Speaking Truth To Power

Roberts, J. Deotis, Bonhoeffer and King:Speaking Truth To Power. Louisville:Westminister John Knox, 2005. 160 pages

Review by Jo Ann Davidson, Andrews University

J. Deotis Roberts, pastor and theologian, is one of the founders of the Black Theology movement. Having previously published The Prophethood of Black Believers:An African American Political Theology for Ministry; Black Theology in Dialogue; Liberation and Reconciliation:A Black Theology; and A Black Political Theology (all published by Westminister John Knox Press), Roberts, with biography and theological reflection, delves into Dietrich Bonhoeffer's courageous stand against Nazism in Europe and Martin Luther King's intrepid mission for civil rights in America.

The Book is structured in three sections: Part 1 is biographical. The reader is informed of the geographical backgrounds, family, early education, and professional training of Bonhoeffer and King. Both completed a doctorate in theology and both had pastoral experience. Their tragically brief contributions are reviewed in Part 2. Both sought to fight ugly collective evil. King's sense of mission is set within America's Civil Rights movement, while Bonhoeffer's is set in Nazi Germany. Both were put to death at the age of thirty-nine.

Part 3 studies Bonhoeffer's and King's respective political theologies. Again, the comparison of their lives is insightful. Both were Protestant (King was Baptist; Bonhoeffer was Lutheran). Neither's passion for social justice had a secular motivation; both issued from their religious convictions. In addition to Scripture, Gandhi's life and teachings also had a major impact on both King and Bonhoeffer. All three were deeply affected by Jesus' "Sermon on the Mount." Bonhoeffer and King spoke out against a solely heaven-directed faith. Ahead of their respective times, they revealed an "earthward direction in their ethical concerns". Bonhoeffer and King were political activists, in what Roberts terms a "social eschatology". While not delving into some of Bonhoeffer's more enigmatic statements, Roberts does touch on Bonhoeffer's views on the relation of church and state. He does the same with King, although King's thinking is more accessible. Roberts is also interested in how King and Bonhoeffer made decisions in a crisis.

One might not readily think of making a comparison of Bonhoeffer and King, but Roberts prepares a credible and convincing case. Having never met either, he studied their published materials. He also taught advanced seminars camparing Bonhoeffer's and King's thinking and work at Eastern Baptist Teological Seminary, Lancaster Theological Seminary, Yale Divinity School, and Duke Divinity School. As a result of the dialogue with the faculty at these various institutions, Roberts decided to write this book. His study of their lives and theologies is historically and theologically helpful. And in this day of floating pluralism, it is good to be reminded of two courageous reformers who truly believed that there are some fundamental truths that anchor reality and that are worth living and dying for.

Do God Exist ?

WHAT A GREAT ANALOGY OF GOD FOR THOSE WHO DON'T KNOW
BY ROBIN WILLIAMS NO LESS

This is one of the best explanations of why God allows pain and suffering that I have seen. It's an explanation other people will understand.

A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed.
As the barber began to work, They talked about so many things and various subjects.

When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said: "I don't believe that God exists."

"Why do you say that?" asked the customer.
"Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist. Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people?

Would there be abandoned children? If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain. I can't imagine loving a God who would allow all of these things."

The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond because he didn't want to start an argument. The barber finished his job and the customer left the shop. Just after he left the barbershop, he saw a man in the street with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and un-kept.

The customer turned back and entered the barber shop again and he said to the barber: "You know what? Barbers do not exist."

"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber. "I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"

"No!" the customer exclaimed. "Barbers don't exist because if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."

"Ah, but barbers DO exist! What happens is, people do not come to me."

"Exactly!"- affirmed the customer.
"That's the point! God, too, DOES exist!
What happens, is, people don't go to Him and do not look for Him.
That's why there's so much pain and suffering in the world."

BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING!

"Do not ask the Lord to guide your footsteps if you're not willing to move your feet."

Are You Jesus ?

A few years ago, a group of salesmen went to a regional sales convention in Chicago. The convention lasted all week, and all the salesmen had assured their wives that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday day night's dinner. As they hurried to the airport to catch their return flight, they rushed down the airport's corridor with their briefcases in hand. In their rush, one of these salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table which held a display of apples. Apples flew everywhere. Without stopping or looking back, they all continued running so they would make their plane. All but one. He stopped after running a few more yards, took a deep breath, and experienced a twinge of compassion for the girl whose apple stand had been overturned. He told his buddies to go on without him, waved goodbye, told one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home destination and explain his taking a later flight. Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor. He was glad he did. The 16 year old girl running the apple cart was totally blind. She was softly crying, tears running down her cheeks in frustration, and at the same time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd swirled about her, no one stopping and no one to care for her plight. The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the apples, put them back on the table and helped organize her display.As he did this, he noticed that many of the apples had become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another basket. When he had finished, he pulled out his wallet and said to the girl, "Here, please take this $40 for the damage we did. Are you okay?" She nodded through her tears. He continued on with, "I hope we didn't spoil your day too badly." As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered blind girl called out to him, "Mister....." He paused and turned to look back into those blind eyes. She continued, "Are you Jesus?" He stopped in mid-stride, and he wondered. Then slowly he made his way to catch the later flight with that question burning and bouncing about in his soul: "Are you Jesus?" Do people mistake you for Jesus? That's our call, is it not? To be so much like Jesus that people cannot tell the difference as we live and interact with a world (shopping, working, reacting to others that are serving us) that is blind to His love, life andgrace. If we claim to know Him, we should live, walk and act as He would. Knowing Him is more than simply quoting Scripture and going to church. It's actually living the Word as life unfolds day to day. You are the apple of His eye even though we, too, have been bruised by a fall. He stopped what He was doing and picked you and me up on a hill called Calvary and paid in full for our damaged fruit. Let us live like we are worth the price He paid. Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

Author Unknown
Maybe is HIM

The Bell

THE BELL

I KNOW WHO I AM

I am God's child (John 1:12)

I am Christ's friend (John 15:15 )

I am united with the Lord(1 Cor. 6:17 )

I am bought with a price (1 Cor.6:19-20)

I am a saint (set apart for God ).( Eph.1:1 )

I am a personal witness of Christ ( Acts 1 : 8 )

I am the salt & light of the earth ( Matt.5 : 13-14)

I am a member of the body of Christ( 1 Cor 12 : 27 )

I am free forever from condemnation ( Rom. 8 : 1-2 )

I am a citizen of Heaven. I am significant ( Phil. 3 : 20 )

I am free from any charge against me ( Rom. 8 : 31 - 34)

I am a minister of reconciliation for God ( 2 Cor 5 : 17-21)

I have access to God through the Holy Spirit ( Eph. 2:18)

I am seated with Christ in the heavenly realms ( Eph.2:6)

I cannot be separated from the love of God (Rom.8:35-39)

I am established, anointed, sealed by God ( 2 Cor.1:21-22)

I am assured all things work together for good (Rom. 8: 28 )

I have been chosen and appointed to bear fruit (John 15:16 )

I may approach God with freedom and confidence (Eph. 3: 12)

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me (Phil. 4:13)

I am the branch of the true vine, a channel of His life (John 15:1-5)

I am God's temple (1 Cor.3:16 ). I am complete in Christ ( Col.2:10 )

I am hidden with Christ in God(Col.3:3)I have been justified(Rom5:1)

I am God's co-worker(1Cor 3:9 ) I am God's workmanship( Eph.2:10 )

I have been redeemed, forgiven and adopted as God's child ( Eph1:5 )

I belong to God

Do you know who you are?

Keep this bell ringing...

"The LORD bless you and keep you;

the LORD make His face shine upon you

and be gracious to you;

the LORD turn His face toward you and give you peace."

Numbers 6:24-26

Light for Life's Journey

Has anyone read H.G.Wells' books? Many of his stories have been adapted into films by Hollywood such as War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Time Machine. However, there is a series of short stories written by him that never found its way into Hollywood and one of them is "The Country of the Blind" - a marvelous short story.

A mountain climber named Nunez falls into an isolated valley in the Andes mountains. He discovers a civilization where everyone is blind due to a genetic defect. These people have adapted very well to their environment, needing no light in their dwelling and possessing extremely acute hearing. The only difference to these people between day and night is the temperature. Houses do not need windows. Nunez hence became the one-eyed King and starts to rule over them since he could not return to civilization. He failed miserably when he is not able to get them to understand the meaning of words like "sight" and "see" and "blind". He talks about light and colour but these people think he is crazy and an idiot. Then one of the elders came out with a brilliant idea of solving Nunez's problem by removing his eyes. Finally, in the end, Nunez decided that he would go through with the surgery to remove his eyes but a few hours before the surgery, he decided to go for a walk. As he walked, he noticed the sunrise creeping over the mountains. He saw the light glistening on the snow and ice. He thought of long-distant places of beauty he had seen in his earlier life. Then he gazed at the rock he had slid down on the day he had fallen into The Country of the Blind......and he began to climb up.



The people who lived in The Country of the Blind was not blind initially but over a period of time as they gradually became blind one by one, they slowly started adapting to life without the light. When we let go of the light, we become accustomed to the darkness and it is easy to lose our way. The Bible is light from God given to help us on our journey through life. It offers hope when we are suffering, gives practical advice for living, imparts moral instruction, insight into God's character and tells us what lies beyond the grave.

The psalmist in Psalm 119 declares, "Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path" and "the unfolding of your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple". The Word of God is like a spotlight, lighting up a dark path. The Word of God is like a doorway allowing light to stream into our world from God's presence. And because of this, the psalmist "loves" the Word. He humbles himself before it, he strives to obey it, he meditates on it day and night, he memorizes it, he is comforted by it and he shares it with others.

There are many other lessons we can learn from this story, one that has great relevance to our world today.

Food for Thought :-

1. Every society has its blind spots and often tend to think that their view of reality is normal. Typically, it is normal for societies to persecute those who are different. What if the world around us is actually a "country of the blind" ? What appears normal is actually sightless people stumbling and crashing around in the darkness ? Only they have gotten so used to it that it seems normal and because Christians have such a different perspective, they seem to be idiots and fools.

2. The blind in the story have their own explanations for how their world was created and what are its limits. The sighted man is a fool and a threat. How often have we behaved like the blind in the story - when we think we know all and that we do not need to learn anymore ? Wells was obviously making a cautionary tale. In the Country of the Blind, we often find the blind leading the blind.

3. How is this story similar to the world we live in where the religiously zealots amongst us have their own tales of creation and their own explanation that have no intrinsic biblical coherence?

God's Word to the World

A lecture given by Professor Daniel Madigan SJ at the 2006 Adelaide College of Divinity and Flinders University Annual Public Lecture in Theology on 'God's Word to the World: Jesus and the Qur'ân, Incarnation and Recitation' in July last year raised such strong interest in the community, with over two hundred and fifty people attending, that the venue for the event had to be moved. In his lecture, Professor Madigan argued that we should give Christian-Muslim relations a privileged place in attempting to develop a contemporary theology. He told listeners that in developing this relationship we should focus on the parallels between the roles played by Jesus in Christianity and the Qur’ân in Islam. In their faith, Christians are people of the Word of God, and the Word is incarnate in Jesus Christ. In Muslim faith, God’s eternal Speech is found in the Qur’ân. The common belief in the Word is a starting point for theological dialogue and mutual understanding.

Professor Madigan’s contribution to the Christian world’s understanding of Islam is profound. He is Professor of Islamic Studies and Interreligious Dialogue at the famous Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome. Daniel Madigan founded the Gregorian University Institute for the Study of Religions and Cultures, which specialises in dialogue between Christians, Muslims and Jews.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer-The Most Admired Man of the 20th Century

"Bonhoeffer is, without doubt, the man I admire most in the history of the twentieth century." Kevin Rudd "Faith in Politics" (2006)

Headed toward a brilliant career as a theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a young German Lutheran pastor, became instead a modern martyr for his opposition to Nazism and his involvement in a plot to assassinate Hitler. He excelled in his theological studies and had earned a doctorate by the age of twenty-four. He served as a pastor in Berlin, and in 1931 became a lecturer in the theological faculty. He was in London for a while pastoring two German congregations, and returned in 1935 to head an illegal seminary for training pastors for the Confessing Church that opposed Hitler. During the war Bohhoeffer was a key leader in the Confessing Church, and spoke out bravely against the anti-semitic policies of the regime. He was imprisoned in April 1943 for conspiracy and hanged two years later, just before the end of the war.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer's most widely ready book, The Cost of Discipleship, begins with these words: 'Cheap grace is the mortal enemy of our church. Our struggle today is for costly grace.' His writings were and are a clarion call to church of what it means to follow Christ in the modern world, where faith is tested on every side and even government can become criminal and godless.

"Who am I?"-- a poem written in prison in June of 1944:

Who am I? They often tell me

I stepped from my cell's confinement

calmly, cheerfully, firmly,

like a Squire from his country house

Who am I? They often tell me

I used to speak to my warders

freely and friendly and clearly,

as though it were mine to command.

Who am I? They also tell me

I bore the days of misfortune

equably, smilingly, proudly

like one accustomed to win.

Am I then really that which

other men tell of?

Or am I only what I myself

know of myself?

Restless and longing and sick,

like a bird in a cage,

struggling for breath, as though

hands were compressing my throat,

yearning for colours, for flowers,

for the voices of birds,

thirsting for words of kindness,

for neighbourliness,

tossing in expectation of great events,

powerlessly trembling for friends

at an infinite distance,

weary and empty at praying,

at thinking, at making,

faint, and ready to say farewell to it all.

Who am I? This or the other?

Am I one person today and tomorrow another?

Am I both at once?

A hypocrite before others,

and before myself a contemptibly woebegone weakling?

Or is something within me still

like a beaten army, fleeing in disorder

from victory already achieved?

Who am I? They mock me,

these lonely questions of mine.

Whoever I am, Thou knowest,

0 God,I am Thine!

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Tegel Prison

Summer 1944