jumpingjersey

Life · Ministry · Faith

Author: Stephen (Page 9 of 17)

Fire is Life

September 29, 2015 /

campfire

One of my proudest moments as a Boy Scout came while on a winter camping trip as a guest of another troop. As one might expect, significant rivalries can exist between Scout troops, ours was no different. Each task became an attempt to show whose troop was the best. So it was that a little contest was set-up to see who could build a fire the quickest. Each of us was given one match and the charge to build a fire. The first to do it gained the glory for his troop. I should point out the little detail of there being two feet of snow on the ground, just to make it a challenge. At the shout “Go!” we each trudged through the snow and into the woods to figure out the challenge. Much to the opposing troop’s disgust ,in less than five minutes I had a raging fire going. The others had not yet even figured out how they were going to do it. It was an unprecedented trouncing of the competition. How did I do get a fire going so quickly in two feet of snow and with only one match? I can assure you I didn’t cheat in any way, but if I told you I would have to kill you. Sorry, I must maintain the pride of my troop. Why was it an important challenge? In a survival situation, the ability to build a fire can mean the difference between life and death.

In fact, for all of us, fire is life. Having a fire means the ability to stay warm when it is cold. Having a fire means the ability to safely prepare food. Around the fire, community happens. Stories are told and the legacy of generations is passed down. Even in our suburban homes, fire is still life. The fire may be a Lennox furnace, a Maytag stove, and a Kenmore microwave, but its importance to life is no less significant.

A person whose fire has gone out is in a vulnerable position. The cold night may suck their life away. The inability to prepare food puts them on the edge of starvation, because fire is life.

A few months ago, I was having a conversation with a fellow pastor. In that meeting, he shared with me an insight from an Egyptian Christian pastor that he knew. The insight pertained to a passage of scripture I never really understood. The passage comes from Romans 12 and Paul is giving instruction as to the practical realities of living as a follower of Jesus in a hostile world. Paul says to his readers, quoting Proverbs 25 “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Romans 12:20-21, NIV).

It seems that Paul has turned his own words onto their head. Is he really saying that our hospitality is an opportunity for us to heap guilt and suffering upon our enemy, as though we were pouring burning coals on their head? In effect, we serve them as a way to get back at them? While this meaning is not consistent with the surrounding verses, it certainly does seem to be the most obvious interpretation of the text. It’s an interpretation I have heard preached many times. Still it has never sat well with me as it appeared to be inconsistent with the larger context of the passage and the Bible. That was until my a recent conversation with my pastoral colleague. He shared that the Egyptian pastor said, as a middle easterner, he reads this passage differently. For him, fire is life. To heap burning coals upon your enemy’s head is to fill a jar with coals that may be taken home, carried upon the person’s head, so that they may restart their own fire. It is to give life to one whose fire has gone out. In effect Paul is saying, when your enemy has come to the edge of death and their defeat is imminent, give them life. Overcome the evil of your enemy with the goodness of life.

For millions of Syrians, their fire has gone out. They are in desperate need of someone to heap burning coals upon their heads and give them life before it slips away in the bitter night. Many Christians are tempted to look upon their suffering with fear. We wonder how many of their ranks are really members of ISIS, our enemy. Could we, by welcoming these refugees into our lives really be giving aid to our enemy and giving life to a person who, by our doing nothing, would be defeated? If our enemy’s fire has gone out, should we not let the darkness envelop them? Would this not be in the best national interest of our country?

Maybe it would be, but as citizens of the Kingdom of God, we live by a different standard of life. Our king says to us something so radical as “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.”

Pastor Stephen

Are we on the run?

September 21, 2015 /

crowded street
As I see the images of Syrian children washed up on Mediterranean beaches, my thoughts go to another fugitive—much older but hardly wiser. His name? Jonah. Unlike today’s refugees, however, Jonah wasn’t fleeing war, violence or hunger. He was running away from God. More precisely he was running away from the opportunity to be used as a conduit of God’s compassion. Jonah reveals his heart in Jonah 4:1-3:

But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. He prayed to the LORD, ‘O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, O LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live. (NIV)

Thousands of people in the ancient city of Nineveh (modern day Mosul, Iraq) repent and turn to God in sackcloth as a result of Jonah’s words, and Jonah’s response is to ask God to kill him. “It is better for me to die” (Jonah 4:3), he says, than to live and see you extend compassion to these people.

Jonah is angry. Really, really angry and perhaps rightfully so. After all, the Ninevites were Assyrians, people who weren’t afraid to flay Jonah’s countrymen alive in front of their wives and children and impale others on poles. In Jonah’s book, they were the absolute worst kind of people.

And yet God has a message for Jonah. Jonah thinks he has a right to be angry, but God has a right to be concerned. And so when Jonah stomps off and builds a shelter out of a few tree limbs, God does something. He sends a “Jack and the Beanstalk” type of vine–one of those vines that grows up super quickly. Sitting out in the hot sun all day, Jonah is exuberant about the vine and the shade it provides. However, the next morning his happiness once again turns to anger as God sends a worm to chew on the vine that God had made to grow. By mid-morning, he is steaming. The vine is wilted, the sun is beating down, and God has sent a scorching east wind. Once again he says, “It would be better for me to die than to live” (Jonah 4:8).

“But God said to Jonah, ‘Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?”

“I do,” Jonah said, “I am angry enough to die.” (Jonah 4:9)

“But the LORD said, ‘You have been concerned about this vine, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?’” (Jonah 4:10-11). Jonah does not have a reply and neither do we. Suddenly we learn that God’s concerns are different and greater than our own. While we are worried about how someone has injured us or fearing someone taking advantage of us, God not only knows their name, he has nurtured them and cared for them. He has made them to grow and tended them. He cares deeply for them and values them.

Suddenly Jonah’s words in Jonah 2:8, “Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs” pertain not just to those who worship other gods, they pertain to Jonah and perhaps to us as well. When Jonah chooses to flee from God in Jonah 1:3, he clings to a worthless idol and chooses to forfeit the grace or hesed (covenantal love) that could be his. Jonah is so concerned about keeping God’s covenantal love or hesed to himself that he fails to realize that in doing so, he is actually leaving it far behind. When Jonah runs away from the LORD, he isn’t just running away from the LORD, he’s running away from a relationship with the LORD—and all because he doesn’t want God to extend to his enemy the same kind of grace and compassion or covenantal love that he himself has received and experienced time and time again.

The irony of Jonah’s story is that he cannot outrun God or his covenantal love. When Jonah begins to sink into the depths of the sea, God sends a fish to eventually take him to dry land. When Jonah stomps off in a pout, God sends a vine to shade him. And when Jonah is drowning in self-absorption and self-righteousness, God sends a worm to destroy the vine and a scorching east wind to heat things up again. God has a lesson for Jonah and for us. Those people you think are far from me—those people you view as enemies—I love them. I have tended them and I know them. I am concerned for them.

The same might be said about Syrian refugees today. God knows them, has tended them and caused them to grow. When we choose to hold up fear rather than to extend love and hospitality are we not behaving in the same way as Jonah? Are we in our attempt to protect ourselves, our way of life and even our religion actually running away from God and forfeiting the covenantal love and grace that could be ours? Can we not hear God say, “But Syria has many, many innocent people. Should I not be concerned about that great country? Should I not be concerned…”

Pastor Laura

 

Author’s note: I am not suggesting Syria is an evil country or that the Syrian people are evil or that they are the enemy. I am simply responding to the general fear and suspicion currently being propagated towards Syrian refugees.

Unclaimed treasures: thoughts on the Syrian refugee crisis

September 9, 2015 /

refugee camp

When I was around seven, my mom got a call from the American Red Cross. They were trying to track down my dad for a Vietnamese refugee staying in a Philippine refugee camp. The young man had escaped from Vietnam and made his way by boat to the Philippines. Years before, my dad had sponsored this young man’s Amerasian sister through the Pearl S. Buck Association. When South Vietnam fell to the communists, my dad lost all contact with the family. Now Michael (not his real name) was trying to reach the only person he “knew” in the United States. Would my dad sponsor him to come? My parents prayed about it and knew that if they were in such a situation that they would want someone to help them. This decision lead to days and perhaps months of preparation–I honestly don’t know how long it was from the time my parents received the phone call from the American Red Cross until we picked Michael up from the airport. I can remember going to Refugee Resettlement meetings with my mom. One of the women present encouraged others to be sure they got everything out of the “vanilla” envelopes they received from the government. She had once missed an important document for a refugee because it was stuck to the bottom of the “vanilla” envelope. As a seven-year-old, I wondered why people were sending paperwork in empty cartons of vanilla ice cream.

When Michael arrived at the airport, he had very, very little. It was winter and he had come from the Philippines. He had on a red, white and blue coat and carried a small blue bag–about the size you would put a bowling ball in–that was it. We took him home and my dad got him set up in the bedroom we had gotten ready for him in our basement. We had been a one bathroom house up until that point, but my parents had a bathroom built in the basement in preparation for Michael. I’m not sure how long Michael lived with us–maybe about six months. I remember him sitting in the living room drawing pictures with magic markers for my sister and me. One picture was of a two story house with a clothesline and gardens. That was his family’s home before Vietnam fell. It seemed to be a nice house and I remember thinking that he liked it a lot. The picture looked peaceful. When he decided to try and escape Vietnam, he went to stay with his grandmother who lived near the coast. When he got up in the morning to leave, she was dead. He ate bananas from a tree and managed to get on a small boat. There were lots of people on the boat. He drew a picture of the boat. The boat was attacked by pirates. The pirates took the gold ring his father had given him when he left. The pirates also took the babies on board and tossed them into the ocean. The babies’ parents jumped in after them to save them and drowned. Somehow Michael and some of the others on his boat managed to survive. Perhaps the pirates got what they wanted and left them alone. I don’t know if he ever said. Eventually, they got to a beach and, well, the rest is history. I know it wasn’t that easy, because he talked about surviving on bananas.

In some ways, the time Michael was in my life on an everyday basis was short, but I have many memories. I can remember my mom loading him and my sister and me in the car and taking us to the Oriental Market, so he could shop. He had his own money and I remember he bought a package of “candy” and opened it up to share with my sister and me. Expecting something sweet, I just about gagged on the dried squid he proudly offered and was probably not very gracious. He had learned how to play the piano while in the refugee camp and would sit down and play for us. Once while he was playing, I came up to him, held up my foot and said, “Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat!” He stopped playing and disappeared out the front door. When he came back, he had a package of candy–he had run all the way to the grocery store and back, which was at least a mile away.

I also remember going to Vietnamese banquets for New Years and other important events. Michael would play the keyboard and we would listen to people sing and talk in Vietnamese. I usually liked the food at these events. Some of my favorites were the egg rolls, chips that I thought looked like Styrofoam but tasted good, and the ever present Vietnamese-style “bundt” cake–I’m pretty sure it had lots of eggs in it. I got used to being one of the only blond-headed kids in the room and really didn’t mind it. Honestly, I kind of enjoyed it.

I’m sure as a family that we missed opportunities to make Michael feel more welcome, but we helped him get here and we still see each other. Today he and his wife are long-time business owners in my hometown. When my dad died, he was there at the graveside with his son. Seeing him meant so much at that moment.

Today, when I see pictures of young Syrian children washed up on shore, I’m filled with sadness. They could be my own children and it seems like this could be avoided. I know something can be done about it, because people throughout history have opened up their homes to refugees seeking asylum. And I envy countries like Germany, Iceland and Greece whose people are opening their hearts and homes to these people. Is is easy? No. Is it doable? Yes. Is it the right thing to do? Yes. Will it pay dividends? Yes. Will it shape your family and worldview for the better? Yes, definitely yes! Is America missing out? Sadly, yes. Every day, we miss out on beautiful, unclaimed treasures. Countless people who could enrich our lives, our homes, our communities and our children’s lives. We are the poor ones.

Pastor Laura

Where are the coal piles?

September 1, 2015 /

Coal Minors

The industrial revolution was billowing out changes to all of society at a never before seen rate. Changes which cast people into a darkness of soul greater than the soot billowing from the industrial machine. As the world was driven into this new era the structures of society, founded on an agrarian community, were unable to accommodate the changes. The home, the church, labor, government, education, all buckled on the verge of collapse under the weight of change.

In the age of the industrial revolution, John Wesley saw the church’s patterns of the past no longer worked, but a solution for the future alluded him. Then a friend, George Whitefield, would call Wesley to leave the security of his pulpit to go into the fields to preach the good news of Jesus. The challenge to Wesley from Whitefield was for Wesley to go to where the people were at rather than waiting for to come. The truth is they were never going to come. In no time Wesley would find himself standing on a coal pile in the faint light of dawn preaching the good news of Jesus to minors as they entered the murderous bowels of the earth.

Once again the pulses of change are colliding against the structures of our life. The great empires built on industry are no more and we are in a world struggling to find a new normal without a pattern or guide to follow. The home, the church, labor, government and education are all buckling under the unrelenting weight of change.

Wesley would leave the comfort of his pulpit to go where the people were at because they were never going to come to him. What about us today? Where are the coal piles today?

Please share your thoughts in the comments below or on Facebook.

Blessings,
Pastor Stephen

Who am I?

August 25, 2015 /

Trees in a mist

Dear Friends,

I know one of the criteria for being a well-educated person is that I am supposed to like poetry. From the carefully crafted words of soliloquy I am to find transcendental peace for my soul. I don’t. Most of it, I actually find annoying and better for solving the world’s sleep deprivation epidemic. I would say that I am sorry for offending those of you who find pleasure in rhyme, but I really am not.

One poem stands out to me as different than all the others. Words written by the German pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer from within the confine of a Nazi concentration camp. Bonhoeffer would pen these words one month before he could be executed. They speak to the depth of the human struggle in our soul. The tension between who we convey to the world on the outside and who we see ourselves to be on the inside. These words haunt me and challenge me. They convey an authentic life that is rarely ever allowed to be seen and expose raw hope as it should be.

Who Am I?
by Deitrich Bonhoeffer

Who am I? They often tell me
I stepped from my cell’s confinement
Calmly, cheerfully, firmly,
Like a Squire from his country house.

Who am I? They often tell me
I used to speak to my warders
Freely and friendly and clearly,
As though it were mine to command.

Who am I? They also tell me
I bore the days of misfortune
Equably, smilingly, proudly,
like one accustomed to win.

Am I then really that which other men tell of?
Or am I only what I myself know of myself?
Restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage,
Struggling for breath, as though hands were compressing my throat,
Yearning for colors, for flowers, for the voices of birds,
Thirsting for words of kindness, for neighborliness,
Tossing in expectations of great events,
Powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance,
Weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making,
Faint, and ready to say farewell to it all.

Who am I? This or the Other?
Am I one person today and tomorrow another?
Am I both at once? A hypocrite before others,
And before myself a contemptible woebegone weakling?
Or is something within me still like a beaten army
Fleeing in disorder from victory already achieved?

Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, Thou knowest, O God, I am thine!

I visited your church this Sunday

August 4, 2015 /

Pews in a church sanctuary

I visited your church this Sunday

I came to your website first. It was very well done. The colors were good. The information was up to date. I could not find your service times. I could not find directions to your church. It was not under the “About Us” tab. I did eventually find it on your site and several clicks later, I finally had the information I needed. I didn’t feel much like going to your church after completing the hunt, but I still came to your church, but only because someone else had made the suggestion.

I came to your church this Sunday. There was no clear signage telling me which door I was to come in. Once I found the door, you did have someone standing outside to greet and hold the door open. A welcome surprise. As he held the door for us to enter, he smiled and said hello. Once in the doors I was greeted by a staircase with no clear indication what to do next. I saw a sign advertising your vacation bible school and encouraging people to register their kids. I noticed it because it was the same one my church had just completed. Your church had completed it too, the event had already passed. I wandered up the stairs and through a doorway, following the smell of coffee. Coffee is always good to have. Good job on that.

I came to your church Sunday, but I did not come alone. My children were with me. Considering the size of your church, I figured you probably had children’s programming during the service. I didn’t know for certain, because it was not on your website, or if it was, I never found it. I looked around for some sign telling me where to go with my kids. There was none. The room I was in, the one with the coffee, did have a desk with a large sign hanging over it that read “Information.” I went there to learn about your kid’s programming. The person at the desk was engaged in a conversation with a friend. I had to interrupt your conversation, I am sorry for intruding, but I needed some information and I was a visitor. I asked if there was any programming for children. Your information person did not know and she suggested I check with the children’s desk and pointed across the room. You did not take me over to the children’s desk. You left me to find my own way. This was made extra difficult because there were no signs indicating what was the children’s desk (in fairness to you, as we left your church, I did finally see in very small letters “Children’s Ministry” on a screen over the desk).

I came to the desk we had been pointed to and asked if there was children’s programming. The person at the desk said he did not know, but offered to check my kids in. I wondered if I was at the right desk. I asked what I was checking my kids in for. He did not know. I said I would keep my kids with me. I really wanted to leave.

I tried to enter the service, but my kids protested having to go in. They know how the church system works and they wanted to do the kids stuff. Now did not seem to be the best time to explain to them my fears and so I relented and took my kids back and decided to try your children’s programming, whatever it was.

I registered my kids and then asked what to do. I was told us to go through a locked set of doors and go upstairs. As I tried to comprehend these instructions, a woman, mercifully, intervened and offered to take us to the room. This was good because once we entered through the locked doors we came into an empty dimly lit hallway. To our left was another set of double doors. Opening them revealed the stairs we were to take. We would have never found them without our guide. At the top of the stairs and through another set of double doors we again found ourselves in an empty hallway. Other children, if they were around, were nowhere to be found. We heard some noise and found a room with a couple others watching a Veggie-Tales movie. Our guide asked if this was the place for the kids. Your leader said it was, but she did not get up to greet me or my kids. I asked if I was supposed to come back here to get my kids. She didn’t really answer but smiled and nodded. As we left our kids with your children’s worker I pleaded with my son to watch out for his younger sister. I will admit I tried to say this loud enough for your children’s worker to hear and maybe sense that I was not comfortable with this situation.

I found my way on my own back to the worship center. As we came into the space there was no person passing out bulletins at the doors I came in. These were the doors immediately off your common space: the room with the coffee. I walked across the room to another doorway to ask a person for a bulletin and then walked back across to find a seat.

You seating was comfortable with a good amount of spacing between rows. The room was well lit. The stage was clean and uncluttered. You made good use of stage lighting. The image on your screen welcomed me to the service. Upbeat music with life in it was playing in the background.

Early in the service you asked me to complete a tear off card and place my information in the offering bag that went by, but you did not give me a pen to use to complete the card. Which was okay, because at this point, I was not sure I wanted you to have my information.

I am sorry to say I cannot evaluate your sermon. I was too distracted by the experience of having to work to be a visitor and was wondering what my kids were doing that I didn’t hear a word that was said in the sermon.

When the service did come to a close the pastor prayed and the band started to play. I was not sure if the service was over or if this was another song we were going to sing. There was no clear indication that the service was over. Either way I got up to go rescue my kids.

Finding them, the worker did not attempt to match the tag we had been given to the two children I was taking with me. Fortunately, I am pretty fond of my kids and really didn’t feel like trading them in for new models.

We left your church, only having been greeted by the person standing outside the door as we came in.

Back in our vehicle I asked the kids if they enjoyed the children’s area. They said they had fun. They watched a movie, played with clay, and played indoor volleyball. There was no lesson. Thank you for providing an hour’s free daycare.

I visited your church this Sunday, but I will not be back, it was too much work to be a visitor. Thankfully, I also already have a home church.

==

Dear friends,

I am sharing with you the recent experience I had visiting a church while on vacation. I do not say, nor will I, which specific church we visited. My purpose is not to publicly shame a particular church. All churches have bad Sundays when it seems, that despite the best planning, everything falls apart. I will accept this may have been the case with this church. My purpose for sharing is for each of us to think about what it must be like to be a visitor in our own churches. Have you ever attempted to see your church through the eyes of a visitor? Could our experience happen at your church? What needs to be changed?

Pastor Stephen

Tending to your Bamboo

July 28, 2015 /

Bamboo Bike

A story keeps crossing my path lately. I am not sure of its original source, but I wanted to share it with you.

A farmer will plant bamboo and he will water and fertilize it the first year. And nothing will happen.

The second year he will faithfully attend the plant. Watering and fertilizing and nothing will happen.

The third year he will again spend it watering and fertilizing only to see nothing for his work.

The fourth year will be spent in the fields once more watering and fertilizing. And the year will close showing no purpose or progress for the hours spent tending.

The fifth year he will repeat the process again. But this time he will watch the plants grow sixty feet in six weeks time. So fast you could almost stand there and watch the plants grow.

The question to be asked: How long did it take the bamboo to grow sixty feet, six weeks or five years? The answer is obviously five years. For if there had not been the previous years of careful work and faithful service there would not have been the fifth year of stunning growth. Bill Gates said, “Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.” Our failure of estimation often leads us to stop too soon on our dreams or sometimes to never start.

When nothing is happening and life is not growing and your dreams and plans don’t seem to be going anywhere do what you can do in your life: dig, plant, fertilize.

Invest in yourself. Invest in others. Never give up.

Pastor Stephen

A Good and Holy Life

July 21, 2015 /

Standing in the Woods

Timothy Keller, in his book Center Church, says that “Legalism says that we have to live a holy, good life in order to be saved. Antinomianism says that because we are saved, we don’t have to live a holy, good life.” And I would add that Gospel says that because we are saved we get to and are empowered to live a good and holy life.

What do you think?

Pastor Stephen

Let Love Roll

July 17, 2015 /

peace

On the night that Jesus was betrayed, as he washed his disciples feet and became a servant he said these words to his disciples: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (‭John‬ ‭13‬:‭34-35, ‬ NIV) It is funny that he would call it a new command. For the three prior years of active ministry he would live out this command to love one another and he would call his disciples to follow his example. On this night, however, love would become unmistakable.

What is love? Paul would tell us so eloquently in 1 Corinthians: “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.” (‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13‬:‭4-8a, NIV)

Racism is deeply embedded in our country and its effects are felt on many different levels. It can cloud our vision and cause us to see what is not there to be seen. My challenge to each of us is that we engage each other with love. When we are tempted to make comments in social media or share another’s words ask yourself if your words are words of love to the “other side.” When one’s actions do not make sense, ask yourself what the lens of their life might be which would cause them to respond in the way they did. One does not have to agree but we must understand for without understanding we have no hope for reconciliation.

The stakes could not be higher for Christians. By our love for one another the world will know that we are followers of Jesus and by our unity we will demonstrate to the world that Jesus is God (John 17:23). The reverse is also true for those of us who call ourselves Christians, our lack of love demonstrates are not truly Jesus’ disciples and our disunity give them a reason to question Jesus himself. Ultimately true reconciliation in the hearts and lives of people can only happen through the reconciling work of Jesus in each of our lives.

Finally, I want to share with you a resource I would highly recommend. It is the autobiography of the civil rights worker, John Perkins, Let Justice Roll Down. As I read in these pages how his brother was murdered by a sheriff’s deputy in 1946. Then as I read of members of his church being loaded into a police van that did not go directly to the police station but instead stopped along the way to beat the people in the back. I was again struck by the similarity to today’s events. Through poignant words and a deep conviction for reconciliation through the good news of Jesus Christ, John Perkins has much to teach us.

Blessings,
Pastor Stephen

Cower or Fight: Building Trust

July 11, 2015 /

Man and Dog

I have been driving the same truck for nineteen years. I can’t change it. It has a little button. A wonderful, great and glorious marvel of modern engineering. The likes of which I have not found in vehicles before or since. The “scan” button. With the press of the button, my radio will automatically advance to the next station it finds with adequate signal strength. You may be saying to yourself, “my car has such a button.” But here is where you are mistaken. Many vehicles have a “seek” button, even my relic has such. This button advances you to the next station found and stops. Many vehicles also have “scan” buttons, but these advanced forward to the next programmed station. My button is unlike these. Mine is a triumph of automotive auditory engineering. With the press of this little beauty, my radio will advance to the next signal it finds but only pause there for a few seconds before automatically advancing again to the next signal of strength, repeating this process perpetually until commanded to stop. For those who have made TV channel surfing an Olympic sport, this wonder brings your years of training into the automobile. Many times I can be found driving and listening to forty-seven radio stations, all at the same time. It is a thing of beauty. Almost brings a tear to the eye just to think about it.

It was on one of these radio binges that I was caught by the words of a preacher. I do not know his name. I do not know the church he was preaching in. I do not even know what radio station he was on. But the words I heard were like a flash of light to my understanding.

We have all seen the pictures of dogs beaten and abused. From a distance, they look like normal friendly animals. But when you step up close and stick out your hand to scratch him on the head a switch in the dog’s psyche goes off and memories of past abuse flood the mind of the dog. Instinctively the dog will cower in terror or run. Other dogs will have the opposite reaction. Fear will overwhelm them and they will lash out in anger striking at the hand extended in love and friendship. This preacher made the connection that African Americans are like the beaten dog. For centuries, they have been abused and excluded in our society. Abuse that all too often continues today.

I remember recently seeing a friends post to Facebook in response to the swimming party debacle in Texas: “If you are not guilty don’t run.” Great advice, unless your life experience has been one of injustice and abuse. Then the prudent thing to do is to run . . . or fight. The history of beatings and abuses of power by those in authority against African American people in our country is long and well documented. The passing of the 13th Amendment in 1865 may have abolished slavery, but it did not change human hearts or behavior. The abolition of segregated schools in 1954 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not change human hearts or behavior. We still have a very long way to go.

One final observation. If I wish to regain the trust of the beaten dog. The one whose natural reaction is to cower or bite. On whom does the greater burden of trust building rest, on me or the dog? The answer is obvious: On me. This is the great challenge we all face and the even greater challenge faced by our law enforcement. Centuries of abuse cannot be erased from the human psyche in a day or with the passage of law. Many well-meaning officers have reached their hand out to members of their community in love and friendship only to be bitten. But we must not give up the hard work of gaining trust.

In my next post, the last of this series, I will offer some insights on a way forward for each of us. In the meantime, I welcome your comments and thoughts. Please visit our website and post them below this post or make them on Facebook.

Blessings,
Pastor Stephen

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