Sunday:
Where are the Christian pacifists?
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TERRY
BAHADUR has Sunday's session:
Since Jesus told
people to turn the other cheek, why aren’t more Christians pacifists?
It's part of a 3-week unit of lessons called Tough Questions About God
and the Bible.
Wow, that's the same title as the book I wrote and gave
away to the class a few months ago. Wonder who thought up that idea?
Let me know if you didn't get a copy of the book and
I'll get one to you.
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Matthew 5: Love Your Enemies
38-42 “Here’s another old saying that deserves a second look: ‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.’ Is that going to get us anywhere? Here’s what I propose: ‘Don’t hit back at all.’ If someone strikes you, stand there and take it. If someone drags you into court and sues for the shirt off your back, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. And if someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously.
43-47 “You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.
Matthew 7:12 “Here is a simple, rule-of-thumb guide for behavior: Ask yourself what you want people to do for you, then grab the initiative and do it for them. Add up God’s Law and Prophets and this is what you get.
Joshua 11:10-11 Then Joshua came back and took Hazor, killing its king. Early on Hazor had been head of all these kingdoms. They killed every person there, carrying out the holy curse—not a breath of life left anywhere. Then he burned down Hazor.
Upcoming sessions
Robert Ladd
on 9.14, Why do Christians say hell is a fiery place of eternal
torture when it’s an invented English word to describe a valley
beside Jerusalem?
Jim Buffington
on 9.21. Why do preachers tell people they have to tithe when
the New Testament says that’s an obsolete Jewish law?
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·
Cafe and chewables:
Bette and Gary Tranbarger
·
RezChat at Central
UMC: Sept 13
·
Second Sunday
Social: Sept 14
·
Soul Train to wine
country: Nov. 7-9
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RezChat at Central
UMC
 SHARP OBJECTS.
Usually, no one is injured. In this case, Barbara Borgelt is an
exception to the rule. She cut herself showing off how she could
juggle butcher knives.*
SEPT
13: Our class will
prepare lunch and serve it to people in the community of Central
United Methodist Church. That's Downtown Kansas City, Kansas.
We generally
meet at the Central church at about 10 in the morning and we are
done between one and two in the afternoon.
* not true
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HERMANN
HILL VINEYARD. Morning
fog hovers above the Missouri River near the Hermann Hill Vineyard
and Inn.
RezChat's retreat: Hermann MO
Planning team: Linda Miller, Rose Buffington, and
Shari Schlotzhauer.
They met recently to lay out a strategy for activities. And
they're meeting again soon, I hear.
Retreaters:
- Cris and Terry
Bahadur
- Barbara
Borgelt and guest
- Rose
and Jim Buffington
- Karen
and Bill Fitzherbert
- Linda
and Steve Miller
- Lisa and Dave Rock
- Shari
and Gary Schlotzhauer
Our journey begins on Friday, November 7, with
a train ride to ye olde German town of Hermann, Missouri. It continues with a Saturday tour of the town
and vineyards along the Missouri River.
The plan is to leave Union Station at 4
p.m. on Friday, Nov 7 and arrive in Hermann at 7:48 p.m.
Fun all day Saturday. Leave Hermann at 10:49 a.m. on
Sunday morning, arriving at Union Station at 2:55 p.m., in time for
a Sunday nap.
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BAHADURS
GONE WILD. Cris
and Terry Bahadur take a walk in the Overland Park Arboretum a
couple of years ago. Last Sunday, we surprised Terry with some
letters of encouragement. I compiled the letters into The Notebook,
which you can download as a Word document. My favorite letter is
the one his wife wrote. You can read it below. Or you can read it
in the blog article I posted today: Bushwhacking a friend
with kind words.
Letters to Terry
ADAM HAS
BEEN PREACHING that we need to spread around words of
encouragement. So we did that in RezChat on Sunday.
Terry Bahadur had mentioned in class the previous week
that he carries scars because of words spoken to him, especially in
his growing up years.
As a kind of healing balm, many in the class and some
of his other friends wrote letters of encouragement, which I
complied for him in The Notebook.
We read many of them during class, while we worked two boxes of
tissue. Robert Ladd also gave Terry a notebook of wisdom he has
compiled over more than a decade.
If you weren't there to give Terry your letter, he has
room in The Notebook.
Here's the letter that moved me the most, written by
Terry's wife, Cris:
DEAR TERRY,
As I sit to
compose this, I’m overwhelmed with emotion. What I
see in you, what I’ve only recently begun to appreciate, is the
truly beautiful gift you have for bringing God’s warmth
to the people you meet.
There’s an exuberant light that you extend to everyone
you come into contact with. It just tumbles out and engulfs
complete strangers. Many of them are caught unawares. I
can see their bewildered smiles as they try to make sense of this
unfamiliar person who seems genuinely interested in them, lathering
them with the hearty laughter, lively conversation, and more often
than not, some random act of kindness.
I’ve come to realize that this isn’t driven by the
innate ‘friendliness’ of an extrovert, or the easy conversation
between kindred spirits, or even pulpit urgings for outreach. And
it isn’t always smooth or glib--sometimes it can even be a little
awkward. But it’s endearing, and lovely to watch. It has the
openness and instant familiarity you tend to see only in children
who aren’t bogged down by self-consciousness or the need to keep
safe social distances.
Every now and then during these encounters, your
unsuspecting stranger would catch me standing close by and I’d
smile so as not to ruin what you’ve started. But honestly, my heart
lags far behind yours in its reach. It happened,
Wednesday. We walk through the door at Burger King: You
start in enthusiastically, with a warm vigorous handshake: ‘Hey
man, how are you doing? Haven’t seen you for a while. You’re not
working here anymore?’
‘No’, the young man replies, hesitantly, trying to
make sense of such an enthusiastic greeting from a fast-food
customer,
Then he remembers . . . Ah, the friendly man who comes
in sometimes. He broadens his smile and offers, ‘Actually. I was
just going to the company across the road to apply for a job. They
work with legal documents.’
‘Yes!’ you respond approvingly. ‘A chance to
move forward . . . good, good!’ Still holding his handshake
you put your arm around his back and give a slight squeeze of the
shoulder, beaming encouragingly at him as a big brother or father
would.
I see him visibly relax, and he immediately succumbs
to the simple but powerful spiritual warmth of another human being.
At this point I catch his eye and decide to chime in
‘Good luck. Hope you get through’.
He nods and smiles quickly at me. But he’s soon caught
off guard, again, when you regain his gaze and confidently assure him,
‘I’ll pray for you, man. I’ll pray that things work out for
you’. I didn’t think to pray for this guy. I was just
parroting social niceties. But he could see that you
meant it. And with a hearty ‘Thank you. Thank you.’ He was
off, and we finally placed our order.
—Cris
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