What can I do?

Great poem on what can I do to be the hands and feet of Jesus in this world…

check it out:

Micah Bournes: What can I do?

Party with Prostitutes

One of my favorite Tony Campolo stories:

What will they write about us?

A few years ago I read the following words and they had a deep impact on me. My prayer is that one day someone will write similar words to the mayor of Mainz.

This quote is from Aristides who wrote to the Emperor in 137 AD and explained Christianity to him:

“It is the Christians, O Emperor, who have sought and found the truth, for they acknowledge God. They do not keep for themselves the goods entrusted to them. They do not covet what belongs to others. They show love to their neighbours. They do not do to another what they would not wish to have done to themselves. They speak gently to those who oppress them, and in this way they make them their friends. It has become their passion to do good to their enemies. They live in the awareness of their smallness. Every one of them who has anything gives ungrudgingly to the one who has nothing. If they see a travelling stranger, they bring him under their roof. They rejoice over him as over a real brother, for they do not call one another brothers after the flesh, but they know they are brothers in the Spirit and in God. If they hear that one of them is imprisoned or oppressed for the sake of Christ, they take care of all his needs. If possible they set him free. If anyone among them is poor or comes into want while they themselves have nothing to spare, they fast two or three days for him. In this way they can supply any poor man with the food he needs. This, O Emperor, is the rule of life of the Christians, and this is their manner of life.”

A very powerful statement.

Philip from crippledJesus.com

 

The Hole in Our Gospel

“It is not our fault that people are poor, but it is our responsibility to do something about it.”

Richard Stearns, The Hole in Our Gospel (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2009), 123

Capitalism for the 21st century

In this article Philip talks about a new understanding of capitalism, so to speak a third option called social business. CrippledJesus as an organisation is a social business and follows the organizational philosophy of Muhammad Yunus. This article wants to help people understand what social business is, encourage them to share about it and challenge some to start their own social business.

Capitalism for the 21st century

Your comments and ideas are more than welcome.

Loving your enemies

I just stumbled over this quote from Martin Luther King Jr.:

We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws, because noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. Throw us in jail, and we shall still love you. Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and we shall still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you. But be ye assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer. One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory. . . .

Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, “Love your enemies.” It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. That’s why Jesus says, “Love your enemies.” Because if you hate your enemies, you have no way to redeem and to transform your enemies. But if you love your enemies, you will discover that at the very root of love is the power of redemption.

– Martin Luther King, Jr., “Loving Your Enemies”, 17 November 1957, Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery Alabama

found on: http://missionalchurchnetwork.com/martin-luther-king-jr-on-loving-your-enemies-2/ 

a powerful prayer from church history

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
Where there is injury, pardon.
Where there is doubt, faith.
Where there is despair, hope.
Where there is darkness, light.
Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive.
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen. 

(Prayer attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi)