(From the DA years)

There are four types of people in the world. 

The first type of person is the weak person.  Although we are all weak in one aspect or another, I use the word here to describe significant physical, socioeconomic, and political weakness as found in the poor, disenfranchised, and marginalized sections of society – minorities, those in poverty, the less-talented, the disabled.  This category struggles to stay afloat. 

The second type of person is the strong person that chooses to be weak.  This group includes people who are blessed but for some reason or other refuse to use their resources for the greater good.  Instead, they turn to fulfilling their own desires or insulating themselves.  We as Americans probably fall into this category the most. 

The third type of person is the strong person that abuses the weak.  Included in this group are dictators, warmongers, haters, and other low forms of life (or as we used to label these people in the lab, “wasted sperm” or “should have been abortions”).  Truly a dangerous group – Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Saddam, child molesters, rapists, to name a few.  These people thrive because of the complacency of the second type of person previously discussed.  This potential lies in all of us. 

And the fourth type of person is the strong person that uses his resources well.  We call these people heroes.  They are truly rare.  There is a saying that goes, “Show me a hero and I’ll show you a tragedy.”  Perhaps this is true sometimes, but I doubt it applies wholescale.  There are everyday heroes – our firefighters, police officers, paramedics, teachers, journalists, and more importantly responsible parents who raise their families properly. 

The reason why the world hates Christians isn’t exclusively limited to the message of the gospel, but rather the lack of us living it out.  Tony Campolo, a prominent evangelical writer and speaker, spoke at various Christian campuses on world hunger.  In his speech, he addressed the students saying something like the following, 

“The truth is that most of you don’t give a shit about world hunger and you are probably more upset that I’ve used a swear word than about the issue I am addressing.”  

True to his prediction, the presidents of these colleges wrote him to admonish his language.  These letters did not mention world hunger once.  

The truth is that if what we preach in our suburban and small-town churches cannot be taught in an inner-city urban church, it is probably not worth teaching at all in the first place (and vice versa).  

 

Don’t look before you laugh

Look ugly in a photograph

Flash bulbs purple irises

The camera can’t see I’ve seen you walk unafraid

I’ve seen you in the clothes you made

Can you see the beauty inside of me

What happened to the beauty I had inside of me?

Oh, you look so beautiful tonight

In the city of blinding lights