Being Peace-makers

The Horrors We Bless: Rethinking the Just-War Legacy is a book by Daniel Maguire, available at Amazon. Maguire argues for a “politics of peacemaking” as an option between pacifism and just-war approaches to conflict.

Much of this provocative book examines the strengths and weaknesses of the just-war tradition. It uses recent wars to illustrate how the fervor and momentum of war over-rides the intended restraints of just war criteria. He pleads for pre-emptive justice rather than pre-emptive violence (emphasis added).

Until we reevaluate our current political diplomacy and set a determined course of national and personal integrity, non-violence, reconciliation and peace-making--individually and collectively--we will continue recycling our past failures over and over.

We need a new mindset that rejects economic, political, and religious domination and allows everyone an equal opportunity to live in peace in a free world. I cannot shake your hand when you have a clenched fist. I will not accept you as my superior, nor will I meet you as my inferior, for we stand on level ground at the foot of the cross.
Wayne

"My Life, My Testimony," as told to me

MY LIFE, MY TESTIMONY
_______________________________
Does finding God make a difference?
Is the day of miracles past?
Is it ever too late to turn to God?
Read on. . .and you tell me what you think.

My life really began when Glenn and Betty St. John adopted me at three months of age. We moved frequently, but lived happily, following my father’s work. We later returned to greater Cincinnati where marital problems escalated into a divorce--I was twelve.

I spent weekends with my father, even after he began experiencing emotional difficulties. One Father’s Day weekend, I woke up early--alone. Discovering my isolation, I quickly called Mom and we. Talked--until she abruptly announced “I love you, I need to go,” and hung up!

Minutes later Dad returned, carrying a handgun. He hustled me into the bathroom- saying “I love you, son, and this hurts me worse than it does you.” Five shots left four bullets in me, two in my stomach, one in my hand, and one in my face.

He quickly left the room, retrieved his shotgun, and dialed the telephone. “There has been or there will be another shooting at ___.” he announced, as I numbly followed him into the Living Room. There, I watched him place the barrel under his chin and pull the trigger.

The Police arrived after what seemed like hours. The EMT’s loaded me into an ambulance and raced toward downtown Cincinnati’s Children’s Hospital.

Millions of thoughts pounded in my head. I wanted my mother, but got no response. Everything was blurring. Hours later, I awoke, still asking for my mother. An unknown voice finally admitted she “passed away.” Confusion clouded my despair and feeling of forsakenness. The drugs wore off over the next six weeks, but the gnawing loneliness lingered endlessly. Eventually, the hospital released me to my aunt and uncle in Winchester, KY, where I started life over again.

Aunt Judy and Uncle Lonnie kindly and lovingly tried to soften my anguish. They did their best, but I now realize how overwhelmed they surely felt. They tried to involve me in church, but anger controlled me. I needed no God that allows things like this to happen, and I bounced from one extreme to another--angry and resentful.

I stiff-armed the people trying hardest to love and support me. I refused friendship. To put it mildly, I behaved like a jerk! Yet, from the beginning there remained one person that refused to be pushed away--uncle’s mother, Cornelia Mathis (Mamaw). She accepted me as her grandchild.
She told me about a man that loved me. He would care for me no matter what and His name was Jesus. Although others talked about God, I heard Mamaw. I was not sure she understood all my feelings, but I told her how I felt. She never stopped telling me about Jesus and praying for me--out loud. She was always there. She will always be a major part of who I turned out to be (“I love you, Mamaw”).

I spent my teen-years as a loner. I wanted no part of anything. I cared about no one--not even myself. I rebelled at everything and everybody. I was a self-destructive, rebellious dare-devil When tired of being bullied and pushed around, I developed an “I ain’t afraid of nothing” attitude. And, I wasn’t! Simply said, I could care less if the sun came up--ever.

Quitting high school in my senior year, I went job to job--restless, edgy, seldom long in one place. I also discovered how to numb my feelings--Marijuana. When stoned, I temporarily forgot my troubles. Soon, I added alcohol.

While nursing a hangover one day, I headed for the store for some Aspirin. En route, I met the Army Recruiter. He quickly saw my anger and hostility, took advantage of it, and persuaded me to enlist. I signed on Monday, left on Wednesday, and spent seven years exploring every insane thing the military offered. In 1990, just before Desert Storm, I returned home, still wandering, still aimless.

My “one constant” was Mamaw. She still prayed that I find Jesus. She described His peace as “the peace I so richly deserved.” I began working Security in Pennsylvania, frequently filling difficult and dangerous assignments. Being a body guard for a CEO that had threats made on his life put me in precarious situations frequently, but I did it with reckless abandon.

Heavy drugs and drinking took additional toll. Depression and suicidal thoughts hounded me into my thirties, filled with cold hatred. Angry at myself, hostile toward others, I resented life. I wanted only to end my torment--die. Arriving in Collegeville, PA I had my fill!

I picked up my 357 Magnum, rolled the cylinder, stuck it in my mouth, and pulled the trigger. When it snapped, I re-checked the cylinder. It being loaded, I put it in my mouth and pulled the trigger.

It snapped--again! Going through the routine a third time, it snapped again. Desperate, I called a friend with whom I worked. He convinced me I needed professional help and for many months I worked with therapists--PTSD and severe depression. Eventually, they found me normal and released me back into society.

Faithfully, letters came from Mamaw. She still prayed for me. She still told me about Jesus. I left the hospital, returned to Kentucky, and began working as an electrician--still using recreational Marijuana. While visiting Mamaw in 2002, I promised her I would try church and visited a church in Winchester.

There, the Holy Spirit began to deal with my heart. I realized I had gone as far as I could humanly go. I accepted Jesus and He began an immediately transformation. First--“I mean immediately“--He removed my desire for drugs and alcohol! “I PRAISE GOD, for I have lived clean and sober since that wonderful night.”

God’s “next thing” was to draw me close to Him and bring me closer to the person I am sure prayed all of this into fruition--my Mamaw. I began reading my Bible daily. I stayed in contact with Mamaw, by phone. Reflecting back, her weekly letters never stopped coming, even when I joined the Army. I received letters--weekly--even when others in my unit did not.

She always told me to tell people my story--my testimony. She constantly reminded me how “good and gracious God had been to me,” but in 2004, she fell ill. At ninety, Mamaw was hospitalized in nearby Corbin. The family told me the end was near and I went as quickly as I could. In a coma, she could not respond, although the doctor thought she could hear us.
Joining my uncle in her room, I leaned over and kissed her. Although she had neither moved nor spoken, she hugged me, without sound. Through my tears, I saw my uncle‘s astonishment, and speaking to no one, I rushed from the room, to the Chapel.

I began talking with THE ONE Mamaw always told me about--Jesus. Selfishly, I asked God to spare her. Then, it dawned on me how sick she really was, and how selfish I was. I began a different prayer: “She deserves what you have waiting for her more than anyone I can think of God, so it’s Okay if you want to take her home. But, I would give anything to speak to her one more time.”

Back in her room, family and doctors awaited the inevitable. Comatose, she could not communicate, but she had no pain. I had already made peace with God about her situation and I prepared to leave, knowing I must work the following day.

Before leaving, I knelt beside her still body and reminded her, “I love you, Mamaw, and I will miss you, good bye; I will see you in heaven.” Before I could back away from the bed, a weak voice declared “I love you too, go preach to them about Jesus.” She wrapped me in a big hug, leaving astonishment on every face in the room. Her last words remain forever etched in my mind.

Days later, she went home to live forever with Jesus and I spent several months questioning God and myself about preaching. I never told anyone what Mamaw said to me. Finally, I admitted to God: If that is what you want, then here I am because without you I am nothing. Give this backward, bashful country boy the words and I will speak them whenever and wherever you want (italics added).

Later, I spoke with the Lord about needing a wife--a partner to share in ministry--one He would have for me. Days later, helping at a local fish fry, I met Delora. We soon wed, assured in our spirits that God wanted us together. Next to accepting Jesus into my life, Dee is the best thing that ever happened to me.

She has been there--without fail--my constant strength. Her unwavering faith shines a beacon in my life. Through the Holy Spirit and Dee‘s strong faith, I am becoming the preacher and man God is calling me to become. Daily, I study, pray, and share God’s Word--at every opportunity.
In October 2006, God impressed upon me the desire to begin the Credentialing process for the ministry and I thank Clarence Thomas, Boonville Pastor, for helping me take that first leap of faith. I met another wonderful man of God, Brother Luther Keaton, who introduced me to a wonderful, God fearing congregation in Polksville.

In March 2007 I accepted the call to pastor the Polksville congregation at Salt Lick, KY. I love the Lord with my whole being. I am eternally committed to His service, although I found it difficult to express the turmoil and suffering I experienced without God. I pray sincerely that this testimony will touch the heart of some lost, undone person. There is a man that brings “peace and tranquility to even the most restless and desperate of souls. He is our reward.
Wayne,
as told to me by Raymond Todd St John

The Praying Grandmother

This story comes out of conversation with my friend John Anderson. John remembers his grandmother, Emaline Harris Anderson, kneeling down by her bed each night, just before she went to bed.

To this young black lad, growing up in a predominately black community, that seemed a strange thing to do. Yet, she did it every night that John stayed with her. She also insisted they memorize a bible verse to recite, before eating dinner. John admits, “We would all try to get John 11:35, ‘Jesus wept.’"

John remembers his grandmother loved to sing hymns from the old Church of God hymnal. He also recalls enjoying singing those old songs with her, partly because he wanted to please her. He still remembers all the words of "I Am On The Winning Side," and "I'm Going On."

In the days when John drove an eighteen wheeler, those words would come back to him and he would sing them aloud to himself--and to grandma. Looking back, he now realizes how hard it must have been for her. Grandfather was a trapper, hunter, and dog trader. When he couldn't make money at any of these things, he worked for local farmers.

John’s granddad sometimes took his little grandson with him on his horse-drawn wagon. Granddad was about the greatest man that ever lived, although John later learned he was not always thoughtful of John’s grandma. In spite of this, she remained faithful, and always supported him in every way.

John still lives in that small village where he grew up. He says he has never heard anyone say a bad word about his grandmother--a rare thing to say about someone. After all, everyone has somebody that doesn't like them--don't they? John finally figured out the reason for this and says “I never, ever heard her say anything bad, about anyone else!”

However, as John grew older, he attended church less and less with his grandmother. John‘s parents left it up to him to decide. Meanwhile, his grandmother continued kneeling at her bedside--every night--praying for John, as well as all of her family.

John didn't realize it at the time, but as he grew older, he moved further from her influence and teaching. By the time he graduated from high school in 1969, his greatest accomplishment was “how much I could drink without passing out.” He loved his father very much, but as he told me, “it was a badge of honor in our home to be able to hold your liquor.”

Still, grandmother knelt down by her bed every night--and prayed before retiring. John never became what you would call a “criminal,” but he now realizes “God had sort-of-a leash on me all my life--grandma's prayers, I know, however, that I did some things that I am not very proud of.”

“But,” through it all,” John adds, “God surely had angels watching over me.” John suggests he could write a book about some of those events in his life, but people would consider it pure fiction. Yet, he insists, “God kept me through all of it, and my faithful grandma kept kneeling by her bed every night.”

Grandma had 10 living children, 34 grandchildren, and many great and great-great grandchildren. She loved them one and all the same, and she prayed for everyone of them. Each one of us, if asked, would say we were her favorite. Yet, she never really saw her prayers answered. Other family members have told John--what he already knew--that she always prayed for a preacher in her family

Thus it was, that John shared this story with me, to encourage all the mothers and grandmothers that kneel by their beds--every night to pray. John sadly recalls that “Grandma passed away while I was still living in sin. But one day on January 1, 2000, my grandmother's prayer was answered. I, like the prodigal son, found myself in a pig sty and I came to myself!”

Through God's great mercy and grace, John Anderson is now both my friend and the pastor of the village church, that Dr. Raymond S. Jackson started many years ago; it is also where John’s grandmother faithfully served throughout her long life.

Sometimes, when I am preaching God's word from that pulpit, John told me, “I can see her smiling face. It fills me with so much joy that I cannot explain.” Thus, he encourages others to never stop praying for their loved ones. “You may not live to see the answer,” John adds, “but it will come.”

If you were to ask today, John would tell you what he told me: “we think it a great miracle, that God caused a blind man to see again--it is. But let me tell you, the way that God turned my life around, and changed me, is the greatest miracle of all--to me. I thank you, Grandma, for never giving up, for never stopping kneeling, for never giving up praying!”

Once an over-the-road trucker, John recently completed his Bachelor’s degree and is currently pursuing a teaching certificate; he also serves as a bi-vocational pastor. My relationship with this church goes back thirty years and John exemplifies the transformation God can bring in a person’s life; I am pleased to count John among my friends.
Wayne

One Day in Iraq

For what we have spent for just ONE DAY of the Iraq War, we could have funded:
95,364 Head Start Places for Children or
12,478 Elementary School Teachers or
163,525 People with Health Care or
34,904 Four Year College Scholarships or
6,482 Families with Homes.

The estimated cost of the first five years of the Iraq War is $1 trillion. We have been in this unnecessary war now for more than five years, a war that only poured highly flamable gasoline on the latent coals of Islamic Terrorism. We satisfied a minority of military imperialists but set back our our economic development by decades. How much better off America and the Middle East would have been without the fanned fires of this American war!

Consider how much better ordinary Americans could cope with current stresses without the destruction aided and abetted by the bad diplomacy and poor patriotism of misguided politicians. Whether or not we can defund the war at this stage seems questionable. Some say we cannot except at great personal risk--a flame fanned mightily by military intervention. In other words, our political leaders led us in setting off more fire than we contained.

Knowing that we must yet bring about a diplomatic solution, I cast my lot with defunding the war, bringing our troops home, and refunding needs at home, as well as in Iraq, and promoting new policies of global peace. Take the politics out of it and consider the economic and moral needs of people everywhere.
Wayne

Something Is Broken

Swamped by the Wall Street tsumi, outraged by the antics of Stewart Parnell’s Peanut Corporation of America, I see that Mr. Parnell’s peanut empire has collapsed. Hopefully, we will experience no more peanut-prompted Salmonella. Americans are rightly concerned about the moral status of their country.

GREGORY KATZ, AP newsman examined the “land of Shakespeare and the Beatles, Churchill and the Queen. Rolling green hills, groovy London shops, hip plaids splashed over raincoats and umbrellas. Cut to the reality of 2009, he currently comments, and you have “the highest teen pregnancy rate in western Europe, a binge drinking culture that leaves drunk teens splayed out in the streets and rising knife crime that has turned some pub fights into deadly affairs. “Ahhh, Britain,” Katz concludes, "13-year-old Alfie and his 15-year-old girlfriend Chantelle became parents last week.”

Some suggest Britain is broken in Britain, but down-under, Australia’s Prime Minister announced their need to prosecute the arsonist (s) responsible for dozens of lived lost in the recent bush fires. Global hand wringing, from the media and us ordinary folk, admittedly helps little.

We’re somewhat like those parochial children who had a problem remembering the sins they needed to confess during confession. Finally, the Priest suggested the teachers help their young students prepare a list of their sins ahead of time. The following week a small child came in and the Priest listened to the unfolding of a piece of paper, then the youngster began: “I lied to my parents. I disobeyed my mom. I fought with brothers and . . .” A l-o-n-g pause followed. Then a small voice angrily said, “Hey, this isn’t my list!”

"I think it's very sad," said retiree Risdon Nicholls, of Alfie and his British girl friend.. "But they lived in a poor part of Eastbourne. That's not common practice in the rest of Eastbourne, which is a very smart town." Nicholls accused the British media of exploiting a one-time situation. "They make it sound as if we're going to the dogs, and we're not," he said adamantly. "This is still a wonderful country — but it's clear standards have dropped."

Neighborhoods, nationalities, classes, cultures, creeds, and countries, make little difference. From the American Congress to the United Nations, from the poverty of Africa to the perversion of the Middle East, everyone declares, “Hey, this isn’t my list.”

Such stories swirled in my mind as I celebrated my 62nd wedding anniversary this past week. Those years don’t reveal all the answers, but they give me direction. When a friend of Coleridge looked at the poet’s weed-filled garden , he asked, “why don’t you dig up those weeds and plant flowers?” Coleridge reportedly said, “I don’t want to prejudice the garden in favor of flowers. We just let it grow up as it is.”

I have learned that doing nothing solves little, nor does lifting up self-centeredness; both remain symptomatic of unhealthy living. Some criticize the Christian Church; others speak of post-Christendom, but I find that in matters of human redemption the Church has no rivals. Christianity has critics, and competing religions, but The Christ has no equal.

W. A. Criswell told of two lawyers (longtime partners) he knew, Will and Tom. Will attended a revival meeting and made a public confession of Christ. Knowing Tom was a bitter critic of the church, and things of God, Will got up early, intending to dissolve his partnership and avoid Tom’s ridicule and sarcasm. En route to the office, he met Tom.

Tom asked Will why he was up and out so early. Will replied, “Tom, last night I gave my heart to Christ. I know how you feel about God and Christ and the church. I just do not think I can live under your bitter and sarcastic criticism. So I got up early this morning, before you would be down, to gather my things and dissolve the partnership.”

To that, Tom admitted, “Will, you did not know it nor did anyone know it. But last night I went to that meeting and stood outside the tabernacle. I saw you go down the aisle, give your hand to the preacher, stand before the people, and confess your faith in God. You and I have been partners all these years. We have always stood side by side. We have been through numerous cases, trials, and difficulties. Will, when I saw you standing up there by yourself last night, it just seemed to me that I ought to be standing by your side. The reason I have come early this morning is that I thought maybe you would teach me how to become a Christian.”

An old commercial used to advertise Zenith as a product where the quality goes in before the name goes on. The surest way I know of to enjoy life's most enduring qualities is to walk with Christ one day at a time.
Wayne

Am I My Brother's Keeper?

Whatever degree of religion, Christianity, secularism, or atheism you claim, your system of beliefs and behaviors will ultimately boil down to a choice: you will pursue life for yourself as an end in itself, or you will incorporate others into your system of beliefs and behaviors at its most basic levels.

Life does not get more elementary than the question that comes out of the Bible story about the brothers, Cain and Abel. You don’t have to be a bible scholar to know that jealousy arose between the two brothers. Cain killed Abel, and when confronted for his anti-social behavior, he asked life’s most fundamental question: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4)

What you believe about the bible, or its authority, does not affect the impact of the question. Either we are our brother’s keeper, and life has an essential social dimension written into it at its foundations, or life is all living (and pleasuring) one’s self. Either I am free to pursue life for myself, or I must cooperate with others for the common good of all.

To some degree, we are all individualists and socialists (now be careful about reading into flash words), but at the core we fall into one camp or the other! Since Jesus is the Lord of my life, I take literally what he said when He summed up Christianity in two statements: love God absolutely; love your neighbor as yourself! That means that life at its core is relational (social) and I cannot love God supremely and reject the common good.

That is as fundamental to life as you can find: individualism versus cooperation. All of our philosophies, theologies, politics and diplomacies fall on one side or the other--either individualism or social cooperation. Life is either all for self or all for the common good. If I serve myself, I compete with my brother and be his boss, or whatever, or I accept working for his good as I also work for my good.

Not only is extreme individualism contrary to the Kingdom of God, it is contrary to life itself. It results in mutual slaughter, wars and rumors of war. Pursuit of the common good results in mutual aid, in one form or other.

Consider the major political players in World War Two: Fascism/Tojoism; Nazism, Communistic Socialism, and Democracy. Fascism at its core was the dictatorship of the state; it resulted in one state warring with another. Nazism was rampant individualism based on the superiority of the Aryan race, which all other races rejected, especially the Hebrews. Communism still lifts up the dictatorship of the proletariat and makes life a class war, individual class against individual class.
Then there was Democracy; we upheld the common good (one nation under God, with liberty and justice FOR ALL). That “for all” puts democracy in the camp of those who cooperate for the common good and rejects the extreme forms of individualism.

As a Democracy, we are having some problems right now with wars, economic recession, and the list is endless. The reason we are having such a struggle is because we have not satisfactorily answered Cain’s question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” We cannot decide whether we are a universe inhabited by human beings that help each other in the basic issues of life, or whether we are just a bunch of individualists out for superiority and all we can get for ourselves.

This question has global implications and no nation, race, or political system can avoid it. Right now many are cheering President Obama for putting limits on Executive salaries. Those executives participated in a system of individualism that allowed no self-restraint from others; their economics was driven by greed (mutual slaughter). In the political realm that would be all-out war!

Those politicians that continually reject government intervention are advocating economic individualism that denies the rights of the common good. If you challenge that, you are a socialist (in the worst sense of the word), and the person calling you that does not comprehend that we cannot co-exist without cooperation (rules, compromises, and limits).

So, what are we do do? I suggest the rules of the Kingdom of God are woven into this blanket we call life, and here I am plowing new ground in my own life applications. It seems to me that the Law of Mutual Aid is pretty well basic to life. Perhaps that is one reason Paul gave us his biblical language of the Body, which he applied to the Church. I believe it is more fundamental than that.

I believe the human body expresses a core unity in which each body part works for every other body part, each is for all and all are for each. That contributes to my good health. I’ve had relatively few injuries in my time, but those I have had teach me that when one part suffers, the whole body suffers. I enjoy good health when each of my body members submits to the head of the body, and when my individual parts cooperate with each other, without competing or trying to dominate.

Actually, that is the way God’s Kingdom works, and when we submit to him and accept his authority into every part of our lives, we find that all this other stuff (power, politics, religion, relationships, et al) comes within our grasp. That, I believe, is the real meaning of Matthew 6:33, a basic rule of life.
Wayne

A Son of Encouragement

Jewish law allowed only the sons of Levi to perform the sacred duties of the temple. One such Levite was a man named Joseph. Joseph became a Christian shortly after the resurrection of Christ. So inspired was Joseph that he sold his lands to help the needy in the young church. He inspired his fellow Christians so much that they re-named him Barnabas--“son of encouragement.”

As Barnabas, he took the risk and introduced Paul to the young church in Jerusalem. That went poorly at first; Jerusalem Christians wanted no part of Paul, or Saul as he had been known. He had persecuted Christians fiercely and vigorously and the suffering church distrusted this zealous-but-new convert to Christ.

As a result, Joseph--now Barnabas--stayed on; he mentored Paul and bridged the gap between the former prosecutor and the victimized. Barnabas later accompanied Paul on his first missionary journey. Eventually Barnabas and Paul disagreed; Barnabas, always the encourager, insisted on giving John Mark a second chance. Young John Mark had deserted his friends; Paul was severely disappointed and had enough of him.

As a result, Paul searched out a new companion--Silas. These two--Paul and Silas--were reportedly singing in prison at the midnight hour; soon they were evangelizing Europe. Europe owes considerable to this man Barnabas, a man willing to play second fiddle to the person he mentored, after risking his neck to extend the hand of fellowship to Paul because people feared Paul as potentially dangerous to their health and safety.

Many western churches now celebrate June 11 as a way of remembering Barnabas on the Christian calendar. Even more widely celebrated is the memory of Barnabas among Christians of every spectrum, the man who spent his life giving encouragement--Barnabas, son of encouragement.

Whatever else your gift may be, our current culture finds sons of encouragement of the stature of Barnabas in short supply. Would you risk it?
Wayne

Make Us Whole!

We recently elected a new President and administration. Our Republican Party was filled with corruption, deceit, cronyism, and a philosophy that allows the forces of society to govern themselves without interference from governmental agencies and economic forces. That is, except for War Powers, which they maintain at a high level.

An overwhelming Democratic party, more in tune with the populous than the privileged, took hope in the message of Barack Obama, as a black man, as a man of potential faith, and as a man proclaiming the audacity of hope (with change). Although the Democrats have their own corrupt viruses, the majority of the nation smelled a breath of fresh air and elected Mr. Obama overwhelmingly.

The current power struggle in Congress reeks with the negativism of H. L. Mencken who once defined hope as a pathological belief in what is impossible and a strong hanging onto past practices, be they productive or destructive.

On the other hand, Mr. Obama has rallied more people into the process than we have ever seen. This in itself is a threat to the entrenched, but it at least offers a promise of hope, and a hint of change. Stanley Jones questioned back during the WWII years: “Can the government of this country be Christianized?”

Jones claimed the ballot box is simply the registrant of individual character and concluded “if the character that comes to that ballot box is weak, selfish, or uninformed, then the resultant government will be weak, selfish, and uninformed.”

Mr. Obama’s administration is not perfect--quite human, and not without some of the same flaws we are trying to correct, as seen in 3 of his cabinet selections. Having said that, Our effectiveness as a nation for the next four to eight years will depend upon us ... and how we empower the President’s Administration to maintain the status quo for the self-defeating individualism that has been given free reign to run rampant--Wall Street--the Banking Industry, to name a couple.

Or _ how we the people will cooperate together and empower the administration to pursue policies of cooperation and social progress for the Common Good.

Mildred Nelms of Hawthorne, CA wrote this verse back in 1967:
“God with us”--
His power to love
(The same that raised
Christ up above)
Now fills my mind
And heart and soul,
Will raise me, too,
And make me whole.

Let us as citizens Christian and secular, be neither weak, nor self-willed, and uninformed! By the grace of God common to all, let us cooperate together, let us extend loving grace to those who think differently than we do, and let us be involved in seeking the common good of not only the privileged with their properties but of those most vulnerable.

Our very Pledge of Allegiance points us to the nature of our democracy: one nation ... under God ... with liberty and justice ... for all ...

May we become a whole nation is my prayer,
Wayne

A PRAYER FOR GLOBAL GOVERNANCE

SPIRIT OF THE LIVING GOD:

Fall fresh today upon our President and congressional leaders
And all who work in global governance.

Mighty as you are, stoop to our human frailties, and
Transform our less than good intentions by your Mighty Love, and
Conform our good intentions into your Mighty works, and
Help us to love your world as we ought to love you.

Forgive our foolish ways
Of pride, patriotism, politics, and selfish partisanship;

Thinking that we can reform our problems by our own devices.

Reclothe us in our rightful minds
Of faith, hope, and charity.

And, in your service,
May we rediscover that purity of life
Needed for facing today’s tasks effectively,
Giving equal opportunity for every person.

Give us that deeper reverence
That will enable us to praise you as we ought,
With integrity and character.

Bless all our global leaders this day:
Fill them with the necessary courage and
The renewed insight, for making wise decisions for common good.

Take the strain and stress from those
Whose jaded spirits have created disordered lives;
Re-order their lives in ways that confess beauty of Your Peace.

Give them the faith, the energy, and the love,
That will carry them inward and onward,
Outward and upward, in fulfillment of their leadership
To their nations and to Your world.

Save us all from weak resignation to the evils we deplore, and
Strengthen our commitment to the common good.

We pray this prayer
In the matchless name of THAT ONE
Who taught us we have more need to give than to receive,
Amen, and Amen.
Wayne

Conversion, A Positive Possibility

I grew up in the Midwest and went to Bible College in Oregon, so I find the following story of great interest. When the United States Senate proposed in 1824 to build a fort on the Pacific Coast of the Oregon Territory, New Jersey‘s distinguished senator, Mahlon Dickerson could see only problems. He vigorously opposed the idea--ludicrous. Deserts, rugged mountains, distance, mode of travel, and the time separating Oregon from Washington’s East Coast made Oregon’s statehood utterly impossible.

Dickerson agreed an elected official might cover twenty miles a day, but that would require 350 days of traveling time. Good government made traveling that distance to and from Washington impossible, especially in those times.

Senator Benton of Missouri, angrily denounced Dickerson’s reasoning as irrational and blind. He could envision a day within one hundred years when the nation's population west of the Rockies might exceed that of the then current nation.

Dickerson 's negative-thinkers won the day; they defeated the proposal. In doing so, they lost the opportunity of a lifetime. Unable to imagine possibilities we enjoy today, they voted against the Oregon Territory, boxed in (or out) by their problem. History proves their negative thinking wrong; they lacked vision and lost a corner-turning opportunity.

How glad I am that I was not punished by those negative Senators. Today, we face problems rooted in centuries of hatred and hostility. Oh, for the ability that Alexander Pope prayed for when muttering, “O Lord, make me a better man.” Pope’s Page wisely responded, “It would be easier to make you a new man.” How wonderful ...

Watson, the father of Behavioristic Psychology, insisted “we need nothing to explain human behavior but the ordinary laws of physics and chemistry.” That unfortunately is short-sighted, negative, and does nothing to resolve contemporary problems, or create better people. We have patched, politicized, rehabilitated, medicated, and given therapy for centuries, but have yet to design adequate means of resolving either our problems or transforming people.

But this, I have found true: while the Church has many critics, it has no rivals in working human redemption, when converting to Christ. Giovanni Papini described beginning his monumental writing of the Life of Christ; he was not a Christian. His study, however, led him through the sequences of experience from the Jesus of history to the living Christ (Elson/And Still He Speaks/118), and he experienced conversion.

Conversion is a possibility we claim to believe, but we largely disregard it. Giovanni Papini found it real, when he met Christ. Thus, Jill Briscoe discovered that transforming love of God while viewing a sunrise in the Swiss Alps.

Vacationing with her parents, and finding no overnight lodging, the family determined to sleep in their compact car. Jill, cramped and not resting, awoke early. She wandered out and about the small ridge overlooking the popular tourist area. “And there” she writes, “I watched the sunrise.”

Later, the Book of Romans told her God revealed Himself in nature. Admitting she had not read the Bible much, she added “I did ‘read’ that sunrise and a huge sense of God’s glory overwhelmed me.” Her consciousness of her own unworthiness met God‘s transforming presence that morning and she concluded in lines she called “Conversion”:


The day breaks softly, filling me with awe.
It seems the other side of heaven’s door.
That God forgives my sin, to me is plain. . .
Today, ‘spite of my sin - the sun doth rise again!’1

The rising sun reminds me we have a great possibility that we too often overlook and even deny, but it remains our one great hope.
Wayne
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1 Jill Briscoe, By Hook or By Crook, (Waco: Word, 1987), p.37.