riots in Jos would have been if more of the youth would have had the chance to learn about real grace.

What if they memorized scriptures like 2 Corinthians 4:8,

“We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed and broken. We are perplexed, but we don’t give up and quit. We are hunted down, but God never abandons us. We get knocked down, but we get up again and keep going…Yes, we live in constant danger of death because we serve Jesus, so that the life of Jesus will be obvious in our dying bodies.”

Or James 1:2-4,

“Whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything.”

Christian author Shane Claiborne has said, “grace is contagious, just like violence.” What if we were able to channel the passion and energy of the youth into spreading grace and not violence?

I have to also think back to my backyard and the neighborhood/city I live in – even the state and country I live in. Are we quick to return violence for violence. Are we so set on revenge that we’ve completely forgotten that God says, “Vengeance is mine.”?

What if as Brian McLaren says, we’re known for an “insurgency of love” rather than an insurgency of shock and awe? Wouldn’t that be the greater shock and awe – if we turned the other cheek – if we sought non-violence rather than revenge?

I still think back to Bush’s Ungiven Speech that McLaren wrote. What if?

Since I hold to the ancient beliefs that vengeance is not a human prerogative and that pride goes before a fall, I have no desire to take our nation down that bitter road. I have become convinced that if we follow a course of war, the results will be undesirable at best and catastrophic at worst. But if we refuse to return violence for violence, if we decide on a response that is at once courageous and peaceful, we can seize this tragic moment as an opportunity not to return evil with evil, but rather to overcome evil with good.

Since September 11, America has experienced an outpouring of emotion from nations around the world. It has been said that on September 11, everyone became an American because all shared our grief and shock. And we Americans learned and felt what so many people in other nations experience on a daily basis: vulnerability, danger, and fear. So in a sense, the whole world has been caught up in a moment of global empathy since that tragic day. I would like to seize upon this moment.

So I am today proposing a plan of peace and security, not through war and revenge, but through cooperation and justice. My plan could be called a plan of courage, character, and cooperation…

If we launch a massive military response to terrorist attacks, we make ourselves appear aggressive and intrusive globally, which plays into the image of us terrorists want to paint, enabling them to recruit more terrorists, launch more attacks, and plunge us farther and farther into their vicious downward cycle. Instead, we must refuse to be drawn into their trap. We must defeat terrorism through broad and multi-faceted international cooperation, dealing collaboratively with its causes and reaching broad international consensus on how to respond when terrorist actions arise.

Martin Luther King Jr wrote ::

Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal.
Through violence you may murder a murderer, but you can’t murder murder.
Through violence you may murder a liar, but you can’t establish truth.
Through violence you may murder a hater, but you can’t murder hate.
Darkness cannot put out darkness. Only light can do that . . .
We will not build a peaceful world by following a negative path. It is not enough to say we must not wage war. It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war but the positive affirmation of peace. We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, a cosmic melody, that is far superior to the dis-chords of war.
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.

Love wins! Now what can you do to prove it to the world?

Shane Claiborne on Buy Nothing Day & Black Friday

Shane Claiborne posted a guest blog entry on the Sojourner blog today and recapped his thoughts on Black Friday and Buy Nothing Day. Loved this story ::

I love the story of one pastor who got fed up with all the decorations and clutter. He began to see that we are in danger of losing the very “reason for the season,” Jesus — the Jesus that was born in the middle of Herod’s bloody genocide, the Jesus who was born a refugee with no room in the inn, the Jesus who knew suffering from the cradle to the cross. This pastor went through the sanctuary the night before the big Christmas service and spread out manure all over the floor — nasty, stinky piles of turd. As folks came in the next day in their best attire, he preached — and did he ever. He preached about how the original story of was not about malls and decorations. He preached about a story that was not pretty. He preached about a God who enters the s**t of this world and redeems all that is ugly and broken. It is a story they will never forget. It is the story of our faith.

Here’s a video from Buy Nothing Day events in Philly – posted by our friend Jamie Moffett – (look for Shane on stilts) ::


(embedded video)

Crazy times

I gave in and joined a couple discussion on Facebook over the weekend about faith and politics.

Several folks whom I consider good friends (and still do) made comments that basically said if you vote for any candidate that supports abortion, you need to really question your salvation and faith.

That really bothers me. But I really don’t want to delve into that here.

For the record, I’m pro-life. Always have been and likely always will be. And I also hope that my pro-life stance doesn’t end with birth of a child. I hope that it goes from conception to the grave. Am I caring for that baby after it’s birth? Am I advocating for quality of life and freedom and justice for that baby as he or she grows into adulthood? Am I advocating that the child will be free from oppression?

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

I will also add that my pro-life stance doesn’t always agree that “life” is the ultimate answer. We tend to think it is. We tend to think that prolonging life is the ultimate goal of medicine. But just because we have the technology to keep a person alive via machine – doesn’t always mean that we should.

But I digress.

Anyways, I wanted to share a couple different views on the election. Two different “Christian” authors have shared some of their thoughts on the election.

This first video is a video of John Piper who shares his thoughts on the unusual challenges this election presents. Such as Sara Palin as VP. Can a woman be “commander in chief?” And what about race and what about abortion? Shouldn’t Barack Obama be concerned about the 12 million unborn babies who have been killed in the U.S.?

Beyond the initial comments, I think Piper makes some great excellent points.

We don’t live for politics. We don’t base our confidence about the future on who gets elected… Let those who vote or do politics do it as though they were not doing it. Which means there is a type of engagement that is not all consuming… We’re not here fully. We have a foot in heaven and a foot on the earth. We are citizens of two kingdoms. This is not our main home. This world is passing away… We know this system is disappearing. We shouldn’t be so worked up about our opponent getting elected that it will undo his life.

The second point of view is from Don Miller. He shares his journey from being a Ronald Reagan Republican to a Barack Obama Democrat.

My Journey from being a Reagan Republican to an Obama Democrat.

I grew up in a Southern Baptist Church along the Gulf Coast in Texas. It was a suburban church nowhere near a bus line, protected as it were from most demographics that didn’t have our common interests. Those interests were embodied in the Republican Party, then led by President Ronald Reagan. Reagan captured our attention with an anti-communist, anti-atheist message, that was easy to understand, emboldening the American people against a clear threat , that of nuclear war and a godless communist regime. Reagan rode that same horse his entire career, even as an actor while President of the Screen Actors Guild, taking stands against blacklisted actors and directors thought to be sympathizers with communist ideology. The Democrats, on the other hand, were squishy, hard to understand, and believed life was complicated. They sounded intellectual and suspicious.

So take some time and dig into these thoughts, these world-views. Do they line up with yours? Does it matter?

I keep going back to Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw’s thought, “What matters more is not who you vote for on Nov. 4 but how you live on Nov. 3 and Nov. 5th.”

Another world is possible!

And one final thought, especially for those of you who haven’t voted yet, “Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.” — John Quincy Adams

UPDATE: @kevinhendricks adds to the Piper conversation on his own blog :: should we pray for the church to suffer?

How would Jesus vote?

This book arrived a little late for me to read (as I had hoped to) before the Oct 27th review deadline.

But it’s still on my stack to read ASAP. I’m wondering if anyone out there has read it and what your thoughts are. I’m still digging Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw’s comment that its more important what you do on Nov. 3 and Nov. 5th than who you vote for on Nov. 4th. I wonder if Dr. James Kennedy says the same in this book. Who do you think Jesus would vote for? And would he even bother?

How Would Jesus Vote?

Summary from the Publisher: The 2008 election is shaping up to be one of the most important political contests in American history. In fact, Dr. D. James Kennedy believes it will be a watershed moment that could impact our very survival as a nation under God.

Values voters—people whose political views and votes are based on their faith in God—are being targeted as never before. As the campaign season moves forward, the significant players will debate terrorism, radical Islam, nuclear threats, global warming, social issues, gay marriage, immigration, education, health care, and many other essential issues that can create sharp ideological divisions.

Into this overwhelmingly complex political situation, Dr. Kennedy and Jerry Newcombe bring a clear, compelling, and nonpartisan exploration of what God’s Word has to say on these critical matters. How Would Jesus Vote? isn’t intended to tell readers which candidates to support; rather it offers a Christ-centered understanding of the world to help readers draw their own political conclusions.

Author Bios:


Jerry Newcombe is senior producer for Coral Ridge Ministries television and has produced or coproduced more than fifty documentaries. The host of two weekly radio shows, he has also been a guest on numerous television and radio talk shows. He is the author or coauthor of more than fifteen books.


Dr. D. James Kennedy is one of the most trusted and recognized Christian leaders of our time. The senior minister of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, he is the featured preacher on television’s “The Coral Ridge Hour” and radio’s “Truths That Transform”, syndicated on over one thousand stations throughout the U.S. The founder and president of Evangelism Explosion International and chancellor of Knox Theological Seminary, he is the author of more than sixty books, including the bestselling What If Jesus Had Never Been Born?