Heritage of Hatred

My heritage is German and Dutch. I no doubt had some relatives who fought under the Nazi flag... I do not embrace THAT heritage... I do not fly a Swaztika flag, which was not a symbol of a nation, but of a normalized movement of economic, military power centered on bigotry and built on hatred and built on the backs of enslaved peoples and was expressed in the genocide of millions.
I am glad that we do not still fly the version of the American flag flown by Texicans who squatted on lands outside our territories and provoked through ramped up aggression a series of battles that created martyrs and ended in us forcing the treaty of Guadalupe hidalgo, so we could steal much of Mexico from that sovereign nation, and so that "our" citizens could steal the lands owned by generations of people who lived there, but who had no legal representation or "appropriate" legal documentation to prove it.
I am glad we do not fly the flag of 1848 also because it was the year that our FEDERAL GOVERNMENT reimbursed mining settlers $1million for BULLETS used to kill native Americans just in the Sacramento Valley... money they collected by producing the scalps of those "barbaric heathen"...
... and the Confederate flag, that is the banner of a movement, considered even a nation by some, a way of life based on an economy built on the enslavement of people, dehumanizing them to be considered chattel, kidnapped and sold... out of a false sense of superiority, entitlement and privilege... wealthy, white landowners getting wealthy for generations on the backs of black slaves through a white construct of race, and some share-croppers because they were easily exploited, who were also turned against others based on race to keep them under the boots of those who "owned them"... it was the banner of a movement, a hateful heritage, because the confederacy is gone... it no longer represents the CSA... but a movement in hearts and minds, where the heritage of hatred continues... a desperate holding on of false superiority, supremacy, entitlement and privilege... based on power over others... which brings memories and images of the "good ole days" for them, and the BAD OLD DAYS for those whose heritage was the victimization of these ruthless folk... I HAD to protest in Columbia on Saturday... we must rid ourselves of these banners of a hateful heritage that further embolden the bigots whose vehement contempt for our President is already unchecked, whose murders of unarmed young black men and women by the police go unchallenged, and whose voter suppression efforts go un-addressed... these are desperate attempts by desperate people to hold onto their false supremacy, privilege and entitlement... a hateful heritage... we necessarily need NOT to let that be displayed... particularly on ANY public land or property...
Pastors - we need to NOT BE IRRELEVANT to the time in which we live (rough quote of Rev. Al Sharpton), the circumstances in which we experience injustice, greed, unrest and gross abuses of power... our silence is compliance, and it SCREAMS of our irrelevance in these situations! The Gospel of Jesus addresses it, when we preach it, teach it and live it... Pastor Jamie

What is the GOOD news?

I rant and rave often in this blog about what is wrong. 
I believe that we need to expose the works of darkness, and
defend those who are hurt by them...
I believe that loving others means advocating them, standing
with them, lending them our power, our presence, our voices...
I believe that loving "the least of these" children of God is
our call as humans, and especially as people who claim to be
followers of Jesus... and loving them with the Agape Love
commanded by Jesus means ACTIVE commitment on their
behalf and not some warm, sympathetic feelings...
I prefer EMPATHY that does not distance, but rather draws
from within me an understanding and desire to closely
walk with those who God loves and positively affect their
well-being...
The GOOD NEWS of Jesus compels me to live that Agape
Love...
So, the Good News in all this is that when we expose the
works of darkness that hurt others, we ARE shedding LIGHT
on them... and when we clearly see what they are, we are
compelled by Agape Love to first, defend those who are being
victimized by them, and then eliminate them...
The Good News for you is that someone did that for YOU!
The Good News for others is that the someone who did that
for you, compels you to do that for OTHERS...
Instead of requesting supernatural interventions, why not pray
for the kind of strength, commitment, compassion and
endurance it takes to LIVE the Agape Love commanded in the
Good News of Jesus, and CHANGE THE WORLD AROUND
YOU?
That would be living the Good News, indeed!
Pastor Jamie

Part of Loving

It is a natural part of loving to defend those who you love.
It is a natural thing to stand with those who need support,
    to lend one's voice to those who have none,
    to use one's power for the powerless,
    and expose the works of those who would hurt them,
        shield them from lack or harm
        and work to assure their well-being.
If that means speaking truth to power,
    standing up against the prevailing, punishing powers
    standing WITH those who one loves, who God loves,
         voicing truth and justice to the lies and injustice of others...
    then that is what one who loves does.
Prophets love.
Activists love.
Followers of Jesus love.
So we ACT on that love on behalf of others.
   We speak, we write, we demonstrate, we demand, we work
         toward the day when all are treated with justice and
         equity, equality, peace and have well-being...
So when those who would want to profit off the exploitation
    of others complain about "class warfare", we continue to
    work against them.
And when those who hate ANYONE and discriminate against
    ANYONE for ANY reason complain that their religions
    or civic rights are violated when they are kept from doing
    so, we continue to work against them.
When equal education, affordable housing, transportation, food,
    jobs, livable wages, insurance, safety, clean air, water and
    land are withheld from any of God's people for the increased
    profit of a few, we continue to work against them...
because it is NOT what we are against that matters,
    but what we are FOR...
    that we LOVE them... THAT is what matters to us,
    because our protest, our insistence and our action is out of
    LOVE... and love never ends!
Pastor Jamie

Mammon - America's Idol

   Greed is America's Idol. It has led us to hold many among us down, out and back through exploitation, quick profits for the few at the expense of the many, systems designed to favor the wealthy and keep the poor right where they are, keep people from having affordable housing, safe transportation, good schools, healthcare, nutritional food, drinkable water, breathable air, livable incomes, adequate benefits, etc., etc., etc. It has led us into wars, exposed us to the world a...s bullies, opportunists and arrogant, intolerant despots. So when people would tell you that God is not pleased over people being gay, having children outside of wedlock, considering abortion as an option or using birth control, let them know why God is TRULY not happy with our nation, and how we all play a part in a reverence to greed that leads to injustice, inequity, inequality, hatred, intolerance and the unrest that comes with it all.
   Agape Love is Jesus' COMMAND. It does not allow us to give the love that belongs to God and Neighbor to Mammon, but COMMANDS us to active commitment on behalf of the "other", especially "the least of these...". Jesus said that we cannot serve both God and wealth... it is time we stop trying to do so as believers, and start being FOLLOWERS OF JESUS' WAY...
   We CANNOT love God and hate our Neighbor, at least not and be faithful to either.  If we say we love God, then we must love what God loves, and the Law and Prophets, Gospels, Acts and Epistles all share that God loves economic justice, helping the poor and disenfranchised and living thankfully with enough.  Our identity as a nation is wrapped up in "The American way", and centered around an unsustainable "standard of living" that we have set up which means MORE, always MORE.  Those who can make that happen for themselves do just that, at the expense of those who cannot.  Our system of laissez-faire Capitalism is set up to benefit those who already have wealth and power at the expense of those who have little of either.   It is an unjust, unfaithful, unloving and un-Christ-like system. 
   If believers in Jesus will be FOLLOWERS of Jesus and His Way, then there will be a different way with a different system based on His commanded Agape Love.  It will reflect the active commitment on behalf of the other that Agape Love demands.  It will lift people up to having enough, and let those who have more than enough know the self-sacrifice of unconditional love in sharing what they have for their neighbors, even strangers and enemies, as Jesus defines neighbor.  It will shift the settling for fleeting happiness over having more than one needs, into a deep, abiding joy and sense of satisfaction in knowing that others have what they need.  The joy will be in relationships with God and Neighbor, rather than in self with un-living wealth.  It will bring completeness, wholeness and well-being to ALL, including those who re-define the objects of their love. 
   THEN there will be peace BECAUSE there is JUSTICE, EQUALITY, EQUITIBABLE TREATMENT FOR ALL in this newfound WELL-BEING.  THEN God will be pleased with us as individuals, corporations, churches, government and nation.  THEN it will be GOOD NEWS, but Good News for ALL PEOPLE...
Pastor Jamie

It doesn't take a genius to see what's going on.

It doesn't take a genius to see what is going on...
    and, no, it is NOT a conspiracy theory thing...
It is CLEAR from words and actions (by their fruits you will know them),
    that there are those who would BUY government because they do not value democracy...
    what they value is HAVING IT ALL... what they are working toward is HAVING IT ALL...
    their only value is that... (where your treasure is, there will your heart be also)...
    having all the wealth (of which the 1% already control 87%)
    having all the power (which they are currently buying - LEGALLY - in government)
    having all the prestige and position (which their propaganda wing is working on)...

It is all toward the establishment of a new GILDED AGE,
    in which, as in the 20's before the crash, the 1% controlled it all...
    worked people to death or near death and fired them at will for unforgivable behavior
         like being sick or needing time off to care for their children...
    worked children in the farms and factories, because they had no future in the schools...
    shamelessly exploited, ignored the needs of and murdered minority citizens...
    used the army to violently quell any expressions of citizen rights...
   
We are heading in that direction again, folks... because we have been duped in believing their
    rhetoric and/or lulled into believing things are not extreme in their minds...

So, we already have RIGHT TO WORK (for nothing states) that also have FIRE AT WILL policies,
   actively killing organized labor that balances the power of owners and corporate management...
      we are moving toward FOR PROFIT SCHOOLS, so those who cannot afford school will
          be left out and available to go into the fields and factories again...
      we already have FOR PROFIT PRISONS that will gladly take in more prisoners who serve
          LONG sentences for small crimes, and who will be shipped out to farms and factories
          for cheap labor - the proceeds to go to the prisons... the new SLAVERY...
      we already have few taxes on the wealthy and the bulk of taxes being paid by everyone else...
      we already have efforts to take away affordable healthcare from those who finally got it...
      we already see efforts to eliminate social security and Medicare/Medicaid from our elderly and
           most vulnerable...
      we already have the new red-lining in the cities, to eliminate poor populations for the
          sake of those who want to take over...
      we already have less affordable, public transportation available...
      we already have food and fuel, insurance prices higher in areas of poverty than in areas of
          affluence...
      we already have public assistance being ripped from those most struggling, while those who are
          rich get tax breaks and incentives - WELFARE
      we already have the new NAFTA (TPP) that will ship more American jobs overseas and
          incentivize corporations once again to move where cheap labor, cheap resources and
          fewer regulations mean more unchecked profit for them at the expense of others..
      we already have our environment being destroyed for the profit of a few...
      we have already seen the CRASH, and have been in recovery, only to hear that some who would
          be elected want to go back to doing what brought the CRASH all over again...

The gerrymandering, voter suppression laws, lack of campaign finance regulations and secretive PAC money collections are all aimed at one thing - a return to the GOOD OLD DAYS for the 1%, which marks the BAD OLD DAYS for everyone else...

You watch the signs of the weather... you have seen this before, too... for some reason, WE THE PEOPLE have stupidly let it go on and on... fighting it at the last second, when it threatens our very existence, and then slumbering while this movement builds again...

It is unconscionable, IMMORAL, reprehensible ... and anti-Christ, whose teachings and commands DEMAND concern and committed action on behalf of the most vulnerable...

It doesn't take a genius to see what is happening, or to act to stop it.  VOTE, speak, write, demonstrate, protest, call an elected official... VOTE as people who follow JESUS - His teachings and commands... looking not only to your own interests, but to the interests of others... VOTE!  While you still can!  Before they take that away from you!  VOTE!

Pastor Jamie
   

New Life

So, I know that Jesus took my sin's death to its death, became sin and took it to its death on the Cross, and gives me HIS resurrection. I know what a gift that is to my soul - what deliverance that means. I know that it is about personal salvation. I also know that dying to sin and rising to new life, DAILY, because I am baptized into His death and resurrection, means that I can and should live differently, as one who has been given new life. I am committed, by Jesus' command to live Agape Love, to see that others have deliverance in THIS PART of God's Kingdom, so that they can live a new life, too. If I am to follow Jesus, then I must follow Jesus' way of not judging, of forgiving, of showing compassion to the most vulnerable and in need, of reaching out to stranger and even enemy in Agape. If I do anything other, I am not following Jesus. I can no more want harm or want come to a neighbor (defined by Jesus as stranger and enemy), than I want that for myself, if I love my neighbor as myself. If I love God, I can no more focus only on my own desires, but also on the needs of others who God loves, and work to make sure they are cared for. I am SAVED from selfish, self-centered, greedy, ruthless, power-hungry, controlling, intolerant, judgmental, unforgiving, bigoted, irrational, unloving, apathetic and complacent living. I am CALLED to a life of self-sacrifice, thankfulness, compassion, love, peace, joy, kindness, acceptance(even celebration), actively committed solidarity with my neighbor (stranger, enemy). I do that because Jesus taught, commanded and modeled that life for me in THIS PART of God's Kingdom. I do it because I am redeemed and saved from sin and its death. I do it as a RESPONSE of gratitude and thankfulness to Jesus. THIS is my prayer, my praise and my offering to God... to LIVE as a living sacrifice for the one who sacrificed for me. So, others may keep any empty worship, praise and tithing that are devoid of active Agape Love. They may keep any focus on personal salvation that comes down only to belief toward pie in the sky when we die. I will LIVE my Faith by Grace in Agape Love here and now. Pastor Jamie

more or less

There are those who say they want LESS Government, so that MORE power is concentrated in the hands of fewer people, LESS gets done to protect citizens' rights, and LESS gets done for the most vulnerable. There are those who say they want LESS Government regulation over business practices, so that MORE money is made for the few, and Greed becomes MORE the norm, so that the many can be more easily fleeced by them, and the economcy for the many is shot, while the few make more. Many of these same folks say they want MORE legislation over people's love lives and bodies, while adding MORE legislation to allow LESS restraint on those who would like to make discrimination a part of their religious freedoms. They also want MORE War, LESS responsibility for the lives of those who fight them for us, MORE profit out of war and LESS restraint in the inhumanities committed in War. They want MORE freedom to profile, harrass and openly kill young, black men. They want LESS participation by all citizens in the voting process. They want MORE profit and privitization of schools and prisons, so there is LESS education for the poorest among us, but MORE room for them in prison and the free labor they provide to farms and factories. They want LESS freedom for people to love who they love, and MORE freedom to openly hate them. They want MORE freedom to buy weapons with not limits, amd LESS affordable healthcare for our citizens. I believe that these attitudes, behaviors, philosophies and ideologies are MORE hurtful and therefore LESS Christ-like than those of the folks who oppose them, so I am one of them. Pastor Jamie PS - it was suggested by a good friend and doctor, that you look up "We are the many" by Makana on YouTube..., that it speaks to this very well... I agree!