Showing posts with label Disciples of Christ. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Disciples of Christ. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 28, 2022
Monday, August 22, 2022
Bishop Barber: "Don't Forget Whose You Are And Where You Come From"
The entire service from Greenleaf Christian Church is important and worth watching, but if you don't have two hours and forty minutes to give to this please start around 45:11 or 58:00 and give it what you can. Bishop Barber's sermon will give you some needed life lessons, build your faith, and give you courage.
Sunday, August 7, 2022
Sunday, July 24, 2022
Rev. Shyrl Uzzell preaching “Lost Can't Be The Last Word?” Luke 15:1-10
I try to say it every week: you can watch the entire
service from Greenleaf or you can skip ahead to the hymns or to the sermons,
but please give a look and a listen. Greenleaf is an exceptional church, and
the messages are inspiring and will give most people a spring in their step and
some good thoughts in their hearts and heads. This is the church most people need.
There are Black and women dimensions to the preaching and to the work being
done at Greenleaf that we don't see in many churches. People get affirmed here,
but our lives get examined as well---no shaming, but there is struggle and victory.
The Bible stories that we think that we know are brought into present time and
interpreted in ways that will surprise and enlighten and strengthen.
Thursday, July 21, 2022
Rev. Hanna R. Broome preaching a Special Sermon at Greenleaf Christian Church
Hardly a week goes by that we don't post something from Greenleaf Christian Church or from Bishop Barber, the Bishop and pastor at Greenleaf. I don't know how many people here pay attention to these posts, but I hope that many of you do. You can catch the hymns and praise and most of the service at Greenleaf or you can skip ahead to the sermons. I have never heard a sermon at Greenleaf that I didn't get much out of. Greenleaf is the kind of church that I'm looking for. I hope that someone reading this feels the same as I do. Reverend Broome gets it done this week. She hits it hard over and over again. I think that we badly need her voice and her testimony right now.
Sunday, July 10, 2022
Bishop Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II preaching, “Keep Going to Class, Keep Getting in The Boat, You Will Get It After While” Mark 4
Click on this and you will get there. It's as outstanding as always.
Sunday, July 3, 2022
Sunday, June 26, 2022
Bishop Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II preaching, "Just When You Need Him Most..."
This is Bishop Barber's first sermon since the historic Poor People's Campaign reached Washington last week. Both the message today and the mass presence in D.C. last week are significant events in our history. Just click on this link and it will take you there.
Sunday, June 19, 2022
Monday, May 16, 2022
Greenleaf Christian Church: Guest Pastor Rev. Dr. Threatt preaching "Who is On Your Ballot?" (Acts 15:19-41)
Greenleaf Christian Church does it right again and again. You can catch moving hymns and praying and see the life of a congregation that loves God, but if you're tuning in for inspired preaching, communion, soul and a sermon then hit it at around 59:00.
This link is NOT dead---click on it and it will work.
Friday, May 13, 2022
Tuesday, May 10, 2022
Our Obligation to the “Least of These”---A Necessary Word From Bishop William Barber
Dear Movement Family,
We live in the richest nation to ever exist since God created the earth, yet many in power use a false Christian narrative to blame poor people and abdicate responsibility for economic justice. But we know that their talk about scarcity and their justifications for serving rich corporations over poor communities are lies. The continuous feeding of the war economy, proliferation of weapons, and notions of peace through military strength give far too many a false sense of security, no matter what curious and twisted attempt at moral justification is tried. Too many politicians raise no question when it comes to funding war, tax cuts for greedy corporate interests, and pornographic sums of money to subvert democracy while at the same time using every excuse to block spending that would lift people out of poverty. This is one of the greatest moral contradictions of our time, and we must be clear that it threatens democracy and civilization itself.
In the Bible, Matthew’s Gospel tells us plain as day in Chapter 25 that a true nation under God must lead by caring for the vulnerable and welcoming strangers. “All the nations will be gathered before [God],” Matthew says, and God will “separate the people from one another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.” Who are the least of these today, and what are the public policies that must change to care for them?
In a nation plagued by hidden poverty, what makes us most vulnerable is the basic moral contradiction of poverty, which we have tried to ignore for the past 40 years. 140 million Americans– 43% of adults and 52% of children–are poor and low-wealth, suffering in plain sight. As pandemic relief programs like stimulus checks, expanded unemployment insurance, and expanded CTC payments have expired, we can expect these numbers to rise. In 2021, the Urban Institute estimated that without these programs, these numbers would have gone up to well over 150 million - nearly 50% of all adults. Yet we have watched billionaires make nearly $2 trillion during that same time.
As long as America ignores these realities and refuses to fully address them, we all live in an impoverished democracy. This requires a warning–not a one-day event, but a demonstration and declaration that the time to act is now. Why?
Because not ignoring the least of these today requires that we address the interlocking injustices of systemic racism, poverty, ecological devastation, the denial of health care, militarism and the war economy, and the distorted moral narrative of religious nationalism. It is time to heal the wounds of our society and declare a moral revival across the land.
Because our politics are trapped by the lies of scarcity. These politics turn us against each other and blame the poor for their poverty, even though we live in a time of abundance. We have the resources to meet the needs of everybody! The only thing our politicians lack is the moral conscience to lift the least of these and the political will to make it so.
Because for far too long poor people, people of color, Indigenous nations, immigrant families, women, children, the disabled, and LGBTQ communities have been under attack, pitted against each other and blamed for society’s problems. Please take 5 minutes today to consider the pain of poverty in America.
Because we must put a face and voice on the shameful conditions confronting this nation and for the least of these we must speak and nonviolently force the nation to hear the truth and to see the faces.
We must have a moral meeting in the public square that takes the social blinders off and puts a face on the realities that can and must be changed. We must become a nation that fulfills our moral obligation to care for the least of these. We must break through the lies that have hidden poverty in America. Poor and low-income people and low wage workers are determined to stand together on Pennsylvania Avenue, Saturday June 18th, gathering at 930am, to make the nation see and hear their pain. Together, we will lift a Third Reconstruction moral agenda for the healing of the nation that can end poverty and low wealth from the bottom up. We need everyone who can to stand together and join us.
In a sermon I once preached on Matthew 25, I said to the Christians sitting in the sanctuary:
So in this season we must say, “America, listen! Hear yourself in the voices of the least of these. Don’t turn away. Recognize that the hope of the nation is in how we treat the least of these.” Remember Rabbi Heschel. Let me paraphrase what he once said: “We as a nation forfeit the right to even worship God until we do right by the least of this nation.”
Brothers and Sisters, we won’t be silent or unheard anymore. In this season we are saying, “If you have been rejected, it’s time on moral authority to challenge policies that create social murder, and we must do it not as Democrats or Republicans but as human beings and moral agents.
It’s time to work together to save the soul of this democracy and the world. Together, we must show the nation that healing is in the very people who’ve been rejected leading a moral revival.
One scripture in the Bible says,
“God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power, and He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.”--Acts 10:38
Those of us who believe in this Jesus have to help the poor and looked over, the left out and hurting, the harmed and broken, to get up! Looked over get up! This is God’s way. No wonder the hymn writer said:
If I can help somebody, as I pass along,
If I can cheer somebody, with a word or song,
If I can show somebody, how they're traveling wrong,
Then my living shall not be in vain.
If I can do my duty, as a good man ought,
If I can bring back beauty, to a world up wrought,
If I can spread love's message, as the Master taught,
Then my living shall not be in vain.
My living shall not be in vain,
Then my living shall not be in vain
If I can help somebody, as I pass along,
Then my living shall not be in vain.
Forward together,
William J. Barber, II
PS- In my update last week, I noted the moral contradiction of a Congress that can find money for more weapons to fight Russians in Ukraine but will still not invest in poor and low-income people here at home. Some people have misconstrued my words as an endorsement of continued military escalation in Ukraine. I want to be clear: nothing could be further from the truth. We need to do everything possible to get negotiated peace, not the death of more people. We also have to do even more on the front end, before war ever starts. All this death, killing one another, and blowing up cities will lead the human race to its own demise.
I’ve stood for 30 years with organizations that challenge the militarism of our war economy. I have had this position as a pastor in a military town, and members of my church who serve in the military have thanked me for my deep commitment to challenging all this war and the influence of the war economy in our world. The Poor People’s Campaign names the war economy as one of the interlocking injustices we must confront in order to have a Third Reconstruction. We must be determined to continue to work together toward a negotiation of peace in Ukraine and an end to policy violence here at home. Every day I pray and sing this hymn, and I quoted it to the nation when I was asked to deliver the inaugural sermon:
God of grace and God of glory,
On Thy people pour Thy power.
Crown Thine ancient church’s story,
Bring her bud to glorious flower.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the facing of this hour,
For the facing of this hour.
Lo! the hosts of evil ’round us,
Scorn Thy Christ, assail His ways.
From the fears that long have bound us,
Free our hearts to faith and praise.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.
Cure Thy children’s warring madness,
Bend our pride to Thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal.
Set our feet on lofty places,
Gird our lives that they may be,
Armored with all Christ-like graces,
In the fight to set men free.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
That we fail not man nor Thee,
That we fail not man nor Thee.
Save us from weak resignation,
To the evils we deplore.
Let the search for Thy salvation,
Be our glory evermore.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Serving Thee whom we adore,
Serving Thee whom we adore.
Forward together, not one step back!
Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II
President and Senior Lecturer
Repairers of the Breach
“The way to heal the soul of the nation is to pass policies that heal the body of the nation. It’s the just thing to do. That’s how we as a nation can together move forward.”
-Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II
We live in the richest nation to ever exist since God created the earth, yet many in power use a false Christian narrative to blame poor people and abdicate responsibility for economic justice. But we know that their talk about scarcity and their justifications for serving rich corporations over poor communities are lies. The continuous feeding of the war economy, proliferation of weapons, and notions of peace through military strength give far too many a false sense of security, no matter what curious and twisted attempt at moral justification is tried. Too many politicians raise no question when it comes to funding war, tax cuts for greedy corporate interests, and pornographic sums of money to subvert democracy while at the same time using every excuse to block spending that would lift people out of poverty. This is one of the greatest moral contradictions of our time, and we must be clear that it threatens democracy and civilization itself.
In the Bible, Matthew’s Gospel tells us plain as day in Chapter 25 that a true nation under God must lead by caring for the vulnerable and welcoming strangers. “All the nations will be gathered before [God],” Matthew says, and God will “separate the people from one another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.” Who are the least of these today, and what are the public policies that must change to care for them?
In a nation plagued by hidden poverty, what makes us most vulnerable is the basic moral contradiction of poverty, which we have tried to ignore for the past 40 years. 140 million Americans– 43% of adults and 52% of children–are poor and low-wealth, suffering in plain sight. As pandemic relief programs like stimulus checks, expanded unemployment insurance, and expanded CTC payments have expired, we can expect these numbers to rise. In 2021, the Urban Institute estimated that without these programs, these numbers would have gone up to well over 150 million - nearly 50% of all adults. Yet we have watched billionaires make nearly $2 trillion during that same time.
As long as America ignores these realities and refuses to fully address them, we all live in an impoverished democracy. This requires a warning–not a one-day event, but a demonstration and declaration that the time to act is now. Why?
Because not ignoring the least of these today requires that we address the interlocking injustices of systemic racism, poverty, ecological devastation, the denial of health care, militarism and the war economy, and the distorted moral narrative of religious nationalism. It is time to heal the wounds of our society and declare a moral revival across the land.
Because our politics are trapped by the lies of scarcity. These politics turn us against each other and blame the poor for their poverty, even though we live in a time of abundance. We have the resources to meet the needs of everybody! The only thing our politicians lack is the moral conscience to lift the least of these and the political will to make it so.
Because for far too long poor people, people of color, Indigenous nations, immigrant families, women, children, the disabled, and LGBTQ communities have been under attack, pitted against each other and blamed for society’s problems. Please take 5 minutes today to consider the pain of poverty in America.
Because we must put a face and voice on the shameful conditions confronting this nation and for the least of these we must speak and nonviolently force the nation to hear the truth and to see the faces.
We must have a moral meeting in the public square that takes the social blinders off and puts a face on the realities that can and must be changed. We must become a nation that fulfills our moral obligation to care for the least of these. We must break through the lies that have hidden poverty in America. Poor and low-income people and low wage workers are determined to stand together on Pennsylvania Avenue, Saturday June 18th, gathering at 930am, to make the nation see and hear their pain. Together, we will lift a Third Reconstruction moral agenda for the healing of the nation that can end poverty and low wealth from the bottom up. We need everyone who can to stand together and join us.
In a sermon I once preached on Matthew 25, I said to the Christians sitting in the sanctuary:
So in this season we must say, “America, listen! Hear yourself in the voices of the least of these. Don’t turn away. Recognize that the hope of the nation is in how we treat the least of these.” Remember Rabbi Heschel. Let me paraphrase what he once said: “We as a nation forfeit the right to even worship God until we do right by the least of this nation.”
Brothers and Sisters, we won’t be silent or unheard anymore. In this season we are saying, “If you have been rejected, it’s time on moral authority to challenge policies that create social murder, and we must do it not as Democrats or Republicans but as human beings and moral agents.
It’s time to work together to save the soul of this democracy and the world. Together, we must show the nation that healing is in the very people who’ve been rejected leading a moral revival.
One scripture in the Bible says,
“God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power, and He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.”--Acts 10:38
Those of us who believe in this Jesus have to help the poor and looked over, the left out and hurting, the harmed and broken, to get up! Looked over get up! This is God’s way. No wonder the hymn writer said:
If I can help somebody, as I pass along,
If I can cheer somebody, with a word or song,
If I can show somebody, how they're traveling wrong,
Then my living shall not be in vain.
If I can do my duty, as a good man ought,
If I can bring back beauty, to a world up wrought,
If I can spread love's message, as the Master taught,
Then my living shall not be in vain.
My living shall not be in vain,
Then my living shall not be in vain
If I can help somebody, as I pass along,
Then my living shall not be in vain.
Forward together,
William J. Barber, II
PS- In my update last week, I noted the moral contradiction of a Congress that can find money for more weapons to fight Russians in Ukraine but will still not invest in poor and low-income people here at home. Some people have misconstrued my words as an endorsement of continued military escalation in Ukraine. I want to be clear: nothing could be further from the truth. We need to do everything possible to get negotiated peace, not the death of more people. We also have to do even more on the front end, before war ever starts. All this death, killing one another, and blowing up cities will lead the human race to its own demise.
I’ve stood for 30 years with organizations that challenge the militarism of our war economy. I have had this position as a pastor in a military town, and members of my church who serve in the military have thanked me for my deep commitment to challenging all this war and the influence of the war economy in our world. The Poor People’s Campaign names the war economy as one of the interlocking injustices we must confront in order to have a Third Reconstruction. We must be determined to continue to work together toward a negotiation of peace in Ukraine and an end to policy violence here at home. Every day I pray and sing this hymn, and I quoted it to the nation when I was asked to deliver the inaugural sermon:
God of grace and God of glory,
On Thy people pour Thy power.
Crown Thine ancient church’s story,
Bring her bud to glorious flower.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the facing of this hour,
For the facing of this hour.
Lo! the hosts of evil ’round us,
Scorn Thy Christ, assail His ways.
From the fears that long have bound us,
Free our hearts to faith and praise.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.
Cure Thy children’s warring madness,
Bend our pride to Thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal.
Set our feet on lofty places,
Gird our lives that they may be,
Armored with all Christ-like graces,
In the fight to set men free.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
That we fail not man nor Thee,
That we fail not man nor Thee.
Save us from weak resignation,
To the evils we deplore.
Let the search for Thy salvation,
Be our glory evermore.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Serving Thee whom we adore,
Serving Thee whom we adore.
Forward together, not one step back!
Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II
President and Senior Lecturer
Repairers of the Breach
“The way to heal the soul of the nation is to pass policies that heal the body of the nation. It’s the just thing to do. That’s how we as a nation can together move forward.”
-Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II
Thursday, May 5, 2022
Friday, April 29, 2022
Sunday, April 24, 2022
Tuesday, April 19, 2022
Sunday, April 17, 2022
Friday, April 15, 2022
Thursday, April 14, 2022
How Congregations Can Practice Restorative Justice In Their Communities
Join National Benevolent Association on April 20 at 1pm CT for How Congregations Can Practice Restorative Justice in Their Communities. This webinar will be a conversation about the positive outcomes derived from Restorative Justice practices. Our panel of experts will discuss why it is important for congregations and communities to examine, explore, and embrace the principles of Restorative Justice which can transform churches, families, schools, and communities.
Go HERE for more info.
Friday, March 25, 2022
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