Avery Grace Paul: my niece

My brother and his wife just had their first born daughter. Born Febuary 20, she weighed in at 7 lbs. and 11 oz. Unfortunately, I live 11 hours from Doug and Elizabeth and will not be able to see Avery and the new parents until this weekend. Until then, here are some initial pictures. I look forward to posting some more after the weekend.

Excerpt from "Jesus and the Other Names"

This is actually a quote taken from David Bosch as used by Paul Knitter. I thought it worth sharing:

"Kingdom people seek first the Kingdom of God and its justice; church people often put the church work above concerns of justice, mercy, and truth. Church people think about how to get people into the church; Kingdom people think about how to get the church into the world. Church people worry that the world might change the church; Kingdom people work to see the church change the world." (110).

Knitter actually uses this quote to generate a type of Kingdom oriented theology, practice and mission. This new 'regnocentric' (rather than Christocentric or even Theocentric) outlook recognizes that the church is not the mission of God but rather, "there is a church because there is mission."

The whole point that Knitter is trying to encompass is that if the church is not the mission of God, though it is still a necessary component of God's work of bringing about the Kingdom, then it may be possible to imagine other ways in which God is bringing about redemption and wholeness to creation.

It kind of puts a question mark next to the famous dictum: No salvation outside the church.

Calling All Stories

I will be preaching on the Beatitude found in Mat. 5, "Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they will be sons of God."

One of my favorite quotes from Bonhoeffer is from his writing entitled, "No Rusty Swords" in which he says, "There can only be a community of peace which does not rest on lies and injustice." Justice and peace are intertwined. Without justice, there is no peace.

I'm looking for stories of people working towards peace and justice: recognizing injustice and actively participating in God's work of restoring creation.

Please, let me hear your stories.