Politics.
Terrorism.
Financial stress globally and personally.
Culture wars gone mad (Bathrooms, really?)

I am grateful that I serve a kingdom that cannot be shaken, even as everything is in flux (Hebrews 12).

To all friends, Left and Right, Religious and Skeptical: let’s have a real conversation on the values and vision that foster human flourishing in our neighborhoods and nations.

Choosing to displace shouting with serving and labeling with love for neighbor.

Come, let’s enjoy a meal together.

Election 2016. A lament.
It is not just a challenge to party elites.
It is a referendum on our character.

My lament is deeper than the rhetoric and tactics.

My lament is that women and men of fine character in both parties are swept away while we are left with tired ideologies and narcissism.

We cannot pay for every progressive promise and Donald Trump does not affirm his party’s principles/platform.

For the sake of generations ahead, let’s call for character, principled proximate justice and reaffirmation of the first principles of love and virtue that create a free society.

Lord, have mercy.

Christ, have mercy.

America’s future does not rest with the next President, Congress or Supreme Court.

They do matter – please vote!

America’s future rests on a spiritual awakening that is

• Ecstatic and ethical,
• Personal and community focused,
• Christ-centered,Serving the common good.

In short

• Revival with reformation,
• Awakening of affections and actions,
• With millions loving God and neighbor in everyday work.

Let’s build tomorrow’s destiny with today’s discipline.

Almighty Lord, who is also Abba,
Christ our King and Brother,
Sovereign Spirit who nurtures Divine Life,
Grant all candidates of all parties and every office:

The wisdom to do justice;

The humility to listen to you and all around;

The courage to implement sound policies;

The loyal love to truth and first principles;

Respect for life from conception to coronation;

Compassion for all, powerless and powerful;

And reverence for your holiness and love.

Lord, have mercy.

Christ, have mercy.

Amen.

Remembering.
Thousands of teenagers met death and disability on the beaches of Normandy.

War is a terrible thing.

Until the final moments, the Allied leaders worried that the invasion would fail.

Once ashore, final victory was quite certain – yet thousands more would perish and suffer in obscure hedgerows, forests and urban war zones.

Western Europe liberated. Nazi Germany defeated…and soon, an Iron Curtain dividing two ways of life.

But for today – let’s remember brave soldiers…

And pray for peace.