Good News in the face of Empire

We are clearly living within Empire here.

As I have written before, it had its birth in European conquests, and further development through the Law of Discovery, Manifest Destiny, American Civil Religion and American "Exceptionalism".

It is based on principles that run contrary to the central teachings of Jesus, though many who promote Empire here claim the name of Jesus.  Their Greed, Lust for Power and Desire for Status fly in the face of what Jesus taught, commanded and modeled for His followers during the Roman Empire injustices, oppression and occupation of His homeland.

The bigotry, xenophobia, ethnocentrism, false superiority and supremacy, racism, classism, homophobia, intolerance of other faiths, misogyny and other hateful intolerances are born of a hubris in believing falsely that some are better than and/or more blessed and favored than others by God.

In Empire, the few have most and the many have little - wealth, power and status.
In Empire, the few conspire with one another to benefit themselves and those just like them at the  
    expense of everyone else.
In Empire, the few control the systems and institutions designed to keep themselves in power and
    wealth.
In Empire, the few pit the many against each other for crumbs (based on race, ethnicity, nation of
    origin, religion, orientation, etc., etc.) and work to convince them that this is a natural and
    necessary (normal) way for the world to be.
In Empire, the eventual and consequential destruction of everyone is acceptable to the elites in
     control as long as in the present they can get more wealth, power and status for themselves.

It was true under Rome.  It is true under the U.S. now.
The control we have wielded in the world through the toppling of governments and propping up dictators in their place, the exploitation of the World Trade Organization to benefit our corporations at the expense of whole nations and to get our citizens cheap goods on the backs of others across the world, our influence with the World Bank and other insidious and un-democratic practices has brought others around the world to hardship for our benefit.  Within the nation, we have done the same to the middle class and poor, destroying any hope they might have for a future of sustainable economic security for the sake of quick, ill-gotten profit for the 1% of our nation.  We do this while claiming that we love Democracy, truth and justice... which are NO LONGER part of the American Way.

The Good News?
There are voices, often ignored or discredited but constant, who continue to resist empire.

Dr. King was a pastor who loved the Good News of Jesus as a better way for the world.
Before him was Rev. Vernon Johns.
Dr. James Cone, Dr. Cornell West, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Rev. Al Sharpton and others...
There have been countless women, clergy and lay, who have been voices for the Good News of
     Justice.
Some women and men who consistently preach, teach, write and demonstrate the Good News of Jesus in the face of empire are not famous or even known to most of us, but they are out there.

The thing is, what is considered normative in our society is heaped in empire. 
The voices of the prophets of God are silenced by what most consider "normal" here, especially since 1981 when the Desolating Sacrilege of the Religious "right" and Political "right" got in bed together and created the movement that has been moving us wholesale into Oligarchy and recently into a Fascist Oligarchy.

Even the victims of empire consider this "just the way it is", many of whom cannot be bothered to vote or speak out against the injustices perpetrated on others, out of fear that they might lose some of their crumbs (nice cars, 800 channels, TV in every room, a few designer clothes and such), as if the things define them as human beings.  They have bought into the acquisition of wealth, power and status as normative and even "godly" for life.  Some believe they  have "made it" and they turn their backs on those who struggle to survive, even blaming the victims for their plight, rather than the system that has created such inequalities and inequities.  It may be normative here and now, but it is not the value taught, commanded and modeled by Jesus.  And it may be "godly", just not of the God of Jesus the Christ. 

The Good News in the face of Empire is your choice.
You can give lip service to Jesus and give your devotion to these other gods (greed, power, status) or you can learn what Jesus taught, commanded and modeled and live it in the world here and now.
You can buy into empire, ignoring the ways it unjustly hurts so many in the hopes that you might somehow benefit from it, or you can resist empire and not participate in it, even fight it at every turn for the sake of all humanity.
You can join your voice to the voices of those who value empire,
     or you can let your voice be heard with the voices of those who value the Good News of Jesus.

You cannot serve two masters according to Jesus. 
Choose this day who you will serve, either the gods of the past generation(s) or the God of Jesus, the Christ.  As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

Pastor Jamie