tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30695457007971022872024-03-05T01:17:53.339-06:00Weighty Matters<small><i>"For you . . . have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness."</i> (<i>Matthew 23:23</i>, ESV) <br><br><i>Weighty Matters</i> is the blog-a-logue of the T. B. Maston Foundation . . . a daily dialogue on the events and issues of the day, viewed through the lens of biblical Christian ethics.
</small>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger73125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-24505825797407249042017-06-23T22:15:00.000-05:002017-06-24T03:44:49.325-05:00Memories of Daddy, part 5: To Hug or Not to Hug; Late-Night Talks; 'the Night of the Three Jasons'; and a Devoted Marriageby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So let's back up for a moment. I remember an incident in the winter of 1962, I believe, so I would have been 11, where I decided I was too old to hug my Daddy anymore. So I started shaking hands with him instead of hugging him.</span>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Once you start something like that, it's hard to stop it. The longer you go, the harder it becomes.</span></div>
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-1-mothers-love.html" target="_blank">Read part 1: A Loving Mother and Daddy, and a Treasured Note</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-daddy-baseball.html" target="_blank">Read part 2: Daddy, Baseball, and Me</a></strong></em><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-hearing-daddy.html" target="_blank">Read part 3: Hearing Daddy Preach and Goodnight, Johnny</a></strong></em></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-4-obu-losing-my.html" target="_blank">Read part 4: OBU, My Faith Crisis, and a Loving Dad</a></strong></em></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So back to the 1970s. Joanna and I married at University Baptist Church in Shawnee, across the street from the campus where we had met, dated, and gotten to know each other, in September 1976. Daddy performed the ceremony. Jerry Barnes, University's pastor at that time, who was the second greatest influence - behind only Daddy - in helping me find my way back to Christ, also stood on the chancel and read scripture during the wedding.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Almost 14 years after that 1962 incident, I was still in my no-hugging-Daddy phase. One of our wedding photos shows Daddy and me, before the wedding, shaking hands as if he's giving me some last-minute advice. Shaking hands. That's what we did.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Somewhere in the next year or two, I remember telling Joanna that it saddened me that Daddy and I didn't hug - but that we had shaken hands for so long, it was an almost impossible bridge to cross. She encouraged me, of course, to give it a try. But it still took awhile. It was somewhere along those late 1970s, as I recall, that I finally gave Daddy a hug. That's not an easy thing for men - at least in those days. I don't even recall his reaction at the time; I just know that eventually it became easier, and it meant a lot to be able to hug my Daddy. I have a feeling he felt the same.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It was also around that time, as Joanna and I settled into married life, hundreds of miles from my parents, that I began developing a greater appreciation for Daddy and wanting to cultivate a deeper relationship with him. So, over the next 30 years or so until he died, whenever we would be visiting them or they would be visiting us, I made it a point - at least once during the visit - to start a conversation with Daddy over some issue of theology, ethics, or even politics. We had great conversations, loved to hash these things out with each other. I learned so much from him. I'm not so great on the details - don't really recall a lot of detailed conversations, or the issues, etc, that we discussed - but I know that I learned a lot from him, and our relationship grew deeper through those conversations. They were usually late at night when we'd be watching TV together.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I do remember one question I asked him one time, however. I remember when I was growing up in Kansas City, that the Kansas City Baptist Association had an African-American minister on its staff, Charles Briscoe, who was the liaison between the KCBA and the National Baptist Convention. The Briscoes were guests for dinner in our home at least a couple of times that I remember. Growing up, I was always taught by my parents that racial prejudice was wrong, that segregation was wrong, and so forth.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">During one of those many late-night discussions in the '70s, '80,s, & '90s, I asked Daddy, <i>"Growing up in Texas when you did, being around the attitudes that were prevalent in those days, how did you come to the racial attitudes that you have?"</i> His answer was very simple and to the point: <i>"T. B. Maston!" </i>I have a feeling there are a lot of Dr. Maston's students who would give the same answer to that question.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We never get too old, I guess, to be embarrassed by our parents. In 1981, Mountain Bell's Accounting Department promoted me to management as supervisor of the billing adjustments unit. The next time Mother and Daddy visited us in Denver, of course Daddy had to follow me to work, go in with me, and take pictures of me at my desk - as my ten employees looked on, amused I'm sure.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In 1987, Joanna's Mobil Oil office in downtown Denver was transferred to Dallas. At the same time, Mountain Bell - downsizing following its 1984 divestiture from AT&T - offered what was called the "Baby Boomer Buyout," in which they offered incentives (including a full year's salary) for managers about my age with about my experience to leave the payroll by April 1. Great timing! So that summer we picked up and moved - with Alison, 5-1/2, and Travis, 1-1/2 - to Plano, a suburb north of Dallas.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">As much as we loved Denver and hated to leave it (30 years later, I'm still a Broncos fan), the Dallas area had one huge advantage - it had major league baseball! (The Colorado Rockies were not born for another 6 years.) So I soon became a Texas Rangers fan and began indoctrinating Travis in love of the National Pastime. Now we were in Texas, and Mother and Daddy were only 3-1/2 hours away, in Austin. So we inaugurated something we called "the night of the three Jasons."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Daddy was Atwood Jason Jones, Jr. So I was the third generation of Jones boys to have the middle name Jason. When Travis was born, we made him the fourth generation, giving him the middle name Jason in honor of his granddaddy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Though Mother and Daddy had left Kansas City in 1974 to return "home" to Texas, Daddy had remained a Kansas City Royals fan, through and through. So after Joanna, the kids, and I moved to Plano, I began inviting Daddy up every year whenever the Rangers played the Royals; "the three Jasons" would go to see the Rangers and Royals play. It became a great tradition that lasted about 5 years, until Mother's health started going downhill in the fall of 1992, and they stopped traveling for the remaining years of her life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">My parents' devotion to each other was something to behold, and that devotion was never more evident than when Mother's health was declining. In late August 1992, Daddy went to California to spend a year teaching Christian ethics as an adjunct professor at Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. I drove Daddy out there (he was just a few days short of 79, after all), then flew home. Mother was to fly out to join him a few weeks later. However, a bursitis attack prevented her from making the trip. Daddy would be coming home for Thanksgiving, and they would then fly back to California together. However, just before Thanksgiving, as Mother was recovering from her bursitis, she suffered a minor stroke. Daddy finished out the semester but asked to be relieved of his responsibility at Golden Gate for the spring so that he could be home with Mother.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A bacterial infection just before Christmas 1993 left Mother bedridden for the remaining 3+ years of her life. Daddy would not hear of letting Mother go to a facility of any kind; he knew that nobody could give her the loving, devoted care that he could. And he was right.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For the remainder of her life, he took care of her. Patsy and I arranged for one of us to be there at least every other weekend - and, eventually, every weekend. Our families sacrificed, lovingly encouraging us to go to give Mother and Daddy the encouragement they needed, and to give Daddy some help, some relief, make it possible for him to go to church Sunday morning, etc.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Both Patsy and I found this time to be very special, as we spent time with Mother and Daddy that we probably wouldn't have had otherwise. And I know it meant an awful lot to Mother and Daddy for us to do that. But it wasn't a hard decision for Patsy and me - our parents had given so very much to us, there was no way that we could ever repay them; just as they had given to us simply because they loved us so much, so, too, did we want to give to them simply because we loved them so much.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">During those 3 years, I sometimes took my camcorder to Austin with me. Daddy and I would occasionally sit down in the living room with the camcorder running, and I interviewed him about family events and stories, his career, their marriage, etc. I have about 10 hours on video of these interviews with Daddy. Priceless!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">As I said earlier, after Mother passed away, Daddy never got over it. They had loved each other so much, that he couldn't conceive of life without her. So he kept her pictures around him and talked about his memories of her - all good, of course. And we listened gladly, because we knew that talking about his beloved Vivian made him feel good - he was sad, but remembering her brought happy thoughts.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There are plenty of other memories, I'm sure, but these have been a few of the highlights. Though I miss them terribly, remembering Mother and Daddy brings me happy thoughts.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There was never any "put-on," as we used to say, about either Mother and Daddy. They were authentic, honest, faithful, loving, generous. Their faith in Christ was authentic and informed, and they passed that on to Patsy and me - and to others too many to count - through the way they lived, the way they loved, the way they treated people. We saw Jesus in them.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-46141882122049783522017-06-23T21:23:00.000-05:002017-06-24T03:41:16.053-05:00Memories of Daddy, part 4: OBU, My Faith Crisis, and a Loving Dadby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In September 1969, I entered Oklahoma Baptist University. Mother and Daddy drove me to Shawnee, helped me register, and moved me into Brotherhood Dorm. Then they said goodbye and left. It wasn't 10 minutes before Daddy was back in my room, telling me he had forgotten to leave me some spending money. I later learned that this was just an excuse - he just had to see me one more time, was already beginning to worry about me and miss me. </span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">(More tears!)</i><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-1-mothers-love.html" target="_blank">Read part 1: A Loving Mother and Daddy, and a Treasured Note</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-daddy-baseball.html" target="_blank">Read part 2: Daddy, Baseball, and Me</a></strong></em><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-hearing-daddy.html" target="_blank">Read part 3: Hearing Daddy Preach and Goodnight, Johnny</a></strong></em></span><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana";"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-3-to-hug-or-not.html" target="_blank">Read part 5: To Hug or Not to Hug; Late-Night Talks; 'the Night of the Three Jasons'; and a Devoted Marriage</a></strong></span></em><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In November 1970, I lost my faith. I had professed Christ publicly at First Baptist Church, Richardson, Texas, in April 1961 and been baptized. In my teenage years at Bethany Baptist in KC, MO, my world had revolved around Youth Choir and the youth group there. I had even become somewhat of a leader, at one point being elected Youth Pastor during our annual Youth Week. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Somewhere around the age of 15 or 16, I became convicted that God was calling me to the music ministry; I went to OBU mainly because of the influence of our music minister - and my dear friend - Joe Dell Rust, who had graduated from OBU, which had a Fine Arts College, led by Dean Warren M. Angell, with a reputation to match or exceed that of at least any Baptist school. I entered OBU on a Church Music degree program.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But my "faith" was built on a house of cards; I had never really understood the nature of faith. To me it was more the acceptance of a set of facts; yes, there was personal commitment involved, too, but the question of faith vs. facts was my problem. On that day in my sophomore year at OBU, when a professor's statement caused me to realize that I couldn't prove any of the stuff I believed, the house of cards collapsed, and I walked out of that class no longer believing in God, much less Jesus Christ as the Son of God.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I had friends at OBU, preacher's kids like me, who went through a similar crisis; when they shared their newfound struggle, their fathers argued with them and yelled at them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When I told my dad what had happened (and it took a year or so before I got up the courage to tell my parents), he told me he understood; he shared that he had gone through something similar when he was young, and that he understood that this was something I would need to work out on my own, but that he would be there whenever I needed, to talk with, to respond to any questions I might have.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I don't recall any specific discussions with him beyond that, but I do know that I consider Daddy the greatest influence in helping me find my way back to Christ.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Of course, having lost my faith, I had to get out of the Church Music program, so I switched to a Music Education degree. No, I really didn't want to teach all that much, but I didn't have any passion, any great love, outside of music. So I completed the Music Education degree and was then pretty lost, still struggling and searching for truth on which to stake my life, and also struggling to figure out what to do with my life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One thing I tried was Law School; I scored in the 96th percentile of the Law School Admission Test and was admitted to the University of Oklahoma Law School, which I entered in August 1975. I spent three semesters there before withdrawing after recognizing that I simply wasn't cut out to be a lawyer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It was during my time in Law School, however, that Daddy and other members of his Home Mission Board Interfaith Witness Department came to speak to the Baptist Student Union at OU. I went to hear them - the only times I ever darkened the doors of the BSU at OU. One evening before one of the sessions, Daddy and I went to dinner together, and I shared with him that, after over 5 years of searching and struggling, I found myself able to once again accept that the Bible is true, that God is real, and that Jesus is God's son. Well, at least I was able to accept it intellectually, although a real faith commitment, a real personal commitment of love and trust would take longer. But now I understood what faith was about. I was trying to build my house on a foundation of faith this time, not a house of cards.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I would never have gotten to that point without the patience and understanding that Daddy showed me from the beginning.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-37807378613173270552017-06-23T20:30:00.000-05:002017-06-24T03:40:52.516-05:00Memories of Daddy, part 3: Hearing Daddy preach and Goodnight, Johnnyby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Daddy was often away from our church on Sunday, "supplying" in another pulpit. I occasionally went with him, especially when I was very young and we were in Dallas. My cousin, Devin Dodson, also went with us sometimes. Devin loved hearing Daddy preach. We usually sat on the front pew. My only specific memory of one of Daddy's sermons is one he preached on Jesus' teaching that He is the Good Shepherd who knows His sheep, and the sheep know His voice and follow Him.</span>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I also often went with Daddy when he spoke to church groups about witnessing to their Jewish friends. Much of this involved educating Baptists on the Jewish people, their faith and culture, and knocking down any stereotypes about them. I guess I was a weird kid, but I loved going with Daddy when he did this and listening to him speak. Sometimes, if he was using slides to illustrate his presentation, I would work the slide projector for him.</span></div>
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-1-mothers-love.html" target="_blank">Read part 1: A Loving Mother and Daddy, and a Treasured Note</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-daddy-baseball.html" target="_blank">Read part 2: Daddy, Baseball, and Me</a></strong></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-4-obu-losing-my.html" target="_blank">Read part 4: OBU, My Faith Crisis, and a Loving Dad</a></strong></em></span><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana";"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-3-to-hug-or-not.html" target="_blank">Read part 5: To Hug or Not to Hug; Late-Night Talks; 'the Night of the Three Jasons'; and a Devoted Marriage</a></strong></span></em><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Daddy once gave me a project to catalogue his books. There were, of course, no word processors back in that day, no electronic databases, etc. I used the Remington typewriter - which he gave me, by the way, at my request, several years before he died - that was on his desk in his study. I typed the information - title, author, copyright date, publisher, etc. - on index cards. Then I placed a little piece of paper sticking out at the top of the book, to indicate that the book had been catalogued.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">That experience came in handy 15 or 20 years later, when my own library grew into the several hundreds (over 1,000 today) and required cataloguing. (Of course, today, that catalogue resides in an Excel file.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One special memory of my growing-up years that I must insert here - whenever it wasn't a school night, such as summer, etc., I stayed up and watched <i>Johnny Carson's Tonight Show</i> with Daddy. I would usually be sitting on the couch or in a chair, but Daddy's favorite place to watch Johnny was the living room floor, where he usually drifted off to sleep about halfway through. I can't begin to count the number of times Johnny went off at midnight, and I got up & walked over, jostled Daddy, and said, <i>"Daddy, Johnny's over. Time to go to bed."</i> Little things like that are special memories.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-87192716737799668512017-06-23T19:47:00.000-05:002017-06-24T03:40:30.859-05:00Memories of Daddy, part 2: Daddy, Baseball, and Meby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Just a week after we moved from Dallas to Kansas City, Missouri, in 1962, Daddy took me to my first major league baseball game, the Kansas City A's hosting the New York Yankees of Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Bobby Richardson, Tony Kubek, et al., with Whitey Ford on the mound that day. That was the day I fell in love with baseball, its personalities, its ever-growing statistics, and especially its history. Growing up in KC, I spent many days and/or nights with Daddy at old Kansas City Municipal Stadium (which was, sadly, demolished following the 1972 season). We loved talking sports - especially the A's and their opponents, and the Chiefs, who came to KC in 1963.</span><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-1-mothers-love.html" target="_blank">Read part 1: A Loving Mother and Daddy, and a Treasured Note</a></strong></em><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-hearing-daddy.html" target="_blank">Read part 3: Hearing Daddy Preach and Goodnight, Johnny</a></strong></em></span><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-4-obu-losing-my.html" target="_blank">Read part 4: OBU, My Faith Crisis, and a Loving Dad</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana";"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-3-to-hug-or-not.html" target="_blank">Read part 5: To Hug or Not to Hug; Late-Night Talks; 'the Night of the Three Jasons'; and a Devoted Marriage</a></strong></span></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">On Father's Day 1963, Mother and I visited Daddy at Fort Leavenworth, where he was doing his annual two weeks of active duty in the Army Reserves. He was serving as the chaplain in the disciplinary barracks there. We went to the PX (Post Exchange) to buy Daddy a Father's Day gift, and bought him a transistor radio; unknown to me, he and Mother had worked it out where Mother & I would buy him a transistor radio, and they would buy me one. Matching GE transistor radios, except his cover case was black, and mine was cream-colored. I still have mine today. One of my favorite gifts of all time! I can't begin to count the number of batteries I wore out by going to sleep with that radio under my pillow, as I listened to one of those late games on the West Coast.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When I discovered I could pull in the St. Louis Cardinals' games on that radio - and the Cardinals won 19 of 20 in late 1963 to almost (but not quite) overtake the Dodgers for the National League pennant - I became a Cardinals fan. Still an A's fan, but they were pitiful, so the Cards became my first loyalty.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In time, each of us had his favorite player. In June 1964, the Cardinals traded for a speedster named Lou Brock from the Cubs and turned him loose on the bases. Within a week, I picked him as my favorite player (today he's in the Hall of Fame). Just a few weeks later, the A's called up a shortstop from the minor leagues, named Dagoberto Campaneris, nicknamed "Campy." On my transistor radio, I listened to Campy hit a home run on the first pitch he was thrown in the major leagues and add a second one later in the game. But power wasn't Campy's forte; as with Lou, Campy's calling card was speed. It wasn't long before Campy was Daddy's favorite ballplayer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So through the years, as our two favorite players annually led their respective leagues in stolen bases, Daddy and I would say things like <i>"Did you see what 'my guy' did today?" or "How did 'your guy' do today?"</i> It was a fun rivalry, comparing Lou and Campy. (Sorry, Daddy, my guy's in the Hall of Fame, yours isn't!) </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For a few years in the mid-1960s, the Kansas City Baptist Association - where Daddy worked - had its offices in the Berkshire Towers, an old hotel that had been converted to space for offices and apartments. Several of the Kansas City A's lived there. One Saturday morning, after arriving home from an out-of-town commitment, Daddy went to the office to check his mail and took me with him. As we were getting out of the car, we saw Campy Campaneris drive into the parking lot. So Daddy and I went over as he was getting out of his car, and Daddy introduced me to Campy. We chit-chatted with him (Campy didn't know much English, so this was interesting), mainly about his having been out of the lineup the night before with a stomach problem. Anyway, pretty exciting to meet one of the A's in person, away from the field.</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-69502136342369927092017-06-23T18:55:00.000-05:002017-06-24T03:39:55.797-05:00Memories of Daddy, part 1: A Loving Mother and Daddy, and a Treasured Noteby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Daddy passed away 10 years ago today.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Ten years!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In 2011, on the 4th anniversary of his death, <a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2011/06/jase-jones-part-1-surrendered-to-gods.html" target="_blank"><i><b>I wrote a three-part tribute to him</b></i></a>, trying to summarize his life as fully and succinctly as I could.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But there were few personal memories in there, so now - 10 years after I learned that I would no longer see him in this life - it's time for me to recall a few more personal memories.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Daddy and I had a great relationship, one that grew closer over the last 30 years or so of his life.</span></div>
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-daddy-baseball.html" target="_blank">Read part 2: Daddy, Baseball, and Me</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-2-hearing-daddy.html" target="_blank">Read part 3: Hearing Daddy preach; and Goodnight, Johnny</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-4-obu-losing-my.html" target="_blank">Read part 4: OBU; My Faith Crisis; and a Loving Dad</a></strong></em><br />
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<em style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana";"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/06/memories-of-daddy-part-3-to-hug-or-not.html" target="_blank">Read part 5: To Hug or Not to Hug; Late-Night Talks; 'the Night of the Three Jasons'; and a Devoted Marriage</a></strong></span></em><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I wrote about Mother this past March, in <a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2017/03/remembering-mother-20-years-after-god.html" target="_blank"><b><i>Remembering Mother, 20 years after God called her home</i></b></a>. But there's one memory that I didn't share in that post; it's one</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> that demonstrates the unbounded grace of her big and loving heart but is a little painful for me, because it's a reminder of just how ungracious I could be toward her. It was after I had broken up with Joanna Wong - after dating her for only a couple of months. (Don't worry - Joanna and I soon got back together <i>for good</i> and celebrated our 40th wedding anniversary last September.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">All of the Chinese students from Hong Kong and other points east were, of course, staying on campus during Spring Break, so I decided I would stay, too, to spend time with Joanna. Then came the break-up. So I got a flight home to Kansas City. Mother picked me up at the airport.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">On the way home, Mother remarked that she was sorry that things didn't work out for Joanna and me. In my most smart-alecky tone, I replied, <i>"Really? I figured you'd be happy, since Joanna isn't a Christian."</i> My dear sweet Mother <i>(and this always brings tears to my eyes) </i>said, <i>"Honey, I just want you to be happy."</i> I don't think I've ever felt so small in my life. She had a grace and a love that I still can't comprehend, to which I can only wistfully aspire.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I should add that, when Mother and Daddy met Joanna the following year, they immediately fell in love with her. <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mother wasn't just a wonderful mother; she was a doting and loving mother-in-law as well. It was the love my parents showed to her that was instrumental in Joanna's decision, a few years later, to give her life to Christ.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This morning, my sister Patsy texted me, <i>"They were good parents, and they were well-suited for each other, weren't they?"</i> Yes, 59 years of marriage, and Daddy always felt that was way too little. He never got over losing Mother, and they're together in eternity now, as we shall be with them one day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One of my favorite possessions is a note Daddy wrote to me - on behalf of both of them - at Christmas 1960, when I was 9. When I opened the box that supposedly contained my Christmas present, all I found inside was a smaller box; and when I opened that one, I found another box, even smaller. I had to open several boxes until I finally found the present - my first wristwatch. Attached to it was a note, which I keep on my desk today, almost 60 years later: <i>"Merry Christmas and lots of love. You had to remove several wrappings to get to this gift, but you see, life is like that. You often have to work long and hard to reach the best things in life. Your mother and daddy want you to keep on searching until you reach God's purpose for your life. You will find it in the center of God's will."</i> <i>(Uh-oh, more tears!)</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">What a great lesson to learn - it's taken years of experience for me to learn the truth and value of that lesson.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-67846166870832890982017-03-11T19:25:00.000-06:002017-03-11T20:18:24.406-06:00Robert Parham's legacy, as reflected in his own writingsby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><b>Robert Parham, founder and executive editor of EthicsDaily.com and executive director of its parent organization, the Baptist Center for Ethics, passed away Sunday, March 5, following a long illness.</b></span>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><b>Robert was a Baptist prophet who leaves behind a body of work remarkable for its breadth, its depth, and its impact on not only Baptist life but the lives of the marginalized worldwide. It can truly be said of Robert Parham that he followed the Jesus model and <i>"went about doing good." (Acts 10:38)</i></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><b>I had the privilege of counting Robert as both a friend and colleague in Baptist work, and I'll miss him, as will countless others. Christian ethics has lost one of its most courageous, eloquent, tireless, and effective advocates and voices.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><b>The best tribute I can pay to Robert is to share with you a few of Robert's own words, as published on EthicsDaily.com over recent years, with links to the articles in which those words appeared. Quotes from 25 articles follow.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><b>May Robert Parham's legacy live on in the work, attitudes, and lives of those of us he touched.</b></span>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Our mission is "challenging people of faith to advance the common good." We think the best way for us to do this is through resourcing and speaking to congregational leaders and congregations.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/remember-what-ethicsdaily-coms-mission-is-how-we-pursue-it-cms-23919" target="_blank">Remember what EthicsDaily.com's mission is, how we pursue it</a>, 2/21/2017</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We, the founders of the Baptist Center for Ethics (BCE), saw a door with the collapse of the moderate control of the Southern Baptist Convention and the radical right turn of its moral concerns agency. We went through the door without the faintest sense of what was on the other side.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/behold-an-open-door-to-ethicsdaily-com-readers-cms-23742" target="_blank">Behold an open door to EthicsDaily.com readers</a>, 11/22/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Wouldn't it be refreshing and rewarding to focus on collaboration for the common good?</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/join-in-500th-anniversary-of-protestant-reformation-in-2017-cms-23703" target="_blank">Join in 500th anniversary of Protestant Reformation in 2017</a>, 11/4/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One would hope that the Pentagon video is wrong, that religious conflict will not be part of a "defining element in the social landscape." Christianity and other religions have an alternative narrative to conflict. It's advancing the common good through collaboration.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/security-issues-may-increase-on-churchs-agenda-if-pentagon-is-right-cms-23687" target="_blank">Security issues may increase on Church's agenda if Pentagon is right</a>, 10/25/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We hope that our new documentary, "The Disturbances," will increase the awareness in churches about genocide and encourage churches to be 'watchmen on the gate.'</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/preventing-genocide-will-benefit-from-christian-jewish-teamwork-cms-23642" target="_blank">Preventing genocide will benefit from Christian, Jewish teamwork</a>, 9/23/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Christians and Muslims have different sacred books, different religious holidays, different faith practices. But we do share in common the faith commandment to seek the welfare of others. We need not agree doctrinally to do the right thing.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/as-9-11-nears-christians-can-build-bridges-with-muslims-cms-23611" target="_blank">As 9/11 nears, Christians can build bridges with Muslims</a>, 9/2/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is an incredible story about ruin and redemption, blood and boldness, denial and dedication, guilt and goodness. "The Disturbances" is both horrifying and inspiring.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/telling-for-the-first-time-horrifying-and-inspiring-stories-of-christian-engagement-cms-23577" target="_blank">Telling for the first time horrifying and inspiring stories of Christian engagement</a>, 8/11/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">At its best, protest is a form of moral critique. It has long been part of the American tradition, especially the Baptist heritage. Not all protests or protesters are righteous, however.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/how-the-church-can-speak-up-for-the-thin-blue-line-cms-23527" target="_blank">How the Church can speak up for the Thin Blue Line</a>, 7/12/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The mother of the moderate movement is unmistakably Babs Baugh. She showed tenacity and courage.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/observations-on-cbfs-25th-anniversary-cms-23505" target="_blank">Observations on CBF's 25th anniversary</a>, 6/30/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We're going to have to break the chains of political ideology and loyalty, the prejudice of cultural heritage, the inherited list of church priorities. We're going to need to recover a much more robust commitment to the biblical message that teaches us that we - and those we dislike - are created in the image of God.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/mass-shooting-calls-christians-to-prioritize-the-fingerprints-of-god-cms-23476" target="_blank">Mass shooting calls Christians to prioritize the fingerprints of God</a>, 6/14/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">She said they wanted me to heal them. Parham as faith healer! Now that made me uncomfortable. After all, I don't believe in faith healing. I felt ashamed later on. I should have had the faith to pray boldly for their healing, knowing that healing comes from the hand of God, not my words. Lord, forgive my ignorance and arrogance.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/fragments-that-have-shaped-my-world-view-over-25-years-cms-23391" target="_blank">Fragments that have shaped my world view over 25 years</a>, 4/26/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When we got back to the hotel, my daughter asked me: Why did that woman in the hat keep writing down everything you said? Yes, Dorothy Patterson was there, spec hunting, taking notes. Hoping I would say something that she and her SBC colleagues could use against me and the BWA. That experience is a lot more humorous today than then!</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/recalling-light-hearted-moments-over-25-years-cms-23340" target="_blank">Recalling light-hearted moments over 25 years</a>, 3/29/2016</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Lebanon has an estimated 1.2 million Syrian refugees. The United States might permit 12,000 by the end of 2016. Big difference: 1.2 million vs. 12,000.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/the-tale-of-two-baptist-responses-on-syrian-refugees-cms-23104" target="_blank">The tale of two Baptist responses on Syrian refugees</a>, 12/1/2015</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">As a deepwater Baptist, I know no Baptist speaks for other Baptists. I certainly don't speak for the readers of EthicsDaily.com. I have always spoken to Baptists and our readers. I have always clarified and emphasized when speaking to the press this treasured tradition among goodwill Baptists.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/4-reasons-to-support-iran-nuclear-agreement-cms-22901" target="_blank">4 reasons to support Iran nuclear agreement</a>, 8/28/2015</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Trump's statements are unkind, untruthful and unbiblical. Trump's immigration plan is also unworkable. . . . We don't need political fantasy, political rhetoric. We need workable solutions. We need bipartisan collaboration to reform American immigration policy.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/trumps-anti-immigration-rhetoric-runs-counter-to-biblical-witness-cms-22878" target="_blank">Trump's anti-immigration rhetoric runs counter to biblical witness</a>, 8/19/2015</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">While Baptists claim to be people of the book, we have glossed over the book's message about the environment. Yes, even moderate Baptists, my own village, skirt the issue.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/praise-be-for-pope-francis-encyclical-on-climate-change-cms-22702" target="_blank">Praise be for Pope Francis' encyclical on climate change</a>, 6/10/2015</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Anti-religious cartoons and spiteful bus ads may legally qualify as expressions of free speech. That doesn't mean they qualify as morally responsible speech. Morally responsible speech is truthful, civil, respectful.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/lets-not-confuse-freedom-of-speech-with-moral-rightness-cms-22638" target="_blank">Let's not confuse freedom of speech with moral rightness</a>, 5/11/2015</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Advancing equal pay for women, paying a living wage and sharing the tax burden are morally reasonable commitments, worthy of church advocacy.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/economic-inequality-is-pressing-challenge-for-the-church-cms-22429" target="_blank">Economic inequality is pressing challenge for the Church</a>, 2/3/2015</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Ending modern slavery is an issue around which many rank-and-file churches could collaborate. Given the ideological polarization within many U.S. churches, finding common ground issues is critical, especially where tangible common good can be achieved.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/global-religious-leaders-pledge-to-eradicate-modern-slavery-cms-22317" target="_blank">Global religious leaders pledge to eradicate modern slavery</a>, 12/9/2014</b></i>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Let's reclaim our heritage as human rights advocates. Let's help congregants know that history by observing Human Rights Day in December and know how human rights is Jesus' agenda.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/observe-human-rights-day-in-december-it-is-our-baby-cms-22276" target="_blank">Observe Human Rights Day in December; "It is our baby"</a>, 11/18/2014</b></i>
</span><br />
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Focus on how Robertson uses the Bible. Clearly, he cherry-picks selected passages. He ignores the Sermon on the Mount with no citation of Jesus' teachings related to making peace.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/duck-dynasty-patriarchs-phil-robertson-plan-for-isis-sounds-like-holy-war-cms-22112" target="_blank">"Duck Dynasty" patriarch's Phil Robertson plan for ISIS sounds like holy war</a>, 9/9/2014</b></i>
</span><br />
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It was a gift some years ago from the staff. They titled it "Robertisms (Or: How to Speak BCE)."</span></b></i>
<br />
<ul>
<li><i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Example One: "If the horse is dead, dismount."</span></b></i></li>
<li><i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Example Two: "That dog don't hunt."</span></b></i></li>
<li><i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Example Three: "What's the next wrinkle?"</span></b></i></li>
<li><i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Example Four: "Let's apply some stress to the situation."</span></b></i></li>
<li><i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Example Five: "We need to leaven that lump."</span></b></i></li>
</ul>
<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">. . . They certainly highlight my own redundancy, shorthand, wacky framing when it comes to organizational planning and strategizing about social change.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/learn-to-speak-bce-cms-22041" target="_blank">Learn to speak BCE</a>, 8/8/2014</b></i>
</span><br />
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">With so many pressing issues--the Middle East, Ukraine, the flood of undocumented children into the U.S.--American Christians might be tempted to turn away from Africa. Let's hope, instead, we find a way to cross the road to help our neighbors in urgent need.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/prayer-action-needed-in-response-to-ebola-virus-outbreak-cms-22018" target="_blank">Prayer, action needed in response to Ebola virus outbreak</a>, 7/31/2014</b></i>
</span><br />
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When I started out, the challenge was how to get more churches engaged in social change through Christian citizenship—political engagement. Now the challenge is how to keep politics from invading and crippling congregations.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/keeping-secular-politics-out-of-the-sanctuary-cms-21909" target="_blank">Keeping secular politics out of the sanctuary</a>, 6/19/2014</b></i>
</span><br />
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">McGee and Stassen spent years toiling in the Southern Baptist vineyard when fundamentalists were breathing fire and brimstone about liberalism in seminaries and universities. Fundamentalists falsely accused them of not believing the Bible, a nasty canard given the fact that both men were so thoroughly Christ-centered in their moral agenda, unlike the fundamentalists who favored Leviticus over the Sermon on the Mount.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">- <i><b><a href="http://www.ethicsdaily.com/a-tribute-to-two-ethics-professors-hearing-vanished-voices-thinking-about-tomorrow-cms-21753" target="_blank">A tribute to two ethics professors: Hearing vanished voices, thinking about tomorrow</a>, 4/30/2014</b></i>
</span>
<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-3974469554537710592017-03-04T21:12:00.002-06:002017-03-04T21:14:40.878-06:00Remembering Mother, 20 years after God called her homeby Bill JonesTrustee, T. B. Maston Foundation<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Twenty years ago this afternoon, around 1:30, Daddy called and
said simply,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>"Bill, she's
gone."</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">My dear mother had passed away. We had been expecting it for a
long time, but you're never ready for the finality of it all.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Vivian Louise Otting Jones was born on March 16, 1906, in Miami
(pronounced<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>Mi-am-uh</i>),
Indian Territory, a year before it became part of the new state of Oklahoma.
She was just two days short of her 45th birthday when I was born, and just 12
days short of her 91st birthday when she went home to be with her Lord.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">In a sense, it seems hard to believe it's been 20 years. Yet in
another sense, it seems forever (and for her, of course, it's been an eternity
- literally).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Mother was the second oldest of 12 children – eight girls and four
boys. Each of the four oldest daughters was assigned one of the younger girls and
given the responsibility to watch over her. Mother's 'child' was her sister Betsy,
and they remained exceptionally close until Mother's death. In fact, in the
last weeks of Mother's life, as she shut down . . . quit eating . . . . quit
responding, obviously just waiting for God to call her home, Aunt Betsy came
and stayed, helping Daddy to take care of her; she was there with them when
Mother took her last breath.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Aunt Betsy passed away last fall; it was an honor to be at her
memorial service and share with her children and grandchildren in celebrating the life of someone who had meant so much to our family, especially to Mother.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Mother and Daddy were married for over 59 years; yet Daddy, who
lived for another 10 years after her passing, always said that those 59 years
just weren't enough. Theirs was a special marriage, and Patsy and I were
blessed to be part of such a loving home.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Mother was a strong woman. In an age when women typically were
known as "housewives" or "homemakers," Mother worked
full-time well into her 60s. In 1943, she found herself left at home to take
care of their 1-1/2-year-old daughter as Daddy served over 2 years as an Army
chaplain in the European Theatre under General Patton's command.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">When Daddy returned home after the war ended, he pastored small
churches while attending Southwestern Seminary, majoring in Christian Ethics
under T. B. Maston; although Mother worked full-time, and Daddy sometimes worked
part-time jobs that supplemented his pastor's salary, there was not exactly a
surplus of food in the pantry.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Patsy recalls how Mother<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>"always
supported Daddy in his ministry - all those every-Sunday lunches that she
hosted for his preacher boys when we lived in Montague"</i><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>(where Daddy pastored First Baptist
Church).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Patsy continues,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>"She
worked full-time, of course, took care of us children, sewed many of my
clothes, did more than her share of church work, and must have longed for a
weekend where she could let down some. We had so little money, but she could
feed those hungry guys (and a couple of wives) without too much expense by
cooking a small roast and, then, adding lots of mayonnaise, boiled eggs, and
pickle relish to make roast salad. And it was delicious to boot!!! She was a
great cook. She told wonderful family stories and was so much fun! Stephanie
always said that Mother was her party Grandma because she loved to plan tea
parties and wienie roasts for us."</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">I remember when I called Mother and Daddy, my senior year at OBU in the spring of 1973, to tell them I
was dating a Chinese girl from Hong Kong. But I need to back up a little; when we moved to
Kansas City, MO, in 1962, Mother took a job at Bethany Baptist Church. She was church clerk and also was secretary to our music minister, Richard Lin, who was on a
leave of absence from OBU while studying for his doctorate at the conservatory
at University of Missouri-Kansas City. During the next year, until the Lins
returned to Oklahoma, our families became close friends; their three sons and I would trade off almost every Sunday, with me spending the afternoon at their house or them at mine. Where did I learn to love Chinese cooking? At Julia Lin's dining table on Sunday afternoons.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Their little daughter, Anita, was still little, several years younger than her brothers. With Richard Lin
leading the music and Julia singing in the choir, Mother volunteered
to sit with Anita in the Sunday morning service every
week. It had been a long time since Mother had a little daughter, as Patsy was
already out of college and married by this time. So Mother simply doted on
little Anita and really loved the time she got to spend with her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">So back to my story. I called Mother and Daddy to tell them about
this girl, Joanna Wong, I was dating at OBU. Mother was on the bedroom phone,
and Daddy on the kitchen phone, or vice-versa. As they told me the story in
later years, as soon as they hung up the phone, they ran to meet each other in
the hallway, and Mother blurted out,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>"We're
going to have Chinese grandbabies!"</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
Well, they were putting the cart a little ahead of the horse, but they turned
out to be right. Joanna and I celebrated 40 years of marriage this past
September, and those "Chinese grandbabies" are now 35 and 31!</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCzOPAKzqdRUfqDRsi40DnIpASnjEHTlQD2v-AOD8htDM5wNYrwXdOr4IssMq_bGY0sMvuT3T3IBOdqv0HCqi2vp41jf-QW3tIGYurOXwPQVcdURtouvVadUG8pL4ub_Je_ljoWafjQnlA/s1600/OurKids.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCzOPAKzqdRUfqDRsi40DnIpASnjEHTlQD2v-AOD8htDM5wNYrwXdOr4IssMq_bGY0sMvuT3T3IBOdqv0HCqi2vp41jf-QW3tIGYurOXwPQVcdURtouvVadUG8pL4ub_Je_ljoWafjQnlA/s1600/OurKids.jpg" /></a></div>
<span erdana="" quot="" sans-serif=""><bold><em>Mother & Daddy with their 'Chinese grandbabies,' Alison & Travis (1991)</em></bold></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Most of all, I remember a gentle, loving Mother who was always
ready to sacrifice for her family. She wanted nothing more than for her family
to be happy. She was a committed Christian, always serving in the church,
teaching Sunday School, GAs, YWAs, and so forth. I remember when I was maybe 9
or 10, asking her why we were Baptist. Mother had grown up in a Presbyterian
home but had eventually become a Baptist after meeting and marrying Daddy.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Anyway, when I asked her why we were Baptist, she had a very
simple, yet profound, answer:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>"Because
Baptists believe the Bible."</i><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And
Mother believed the Bible, and she was a devoted follower of Jesus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Twenty years today! In June, it will be 10 years since Daddy passed
away. Patsy and I, and our families, have been blessed. They made a loving home
for all of us, and their influence, their legacy, lives on, and will for generations
to come.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-3627593943597747862016-03-25T00:12:00.001-05:002016-03-25T02:05:38.730-05:00Jesus - Peacemaker or "loser"? Ask Pentaquod.<div style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px;">
From the 1st chapter - "Voyage One: 1583" - of James Michener's 1978 novel, <em>Chesapeake</em>:</div>
<blockquote><em><div style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px;">
Reluctantly, he was coming to the conclusion that he must leave this tribe which had done everything but outlaw him publicly. As a child he had watched what happened to men declared outcasts, and he had no desire to experience what they had suffered: the isolation, the scorn, the bitter loneliness. . . . The trouble had started that day when he voiced his apprehension over a raid proposed by the high chief. . . . the Susquehannocks of the middle section had never in Pentaquod's life been easy in times of peace; they felt intuitively that they should be on the warpath, proving their manhood.</div></em></blockquote>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px;">
To me, this seems to aptly describe Americans today. And we Christians seem to be leading the way. Instead of seeking peace, we beat the drums for war and the bushes for enemies. We seek conflict to prove our "greatness." We make war to stake our claim to the political power that is our obsession. We hurl epithets - such as "weak" and "losers" - at those who seek first to negotiate and to compromise. We make outcasts of those who Jesus called the least of these, those who he told us to serve in order to serve him.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px;">
Who gets lost in all of this? The one whose death and resurrection we acclaim this week. He lived, died, and rose to give us victory, but we still act as those whose hope is in ourselves rather than in Him. We act as those who are defeated rather than victors.</div>
Jesus' teachings and commandments still make us uncomfortable, so we find a way to explain them away and wriggle out of doing them. But these words were not simply a hollow sound bite or applause line; they ring throughout Jesus' life, every action, every teaching:
<div style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.32px; margin-top: 6px;">
<blockquote><em><b>"Blessed are the peacemakers."</b></em><br><em> - Jesus the Christ in his sermon on the mount</em></blockquote></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-33451913919812916352015-07-11T00:30:00.000-05:002015-07-10T21:08:14.656-05:00Appeal for UNITY amidst the Christian and gay divideby Brenda McWilliamsLong before the recent Supreme Court ruling making same-sex marriage legal in all of our United States, the debate regarding the religious or moral “rightness” of same-sex intimacy was at fever pitch. The Court ruling, far from settling the issue and “putting it to bed” (pardon the pun) has, in many ways, added fuel to the fire, and the temperature continues to rise.<br />
<br />
First, let me be straight regarding who I am. I am an out, gay, Christian woman in a fourteen-year covenant relationship with another Christian woman. We worshiped together for many years at the First Baptist Church of Tyler, TX. I believe First Baptist would be considered a fairly conservative Baptist church affiliated with both the Southern Baptist Convention and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. I will not go into the details of my years of struggle coming to accept my sexual orientation and the journey, with God’s grace, toward reconciliation of who I am and my Baptist faith and beliefs. When asked how I reconcile being Christian and gay, the short answer is that I am a child of God through the saving grace of Jesus Christ and a woman who happens to have a same-sex orientation. However, my story and struggle is not the point of my writing today.<br />
<br />
I write today because I am saddened and heartbroken, and to pose a question: <i>What are we doing?</i> What are we doing to our Christian brothers and sisters, to our churches, and, perhaps most importantly, to our witness to the world of the all-inclusive love and grace of Jesus Christ? Perhaps that is a question we should ask ourselves daily and not just in regard to current issues of sexual orientation and our lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender folks.<br />
<br />
Here’s the source of my heartache and sorrow. More and more regarding the gay/same-sex marriage and Christian paradigm, I see battle lines being drawn, troops being mustered, and “war” strategies taking shape. I see the flourishing of a “them vs. us” mentality and thinking. I recall reading the call to arms by Matthew Vines, founder of the Reformation Project, to <i>“eradicate homophobia through the preaching and teaching of the Bible.” (ABPNews, 9/13/2013)</i> That was almost two years ago! Now, eradication of homophobia would be a good thing, a very good thing; however, I don’t know that it will happen through the preaching and teaching of the Bible. After all, did decades, perhaps centuries, of Bible teaching and preaching eradicate homosexuality? Go figure on that one!<br />
<br />
Then there is the NALT – Not All Like That – Christians Project, launched in 2013 <i>“to give LGBT-affirming Christians a means of proclaiming to the world—and especially to young gay people—their belief and conviction that there is nothing anti-biblical or at all inherently sinful about being gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender”</i> (<a href="http://notalllikethat.org/" target="_blank"><i>notalllikethat.org</i></a>). I am in agreement that it would be a good thing for LGBT-affirming Christians to be more vocal, to speak up and share their convictions in their congregations, Bible study groups, at work, at school, wherever they might be, in any circumstance and, particularly, in response to something hurtful or derogatory that has been said or done. Both The Reformation Project and the NALT Project are great, and they have done and continue to do good work. Yet, the fire still rages and the temperature still rises.<br />
<br />
If we want to truly talk about and strive toward “reformation,” let’s talk about relationships. Let’s sit with one another and share our stories, our faith journeys, our soul yearnings, and see and come to know the Christ within – within ourselves and our brothers and sisters in Christ. This is how true soul formation and reformation occurs.<br />
<br />
What hinders us from sharing our stories? Could it be the “other?” How do we perceive, approach, behave toward, and relate to people whom we believe to be different from who we perceive ourselves to be? How do we get to know the "other?" Do we want to know others, to seek to understand, and to strive to live with respect and acceptance of those we perceive as different? If we answer "Yes" to these latter questions – and I hope we do – I would propose that we start sharing our stories, our heartfelt convictions, and listening to one another as opposed to entering battle heralding our proclamations and unfurling our regimental flags.<br />
<br />
I sometimes wonder in this gay/same-sex marriage and Christian paradigm, if both “armies” are more focused on attempting to change, convert, and convince the “other” side than on loving one another and fostering unity in the body. Again, I would ask a question: <i>With regard to this issue, what is our desire?</i> Is our desire to be “right,” or is our desire to be in relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ and to be a witness to the abounding love of God through Christ?<br />
<br />
I am reminded here of Paul’s urgings to the Ephesians <i>“. . . to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit – just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call – one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” (Eph. 4:1-6; emphasis is mine)</i><br />
<br />
I see the division among Christians on the gay issue, and I am saddened. I see and hear the “gay-bashing” from many Christian groups, and I am saddened. I am equally saddened by the “church and/or Christian-bashing” coming from various factions of the LGBT community, even at times from the Christian LGBT community. Where is the humility, gentleness, patience, bearing with one another in love, and eagerness to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace? This breaks my heart.<br />
<br />
As Christians, regardless of our beliefs on the gay/same-sex marriage issue or any other aspect of our present-day culture, we are bound together in Christ. I want for us, the church, the body of Christ, to be inclusive and affirming of one another, bound by Christ’s love for us, our love of Christ, and our desire to share His love with others. I want for us, the church, through and because of our bond in Christ, to be able to sit with one another in covenant community and engage in civil and respectful dialogue about all sorts of issues and questions – even, especially, the hard ones.<br />
<br />
Yes, we may disagree on some things, and – since Christ binds us – we can agree to disagree, be respectful of one another’s “soul competency,” and carry on with the mission to share the love of God through Christ. As Christian brothers and sisters, gay and straight, I want for us, the church, to live in unity and the peace of Christ, knowing that unity does not require uniformity in thought or action, nor does the peace of Christ mean there is no disagreement. I want for us, the church, to be the Presence of Christ in and to the world. Somehow, I don’t think we are being that, the Presence of Christ, in our responses to the gay/same-sex marriage and Christian paradigm. I am saddened and heartbroken. Again, I pose the question: <i>What are we doing?</i><br />
<br />
More and more, I am being called back to <i>Matthew 10:27</i>, a verse I claimed many years ago: <i>What I tell you in the dark, speak in the daylight; what is whispered in your ear proclaim from the roofs. (NIV)</i> I also like <i>The Message</i> translation: <i>Don’t hesitate to go public now.</i> Well, I have gone public!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-9564466136852652532015-07-10T15:12:00.001-05:002015-07-10T15:15:22.727-05:00James Dunn's greatest legacyby Dick Maples<b><i>(EDITOR'S NOTE: Dick Maples is a former chair of the T. B. Maston Foundation.)</i></b><br />
<br />
When the news came last Sunday of <b>James Dunn’s</b> passing, I spent an hour or so lying in the hammock on the back porch, reminiscing and thanking God for a friendship that began sixty years ago when we served as youth directors of neighboring churches in <b>Weatherford, Texas</b>. Many will write about his accomplishments as director of the BGCT Christian Life Commission and later as director of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, but there may be little mention of the powerful impact that he had upon the lives of <b><i>students and young adults</i></b>.<br />
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My son, <b>Drake</b>, is one of the many who have been positively influenced by the life and ministry of James Dunn. Upon learning of James’s death this past week, he wrote his young adult children the following email, which I quote by permission:<br />
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<i>“James Dunn was a friend of mine as a child and as a young adult. He was, and has been, a strong and solid friend of our family for sixty years. He is one of the truly great men whom I have known in my life, and one who has truly influenced American policy and lawmakers for the past 30 years. Strangely, I think you will find that he is not one of those typical ‘churchy’ people that you might expect in Baptist life. In fact, James blustered in the face of the traditional Baptist church . . . and chose to represent individual freedom of religious thinking over any and all church doctrines and church dogmas. He was in fact a true maverick. . . . And one whom I loved and respected very much. </i></blockquote>
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<i>“HE . . . is one of the reasons that I have never fully tolerated or accepted the traditional trappings of the ordinary church. And I am hopeful that he would be proud of that. He always challenged me to think as well as act. He always demanded that people think and ask questions rather than simply accept the answers of a preacher or a church. He believed that every man has a ‘right’ to speak to his God as he sees and relates to him . . . And that no Government or individual had the right to dictate or interfere in this right. </i></blockquote>
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<i>“Regrettably, I think that there are very few James Dunns left in the world today . . . And I don’t know if any of you will be as fortunate as I have been to know this one.”</i></blockquote>
I believe there are legions of people like Drake who would express similar words of appreciation for their friendship with James Dunn and for the rich contribution he made to their lives. How fitting that, upon his retirement from the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, he returned to the role in which he began his ministry, that of teaching students. Wherever he has served, from Weatherford to <b>West Texas A&M</b>, from the <b>Christian Life Commission </b>in Dallas to the <b>BJCPA</b> in Washington, and most recently at the <b>Divinity School at Wake Forest</b>, James Dunn has positively impacted the lives of students and young adults and motivated them to become more devoted followers of Christ, and this may be his greatest legacy.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-66525587650614299682014-05-17T10:05:00.000-05:002014-05-17T15:13:29.156-05:00JUDGE WENDELL GRIFFEN, Baptist pastor:From Fear to Joy - to Love - and to Covenant<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 20px;"><b><i>(Originally posted by Judge Wendell Griffen, pastor of New Millennium Baptist Church, Little Rock, AR, to his Facebook timeline on May 14, 2014; published here with his permission. The T. B. Maston Foundation encourages candid and thoughtful dialogue on ethical issues.)</i></b></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; line-height: 20px;"><b><i>I want to express special appreciation to Jack P. Rogers for his fine book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Homosexuality-Revised-Expanded-Edition/dp/066423397X" target="_blank">Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality</a>. I am indebted to Jack P. Rogers, who did the research on the eight passages addressed in my post. - WENDELL GRIFFEN </i></b></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; line-height: 20px;">Thanks to family, friends, and everyone else who has posted concerning Judge Chris Piazza's historic decision last Friday which declared Arkansas laws unconstitutional that prohibit marriage licenses from being issued to same sex couples. Pulaski County Clerk Larry Crane and the dedicated public servants who work to receive and process applications for marriage licenses also deserve tremendous pr</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; line-height: 20px;">aise for their professionalism, hard work, and friendliness to the many people who've sought and received marriage licenses since Monday morning. And anyone who has observed the courteous way the security personnel have treated people has to be very impressed. As someone who works in the Pulaski County Courthouse every day, I can affirm that this is the way all these people approach their work each day.<br /><br />Some of my friends strongly disagree with my decision to officiate marriage ceremonies involving same sex couples. While I cannot and will not disrespect anyone for disagreeing, I hope everyone will take a few minutes to ponder comments I delivered two years ago at a Baptist Conversation on Sexuality and Covenant my wife and I attended in Decatur, Georgia that was co-sponsored by Mercer University, McAfee School of Theology, and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>L</b></span>ike many other pastors I know and countless more I don't know, I've learned to be available, responsive, and alert to calls for help in unexpected times and circumstances. But nothing in my ministry formation prepared me on how to respond to the reality of human sexuality, congregational unity, pastoral care, and the various challenges and opportunities to experience and enlarge what we mean by <i>"covenant"</i> when it comes to human sexuality. Human sexuality is as real as anything else one encounters in pastoral ministry. But I wasn't educated about it in church, college, or as part of my seminary studies.<br /><br />My parents talked with me about sex. But I don't recall any conversations with my parents or youth leaders about human sexuality during my youth. I don't recall any church conferences about human sexuality. I don't think my experience is very different from other congregational leaders.<br /><br />If my experience is typical, then it's probably safe to say that many—if not a majority—of the people who lead congregations reached adulthood like I did: with a very limited understanding about human sexuality. Perhaps we had conversations with our parents or other elders about sex and sensuality. Youth leaders occasionally and delicately talked about the topic of sex and dating. But I have yet to meet any Baptist pastor who grew up in a family or congregation where human sexuality was mentioned.<br /><br />It's not unfair or inaccurate to say that when it comes to the issue of human sexuality, religious people in the United States have avoided serious thinking, honest conversation, and open-minded dialogue. I trace our aversion to engage the issue of sexuality by serious thought, honest discourse, and open-minded conversation to one thing. We have a phobia about human sexuality. We're afraid to admit that we're afraid about sexuality. We're uncomfortable thinking about it. We're uneasy. As individuals, families, congregations, communities, clergypersons, and members of a society where free expression of opinions is supposedly valued, we've been afraid to think, speak, and work to lovingly understand sexuality, one of the basic aspects of our humanity.<br /><br />Sexuality has historically been left off the list of subjects we recruit educators to teach in high school. Sexuality has traditionally not been included among the issues seminary faculty and students analyze. In the minority of seminaries that include courses on human sexuality in the curricula the courses aren't required.<br /><br />So no one should be surprised that our congregations aren't comfortable dealing with sexuality. This Conference has been needed for a very long time. I hope it will mark the start of a new era of candor for Baptists and other faithful people.<br /><br />I haven't been immune or exempt from the fearful aversion to addressing sexuality. But I'm convinced that the aversion has done great harm to individuals, families, faith communities, and our desire to be agents of God's love and truth in the world. I've seen firsthand the pain and fear of families faced with the prospect that some aspect of a loved one's sexuality will become known. I've witnessed the anxiety of parents, grandparents, siblings, and other relatives.<br /><br />And I've witnessed firsthand the way fear and misunderstanding can work cruel results. I have known and hurt for people who were afraid to come to worship because they expected to be shunned or blamed on account of their sexuality. I've tried to protect and comfort family members who were afraid to ask their congregation to pray for a loved one who was diagnosed with AIDS. I've known the special anxiety young people feel when they are afraid to talk with parents, other relatives, and church leaders about sexuality. I've seen and heard pastors and other clergy demonize vulnerable children, teenagers, and adults simply because those people are different because of sexuality. And I've seen preachers and other church people mount and support political efforts that portray people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender as threats to family cohesion and societal order based on solely on their sexuality.<br /><br />So when New Millennium Church was organized in 2009 I prayed that we would be different. I prayed that we would be people who are not bound by a fear of difference but who are inspired by God's love to be <i>"inclusive, welcoming, and progressive followers of Jesus Christ."</i> But how would we live out that challenge surrounding the issue of sexuality? I will share what we've done and how it has affected us.<br /><br />We affirm oneness and welcome all persons in God's love during every Sunday worship service. Our congregation recites the following <i>"Affirmation of Oneness and Purpose"</i> each Sunday morning.</span></span><br />
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<i style="color: #37404e; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"We praise and worship God together. We petition God, together. We proclaim God, together. We welcome all persons in God's love together. We live for God, in every breath and heartbeat, by the power of the Holy Spirit, as followers of Jesus Christ, together."</span></i></blockquote>
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<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; line-height: 20px;">Why is this important? Almost every person in our congregation has lived through times of legalized segregation and religiously inspired discrimination against people who are different because of race, gender, and sexuality. But we have come to know God's love as expressed and demonstrated in Jesus Christ. In Christ, we have come to understand God's love for and acceptance of all persons. In Christ, we have come to realize that humanity involves a wonderful and God-ordained diversity. In Christ, we have experienced the meaning of being one with God and others by the unifying work of grace and the Holy Spirit. Somehow, our congregation was inspired to affirm our commitment to oneness and to <i>"welcome all persons in God's love"</i> because we sincerely trust that this is what it means to be one with God in Christ.<br /><br />Pastors have a prophetic duty to proclaim God's love in ways that welcome all people. Congregational life isn't defined by the personality of a pastor, but a Baptist pastor has a profound potential on that life by the way we proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. I'm struck, however, by how often pastors seem unwilling or unable to grasp and present God's love for all persons.<br /><br />I'm no model preacher by any means. But I was led to preach about the encounter Jesus had with a Samaritan woman at Jacob's Well for the inaugural worship service of New Millennium Church (May 31, 2009). I tried to present what that encounter meant to her and means for us in a sermon titled <i>"Give Me This Water!"</i> Please forgive me for quoting myself.
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<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 20px;"><i>"By his deliberate encounter with the Samaritan woman, Jesus revealed to her and to us that we can never be truly refreshed and rejuvenated by a well and bucket approach to life and faith. We need 'living water' that is invigorating, soothing, and cooling as we experience the challenges, conflicts, defeats, insults, and tragedies of our journeys. We need a source of strength and vitality that is bigger and deeper than domestic status, work, culture, and religious ritual. Until we are connected with 'living water,' we will keep coming up dry and empty, no matter what is in our family, cultural, or religious water pots and buckets.<br /><br />"God's love is the 'living water' that Jesus spoke about to the Samaritan woman. We are designed to be nourished, invigorated, soothed, and cooled by the constantly flowing stream of God's love. We need the push of God's unstoppable love in the face of our setbacks. We need the comfort of God's healing love for our hurts and injuries. We need the assurance of God's always flowing love as we deal with obstacles, disappointments, sorrows, and anxieties. You and I, like the Samaritan woman, need to be invigorated, soothed, and cooled by the flowing stream of God's love.<br /><br />"Here is the good news. God's love comes to us! Despite whatever situations, setbacks, disappointments, insults, conflicts, or frustrations life may present, God's love comes to us! The meaning of Jesus showing up in Samaria at Jacob's Well is that God's love shows up! Her marital history could not keep God's love from showing up in Jesus. The bigotry imposed on her people could not keep God's love from showing up in Jesus. The religious turf fight between preachers in her region and other preachers elsewhere about where people should worship could not prevent God's love from showing up in Jesus. God's love flows to wherever we are to call us, claim us, soothe us, invigorate us, renew us, and redirect us. We do not need to go to Jerusalem or elsewhere to experience God's love. Jesus at Jacob's Well talking with a Samaritan woman tells us that God's love comes to us, wherever we are, however we are, to fill our dry emptiness.<br /><br />"By the love that God has given us through Jesus, we are able to confront injustice. By that love, we draw strength to overcome adversity. By that love, we are called as instruments of peace in the face of conflict. Through that love, you and I are agents of hope to people in despair. As God has given us the living water of divine love in Jesus, God has made us part of that love with Jesus. Like a stream flows to fill dry places, God's love flows in Jesus to fill us and flows in those who are filled by that love to renew, reinvigorate, redirect, and soothe others. This is what happened to the woman of Samaria. God's love came to her. Eventually, she became part of that love to others in her community."</i></span></blockquote>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 20px;">If pastors believe that God loves people in whatever aspect of life they present themselves, then we must proclaim that love from our pulpits. And our sermonic efforts should call and challenge people to trust God's love in their relationships with others without regard to ancestral, cultural, ritual, or other bases for treating people differently because of their sexuality.<br /><br />New Millennium intentionally confronted our phobia and prejudice about sexuality by prayerful study. Rather than use Sunday School quarterly materials and lessons, New Millennium follows a book study approach. I try to prayerfully select books that will stretch us. We studied writings by Howard Thurman (<i>Jesus and the Disinherited</i>), Dan Southerland (<i>Transitioning: Leading Your Church through Change</i>), Rob Bell (<i>Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith</i>), Daniel Vestal (<i>It's Time… a Journey Toward Missional Faithfulness</i>), and Samuel Proctor (My Moral Odyssey) between our formation in May 2009 and the fall of 2010. And during the fall of 2010 and the winter months of 2011 we studied a book that challenged us to prayerfully ponder the ethical implications of being Jesus-followers concerning the issue of human sexuality when we studied a book written by Jack P. Rogers (<i>Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality</i>).<br /><br />Like it or not, people act out their beliefs and our fears. The phobia about human sexuality has driven how many people think and act about sexuality—both for themselves and for other persons. But the Bible declares that <i>"God has not given us a spirit of fearfulness."</i> One of the most frequent commands found in our Scripture is <i>"Don't fear."</i><br /><br />So our congregation prayerfully engaged in months of serious study and honest conversation about sexuality by following a study guide included with Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality. We watched videos that addressed how persons who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender are perceived and treated by religious people and the efforts of people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender to find acceptance and affirmation as they try to live out their faith in God's grace and truth (For the Bible Tells Me So and A Fish Out of Water). Instead of adopting the usual fearful approach to human sexuality we deliberately, prayerfully, and congregationally chose to study, listen, share, and trust the Holy Spirit.<br /><br />I didn't introduce the sexuality study to make a political statement for the congregation or myself. As pastor, I introduced that study for the same reasons that guided whatever we study. Human sexuality is a reality religious people, including followers of Jesus, cannot deny or avoid. Humans are sexual beings by design. But sexuality isn't a subject religious thinkers have been comfortable engaging. Augustine, considered by some to have been the father-figure of Christian theology, never seemed to be comfortable with the human body. More than a few people have expressed concern, if not regret, <i>"that for many centuries the teaching of the Church on human sexuality has suffered from its adherence to Augustine's distorted emphasis."</i><br /><br />I led New Millennium to intentionally study and confront the religious phobia about human sexuality knowing the study would challenge us. It did. One of our charter leaders eventually left the congregation because she didn't want to participate in it. She left with a clear conscience and remains in contact with us. Although others openly expressed anxieties, they committed themselves to the study because it marked the first time they were part of a congregation where human sexuality was being openly pondered, discussed, and embraced.<br /><br />At the beginning of the New Millennium study of human sexuality, we agreed that our effort would be guided by some fundamental thoughts.<br /><br />• Every person's opinion counts.<br />• Respect each other.<br />• Be open-minded and non-judgmental.<br />• Have compassion.<br />• Maintain and protect confidentiality.<br />• Listen to each other respectfully.<br />• Disagree agreeably.<br />• Don't be afraid to grow.<br /><br />New Millennium Church is a new church start. Most of our members are middle- aged and senior citizens. Most of us have been Baptists for decades. But regardless of our ages, varying levels of education, vocational diversity, racial diversity, and other factors, none of us had ever engaged in a serious study of human sexuality and Christian theology. Our study marked the first time we were able to openly discuss sexuality and faith. The study allowed us to follow the Holy Spirit as we listened to each other, as we read and pondered the assigned reading material, and as we intentionally met a same-sex Christian couple whose relationship has endured for more than forty years. We were able to confront the truth that the Bible has often been misused to justify slavery, segregation, and subjugation of women. We studied principles of Biblical interpretation. We prayed for each other.<br /><br />Our study didn't weaken us. It gave us a new courage. We came to understand the importance of testing how Scripture is read and understood according to the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Thanks to prayerful study, we were able to have honest conversations about sexuality and faith. We learned to celebrate the gift of sexuality with each other. We moved from fear to joy.<br /><br />Our experience also allowed us to rethink and re-envision what covenant means. Covenant involves much more than a ceremony. Covenant is about commitment and relationship. Our study showed that heterosexuals enjoy economic, social, and legal benefits that are denied other people. In our conversation with the same-sex couple who has been together for over forty years—longer than my wife and I have been married—we learned that one member of the couple was denied the opportunity to be in the other's hospital room overnight following a surgical procedure. Arkansas does not recognize their relationship, despite all its evidence of commitment, as legitimate. They cannot marry. They cannot file a joint tax return. They cannot claim each other as dependents for health care benefits. For a brief time they were legally banned from being adoptive or foster parents. No matter how committed they are to each other, their relationship is not considered legitimate. Meanwhile, people who are heterosexual are permitted to marry—and receive all the social, economic, and legal privileges associated with marital status—whether they are committed to each other or not.<br /><br />As we became better informed about these and other aspects of heterosexual privilege we remembered our personal and collective experiences with injustice. We recalled that during slavery marriage ceremonies did not protect slaves from being sold away from each other and that Baptists misused the Bible to justify human trafficking, chattel slavery, and Jim Crow segregation. We recalled that black people and women were denied citizenship and social equality. We remembered the hurtful impact of those injustices.<br /><br />Above all, we remembered the love of God as revealed in Jesus Christ. In Christ, those who were once considered spiritual outsiders—and outlaws—have been brought into a covenant relationship with God and each other. The relationship and commitment associated with it creates and defines the covenant. And at the heart of what that relationship with God in Christ means are the great commandments. We are called to love God with all our being (including our sexuality) and love other persons as we hope to be loved. The essence of covenant is love and justice, not legality.<br /><br />Months of prayerful study about faith and sexuality made us more aware about heterosexual privilege. We heard about and witnessed its consequences on people who have been branded moral and social misfits on account of their sexuality. We remembered Jesus, the embodiment of God's wonderful love, who embraced people who were considered moral and social misfits.<br /><br />Through prayerful study, prophetic preaching, and worship that intentionally welcomes all persons in God's love, New Millennium Church no longer lives in fearful silence about sexuality. We rejoice in the diversity God has created, including the diversity of human sexuality. We rejoice that covenant is about relationship and commitment, not ceremony. And we affirm that the love of God we've come to know in Jesus calls us to be agents of love, truth, and justice. We aren't afraid of sexuality. We rejoice in it. We're inspired to be agents of God's love, truth, and justice concerning it in the true sense of covenant.<br /><br /><i>"We praise and worship God together. We petition God, together. We proclaim God, together. We welcome all persons in God's love together. We live for God, in every breath and heartbeat, by the power of the Holy Spirit, as followers of Jesus Christ, together."</i> Amen.</span>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-44137683204887929232014-01-16T11:33:00.000-06:002014-01-19T21:34:10.079-06:00FOY VALENTINE (1987): Crying in the wilderness: Streaking in Jerusalem: The prophethood of all believers<div align="left" class="text1">
<b><i><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(NOTE: The late Foy Valentine, who served as director of the Christian Life Commissions of both Texas Baptists and Southern Baptists, presented this address upon receiving the first T. B. Maston Christian Ethics Award, November 6, 1987.)</span></i></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Mark 1:3</em> says that <b>John the Baptist</b> was <i>“a voice crying in the the wilderness”</i>; and of this prophet who <b>Jesus </b>called <i>“more than a prophet”</i> (<em>Luke 7:26</em>) our Lord said, <i>“Among those born of women none is greater than John”</i> (<em>Luke 7:28</em>).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Isaiah 20:1-6</em> (RSV) says,</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>“In the year that the commander-in-chief, who was sent by Sargon the king of Assyria, came to Ashdod and fought against it and took it — at that time the Lord had spoken by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, ‘Go, and loose the sackcloth from your loins and take off your shoes from your feet,’ and he had done so, walking naked and barefoot — the Lord said, ‘As my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot for three years as a sign and a portent against Egypt and Ethiopia, so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians captives and the Ethiopians exiles, both the young and the old, naked and barefoot, with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. Then they shall be ashamed and confounded because of Ethiopia their hope and of Egypt their boast. And the inhabitants of this coastland will say in that day, “Behold, this is what has happened to those in whom we hoped and to whom we fled for help to be delivered from the king of Assyria! And we, how shall we escape?”’”</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Numbers 11:27-29</em> (RSV) says, <i>“And a young man ran and told Moses, ‘Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.’ And Joshua the son of Nun, the minister of Moses, one of his chosen men, said, ‘My lord Moses, forbid them.’ But Moses said to him, ‘Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them!’”</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Joel 2:28</em> has the prophet <b>Joel </b>speaking for <b>God </b>and<em> Acts 1:17-21</em> has the Apostle <b>Peter</b>, quoting <b>Joel</b>, to say, <i>“In the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; yea, and on my menservants and my maidservants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.... And it shall be that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong class="sectiontitle" style="font-style: italic;">Activating Our Christian Prophethood</strong><br />The concept of the <i>the prophethood of all believers</i> is quite old, traceable at least to <b>Moses </b>(see <em>Numbers 11:29</em>). The term itself has been around for at least a hundred years; but I am personally indebted to <b>James Luther Adams</b>, whom I knew, for having jogged me into hot-eyed excitement about the idea through a piece that he wrote in 1947 and which <b>George Beach</b> both included and, at Adams' suggestion, used as the title for a volume of compiled addresses and articles by Adams, published by Beacon Press in 1986.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">According to the papers, a leading Methodist bishop, former president of the Methodist Council of Bishops, and former tallsteeple church pastor, who after fifty years of intense homosexual activity recently died of AIDS, built his stunningly successful professional career on a ruthlessly pursued program of rigid <i>“conservatism”</i> and aggressive initiatives for full-speed-ahead-damn-the-torpedoes <i>“evangelism and church growth.”</i> Prophethood was not his cup of tea.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I was enrolled at <b>Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary</b>, it was the rule rather than the exception for the teachers to fail to get to the latter sections of <b>Paul’s</b> epistles, to perambulate around the prophetic, to denigrate the prophetic demands of the Christian calling, and, like a yo-yo stalled on hesitation at the bottom of the swing until its energy is spent, left ethics till the last and then left it out. Prophethood was not their priority.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We do well to remember that <b>Henry IV</b>, who had called his ally, the French soldier of fortune, <b>Louis Crillon</b>, <i>“The bravest of the brave,”</i> said to the tardy Crillon after victory had been won in 1587 against a particularly aggressive show of force by the Leaguers in northern France, <i>“Hang yourself, brave Crillon! We fought at Arques and you were not there.”</i> (cf. James Luther Adams, <em>The Prophethood of All Believers, </em>p. 103.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The prophetic dimension of revealed religion has everlastingly fallen onto hard times. It has never been the most coveted of callings. There are some obvious reasons for this. Even the Lord’s anointed are subject to temptations related to <i>“soft clothing,”</i> pleasure, materialism, economic determinism, and love of comfort. When the winnowing and harrowing of Fundamentalism started among Southern Baptists, Baptists were not lean and mean, ready for the war, but soft and satisfied, flabby and floppy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The craving for adulation has also had its effects. <b>Earl Guinn</b> has spoken of this malady when he said that the churches, instead of hearing God’s prophets in the pulpits sounding the trumpet in thrilling, clarion tones, have heard instead <i>“... inoffensive little men tooting piccolos and then running to the door to grin like Cheshire cats at those whose compliments are demanded by their itching ears”</i> (“The Prophetic Ministry,”<em>Southern Baptist Preaching, </em>ed. H.C. Brown, Jr.; Nashville: Broadman Press, 1959, p. 91).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Perhaps the most chilling reason of all for our resistance to prophethood has been idolatry. For decades now, we Baptists have been bragging that our programs, our missions, our evangelism have made us great, that our institutions, our brick buildings, our budgets have made our God (or god) look good to the heathen. When the death of Northern, essentially German, Fundamentalist rationalism was slipped into the pot of Baptist life, we said that these wonderful things, which we made with our own hands, have always saved us, and that they would surely save us now. It has been an idolatry that a jealous God could never have been expected to cotton to with any real enthusiasm. And it is turning out to be as <i>“one in a certain place has said”</i> (<em>Hebrews 2:6</em>) - that it is <i>“a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God”</i> (<em>Hebrews 10:31</em>).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">An exceptionally successful, much lionized Southern Baptist pastor told a young protégé (whom I know) when he was just starting out in the ministry, <i>“Just preach salvation; and don’t make waves.”</i> Prophethood has never been his bag.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A very safe, scrupulously middle-of-the-road, extremely well-paid and highly successful pastor of a big city church recently sought to placate an agitated rich member deeply concerned about the takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention by Fundamentalist extremists by counseling, <i>“Just be patient; don’t rock the boat; don’t talk this around; don’t designate your money; this thing is going to turn around; the pendulum will swing.”</i> Prophethood is not for him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some time ago, a pastor of a large Southern Baptist church recounted this chilling tale:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A Southern Baptist megachurch pastor had been invited to his city to hold a city-wide evangelistic crusade. The megachurch visiting evangelist looked up this pastor of the biggest church in the city and said, <i>“Look, I’m in desperate circumstances: I’ve got to have a good love offering.”</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The pastor said,</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> “You’re greedy.”</i></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>“No, I’ve got these huge payments to make on my house.”</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>“No. You’re unconscionably greedy. You’re several times a millionaire.”</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>“How did you know?”</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>“Elementary, my dear Watson.”</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nevertheless, the “evangelist” pressed his case with other preachers in the city until he was able to walk away with his $25,000. He had his reward. Prophethood is not his vocation.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At the <b>1985 Southern Baptist Convention in Dallas</b>, there were 36,270 seats in all three auditoriums; there were 45,049 messengers registered; and there were 44,248 ballots allegedly cast (with 98.2% of the registered messengers allegedly present and allegedly voting) in the presidential race between <b>Charles Stanley</b> and <b>Winfred Moore</b>; the denominational news services and the editors of state Baptist papers chose not to report those curious statistics. Let-the-chips-fall-where-they-may, tell-it-like-it-is prophethood did not ring their journalistic bells.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Most of the Southern Baptist Convention’s real bishops, during most of the last decade-and-a-half of unprecedented crisis, while the Fundamentalists have gone for the Southern Baptist Convention’s jugular with precinct political organization and bused-into-the-Tuesday-afternoon-Presidential-election votes, have been tongue-tied in words and hamstrung in deeds, waiting for the storm to blow over, hoping for others to rise up and fight the Philistines, watching for that pendulum to swing, straddling the fence from underneath, hunkered down in paralyzed ambiguity, reeds <i>“shaken with the wind”</i> of Fundamentalism, men <i>“clothed in soft raiment”</i> (<em>Matthew 11:7, 8</em>); <i>Gamalielized.</i> Prophethood has not been their long suit.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Prophecy has to do with visions and with visionaries, with seeing and with seers, with justice and with judgment, with righteousness and with retribution, and with sometimes striking an uncouth note in the world of possibility thinking. Our world needs few things more now than prophetic words and prophetic deeds. The churches now need few things more than the prophethood of crying in the wilderness like brave <b>John the Baptist</b>, streaking in Jerusalem like courageous <b>Isaiah</b>. By these words and deeds, the demands of <b>God </b>are understood to be not obscure or ambiguous, but understandable and doable, practical and specific, clear and concrete, relevant and redemptive.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong class="sectiontitle" style="font-style: italic;">Definitions Related to the Prophetic</strong><em>Prophet</em> is the English transliteration of <em>prophetes</em>, a Greek word used in the Septuagint to translate the Hebrew word <em>Nabi</em>, probably meaning “one who utters a God-given message.” The word originally meant forthteller but came early to encompass the idea of foretelling; and both ideas, forthtelling and foretelling, are properly associated with the term <em>prophet</em>. The great prophets of biblical times were driven by an irresistible constraint to declare the word of the <b>Lord</b>, to obey the word of the Lord, and to act in response to the word of the Lord. The prophet is the priest who is taking the longer look, listening to a different drummer, and feeling the fire in his baptism as it burns to become fire in his belly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Prophecy</em> is the work of a prophet, the vocation of a prophet, the utterance of a prophet. It may be a courageous, communicative, cathartic prophetic act. It may be a prediction. It may be a discernment and interpretation of <i>“the signs of the times”</i> (<em>Matthew 16:3</em>).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Prophetic</em> is an adjective which refers to things pertaining to the character or function of a prophet or of prophets, including both forthtelling, or the proclamatory, and foretelling, or the predictive. The prophetic word in the gospel presses toward the ideal, champions the moral imperative, stands, stands for right.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Prophesy</em> is a verb meaning to speak by divine inspiration, to announce, or to predict. <em>Amos</em> said, <i>“The lion hath roared, who will not fear? The Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy?”</i> (<em>3:8</em>)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Prophethood</em> has to do with the word or position or office of the prophet. As we speak of the priesthood of all believers, we may also rightly speak of the <i>prophethood </i>of all believers. There is nothing that would do more to revive authentic Christianity in our time than for us to find the ways and devise the means to press successfully for the prophethood of all believers.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong class="sectiontitle" style="font-style: italic;">Biblical Roots of Prophethood</strong><br />The first mention of a prophet in the Bible is the reference in <em>Genesis 20:7</em> in which <b>God </b>said to <b>Abimelech</b>, king of Gerar, concerning <b>Abraham</b>, <i>“he is a prophet.”</i> <b>Moses </b>was a prophet in a truly classic sense. As men and women of heroic deeds, the <b>Judges </b>of Israel performed prophetic functions representing God and pointing to God. The kings of Israel were frequently compelled to fall in line with the visions and calls of the Lord’s divinely inspired prophets. The great prophets like <b>Elijah </b>and <b>Elisha</b>, <b>Amos </b>and <b>Hosea</b>, <b>Isaiah </b>and <b>Micah</b>, <b>Jonah </b>and <b>John the Baptist</b>, and many, many more were people of mighty words; and they were men and women of mighty deeds. Prophetesses like <b>Miriam</b> and <b>Deborah </b>and <b>Huldah </b>and <b>Anna </b>and the <b>four virgin daughters of Philip the evangelist</b> (<em>Acts 21:9</em>) prove that God is no respecter of persons at the point of sex, that prophethood has no direct connection to gonads or ovaries, to sex or sexuality. The call of these prophets and prophetesses was a call to ethical monotheism, justice, righteousness, goodness, mercy, kindness, forbearance, truth, love, rectitude, and responsibility. They everlastingly highlighted the worth of the individual.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The <b>Lord Jesus Christ</b> was himself a prophet <i>“mighty in deed and word before God and all the people”</i> (<em>Matthew 21:11; Luke 24:19; John 4:19; John 7:40</em>); and his most profoundly prophetic witness to the world was his incarnation. The scandal of the cross and his awful nakedness there was preceded by his pitifully provincial nakedness as a newborn human baby sucking at the breast of <b>Mary </b>his mother and then wetting his diapers in the barn of <b>Bethlehem</b>. That incarnational witness of <b>God in Christ</b> puts the streaking of <b>Isaiah in Jerusalem</b> into perspective. Isaiah’s witness was but a pale portent, a mere shadow, of the power of prophecy when presented by the Prophet of prophets, Jesus Christ.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The prophetic tradition in church history has not had a brilliant record; and for this, the church is infinitely poorer; for this, the Kingdom of God is sadly diminished. In the early church, of course, prophets are sometimes mentioned as ranking next to the Apostles (<em>Acts 11:27; Ephesians 4:11; 1 Corinthians 12:28</em>). The Apostles themselves discharged prophetic responsibilities. <b>Paul </b>was not disobedient to the heavenly vision. <b>Peter </b>learned in his vision on the housetop of Joppa that what God had cleansed we may not call common or unclean. Authentic prophecy stumbled on many stones, including the stone of incipient pentecostalism which fostered excesses of emotionalism, dispensationalism, escapism, and moral nihilism.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong class="sectiontitle" style="font-style: italic;">The Need for the Prophethood of All Believers</strong>Few biblical insights, concepts, doctrines, or teachings are more neglected, more generally ignored, or more shamelessly rejected than those pertaining to prophets, prophethood, and the prophetic aspect of the Lord’s high calling.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the Reformation, Christians took a giant step toward recovering the priesthood of the believer. <b>Martin Luther’s</b> nailing of his 95 theses to the door of Castle Church in <b>Wittenburg </b>was a prophetic act. The formulation of those 95 theses was a prophetic utterance or statement communicating a divinely inspired insight. The <b>Anabaptists </b>and the whole radical left wing of the Reformation subsequently took some halting steps toward the prophethood of all believers; but the plane has not ever sustained its flight for very long. Institutionalism keeps metastasizing. The priestly keeps squeezing the life out of the prophetic. Comfort keeps conquering courage.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The need now is not just for a prophet, an <b>Abraham</b>, a <b>Moses</b>, a <b>Rahab</b>, an <b>Amos</b>, an <b>Isaiah </b>to take his clothes off and go barefoot for three years as a sign, or a <b>John the Baptist</b> with his lone voice crying in the wilderness. The need is for an extension of the Reformation, a commitment to the basic agenda of Baptists in the free church tradition, general acceptance of the prophethood of all believers. With this prophethood in place, <i>we can dream dreams and see visions. We can run and not be weary; we can walk and not faint. We can lay hold of the frequent vision (I Samuel 3:1, RSV). We can be salt for the earth and light for the world and leaven for the lump.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The prophethood of believers can smash idols. And we can grind them to smithereens and mix them in the water, and bring the world to drink them. This was a sure sign to the <b>Israelites </b>that their false gods had been irretrievably disintegrated, ingloriously ingested, and ignobly excreted. Gentleness and facile optimism sometimes need to be balanced by justice and hard reality.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The prophethood of believers can foster repentance; and repentance, it is to be remembered, is the keynote of the <em>New Testament </em>message. That is, we can encourage the world, which God loves and which He came in Christ to save, to change its mind about its sin. We can foster repentance by first getting the world’s attention. Voices crying seize interest; and prophets streaking, naked and barefoot for three years at a time, demand attention. Prophethood, having got the world’s attention, then points people to the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Then with repentance effected, purification is brought about, renewal is achieved, integrity is apprehended, salvation is realized, and church takes on meaning.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Oh, there is one other little matter. With the prophethood of all believers recovered and then taken seriously, failure is assured. As surely as sparks fly upward, rejection, loneliness, scandal, stoning, banishment, scorn, hatred, and crucifixion go with prophethood. The prophet’s mantle is made of tow sacks and old cowhides. The prophet’s food may be grasshoppers and wild honey. The prophet’s house may be a cave. The prophet’s servants may be crows. The prophet’s pay may be spit in the face.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But the prophet’s reward is God’s <i>“Well done, thou good and faithful servant.... Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord”</i> (<em>Matthew 25:21</em>).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As we believe in and practice the priesthood of all believers, so let us believe in and practice the prophethood of all believers.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>The Lord God has spoken; who can but prophesy.</i></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-87298887501757886312014-01-07T09:37:00.000-06:002014-01-12T05:34:41.845-06:00PATRICK ANDERSON: Foy Valentine remembered . . . A friend for the ages<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b><i><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(NOTE: The author, Patrick Anderson, is editor of Christian Ethics Today journal. He also recently served as executive coordinator of Cooperative Baptist Fellowship in the interim between Daniel Vestal and Suzii Paynter.)</span></i></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>E</b></span>ight years ago
January 7, one of our great <b>Baptist</b> leaders, <b>Foy Valentine</b>, passed on. We
remember him fondly, and miss him a great deal.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The first time I met <b>Foy Valentine</b>
was on the telephone. I was in my faculty office at Louisiana State University
late one afternoon when the call came. He identified himself, and I recognized
the name, remembering his valiant leadership of the <b>Southern Baptist Convention’s
Christian Life Commission</b> during the turbulent <b>Civil Rights Movement</b> era. I
could not imagine why he had called me, and I could not imagine how he got my
name and number. I was not at all involved in Baptist life at that time, but I
was honored and intrigued to receive a call from someone so important.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He told me that my
pastor, <b>Doug Cheatham</b>, had spoken to him about me as a member of his church and
a professor of Criminology at LSU. He suggested to Foy that, if the CLC ever
needed a criminologist, he give me a call. So the call came and, after some
pleasantries, I asked, <i>“What do you need a criminologist for?”</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He replied, <i>“Do you know anything about
gambling?”</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a name="foy">I</a> said, <i>“Well, I know the
difference between a full house and a flush. What do you want to know?”</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We both
enjoyed the moment, and I believe from that first conversation we became
friends.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He asked me to
study the impact of legalized gambling on crime and other social problems. I used
the scientific data and a surprisingly large body of literature to make the
case against the expansion of legalized gambling in America and became a strong
opponent of the gambling industry. I testified in several state legislative
hearings against legalized gambling, and <b>Foy Valentine’s Christian Life
Commission</b> led the fight against the gambling industry’s intrusion into our
society, a hard-fought fight largely lost. He used to laugh and say, <i>“Doc, you
never lost a debate but you never won an election!”</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Foy was ahead of
the curve, ahead of his time. He saw, years before the first legalized lottery
in America, the terrible potential for harm that legalized gambling posed. I
caught up with his intuitive antipathy for gambling after my study, and agreed
with his prescient knowledge that gambling, especially state-sponsored
gambling, was bad, it was wrong, it was the antithesis of moral behavior, the
opposite of what the government should encourage.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our friendship
lived beyond the gambling fights and his retirement from Southern Baptist life,
a retirement that marked a terrible transition in Southern Baptist life. He had
led the Christian Life Commission to assist Southern Baptists in espousing the
very best in moral and ethical behavior. His leadership was marked by addressing
the pressing issues of <i><span style="background-color: white;">birth control, abortion
rights, sex education, racial justice, equal rights for women, strict
environmental regulations,<span style="color: #555555;"> </span></span>poverty,
war, gambling</i>. He understood <i>Baptist principles</i>, especially the <i>Separation of
Church and State</i>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When he retired or,
more accurately, was pushed out of the way, Southern Baptists’ new leaders
changed the CLC into a partisan, political member of the Religious Rightwing
Movement, an apologist for war after September 11, 2001, and blatant public
supporter of Republican politics and politicians. An early casualty of the
changes in the CLC was aggressive opposition to gambling; since Foy’s departure,
we have seen state lotteries, televised poker, casinos, and sports betting
spread like wildfire.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The change was
tragic for Foy, and for his friends. We talked about it often at various board
meetings or CBF gatherings, and on the telephone. I loved to talk with him on
the phone. His soft East Texas twang and rich humor made every conversation a
pure delight. He often spoke of his wife, <b>Mary Louise</b>, and his three grown
daughters, <b>Jean, Carol, and Susan</b> with great pride and affection. He loved his
mountain get-away and vintage jeep.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Many of us enjoyed
his essays in the journal he founded during his retirement, <i>Christian Ethics Today</i>. When he
collected those essays in a published book, <i>Whatsoever
Things Are Lovely</i>, he was as pleased as punch. If you do not have a copy of
that book, ask for one through <a href="http://www.christianethicstoday.com/"><i><b>www.ChristianEthicsToday.com</b></i></a>.
I’ll be happy to send a copy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I really miss <b>Foy
Valentine</b>, his infectious laughter, solid Biblical good sense, and candor. If
you knew him, I am sure you share that sentiment. Many were blessed to have
known him much better and for a longer time than I.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wish I had called
him more often, talked longer, laughed with him more. He was one great man, one
great Baptist, a friend for the ages.</span></div>
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-84656577972498245302013-12-07T10:59:00.001-06:002014-01-08T23:08:26.608-06:00PATRICK ANDERSON: My Mandela Pilgrimage<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b><i><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(NOTE: The author, Patrick Anderson, is editor of Christian Ethics Today journal. He also recently served as executive coordinator of Cooperative Baptist Fellowship in the interim between Daniel Vestal and Suzii Paynter.)</span></i></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></b>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: 16pt;">S</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt;">everal years ago, I traveled to South
Africa. In preparation for my trip, I picked up a few books to read, including
<b>Nelson Mandela’s</b> <i>Long Walk to Freedom</i>,
which I read on the long plane ride from Atlanta to Johannesburg. Of course,
Mandela was not a total stranger to my brain, but while reading that remarkable
book I became a Mandela disciple and, during that trip and since, I have read
much of his writings and a great deal about the man himself. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since I had a couple of days layover on my
Africa trip and I was alone, I spent a night near the Soweto Township in
Johannesburg and hired a driver to take me on a tour. I visited Mandela’s home.
I stood in the front doorway and looked into the tiny living room where a wall
had been built the length of the house just inside to block the snipers’
bullets which <a href="" name="Mandela">sometimes</a> were fired into the front window. I walked through the
small house and got a sense of how he and <b>Winnie</b> lived there. I saw mementoes
given to him through the years, including the World Championship Boxing Belt
from <b>Sugar Ray Leonard</b> and letters from school children and dignitaries from
around the world. He was loved by many in his life, and inspired some
remarkable people.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I walked down the street and around the
corner to where his friend, <b>Desmond Tutu</b>, lived, surprised by the close
proximity. I tried to imagine life in that small tight-knit community, and
remembered the stormy, violent history of that place during Apartheid. My driver-guide tolerated my mulling and
questioning. I did not want to leave the place. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Later, I took a plane to Cape Town, and then
rode the ferry across to Robben Island, where Mandela spent 27 long years in
prison under a life sentence. I stood outside the cell he lived in and tried to
put myself into that stark setting, sleeping on the thin mat, feeling the cold
air, imagining the sounds of that despairing place. I sat on the ground in the
courtyard where he and the other prisoners spent many hours each day in silent,
tedious work, where they somehow managed to smuggle messages to each other and
to people on the outside from that place. I walked in the lime quarry where he
and the other prisoners toiled in the hot sun, in a pit so blindingly bright
that some were actually blinded. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I thought of how, during all the years he
spent in that terrible place, I had lived in comfort and oblivious peace in
America, enjoying the benefits of freedom, food, education, good health.
Somehow, I felt ashamed of myself, wishing that somehow my life had been more
focused and meaningful while Mandela had exhibited such strength and fortitude
in his discomforts. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the ferry back to the mainland, I thought
about how Mandela, just like <b>Paul and Silas</b> long before, refused a secret,
private release from prison, demanding instead to be released as publicly as he
had been incarcerated. His election as President of South Africa, his
appointment of his jailer to his cabinet, and his insistence for a full
disclosure kind of reconciliation . . . all of those actions he took without any
rancor, with no hatred or retaliatory impulse . . . humbled me, and made me both melancholy
and thrilled at the display of the human spirit at its best.</span></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since that pilgrimage, I have thought much
about Nelson Mandela, finding in him an inspiration and role model for my own
life. Now that he <i>“belongs to the ages,”</i> as <b>President Obama</b> stated, take some
time to stop and reflect on Mandela’s life, seeing it as a Christ-like example
to us all, far from perfect, very human and full of struggle and hardship. His
spirit lives on, and in my own heart I make a new commitment to justice,
compassion, and strong living.</span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-18778476934252182012013-11-22T23:59:00.003-06:002013-11-23T23:17:01.398-06:00Breakfast at the Elite Café—November, 1963 . . . by Joe E. Trull<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b><i><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(NOTE: The author is Joe E. Trull, member of the T. B. Maston Foundation Board of Trustees and former editor of Christian Ethics Today journal. Dr. Trull was recently honored with the 2013 T. B. Maston Christian Ethics Award, and his brother, Don, will be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame on December 10, 2013.)</span></i></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></b>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">T</span></b>he year was
1963. The 175<sup>th</sup> year of our nation’s life. President John F. Kennedy
was completing his first term in office.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Abroad our country was engaged in a “cold war” with the communist-bloc countries, including <st1:country-region w:st="on">Cuba</st1:country-region> just
ninety miles away. Thousands of American soldiers were massed along the 39<sup>th</sup>
parallel that divided North and <st1:country-region w:st="on">South Korea,</st1:country-region> guarding an uneasy truce. The <st1:country-region w:st="on">United States</st1:country-region> was escalating its involvement in the war in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Vietnam</st1:country-region> with 25,000 advisors.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a name="elite">At</a> home, other battles were waging, many focusing upon basic civil rights for African-Americans. Racial segregation in the public schools was still common,
as well as other forms of separation in public places—especially hotels and motels, restaurants, transportation, bathrooms, and even water fountains! Black
Americans found voting very difficult in many parts of the country. In 1963, the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote his famous <i>“Letter From a Birmingham Jail”</i>
after the bombing of the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Sixteenth</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Street</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Baptist</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Church</st1:placetype></st1:place> in that segregated city. Tensions between the races were escalating.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was living on the field of my student pastorate in southwestern <st1:state w:st="on">Oklahoma</st1:state>. The year was a unique one for our
family, as my brother Don was setting records as an All-American quarterback for the Baylor Bears. He led the nation in passing and total yardage, and was
runner-up behind Roger Staubach for the Heisman Trophy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I listened to every game with pride. One Saturday in November was designated R.A. day, a special afternoon at Baylor stadium when all the young boys in Baptist churches, along with their sponsors, could attend the game at discount prices and root for the Bears.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At FBC, Roosevelt (a farming community), we had about ten young boys in our R.A. group. Our basketball and baseball team won almost every game, mainly due to two of
our group who happened to be black (not a problem in our small rural community).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On Friday afternoon we left for <st1:city w:st="on">Waco</st1:city>, riding in a “wheat-harvest” bus one of the men used for his work crews. Inside
were enough bunk beds for us all, and the seats were OK.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When we stopped for gas in Jacksboro, we heard the first report: “The President has been shot in <st1:city w:st="on">Dallas</st1:city>.” When his death was announced over the networks, I called Don. He was uncertain if the game Saturday would be cancelled but, since we were not too far away, he urged us to come ahead with our ten R.A. boys.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That evening, as we prepared to bed-down in our harvest bus, Don came by to tell us the game was cancelled. “Tomorrow, after we meet for breakfast at the Elite
Café, I will take all of you for a tour of the campus, including visiting the bear pits where our mascots live.” The trip would not be a total loss, and the
boys were enjoying the adventure.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Don called the manager of the café, whom he knew well, and told him of his brother’s visit and the group of R.A. boys and sponsors who were coming to eat. “Sure, Don,” he
said, “Bring them by and we will be sure they get a real <st1:state w:st="on">Texas</st1:state> breakfast they won’t forget.” I knew we would be treated royally, for in the fall of 1963 my brother was the town hero, leading the Baylor football team (along with several other star players) to nationwide prominence.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As our group walked in the door, we were greeted and led to tables prepared for us. I noticed the waitress seemed startled—a bit nervous about our group. She
disappeared, and soon the manager came out. As Don introduced us and the host welcomed us, I noticed his eyes kept moving across our group. He then walked
back toward the waitress and mumbled, “Let’s serve Don’s group.” I began to sense something was wrong.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As we departed after the breakfast, the manager came up to me and said, “Your boys were the best-behaved group of young people we have ever had. But preacher, I
need to tell you something else. All these years we have had a policy of not serving colored people. Your colored boys are the first ones we have ever
served in this café.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He continued, “Don is not only our hero, but a good friend. I promised to serve his brother’s group, and we did. And yesterday our President was assassinated.” The manager paused, then looked me in the eye and said, “I guess it’s time we changed that policy.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As I walked toward the bus, I thanked God for several things—that the boys had followed our instructions to be at their best in the café, that we had decided to come on to Waco even knowing the game might be cancelled, and the sequence of events that led us to eat breakfast that somber November day in the Elite Café.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The café is still there, near old 35 on the Circle that winds to I.H. 35 today. It has been refurbished, updated, and the menu is more in keeping with its name. I recently had dinner there with my grandson (a Baylor student now). I never pass the place without thinking of that day.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The events of 1963 and the following years led to civil rights legislation and many social changes—the American dream of “justice and equality for all” was renewed. History books record seminal events in those years—Rosa Parks' refusal to sit at the back of the bus; a civil-rights march across a bridge in Selma; the rally in Washington, D.C., highlighted by Martin Luther King’s sermon, “I Have A Dream,” and many more. </span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But for me it began at breakfast in the Elite Café.</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-11391834360433394182013-09-02T10:19:00.002-05:002013-09-15T08:01:23.201-05:00OBSERVING DADDY'S CENTENNIAL:A. JASE JONES, part 1: Surrendered to God's Call<div style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;">
<img border="0" r6="true" src="http://www.tbmaston.org/Images/Daddy_01.jpg" align="left" /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif"; font-size: 12px;"><b><i>(NOTE FROM BILL JONES, CHAIR OF THE T. B. MASTON FOUNDATION: Daddy was born 100 years ago today, September 2, 1913, in Corrigan, Texas. In commemoration of his centennial, I'm republishing the three-part tribute I wrote for this blog in June 2011. Daddy, who passed away in 2007, chaired the T. B. Maston Foundation in its formative years, throughout the 1980s and into the early '90s. It's my privilege to sit where he once sat and to work with my fellow trustees - among them several of Dr. Maston's students - in continuing the legacy of T. B. Maston, who was Daddy's teacher, friend, and guiding influence throughout the years.)</i></b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><b><i>(ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED June 21, 2011)</i></b> I've been thinking a lot about my Daddy the past few days. He passed away 4 years ago this week at the age of 93. Father's Day brought to mind our family's last visit with him. We celebrated Father's Day with him a day early that year, on Saturday. He died exactly a week later.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">That last visit was a precious gift from God. Although Daddy had struggled in his last years - as so many do at that age - with a fuzzy memory and mental faculties that weren't as sharp as they once were, that Saturday he was truly his old self. He was recalling family memories as if they were yesterday, and he was laughing and joking with us - and we had a wonderful time together as a family that day.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><a name="JaseJones2">As</a> the rest of the family said goodbye and started toward the door to allow workers to take him back to his room, my son Travis and I lingered behind for one more goodbye. I had a pretty strong feeling that I might never see him again in this life. One more time, I told him how much I loved him, and he told me the same - and how proud he was of the man I had become. What a gift! Thank you, Lord.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Dr. A. Jase (Atwood Jason) Jones was a special man. Most people - even Baptists - don't know his name, because he was never prominent in national leadership. Yet he spent 22 years (January 1957 through December 1978) with the SBC Home Mission Board's Department of Interfaith Witness, leading the department's work in about a dozen midwestern and southwestern states.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><a name="JaseJones">Daddy</a> surrendered to the ministry in the late 1930s, only after struggling against God's call for quite a time. When he finally surrendered to God's call, he was a rising young assistant manager in the F. W. Woolworth chain. In fact, he was told he was being transferred to a store that everyone knew was the final stepping stone to being promoted from assistant manager to manager.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Unfortunately for Woolworth, their timing was all wrong. Daddy had recently decided to stop fighting God's call to the Gospel ministry. When he told his manager that he couldn't in good conscience accept the transfer because he had decided to go to seminary to study for the ministry, his manager laughed at him and said, "You're going to be a preacher? There's no money in that!"<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">But now Daddy was the one who was laughing. "Don't you think I know that?" Money, he explained, had nothing to do with his decision; it was all about being faithful to God's call.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Daddy had graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1936. He was a Texan through and through, having been born in Corrigan in 1913 and grown up in various Texas towns.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
Daddy married my <span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Mother, Vivian Louise Otting, in January 1938, and they would soon be starting a family (my sister, Patsy, was born in 1941), so a Woolworth manager's salary would have made life more comfortable, but that wasn't what Mother and Daddy were about. They would trust God to provide what they needed.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/09/observing-daddys-centennial-jase-jones_2.html">Read part 2: Seminary Student; Pastor; Home Missionary; and Chaplain</a></strong></em></span></span><br />
<br />
<em><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/09/observing-daddys-centennial-jase-jones.html">Read part 3: Maston Foundation; and At Home with His Family</a></strong></span></em>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-25334885796178429212013-09-02T10:19:00.001-05:002013-09-02T10:24:53.903-05:00OBSERVING DADDY'S CENTENNIAL:A. JASE JONES, part 2: Seminary Student; Pastor; Home Missionary; and Chaplain<img border="0" r6="true" src="http://www.tbmaston.org/Images/OurKids.jpg" /><br />
<span erdana="" quot="" sans-serif=""><bold><em>Mother & Daddy with our kids, Alison & Travis (1991)</em></bold></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><b><i>(ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED June 21, 2011)</i></b> Daddy began study at Southwestern Seminary, but his study was interrupted when, in early 1943, he enlisted in the U. S. Army as a chaplain. For the next 2 years, he served under General George S. Patton's command in the European Theatre of Operations.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">In the summer of 1945, after victory in Europe was achieved, his regiment returned home on the Queen Mary. They were expecting only a brief stay at home, for they were scheduled to ship out for the Pacific in the fall. Only Harry Truman's decisive actions, leading to Japan's surrender, changed those plans, meaning Daddy was home to stay.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">He soon resumed his seminary work while pastoring small churches. He received his Master's degree from Southwestern in 1948 and decided to pursue a doctorate in theology, with a major in Christian Ethics under T. B. Maston.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">In fact, my connection with Dr. Maston goes back to my birth. Daddy was scheduled to take his spring 1951 oral exam on March 16, but Mother was expecting, and the due date was right around the time of his exam. Although he was studying diligently (while also carrying out his pastoral responsibilities and working a part-time job with Foremost Dairy), his mind was preoccupied with taking care of Mother and preparing for the birth of their second child. So he requested an extension from Dr. Maston, and Dr. Maston granted him an extra month, rescheduling the exam for April 16. I was born on March 14.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Daddy received his Th.D. in Christian Ethics from Southwestern Seminary in 1956, just months before his 43rd birthday.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">He continued pastoring small Texas churches until January 1957, when he began work with the SBC Home Mission Board. His work was co-sponsored by the Dallas and Tarrant Baptist Associations, and – for a time – by the Baptist General Convention of Texas. He had offices at both the Dallas and Tarrant Baptist Associations.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">At that time, the department was known as the Department of Jewish Evangelism. He began studying the Jewish culture, the Jewish faith, and the Jewish people, and he developed a special lifelong love of - and admiration for - the Jewish people. In fact, in 1973 he and Mother spent a 6-month sabbatical in Israel, where he studied at the Institute of Holy Land Studies, and he obtained a working knowledge of the Hebrew language.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">In 1962, we moved to Kansas City. He was still with the Home Mission Board, but his work was now co-sponsored by the Kansas City Baptist Association (where he had his office) and the Missouri Baptist Convention. In 1974, he and Mother moved "home" to Texas, and he spent his final 5 years with the Home Mission Board officing from their home in Marble Falls.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Through the years, in addition to his daily work as pastor and then home missionary, Daddy remained in the U. S. Army Reserves as a chaplain attached to hospital units, attending monthly meetings and performing his annual required 2 weeks of active duty (including a stint in 1963 as chaplain in the disciplinary barracks at Fort Leavenworth). Shortly before retiring from the Reserves at age 60 in 1973, he attained the rank of Colonel, an achievement of which he was especially proud.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana;"><em></em></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana;"><em><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/09/observing-daddys-centennial-jase-jones_6114.html"><strong>Read part 1: Surrendered to God's Call</strong></a></em></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/09/observing-daddys-centennial-jase-jones.html">Read part 3: Maston Foundation; and At Home with Family</a></strong></em></span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-5920243994948718152013-09-02T10:19:00.000-05:002013-09-02T10:24:07.499-05:00OBSERVING DADDY'S CENTENNIAL:A. JASE JONES, part 3: Maston Foundation; and At Home with His Family<div style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;">
<img border="0" r6="true" src="http://www.tbmaston.org/Images/398thCaps.jpg" /></div>
<strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Thanksgiving 1998: We're all wearing caps commemorating the recent reunion of Daddy's WWII regiment, the 398th Engineers. (missing - Michael, Patsy & Palmer's son)</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">L to R: Daddy; Alison; Travis; Patsy; Stephanie's husband, Jim Markgraf; Joanna; Stephanie; and yours truly</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Jim is holding the cap belonging to Palmer McCown, Patsy's husband, who is taking the picture.</span></strong><br />
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<br />
<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><b><i>(ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED June 21, 2011)</i></b> Over the years, Dr. and Mrs. Maston and Tom Mc, their elder son, were visitors in our home on several occasions. Daddy always considered Dr. Maston his primary mentor and influence in his own ministry, but they were also close friends and stayed in touch regularly by mail and by phone.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">A vision eventually began to form in Daddy's heart and mind - a vision of an entity that would keep Dr. Maston's life and teaching alive, long after Dr. Maston and his students were gone, as a legacy for generations yet unborn. When Daddy retired from the Home Mission Board at the beginning of 1979, he was able to focus more directly on this vision. He had already begun talking about the idea to some of his friends - fellow Maston students like Bill Pinson, Jimmy Allen, James Dunn, and Foy Valentine. In 1979, he flew to San Francisco and met with Bill Pinson - then president of Golden Gate Seminary - to discuss funding.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">The T. B. Maston Scholarship Fund was born, ultimately becoming the TBMaston Foundation. In 1987, the Foundation held its first biennial Awards Dinner and honored Foy Valentine with the inaugural T. B. Maston Christian Ethics Award. Dr. and Mrs. Maston were in attendance. Dr. Maston died the following spring.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Daddy chaired the Foundation's Board of Trustees from its inception until 1992, after which he continued to support the work of the Foundation throughout his life. At the Foundation's 1993 Awards Dinner, the Board honored A. Jase Jones with the T. B. Maston Christian Ethics Award. I doubt that any recognition or award ever meant more to him than this one, because T. B. Maston had been <em>the</em> major influence in his life and ministry. In the years following, as Mother's failing health and then his own required him to step back from active involvement, Daddy remained pleased to see the vitality and work of the Maston Foundation.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">I've tried to share just a little bit about Daddy's ministry - barely a nutshell view. But that doesn't even begin to tell the story of A. Jase Jones.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Father's Day reminds me of the caring Daddy who was patient and understanding when I lost my faith during my college years. He was <em>the</em> major influence in helping me to find my way back to Christ. Father's Day reminds me of the caring Granddaddy who doted over his grandkids - first Stephanie and Michael (Patsy's children) and then Alison and Travis (our kids), and then his great-grandchildren Jon Michael and Christopher (Stephanie's boys).</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Father's Day reminds me of the loving husband who insisted on keeping Mother at home where he could personally take care of her day and night after she had become unable to care for herself. For him, the blessed marriage that lasted 59 years and ended only with her death in 1997 seemed much too short.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";"><span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">And last night, as I sat rocking our second grandchild, Anderson James Clements (born yesterday afternoon), in Alison's hospital room, I couldn't help but think how much Mother and Daddy would have loved Anderson and his sister, Avery Lin, if only they had lived to see them.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif";">Above all else, they were loving parents, and Patsy and I - and our families - know how very blessed we've been. Thanks be to God.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/09/observing-daddys-centennial-jase-jones_6114.html">Read part 1: Surrendered to God's Call</a></strong></em></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana;"><em><strong><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/09/observing-daddys-centennial-jase-jones_2.html">Read part 2: Seminary Student; Pastor; Home Missionary; and Chaplain</a></strong></em></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-18964093999187952642013-08-28T22:59:00.001-05:002013-09-15T08:06:52.286-05:00MICHAEL BELL: Reflecting on 50 Years since the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom<div class="MsoBodyText">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>(<b>EDITOR'S NOTE:</b> The author of this post is <b>Michael Bell,</b> senior pastor, Greater Saint Stephen First Church, Fort Worth, Texas, and a member of the T. B. Maston Foundation Board of Trustees, who has written on this subject for the Foundation's <b>Weighty Matters</b> blog, at my request. In 2005, Michael Bell became the first African-American elected president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.)</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">O</span></b>n August 28, 1963, tens of thousands of marchers
assembled on the Washington Mall. Police estimated the crowd to be around
250,000, but others argued that the crowd numbered as many as <i>half a million</i>.
The occasion was the <b><i>March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom</i></b>.
The march was organized by a coalition of civil rights, labor, and religious
organizations; though coalition members differed on the purpose of the march, when
all was said and done, they agreed on a set of objectives, which included,
among other things, advocating the passage of meaningful civil rights
legislation and the elimination of racial segregation in public schools.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a name="Bell2">For</a> better or for worse, the March is best known as the
venue where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his <i>“I Have a Dream”</i> speech. And I lament, along with Gary
Younge, that King’s <i>“I Have a Dream” </i>speech
and the March on Washington have been <i>“neatly
folded into America’s patriotic mythology.”<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Also, Dr. King’s speech has been packaged in a way that
excludes his legacy beyond that distant day when he stood on the steps of the
Lincoln Memorial. I<span class="st">n his book <i>Martin Luther King: The
Inconvenient Hero,</i></span> <span class="st">Dr. Vincent Harding – </span>Dr.
King’s <span class="st">friend, colleague, and former speechwriter – asserts that
the post-March-on-Washington phase of King’s life has been conveniently overlooked.
Gary </span>Younge agrees: <i>“To judge a
life as full and complex as his by one sixteen-minute address, some of which
was delivered extemporaneously, is neither respectful nor serious.”</i><sup><o:p></o:p></sup></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, from where I sit, to talk about how race relations
have fared since King’s August 28, 1963, speech, given the misinformation
inherent in the <a name="bell">reshaping</a> of King’s image, is not an honest discussion. A more
constructive and helpful conversation may be how race relations have fared
since the August 28, 1963, <i>March on
Washington</i>. And I’m going to fight the feeling to offer the obvious answers,
because studies, reports, and findings by – among others – the Economic Policy
Institute, Brandeis University’s Institute on Assets and Social Policy, the
American Civil Liberties Union, and the Center for American Progress have
already provided irrefutable evidence that the fight for racial justice and
equality has stalled out. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I wish I could say that I’m surprised that a
half-century after the March, we’re still what David Shipler calls <i>“a country of strangers.”</i> <b>But I’m not.</b>
Andrew Hacker’s conclusion, published just over twenty years ago, that we are <i>“Two Nations: Black and White, Separate,
Hostile, Unequal”</i> is still on point. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Over the past forty years, I’ve been on the frontlines of
countless marches, pickets, demonstrations, and rallies for racial justice; I’ve
organized, led, and participated in boycotts and protests across Texas and in
other states. As recently as last week, I sat down with the elected and
appointed leadership of a large Texas city and advocated on behalf of Black
police officers who are being bullied, passed over, harassed, and intimidated
by their own police chief and the predominantly White police officers' association to which they pay dues. Frankly, the angst and frustration that
racism generated in the past still exists, despite some notable advances toward
equality. And there has not been enough significant progress toward Black
freedom and liberation to overcome the lingering systemic racial separateness
that permeates <span class="a"><span style="letter-spacing: .6pt;">every aspect of
both public and private life in America.</span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Younge notes, in his article <i>Obama and Black
Americans: the Paradox of Hope, </i>that today <i>“racial advancement is increasingly understood not as a process of
social change but of individual promotion – the elevation of African American
faces to high places.”</i> And I don’t see evidence of any meaningful, sustainable
effort to move this country away from its racialistic moorings. I’m convinced
that White denial and Black dualism will continue to hold sway and inhibit any
real national dialogue or community conversation on race. The subtle,
stealth-like racism that is both vehemently denied and incessantly practiced in
21<sup>st</sup>-century America has become normative.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But none of this means that those of us who
refuse to buckle under the unrelenting constraint of the system of race will
stop fighting. So, five decades later, the struggle continues!</span><span style="font-family: Garamond, serif; font-size: 12.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-78232820388290561942013-04-20T08:34:00.000-05:002013-04-20T23:30:44.961-05:00CHAD CHADDICK: A Moral Argument for Strict Regulation of the Payday and Auto Title Lending Industries<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>(EDITOR'S NOTE: On Monday, Chad Chaddick, pastor of Northeast Baptist Church, San Antonio, testified before a Texas Senate committee on the payday and auto title lending bill that is being considered by the Texas legislature. We publish his prepared testimony here with his permission.)</i></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Two years ago, I testified before the Senate Committee on Business and Finance </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">regarding what I had witnessed first hand involving the devastation visited upon a family by a </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">payday loan. It was a story that involved a $700 loan rolled over 9 times at $200 a roll-over with </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">interest and fees amounting to a 740% APR. Ultimately, the loan was paid off by a church. I told </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the story because I found those numbers to be shockingly unjust, and I hoped that others would </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">as well.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since I told that story, I have heard many stories with similar numbers, and some stories </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">with even worse numbers. I have witnessed and heard about extended families that have been drawn into cycles of debt from which they could not escape. I have seen my church and others forced to give charitable gifts to those who have been trapped by such loans or watch these families slide into homelessness, or lose their children to protective services because they could not afford to keep their utilities connected. I have considered that the taxpayers of this state are forced to fund the payday industry as those who get trapped in cycles of debt become ever more dependent on state and government services. In the process of hearing these stories and witnessing these scenarios, I must admit that I am no longer shocked by the numbers. Interest rates of 500%, 700%, 900% are so common that they cease to move any real emotion in me. I suspect that the shock value of these numbers is ultimately lost on all of us who look often enough at the situation.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So today I want to take another approach - an approach that does not appeal to the shock value of these brutal interest rates and fees. Instead, I want to make a moral argument. I do so, not only because I see that our natural moral inclinations are becoming desensitized by the sheer volume of stories about “700% interest loans,” but also because I hear a decided shift <a name="payday">in</a> this discussion away from thoughts about moral responsibility and towards a supposedly amoral standard for our decision-making. More and more I hear appeals to “The Market.” I have lost count of how many times recently I have heard the phrase “The Market will bear” in discussions about these kinds of loan products. I would like to point out that The Market is a poor standard for helping us measure what is good for ourselves, for our fellow citizens, or for our state. The Market has and will continue to bear a great many things that are not good. The Market bears all manner of human rights abuses around the world. Not to distract us from the issue at hand, but to emphasize this point, The Market will bear the sale and transport of underage girls for sexual slavery. One could well use the argument that if there were not a desire for these products, the sex-trade industry would not exist. But it does, and the desires that drive it do not justify its existence. Likewise, The Market will not only bear but will encourage illegal immigration in our state. Clearly, there is a demand for cheap labor - so much so that despite the regulations we have in place, men and women are seeking to illegally cross our borders and our citizens are hiring them. The fact that there is a demand for these products does not justify deregulation.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We could spend a long time elucidating the number of things that The Market will bear Some of those things we have called good, and we have encouraged these good things through a lack of regulation and through positive incentives. But some of those things that The Market will bear we have said it should not bear. These things we either sought to eliminate completely or we have sought to regulate. Either way, we have acted out of moral impulses for the good of our citizens and for our own protection. In every case, we have looked at the amoral Market and sought to influence it with our moral judgments. The Market is wholly without moral sensibility and it is up to us - and more directly, it is up to you - to invest The Market with moral guidance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Clearly, The Market will bear 700% short-term loans. Clearly, The Market will bear the entrapment of families into cycles of debt from which they cannot escape. Clearly, The Market will bear the repossession of 35,000 vehicles through auto-title loans. The Market will bear it but should it? And should it bear it without regulations?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Consider the scenario we are all familiar with in which The Market bore a very specific type of predatory lending. I am speaking of the sub-prime housing loans and the mess they have made of our wider economy. A lot of money was made from these lending practices. A lot of people took advantage of those with poor credit even though they knew the borrowers could not afford the loans they were taking. Lenders, realtors, and peer pressure within The Market itself encouraged people to avail themselves of these overly available lines of credit. The Market bore these excesses - for a time. And now we are looking for protective regulations to insure that the issuing of credit does not unsustainably prop up individuals, families, or industries.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Payday and Auto-Loan industry is not so different from sub-prime lending. The product they offer often unsustainably props up individuals and families. In fact, the products are more profitable the more unsustainable they are. It is better for the industry if the product is rolled over multiple times rather than being repaid in full. The result of this lending is increased debt and increased hardship on families. People lose houses when their finances are unsustainably propped up by quick loans they cannot afford. People lose cars, and then they lose their jobs when they can’t get to those jobs without their cars. And who pays for these failed loans? Who pays for the cycle of debt that is created through this easy, unregulated, artificial cash-flow? My church does, and other benevolent agencies do. The taxpayer does as the government assistance programs are burdened. Every day, we are bailing out those families that have become trapped by these unregulated predatory lending practices. The great irony, of course, is that these lenders exist as Credit Service Organizations - organizations that were intended to be a help to citizens in rebuilding their credit and rebuilding their lives.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That The Market will bear these excesses and predatory practices is a poor justification for crushing the citizens of Texas with debt. Other states have recognized the moral component in this, and they have passed regulations to protect their citizens. The payday industry in their states continues to do business showing that The Market will bear these regulations. Let me say that again: The Market will bear these regulations. As a citizen, as a taxpayer, and as a moral human being, I urge you to not simply consider what The Market will bear, for The Market knows nothing of right and wrong. I urge you to do what is right for the citizens of Texas and to guide an amoral Market away from abuse and toward the greater financial health of our citizens. In this case, siding with what the amoral Market will bear will place you squarely on the side of immoral financial oppression. Texans deserve better.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Respectfully submitted,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Chad R. Chaddick, D.Min</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pastor</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Northeast Baptist Church</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">San Antonio, Texas</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-3191024436373897232013-02-28T01:21:00.000-06:002013-03-02T18:26:20.212-06:00Christians and Race, part 2: Christians Must Challenge Racist AttitudesChristians should be Christ-followers.<br />
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Sounds pretty simple, doesn't it? No earth-shaking sentiment there.</div>
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In theory, it's simple. In practice, it's the hardest thing you'll ever do - follow Christ, live according to His teachings, live in accordance with His example.</div>
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Or, as <b>T. B. Maston</b> liked to say, <i><b>"walk as Jesus walked."</b></i> <i>(Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did, 1 John 2:6)</i></div>
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I was recently at lunch with a few friends, all Christians, all white males. At one point, the conversation turned to President Obama's recent State of the Union message to Congress and, in turn, to the state of our nation as those in the group perceived it.</div>
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You know, we white Christians in this country like to think that racism is ancient history. We believe we live in a more enlightened age than our parents and grandparents, and that we, in turn, have racial attitudes that are enlightened. Some even go so far as to say that everyone is playing on a level field these days, that laws are no longer needed to enforce equal opportunity. When our <b>African-American </b>and <b>Hispanic</b> friends, among others, assert that they are still discriminated against by our society and our legal system, and that racism is alive and well in America, their concerns are met with denial and even derision by some white Christians.</div>
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<a name="challengeracist">Our discussion was fairly benign up to a point. Oh, there were some political differences, but that can be expected. Then one among our group stated his disgust with <i>"these people who don't want to work and just want to stand in line for handouts."</i><br />
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Another asked him, <i>"who are you talking about?"</i><br />
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He replied, very matter-of-factly, <i>"the blacks."</i></a></div>
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I'm not used to this stuff, friends. I don't normally hear such attitudes expressed by people I hang out with, and I like to tell myself that such attitudes are ancient history. But they're not. I have to admit I was stunned by his frank reply, <i>"the blacks."</i> And I didn't try to hide my astonishment or my disgust. I practically shouted at him, <i>"where in the world are you getting this stuff?"</i><br />
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His answer? <i>"Why, TV,"</i> he replied. He didn't even attempt to cloak his ignorance; he admitted it upfront. <i>"Why, TV,"</i> as if he couldn't imagine getting his information anywhere else.</div>
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But our friend was just getting started. He later talked about <i>"wetbacks"</i> and the problems, he asserted, that they've caused in our state for decades; as with <i>"the blacks"</i> mentioned earlier, he said that the <i>"wetbacks"</i> were lazy parasites. When a couple of members of our group began talking about the reality that white people are becoming the minority in both Texas and America, our friend said, <i>"yeah, it's frightening."</i><br />
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It's good to have friendly discussions among friends. But this man's statements were not, to my mind, a "friendly discussion." They were racism and bigotry; they were stereotyping, fear, condescension, and even hatred toward others for no other reason than that they are of a different skin color or from another culture.<br />
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One or two others in our group also challenged this man's attitudes, though they probably did so in a manner that reflected <b>T. B. Maston</b> better than I did. In part 1 of this post, <a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/02/christians-and-race-part-1-t-b-maston.html" target="_blank"><b><i>T. B. Maston and Race Relations</i></b></a>, taken from material written by my father, <b>Jase Jones</b>, we find that Maston's responses to expressions of racism and bigotry were <i>"kind and noncondemnatory"</i> toward the person expressing those attitudes and that <i>"he refused to let anyone make him angry."</i> I wasn't quite so controlled in my response; I replied not just in disagreement but in attack mode. I simply couldn't help myself and probably sounded pretty strident as I responded to this man's comments.</div>
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On my way home, I momentarily felt a little guilty, simply because I don't like to hurt people's feelings, I don't like to attack others. But my guilt was only momentary, because I then began to think of my very dear African-American and Hispanic friends, and the aspersions this man had casually - and hatefully - cast onto them. I realized that I wouldn't have been able to live with myself if I had let his assertions pass without attacking them with every ounce of my being in the most vigorous way possible.</div>
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When a group of white Christian men discuss those who are different - of another race, another culture, or even the opposite gender - we should speak and act as we would if we were joined by those about whom we are speaking, in a way that we would not be ashamed of our words and actions if we were joined by those who are different than us. But, truth be told, all of us Christians could stand some self-examination every so often; we all likely harbor one attitude or another for which we should ask forgiveness.</div>
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My only regret is that I wasn't better prepared to ask our friend some key questions that might have helped him to recognize the emptiness of his thinking and the unChristlikeness of his attitudes. That's the way Jesus did it - asked probing questions that caused painful but needed self-examination. I still have a ways to go in learning to be like Jesus.</div>
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Ninety years ago, T. B. Maston was speaking out, teaching, and writing to oppose unChristlike racial attitudes and behaviors. Unfortunately, as he himself asserted in the last sentence quoted in my previous post, that work isn't finished. People Jesus loves - the "least of these" - are still oppressed, derided, and marginalized by those who call themselves Christian. If we say we belong to Christ, then we must confront and challenge these oppressive, superior, hateful attitudes wherever we find them, even - or perhaps especially - when we find them in our Christian friends. It's a matter of <i>walking as Jesus walked</i>.<br />
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<a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/02/christians-and-race-part-1-t-b-maston.html" target="_blank"><b><i>Christians and Race, part 1: T. B. Maston and Racial Relations</i></b></a></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-7639552653321117242013-02-28T00:32:00.000-06:002013-02-28T09:56:10.569-06:00Christians and Race, part 1: T. B. Maston and Race Relations<b>(This post consists entirely of excerpts from the chapter, "Maston's Contributions to Race Relations," by Jase Jones, in <i>An Approach to Christian Ethics: The Life, Contribution, and Thought of T. B. Maston,</i> William M. Pinson, Jr., Compiler/Contributor, copyright 1979, Broadman Press.)</b><br />
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In 1938 . . . Maston offered a new course, <i>Social Problems of the South</i>, half of which dealt with the race problem. A full course on race, <i>The Church and the Race Problem</i>, began in 1944. In this course, distinguished black leaders addressed the class. The students were taken on a field trip through the Fort Worth black community. . . .<br />
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His first published writing on race (pamphlet) bore the title <i>Racial Relations</i>, and was published by <b>Woman's Missionary Union</b> in 1927. <i>Integration</i>, a pamphlet published by the <b>Christian Life Commission (SBC)</b>, was first prepared in 1956 at the request of the <b>Advisory Council of Southern Baptists for Work with Negroes</b> to be read at its annual meeting. Another booklet, <i>Interracial Marriage</i>, was published by the <b>Christian Life Commission</b> in 1963. The <b>Brotherhood Commission</b> of the Southern Baptist Convention published <i>The Christian and Race Relations</i> (pamphlet) in the same year.<br />
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<a name="Mastononrace">In 1932, Maston wrote a <b>Training Union</b> monthly program series on the social teachings of the Bible. Race and class was the subject of one month's program. Another <b>Training Union</b> program on race appeared in November, 1941. Maston wrote the <b>Graded Lessons Sunday School for Sixteen Year Pupils</b> in the thirties, with one quarter's lessons on social problems. Another <b>Sunday School</b> lesson in 1943 was entitled <i>"Christianity Crosses Racial Lines."</i> . . .<br />
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Of Maston's many books, the following dealt solely with the subject of race: <i>Of One</i> (1946), <i>The Bible and Race</i> (1959), and <i>Segregation and Desegregation</i> (1959). Race was dealt with in parts of six other Maston books. Maston considers <i>Segregation and Desegregation</i> to be his major scholarly work on race. He thinks that <i>The Bible and Race</i> has been his most influential book on race. <b>Woman's Missionary Union</b> chose it as a study book in 1962, and <b>Broadman Press</b> published over 50,000 copies.<br />
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The speech which Maston made before the Southern Baptist Convention in Kansas City in 1956 drew more reaction and was probably more influential than any other that he made on the race issue. Carried by the <b>Associated Press</b>, it was widely reported in secular and religious publications. Coming as it did not long after the United States Supreme Court decision in <i>Brown v. Board of Education</i>, it is of historical significance. . . .<br />
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When Dallas, Texas, was ordered to desegregate its school system, the Baptist pastors of Dallas asked Maston to speak to them on the subject, <i>"A Pastor in a Community Facing Desegregation."</i> His speech was reported in word and picture by the secular press, and it caused a reaction next in size to the Kansas City speech.<br />
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Maston spoke quite often before interracial meetings of pastors and laymen in a number of states. . . . <b>Frank Leavell</b>, Southern Baptist student work leader, called upon him to speak many times, usually on the race issue. <b>Carson-Newman College</b> in Tennessee invited him to speak on race at its faculty conference. Maston spoke several times at conferences of <b>Southern Baptist workers with Negroes</b>. After he had spoken about love at one of these, a young black worker asked a question that Maston says he has never been able to get away from. <i>"Isn't there a real danger that one may make love a substitute for justice, a mere sentimentality?"</i> Maston answered, <i>"Not genuine Christian love. It is inclusive of justice."</i> . . .<br />
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Maston participated in a variety of denominational and community organizations. He was one of the principal founders, along with <b>J. Howard Williams, A. C. Miller, </b>and <b>W. R. White, </b>of the <b>Christian Life Commission of Texas</b>. The race issue has been a major concern of the commission since its founding. . . .<br />
<br />
<b>Southwestern Seminary</b> opened its regular classes to blacks in <b>1951</b>. Maston had urged it for many years. . . .<br />
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The <b>Advisory Council of Southern Baptists for Work with Negroes</b> was another organization in which Maston served. He was its first chairman and was reelected chairman several times. The council performed a valuable service for leaders of the Baptist boards and agencies represented on the council by keeping them abreast of the issues, concepts, and developments in the race struggle. Other groups to which Maston belonged were the <b>National Association for the Advancement of Colored People</b>, the local <b>Urban League</b> (serving on the Executive Committee), and the <b>Southern Regional Council</b>.<br />
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The Mastons are members of <b>Gambrell Street Baptist Church</b>, Fort Worth, where Maston is a deacon. A black man once called Maston when the Gambrell Street pastor was out of town and said, <i>"We're looking for a church home, and my pastor suggested I call you."</i> Maston invited him to visit the church that Wednesday night. He met him on the sidewalk and escorted him into the church, where the visitor was warmly welcomed. A fellow deacon later said, <i>"Here's the fellow (Maston) more responsible than anybody else for the church's open-door membership policy."</i> This statement reminds one of a remark made by <b>Theodore F. Adams</b> after Maston's speech in Kansas City: <i>"The progress that we have made among Southern Baptists on this matter of race is due to men like you and O. T. Binkley."</i><br />
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Maston developed strong personal relationships in the black community. He describes the <i>"real kinship of spirit"</i> which exists between himself and <b>J. M. Ellison</b>, longtime chancellor of Virginia Union University and editor of <i>The Religious Herald</i>, and tells of visiting in the Ellison home. Ellison calls Maston his <i>"very real friend."</i> He tells of being a guest at the Maston table, of being an overnight guest in the home, and of sharing <i>"the full meaning of their fellowship and thinking as we had devotional moments together."</i><br />
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The black students of Southwestern Seminary were Maston's friends. One of these, <b>Clarence Lucas</b>, now pastor in Louisville, Kentucky, said, <i>"At a time when I wasn't even allowed to live in dormitories, Maston would come and talk with me. He offered some direction, then let me as a proud human being struggle with it myself . . . I personally prefer this to any paternalism."</i><br />
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Maston has extensive files of correspondence which came as a result of his writing and speaking. . . . He never failed to reply when the person identified himself as a Southern Baptist. A perusal of the files reveals that his answers were polite, factual, kind, and noncondemnatory, even to the most vicious letters. To a young colleague troubled by the ugly letters, Maston said, <i>"If we are right, the Lord and time are on our side."</i><br />
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To those aspiring to be active in the racial struggle, Maston said, <i>"Don't go into this if you have to be accepted by everybody."</i> Colleagues said that two keys to his effectiveness were that he knew when to act and when to wait and that he refused to let anyone make him angry. . . .<br />
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Maston says of the future,<i> "Of course, I don't think the race issue is settled by any means. There are plenty of things that still need to be done."</i></a><br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><a href="http://tbmaston.blogspot.com/2013/02/christians-and-race-part-2-christians.html" target="_blank"><b>Christians and Race, part 2: Christians Must Challenge Racist Attitudes</b></a></i></div>
<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=3069545700797102287" name="Mastononrace">
</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-70223788814653575282013-01-18T10:41:00.000-06:002013-01-19T15:05:09.076-06:00Suzii Paynter named to lead CBF: Reflections on a friendYesterday it was announced that <b>Suzii Paynter</b>, director of Texas Baptists' Christian Life Commission (CLC) and Advocacy/Care Center, has been nominated to succeed <b>Daniel Vestal</b> as executive coordinator of the <b>Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF)</b>.<br />
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Suzii is one of our own, a longtime supporter of the <b>T. B. Maston Foundation</b> and member of our Board of Trustees. More than that, though, Suzii and her husband, <b>Roger </b>- senior pastor of Austin's First Baptist Church - are Maston <i>practitioners</i>; they live lives that are grounded in the kind of biblical Christian ethics that Dr. Maston lived and taught, that <i>walking as Jesus walked</i> kind of ethics, that <i>loving and ministering to the least of these </i>kind of ethics, that <i>seeing Christ in all you meet</i> and <i>being His presence everywhere you go</i> kind of ethics.<br />
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I'm not writing a biography here. You can get details about Suzii's life, ministry, and qualifications from the CBF press releases. For that matter, you can see her <i>heart,</i> her passion for ministry, in the wonderful <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAEoA4PIi8Q&feature=youtu.be&utm_source=E-newsletters&utm_campaign=ad8ccd716b-ChurchWorks_October_201210_17_2012&utm_medium=email" target="_blank"><i><b>introductory video that CBF has produced</b></i></a>, and I urge you to watch it. It moved me, and I guarantee it will move you.<br />
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<a name="Suzii">But</a> I just want to write a brief reflection about the Suzii and Roger Paynter who I know, and I don't know how you talk about the one without talking about the other, because - as the video so warmly shows - the two of them are truly <i>one</i>, a part of each other.<br />
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I first got to knowing Roger in the late 1990s, after my dad joined First Baptist. Whenever we would visit Daddy in Austin, we would go to church with him on Sunday morning. In fact, my family and I were blessed on our numerous visits to get to know several wonderful people there at First Baptist. In the CBF video, Suzii talks about the privilege of getting to hear Roger preach every Sunday morning; I understand what she's talking about, because I was always challenged by Roger's preaching and inevitably took out my pen and made a note or two during his sermon.<br />
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But beyond his preaching, Roger has been a good friend to me. I always love talking with him, because I know I'm going to learn something but, more importantly, I'm hoping a little of his graciousness will rub off on me.<br />
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Where I really got to knowing Suzii was at the BGCT Annual Meetings back in the early 2000s. At that time, my wife and I were still attending a church that was lurching toward Fundamentalism, and I was struggling to influence people in that church to turn back to Baptist principles of grace and freedom. So at those BGCT Annual Meetings, I would stop by the <b>CLC booth</b> and talk to <b>Phil Strickland </b>and <b>Suzii Paynter</b>, sharing my frustrations, telling them about my apparently futile attempts to change the church's direction. The most important thing that Phil and Suzii did was listen to me and let me know that they cared about what I was experiencing and that they appreciated my conviction. They were great encouragers to me at a difficult time. When Joanna and I finally decided, in 2004, that it was time to find another church, it was Phil Strickland who led us to Wilshire in Dallas.<br />
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Over the years, Suzii has continued to be a great friend and encourager to me. When I was asked to lead <b>Texas Baptists Committed</b> 2 years ago, it was a new world for me; I had never led an organization like this, had never done anything close to this. At times, I have turned to people like Suzii, as well as <b>Rick McClatchy</b> at CBF Texas, for guidance. Both of them are savvy, experienced, and always willing to share their knowledge and experience.<br />
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Last spring, I attended the <i>Currie-Strickland Distinguished Lectures in Christian Ethics</i> - named for <b>David Currie </b>and <b>Phil Strickland</b> - at Howard Payne University. At the gracious invitation of <b>Dean Donnie Auvenshine</b>, I was privileged to attend not only the public lectures but the following day's sessions as well, in which the lecturers - <b>Suzii Paynter </b>and <b>Stephen Reeves</b> of the CLC, and <b>Welton Gaddy</b> of the Interfaith Alliance - met with students and answered their questions.<br />
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This morning, I looked back at the <a href="http://texasbaptistscommitted.blogspot.com/2012/04/howard-payne-students-get-to-interact.html" target="_blank"><b><i>blog post</i></b></a> I wrote concerning that day. In summarizing the session that Suzii and Stephen held with Howard Payne's Ministerial Alliance members, I wrote about Suzii's characterization of the BGCT as <i>"a relational body, not an institutional body"</i>; her emphasis on the diversity of those who are on the receiving end of the BGCT's ministries; and her description of the CLC as <i>"a witness to the whole community."</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
In her message on the first day, <a href="http://texasbaptistscommitted.blogspot.com/2012/04/suzii-paynter-leading-your-church-to-be.html" target="_blank"><b><i>"Leading Your Church to Be Politically Responsible,"</i></b></a> Suzii always brought the focus back to ministry, urging listeners, <i>"look beyond the walls of your church"</i>; <i>"don't start with politics; start with ministry"</i>; and <i>"be unapologetic about bringing a biblical rationale and theological perspective to any issue."</i><br />
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That's the Suzii Paynter I'm blessed to call my friend. In the <b>T. B. Maston</b> tradition, Suzii is always about ministering to those who need us; advocating for justice for <i>"the least of these"</i>; seeking mercy and healing and redemption for those who are hurting; in short, <i>being the presence of Christ</i>. That's exactly what <b>CBF </b>should be about.<br />
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If there's one thing I've learned in leading TBC, it's that no one can carry out a weighty mission like ours on her or his own. As <a href="http://texasbaptistscommitted.blogspot.com/2013/01/a-not-so-new-executive-director-for-tbc.html" target="_blank"><b><i>I wrote a few weeks ago</i></b></a> on the <i>Texas Baptists Committed blog</i>, it takes cooperation and partnerships. Suzii will lead CBF in the right direction, but she can't do it alone. I pray that all of us who support the mission of CBF - and the <i>missions </i>focus of CBF - will partner with Suzii and each other in being Christ's presence in our own corner of the world and throughout the world.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-90350504118793813952013-01-09T23:20:00.000-06:002013-01-09T23:20:50.527-06:00George Mason: Will we choose fear that destroys or Jesus' love that transforms?<b><i>(NOTE: The following is excerpted from a sermon, "East Side Story," preached by George Mason, senior pastor, Wilshire Baptist Church, Dallas, Texas, January 6, 2013; and published here with Dr. Mason's gracious permission.)</i></b><br />
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Let me ask you, this morning: <i>what good decisions have you made in your life that were impulsively driven by fear?</i><br />
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The big lie the Devil tells us is that if we are afraid, the best way—and maybe the only way—to deal with that fear is to arm ourselves against it. If we will just get more powerful, if we will just become so protected that no one can hurt us, if we will just destroy our enemies with brute force, then we will be secure.<br />
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<i>You think?</i> <i>Ever consider the spiritual and psychological consequences of that reasoning?</i> Even if you are not attacked or harmed by your enemy, you are forced to live in fear forever. You have to keep alive the idea that you are always under threat.<br />
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And if you nurture that sense that you are always on the lookout for bad people, for people who would do you harm,<i> how do you flip the switch to suddenly learn to love your enemies and do good to them who hurt you?</i> <i>How do you look for opportunities to witness to the light of Christ?</i><br />
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It makes you a divided self. If following <b>Jesus </b>does anything, it should <i>drive away fear</i> and fill you with love in a way that <i>transforms your very being and makes you one kind of person</i>, not two kinds.
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3069545700797102287.post-35636819705689690082012-12-21T00:22:00.000-06:002012-12-21T20:54:59.142-06:00It's a Small Word, After All . . . by George Gagliardi<br />
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">A baby was born,
long ago on a Christmas morn in a manger, etc. </span></i></b><b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">And the aching soul,
having borne one too many burdens, may well be tempted to say, </span></i></b><b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">“That’s nice” or
perhaps even more harshly, “So what?” </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">What indeed? </span></i></b><b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">What does a birth of
a Jewish kid some 2000 or more years ago have to say to me now?</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">It’s a good question and it deserves a
good answer. However, I don’t have one – at least not exactly. I don’t have one
custom made for you as you try and make sense of that which makes no sense. I
don’t have one that makes the pain go away or fills the empty heart. But what I do have is this … hope.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">It’s a small word,
easily lost among the clichés of the world and not hard to submerge beneath a
sea of cynicism and anger. But let’s think about this word for a moment.<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;"><a name="Gagliardi">What</a> if hope were
not just a word but a person? A person who knew firsthand about heartache and loneliness and being abandoned. A person whose birth was
cause for violence and greed and hatred for some and, at the same time, an
occasion to bring out the whole angelic choir </span></i></b><b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16pt;">–</span></i></b><b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;"> trumpets included, I’ll betcha – for others.<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">It was the kind of
birth that was so remarkably unremarkable in its locale as to be ludicrous. If
this is God’s idea of how to introduce eternal hope to the world, well… man,
what could you have been thinking! This baby boy is it? This is the hope we’ve
been waiting for? And I suspect He was smiling as He was saying, “Yes, just
wait and see.”<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">I guess that’s the
hardest part of hope sometime, the waiting. But turns out God was right. Jesus
did more than “make good”; he “made good” by making miracles and making the
lives of people better, people who most
folk had given up on. Well, I’d say when hope looks like that, then it’s worth
putting your faith in or at least investigating.<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">Well, that’s what people of faith, me included, believe about Jesus. He
was/is the embodiment of hope, that God is not “asleep at the switch,” even
when it seems He is.<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 16.0pt;">I
wish, for all of you who find sadness an unwelcome companion this Christmas,
the hope that He brings, that He ushered into this crazy, mixed-up, unfair,
unjust world that first Christmas years ago when he was born. It’s a hope as
vital and alive as the heart that receives the gift of love and gives the gift
of love. And with all my heart, I wish that kind of hope for you this Christmas
and the whole year through.<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><sup><span style="color: red; font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 18.0pt;">Merry Christmas (Anyway),</span></sup></i></b></div>
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<b><b><i><sup><span style="color: green; font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 18.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">George
Gagliardi, December, 2012</span></sup></i></b></b></div>
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0