Posts Tagged ‘Church’
Dear Church, Let’s Break Bread and Drink Wine
Dear Church, Like every good preacher’s kid, I was due a crisis of faith somewhere between my late-teens and early twenties. I would not say that my relationship with Jesus ever faltered but my relationship with his church certainly did. Now, I do not for a second regret or dismiss my Southern Baptist roots. I…
Read MoreDear Church, Serve Alongside Others
Dear Church, I want to sit here and talk about the ways I wish the Church would do better. I want to rattle off the ways I wish people would really step up and make progress. But I also think the most vulnerable and honest way I can talk about this idea of serving…
Read MoreDear Church, It’s Time to Overturn Tables
Dear Church, Anger. It is something that we don’t talk about much. We have categorized anger as a sin; however, the emotion of anger is not a sin. According to Ephesians 4:26-27 (The Message), “Go ahead and be angry. You do well to be angry—but don’t use your anger as fuel for revenge. And don’t…
Read MoreDear Church, God’s Children Need More
Dear Church, As a Christian and an educator in New Orleans Public Schools, I recognize the need for God’s children to have backpacks and school supplies, but we may be limiting the way we see God’s power manifested to transform our world. God’s children need more; they need the grace and courtesy to walk with…
Read MoreDear Church, Music Can Bridge the Divide
Dear Church, In 1979, President Jimmy Carter declared June, Black Music Month. Later in 2009, President Obama renamed it African-American Music Appreciation Month. This month was created to celebrate the influence African-Americans have had throughout the world by their music that has been created. It tells stories of faith, freedom, love, and justice. For years,…
Read MoreDear Church, Lest We Forget Our Need for Repentance
Dear Church, Where does reconciliation start in America and are we even ready? Where does the church fit in? I think it’s important to try to understand the rich and complicated history of the church in America before we can answer either of those questions. Our country is deeply forgetful; one could say we have…
Read MoreDear Church, It’s Time to Take Responsibility for Your Politics
Dear Church, As a white kid growing up in rural Alabama, I was exposed to a lot of church and a lot of racism at an early age. I’ve attended churches that were overtly racist, where people felt free to make racist jokes and say that marrying someone of another race was Biblically forbidden. I’ve…
Read MoreDear Church, This is no time for complacency. Action is required.
Dear Church, Over 60 years ago, Martin Luther King Jr., stated: “A solution of the present crisis will not take place unless men and women work for it. Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. Even a superficial look at history reveals that no social advance rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. Every stop…
Read MoreDear Church, Let’s talk about some history
Dear Church, Let’s talk about some history. On December 31, 1862, New Year’s Eve, thousands of free and escaped slaves gathered in churches across the North (and some in the South) to anxiously await January 1. On Freedom’s Eve, they waited for freedom to come. Then-President Lincoln’s the Emancipation Proclamation was set to go in…
Read MoreDear Church, What is Your Why?
Dear Church, What is your why? Why do you exist? … As a Jesus lover and follower and founder of Mission Reconcile, I sometimes wonder if the churches of today are executing their purpose and their reason for existence. Are the churches of today functioning like the beginning churches in the book of Acts? To…
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