Adoption Summit Day One

We have just arrived back at our hotel after an amazing day. Bethany and I signed up for the Christian Alliance Adoption Summit unsure of what exactly to expect, but compelled to attend. Our connection point was our own adoption journey we are currently in the middle of, so I expected or hoped for some confirmation of our choice to jump into this call without all of the answers. What happened today was that and SO much more.

As I’ve listened to awesome Christian speakers in the field, and organizations and workers in ministries related to orphan care God has not only confirmed in my heart our choice but has enlarged my vision for the local church. Today God powerfully reminded me that the church is the hope of the world. Today God helped me to catch the vision that orphan care is far more than a social agenda but is in fact part of the lifeblood of His gospel.

All over the world churches are stepping up to care for orphans in their midst and sharing the truth of Jesus with the audience of people their loving care gained them.

The church in America is being awakened to this incredible need and opportunity to use her resources to empower her brothers and sisters in hurting places to spread the gospel. And I believe as churches in the US do this, they are awakened to God’s power, His love, His missional call, His call to sacrifce and be set apart, our hope in Jesus through the gospel, and God’s glory through His church that embraces the love and sacrifice of Jesus.

I am encouraged in the midst of transitions in my life that God has called me to love and serve his bride the church and to expect and encourage great things from her!

The Illusion of Our Power

I read through the Old Testament book Nahum yesterday and again this morning.  It’s a great reminder to me of God’s bigness and control and involvement in world affairs.

In our churches we focus much on the goodness and mercy of of God.  Nahum acknowledges as much too:

7 The Lord is good,

a refuge in times of trouble.

He cares for those who trust in him…

Nahum’s focus, however, is on God’s judgment of the people and leader of Nineveh.  The same people that Jonah was sent to to preach repentance had, well, un-repented I suppose.  God’s word through Nahum was that the time of mercy had ended, and now because of their wickedness God would wipe them off the map.

2 The Lord is a jealous and avenging God;

the Lord takes vengeance and is filled with wrath.

The Lord takes vengeance on his foes

and maintains his wrath against his enemies.

3 The Lord is slow to anger and great in power;

the Lord will not leave the guilty unpunished…

6 Who can withstand his indignation?

Who can endure his fierce anger?

His wrath is poured out like fire;

the rocks are shattered before him.

This is the same God who I worship, and of whom John says “God is love.”  We must remember that God’s goodness leads not only to mercy, but also to justice.  May we remember as Christians that our hope rests in this God who controls the fate of nations.  May we also remember the fate of those nations who felt God’s wrath because they practiced gross injustice.

Reflections on an Historic Night

The verdict is in, this marathon of an election that has consumed so much is complete,  and Barack Obama is the President Elect of these United States of America. My emotions are mixed, and although John McCain received my support and my vote, I will take a cue from his gracious exit speech, and focus on my hopes tonight.

I am hopeful for a nation that has selected it’s first African American president. I am hopeful because young people appear to be energized in a political process in greater ways than before. I am happy to live in a nation that allows candidates to battle hard for it’s Presidency, and the winner-elected by it’s citizens- is welcomed and applauded by his supporters, and even his defeated opponent. I am hopeful, even though many of my views differs from his, for my President Elect has succeeded in inspiring a hope about tomorrow for so many that want to believe our nation may have its brightest days ahead.

Mostly I am hopeful, optimistic, and happy to know that “on Christ the solid Rock I stand, all other faith is shifting sand.” So tonight, I will sleep secure and I will do so because I follow a God who is sovereign over all and a Jesus who is the King of Kings (and presidents).

Jesus once said to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s, so tonight I applaud the achievement of Barack Obama’s team, and I give God all respect and hope for tomorrow.

At the end of a long war for independence from Britain, in his final communications as Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army, George Washington wrote about this unusual in experiment we the “Citizens of America” are still sharing in today:

They are, from this period, to be considered as the Actors on a most conspicuous Theatre, which seems to be designated by Providence for the display of human greatness and felicity.

Washington believed that the American experiment was a gift to shine a beacon of freedom to the world, and that no other reason but the hand of Providence could explain the unique opportunities the infant nation (or soon to be one) had been granted. I hope America can increasingly be a blessing in our world, but more-so I hope that Christians can be.

Jesus told his followers that they are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. May God grant to Christians in America increased opportunity to preserve, save, flavor, and lighten this world of ours because of or in spite of or irrespective of these concluded elections.

Apologies for America’s “Original Sin”

I recently took my son to the mall where we spent time at his favorite spot: the toddler play area.  It’s here that he loves to run ferociously around a padded play track that looks like a roadway.  He also likes to crawl through a train-shaped tunnel, climb an oversized baseball bat, and slide down a little dog-shaped slide.  It is this last structure that tends to cause problems.  The slide has been the site of many toddler scuffles in the past year as energetic and impatient boy and girls (like my son) struggle to share the alluring dog slide.  On quite a few occasions I’ve caught my little angel shoving a kid he thought was taking too long to go down the slide, or getting in a little skirmish at the bottom of the slide with a kid who had the nerve to slide down after him and try to dislodge him from his new home at the base of the slide.

These little toddler squabbles with my son typically end with dad breaking things up and asking my son to say he’s sorry to the other child.  I do this because I want my son to understand that his actions matter; that what he does to people is important.  I want my son to know that if you wrong someone then you need to own up to it and apologize.  It’s the right thing to do.

So I was intrigued by a news story I caught this morning out of the House of Representatives.  Tuesday the House passed H. Res. 194 issuing an apology for slavery.  Perhaps some of you would be surprised to learn that the US government avoiding such an apology so long.  Twenty years ago congress apologized for its treatment of Japanese-Americans in WWII; an apology that was backed with financial reparations.  The magnitude of wrongs committed by Americans and a complicit government during the years of slavery and Jim Crow are nearly incomprehensible to young people today.

The resolution is written as a step forward in our long healing process as a nation.  Acknowledging our wrongdoing, even if it is far overdue, is healthy.  The Christian faith embraces the spiritual power of confession (see the book of James 5:16).  

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.

More than that it’s something the parent of any toddler realizes: when you do something wrong, it’s important to own up to it and to apologize.

I don’t know what difference this makes in the long run, but I do know that I’ve more appreciation for a government that will embrace it’s sins than one that sweeps them under the rug.  When I talk with my son someday about the sins of our past, I can at least point to a much belated apology too.

Here’s a section of the resolution:

Whereas an apology for centuries of brutal dehumanization and injustices cannot erase the past, but confession of the wrongs committed can speed racial healing and reconciliation and help Americans confront the ghosts of their past…

Whereas it is important for this country, which legally recognized slavery through its Constitution and its laws, to make a formal apology for slavery and for its successor, Jim Crow, so that it can move forward and seek reconciliation, justice, and harmony for all of its citizens: 

Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 

(1) acknowledges the fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality, and inhumanity of slavery and Jim Crow; 

(2) apologizes to African-Americans on behalf of the people of the United States, for the wrongs committed against them and their ancestors who suffered under slavery and Jim Crow; and 

(3) expresses its commitment to rectify the lingering consequences of the misdeeds committed against African-Americans under slavery and Jim Crow and to stop the occurrence of human rights violations in the future.