mark 5:41

He took her by the hands and said to her, "Talitha koum!" (which means, "Little girl, I say to you, get up!).

[simplyheavenlyfood]

[delta-breezes]

[love-your-bible]

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it ❤️

[worshipgifs]

[delta-breezes]

[heartsings77]

Visit us at: www.praise-and-worship.com

[littlethingsaboutgod]

So no matter what I say, what I believe and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love. 📷: @stvmink

[mark541]

The Golden Door

Okay.  I realize I’m just a 25 year old St. Louisan with a laptop and a lot of thoughts in her head.  I had the opportunity to attend a discussion on Syrian refugee placement at the International Institute this morning.  I’ve also been following the news and various editorials like a hawk.  And sipping a lot of coffee over long conversations with friends.  What else is new.  So for what that’s all worth, some thoughts for the moment.

Pardon my French, but there has been some shitty reasons for why people are up in arms about the refugee crisis as it relates to their placement in the U.S.  Sorry I’m not sorry for the ranty parts.  

“Accepting refugees would be allowing terrorists unfettered into our country.”

False.

Straight from the International Institute of St. Louis’ FAQs on Syrian refugee placement:

“Admitting refugees to the U.S. is a time consuming and rigorous multi-step process which can take 18 months to two years to completion.  And even then, less than one half of one percent of the world’s refugees will be selected.

Here is a link to a thorough listing of security and health checks that each refugee must undergo.

Throughout our history, each new refugee group admitted to the US has faced the same fears.  In the 1970s and 1980s, there was widespread fear that North Vietnamese soldiers and spies had infiltrated the ranks of the Vietnamese Boat People.  In the 1990s, fears were expressed about Bosnian Muslims and their Middle East affiliations.  Decades later, as we look back on earlier resettlement waves, we realize that our fears were largely unfounded.”

Of the 60 million refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the world, only 130,000 of them have been identified thus far by the UN for third country sponsorship.  This is because it is extremely difficult and time consuming to get placed as a refugee in the U.S.  There are alternate, less legal and less time consuming, routes that persons with malicious intent can take.  

Also, home-grown terrorism poses a significantly larger (and actual) threat for several reasons to include less visibility (blending into the crowd), fairly unpredictable self-radicalization, and a much larger population pool.  

Bottom line.  We’re talking a potential threat that a refugee might pose to national security compared to the actual threat that refugees face in their current situation.  

A recap of what it takes to be designated as a refugee by the US and the UN: (these three criteria must be met) (Slide 6)

1) Fled country of origin due to persecution 2) Cannot/unable to return to home country, cannot stay in asylum country 3) Pass background check for Homeland Security

“We already have homeless and unemployed.  We need to take care of ourselves for a change.”

Yes.  Once we have solved ALL of our problems, only then can we help anyone else.

It is true we have a homeless population and unemployment.  It is also true that our standard of living is based on a self-determined scale (i.e. “the American dream”) that frankly has created its own inequalities (looking at you capitalism) and the existence of its negative outcomes (homelessness and unemployment to name a couple) should not preclude us from reaching out to other people in the world.  Yes, we should continue to combat homelessness.  But these two concepts are not mutually exclusive.

The U.S. is not the only country to pitch in and help with the refugee crisis.  There are nine other developed nations (Slide 4) that are also providing third country sponsorship.  We are not alone.  It’s not just us.  But we have a responsibility as the most developed nation in the world to give a shit about other people.  

Also.  We are a country of immigrants.  At some point, unless you are 100% native, each of us somewhere along the line came from somewhere else.  Most of my ancestors came from Ireland and Holland (two sides of my family), both because they were unable to provide adequate food and shelter for their families.  

The “we were here first” game doesn’t work.  So stop.      

“If we do allow refugees, we should prioritize Christian refugees (because we are a Christian nation).”

As a Christian this is my personal favorite argument concerning refugee placement.  

Mostly because we claim to be a Christian nation.  And mostly because never, at any point in my entire life of being raised as a Christian and ultimately affirming my own faith have I ever heard a single part of scripture support this notion.  And also because people are watching us.  Our non-Christian friends, neighbors, co-workers.  They see how we respond to this humanitarian crisis and our response, our actions, speak louder than what we say we believe on Sundays.    

Jesus literally said that in His kingdom, the first would be last (Matthew 20:16).  

And that whatever we do not do for one of the least, we do not do for Him (Matthew 25:45).  

And He said that the greatest commandment, on which all of the law and the prophets hang is to love God and to love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:37-40).  

American Christians are not comfortable with the reality that true Christianity - a homeless Middle Eastern man preaching love and dying for the world - is fundamentally at odds with how we think life should go.  Money, jobs, houses, cars, stuff.  Jesus didn’t have any of that, and we say we follow Him.

I know I sound critical.  

I am.  

Because I’m a disillusioned millennial still trying to figure out my place in the world.  I know I don’t know everything.  I know that other people will disagree with what I have to say.  I don’t have all the answers and I don’t pretend to.  

I just know that I cannot confess Jesus as my savior and abide by the idea that we should refuse to help people who need our help.

That’s all.  

[mark541]

Open

Paris.

Yesterday Paris experienced their own 9/11.  Yes I’m using 9/11 as a frame of reference because, as a member of the 9/11 generation, that is a big part of how I relate to what has happened.  It’s how many of us relate, tucked far away from Paris, many of us haven’t ever even been there (I’m lucky, I have), who went about our lives yesterday completely unaware of what happened until our phones started buzzing.

Tears and sobbing and prayers.  Because even though we weren’t there and never can be there in those instances when lives were ended and changed, even though each act of violence is its own island of emotion and experience all determined by the hands holding the weapons and through the eyes of the witnesses and the victims, even though we cannot fathom what Paris is feeling, we’ve been there in our own way.

And it’s heart wrenching.    

And it’s not about us, or me.  So I’ll make that damn clear.  But how we relate to Paris right now, or Baghdad, Lebanon, Japan, Mexico…  How we relate to any tragedy is part of our humanity.  It’s how we see our brothers and sisters.  Through our eyes.  Empathy.  

Our eyes saw the black smoke filling a clear blue sky.  Saw the screaming and the chaos.  Saw everything.  Some of us were there in New York, or DC, most of us were not.  Most of us witnessed 9/11 through our teachers, through the television, through eyewitness accounts, family members, friends.

Friday late afternoon our phones and tvs and computers started relaying the horrors that were unfolding in Paris.  Blink, 9/11.  Blink, Paris 2015.  

Their eyes saw what happened.  Their eyes will permanently engrave in their memory the smoke and chaos and fear.  Their eyes will never forget.  

Just like ours haven’t.

And if that’s how we relate, even though we know we can’t know exactly how they feel, and we know we can’t change a damn thing and we know that there are other bad things happening in the world, but if that is how we relate even to one other part of mankind, what then?

There isn’t a competition for who has the shittiest circumstance and thus deserves the most attention.  No, there isn’t a hashtag for every tragedy that has happened in the world over the past 48 hours.  No, Paris is not the only tragedy.  

But it isn’t misguided to want to reach out and show solidarity to Paris.  We know our colored profile pictures and our hashtags and our Eiffel Tower peace signs can’t change what happened.  

We’re aware.

So completely aware that it hurts like a knife twisting inside us.  

But just like we know how it feels to have a nondescript day turn into a nightmare, we also know how it feels to have people reach out in love and solidarity.

And we’re just trying to pass that on.  In whatever way we can, whether it makes a difference to someone we will never meet or not.  But that’s not the point.

The point is, Paris is heartbroken right now, resilient though they may be.  And as human beings with the same capacity to feel terror, we also have the same capacity to feel and show love.  As one Albus Dumbledore said,

“Lord Voldemort’s gift for spreading enmity and discord is very great. We can fight it only by showing an equally strong bond of friendship and trust. Differences of habit and language are nothing at all if our aims are identical and our hearts are open.”

So, dear people, let’s be open.

p.s. at the risk of getting into a symbolic analysis of my cover image, and the war laden themes notwithstanding, I love the energy in it and that’s why I chose to use it here, that is all.

[love-your-bible]

instagram.com/love.your.bible/ love-your-bible.tumblr.com

[mark541]

When Jesus tells us not to worry, He doesn't mean when you have a mental illness and can't control your anxiety. When He tells us His parable of the sower, in part He means that anxiety chokes us and prevents us from bearing fruit. When He tells us we're forgiven, He means that He has conquered our fears. And it's okay to get help.

[hiricky]

As Christians, our most “deeply held religious belief” is that Jesus Christ died on the cross for sinful people, and that in imitation of that, we are called to love God, to love our neighbors, and to love even our enemies to the point of death. And yet right now, the prevailing perception of American Christians is that baking a cake for a gay couple is too much to ask…If conservative Christians continue to treat LGBT people as second-class citizens and cry persecution every time they don’t get their way, they will lose far more than the culture wars. They will lose the Christian identity.

Rachel Held Evans, “For the sake of the gospel, drop the persecution complex” (via hiricky)

[the-worship-project]

[mark541]

Above all death, above all life, above the battles that we fight, above any other name our God is strong to save

[mark541]

But if Jesus came to your church, would they actually let him in?

[mark541]

#LOVEWINS

[mark541]

And they were wide eyed in disbelief and disillusion They were tongue tied, drawn by their conclusions Would I have turned and walked away And laughed at what He had to say And casually dismissed Him as a fraud Unaware that I was staring at the image of my God

Wide Eyed, Nichole Nordeman