Living as an exile

 HE LIVED a life of love, integrity, witness, and resistance. Rants and condemnation are echo chambers of what others are saying. Asking questions about our own sin that could distract us from His kingdom should be repeated to ourselves and those closest to us. 

Scot McNight

In my opinion, our generation is witnessing yet another dangerous turn away from these moral and ethical guidelines and finding justification for much evil perpetrated against women, orphans, the poor, and the disenfranchised around the world, and, what seems worse, a bold assertion of arrogant exceptionalism—a claim not unlike that of the Jerusalem/Temple elite in Jeremiah’s day that resulted in God permitting Nebuchadnezzar to destroy Solomon’s Temple and turn Jerusalem into a pile of ashes and rubble.

I’m not saying I think Washington is a present-day parallel to Jerusalem or the Whitehouse to Solomon’s Temple. (The God of the Bible has made no covenant with America nor any of its presidents.). I just don’t think I should be surprised to find exceptionalist religions (Nationalism in any form, including, or perhaps especially, Christian).

Jamar Tisby

Religious Nationalism as a Political Weapon

Christian nationalism is not merely a religious movement—it is a calculated political strategy designed to justify minority rule. As Katherine Stewart explains, this ideology claims that America was founded as a Christian nation and that a "sacred heritage" has been betrayed by secular elites. It positions political opponents as enemies of the faith and Trump’s rise to the presidency as a divine sign of God’s favor. In its pursuit of fundamentalist “Christian privilege” it will trample over the principles of participatory democracy.

The War on Public Institutions

Public institutions—especially schools, universities, and government agencies—are primary targets for the anti-democratic movement, which sees them as barriers to conservative dominance. Stewart documents how school boards, state legislatures, and local governments have been infiltrated by activists who aim to reshape education into an instrument of ideological control. 

Disinformation is a strategy

An International Counterrevolution

The authoritarian counterrevolution is not merely a United State phenomenon.

Michael Sprague. 

Our waiting days are not wasting days but are training days. Think of Joseph----13 years of waiting.

Noah-----120 years building a boat.

Moses----40 years in the wilderness.

David----18 years waiting to be King.

Paul----3 years in Arabia.

Abraham----100 years to have a son.

Some of you are waiting as well. I wish I had words tender enough for your soul. However, God has not abandoned you. Isaiah 40:31 says, “But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.”

Nijay Gupta

“Like how can we go through the change that Paul went through to that our affections would be more and more like Jesus over time?

I love that question. I’ve actually never gotten that question even though I’ve done a ton of teaching on this. I don’t say this tritely, but love must be caught as well as taught, meaning the more we meditate on scripture and know and enjoy Christ’s love for us, the more we see the power of love that empowers us to love others.

It’s that pay-it-forward mentality when someone has loved you and blessed you and changed your life, whether it’s a parent, whether it’s a mentor, someone just reaching out graciously, it softens your heart. It really does. And so I encourage people, spend time in the Gospels with Jesus, spend time in the Old Testament with Yahweh, and read Deuteronomy 6, read the prophets and look at how God says, I will never leave you nor forsake you.”