{"id":2024,"date":"2017-08-19T12:12:48","date_gmt":"2017-08-19T18:12:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/?p=2024"},"modified":"2017-08-19T12:27:38","modified_gmt":"2017-08-19T18:27:38","slug":"we-are-better-together","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/?p=2024","title":{"rendered":"We Are Better Together"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week has been a tough one for our nation and our world. \u00a0We have seen new expressions of\u00a0racism, violence, and death.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As I talked to my kids this week about the rise of\u00a0racism, violence and death,\u00a0they asked me how we should respond. \u00a0I thought that was a great question\u00a0that deserves a hearing, so I thought I would share my answer with you.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>As I think about fulfilling our\u00a0role in the world as Christ’s church, I am more convinced than ever that what the world needs from us is to live differently. \u00a0 Here are the two ways I encouraged my kids to\u00a0live differently:<\/p>\n

1. Stand Up\u00a0Against\u00a0The\u00a0Evil Of Racism\u00a0To Reveal God’s Divine Embrace<\/strong><\/h1>\n

As a white male, it is especially important for me not to be silent on the issue of race.\u00a0 I need to stand up against all those who would seek to keep others out while they reap the benefits of society.<\/p>\n

In this way, I can\u00a0express God’s divine embrace of all people. \u00a0I can tell\u00a0the story of his love for humanity. \u00a0Christ’s sacrifice demonstrates God’s embrace of all his\u00a0beloved\u00a0children. \u00a0Paul and Peter understood God’s divine embrace\u00a0by\u00a0welcoming into the church\u00a0not only the Jews, but also the gentiles. \u00a0Anyone who counters God’s divine embrace, counters God’s purpose because God is drawing all people to himself.<\/p>\n

Rev. 7:9 \u00a0\u00a0After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language,\u00a0standing before the throne\u00a0and before the Lamb.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

2. Sacrifice In Order To Extend God’s Justice & Mercy<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Racism has been a long standing problem, and it has left a wake of destruction in our\u00a0lives. \u00a0How can we\u00a0restore the brokenness that racism has caused? \u00a0We can restore the brokenness of racism by learning to extend\u00a0justice and mercy to those most effected by it.<\/p>\n

God does not tolerate rebellion against him, and he has given his judgment. \u00a0However, the surprise is that God personally took on the punishment for our crimes through the cross.\u00a0\u00a0Christ’s sacrifice\u00a0also gives us\u00a0access to the mercy we need to belong\u00a0to God again. \u00a0When we confess that we need Jesus to be the\u00a0substitute for\u00a0our personal wrongdoing against God and others, we are restored. \u00a0As a result of this restoration that we get from Christ’s\u00a0justice and mercy, we find that it\u00a0creates a humility in us.<\/p>\n

This new found humility that comes from receiving Christ’s justice and mercy,\u00a0allows us to extend to others\u00a0the\u00a0justice and mercy we have received from Christ. \u00a0The difficult part of extending God’s justice and mercy is that it always demands that we sacrifice something in our life to give it to someone else.<\/p>\n

As part of the majority white\u00a0culture, I feel challenged\u00a0to sacrifice in order to provide justice and mercy for those who have gone without it for too long.\u00a0\u00a0I can commit to\u00a0sacrifice\u00a0my words, in order to listen to what minorities\u00a0have to say. \u00a0I can commit\u00a0to giving up my agenda, in order to help someone with theirs. \u00a0I can commit\u00a0to setting aside my needs, in order to help others\u00a0with their needs. \u00a0Through these sacrifices, I can learn to extend justice and mercy to those who have gone without it.<\/p>\n

Micah 6:8 He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.<\/em>And what does the LORD require of you?<\/em>To act justly and to love mercy\u00a0<\/em>and to walk humbly with your God.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So in answering my kids questions about what we can practically do to represent Jesus in our world, I\u00a0have challenged us to live differently by:<\/p>\n

1. \u00a0Standing up against racism in order to reveal God’s divine embrace<\/p>\n

2. \u00a0Sacrificing in order to extend God’s justice and mercy<\/p>\n

How have you been talking to your followers about the events of the past week?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week has been a tough one for our nation and our world. \u00a0We have seen new expressions of\u00a0racism, violence, and death. As I talked to my kids this week about the rise of\u00a0racism, violence and death,\u00a0they asked me how we should respond. \u00a0I thought that was a great question\u00a0that deserves a hearing, so I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.theawakenministry.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/We-Are-Better-Together.001-copy.jpg?fit=1024%2C576&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2024"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2032,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024\/revisions\/2032"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}