Audacity of Hope

"Dear Senator Obama:

As an immigrant from Kenya, your father found new hope in America’s noble principles and vast opportunities. The same promise brought my parents here from Egypt when I was still too young to thank them. Now you have inspired my generation with your vision of a country united around the same ideals of liberty and justice, “filled with hope and possibility for all Americans.”

But do you mean it?...

Can we provide every member of the human family equal protection under the law? Your record as a legislator gives a resounding answer: No, we can’t. That is the answer the Confederacy gave the Union, the answer segregationists gave young children, the answer a complacent bus driver once gave a defiant Rosa Parks. But a different answer brought your father from Kenya so many years ago; a different answer brought my family from Egypt some years later. Now is your chance, Senator Obama, to make good on the spontaneous slogan of your campaign, to adopt the more American and more humane answer to the question of whether we can secure liberty and justice for all: Yes, we can."

The above is written by a Princeton University student Sherif Girgis of Dover, Delware. You can read the short but powerful letter here.

You know what they say...

Once you go Mac, you never go back!

A couple of days ago we got new computers at work. Guess what we got. They are terrific. My wife has threatened divorce if I don't stop talking about it. I guess I shouldn't tell her I almost kissed the sleek shiny 20" screen this morning. I had mentioned we take our Bush money and go get one. But she thought a trip to a tropical paradise would be a better use of that money. I know, I can't believe it either.

prosperity gospel

Comments??

Spurgeon Quote

I don't just like Spurgeon because he enjoyed a fine hand rolled cigar quite often. He could craft a sermon the way a sculptor chisels out a masterpiece. To be sure this was the work of the Spirit in him, and I'm thankful that the Lord saw fit to use him in such a mighty way both past and present. As people even today are being blessed and shaped through his ministry, I thought it appropriate to post this quote. A few days ago I was struggling to articulate the reason for suffering and why it is necessary and good for those who believe in Christ. So below is a quote from the Morning and Evening Readings of Spurgeon for this morning of March 4.

"If none of God’s saints were poor and tried, we should not know half so well the consolations of divine grace. When we find the wanderer who has not where to lay his head, who yet can say, “Still will I trust in the Lord;” when we see the pauper starving on bread and water, who still glories in Jesus; when we see the bereaved widow overwhelmed in affliction, and yet having faith in Christ, oh! what honour it reflects on the gospel. God’s grace is illustrated and magnified in the poverty and trials of believers. Saints bear up under every discouragement, believing that all things work together for their good, and that out of apparent evils a real blessing shall ultimately spring—that their God will either work a deliverance for them speedily, or most assuredly support them in the trouble, as long as he is pleased to keep them in it. This patience of the saints proves the power of divine grace. There is a lighthouse out at sea: it is a calm night—I cannot tell whether the edifice is firm; the tempest must rage about it, and then I shall know whether it will stand. So with the Spirit’s work: if it were not on many occasions surrounded with tempestuous waters, we should not know that it was true and strong; if the winds did not blow upon it, we should not know how firm and secure it was. The master-works of God are those men who stand in the midst of difficulties, stedfast, unmoveable,—
“Calm mid the bewildering cry,
Confident of victory.”
He who would glorify his God must set his account upon meeting with many trials. No man can be illustrious before the Lord unless his conflicts be many. If then, yours be a much-tried path, rejoice in it, because you will the better show forth the all-sufficient grace of God. As for his failing you, never dream of it—hate the thought. The God who has been sufficient until now, should be trusted to the end."

Baptist Joke

During these serious times, people of all faiths should remember these four religious truths:
1. Muslims do not recognize Jews as God's chosen people. 2. Jews do not recognize Jesus as the Messiah. 3. Protestants do not recognize the Pope as the leader of the Christian world. 4. Baptists do not recognize each other at Hooters.