The Homesteader:  October 25,  2017
Addressing Racisim
The Belhar Confession (1986) is the newest confession in the PC(USA) constitution. Here are some Highlights.

We believe...
  • that Christ's work of reconciliation is made manifest in the church.
  • that unity is, therefore, both a gift and an obligation for the church.
  • that this unity must become visible so that the world may believe that separation, enmity and hatred between people and groups is sin.

Therefore, we reject any doctrine...

  • which absolutizes either natural diversity or the sinful separation of people.
  • which professes that this spiritual unity is truly being maintained in the bond of peace.
We are the racist culture
by Sure Washburn

"I was watching a baseball game the other night, and they showed a shot of a really beautiful woman in the stands," she said. I thought, Who cares? I was going to ignore her, but I caught her eye in the rearview mirror and she had the mom look that told me I should listen.

"I thought she was so lovely," she continued, her eyes flicking again to the mirror to look at me. "But then they showed her husband at bat. He was a black man." She paused. "You know, after seeing him I didn't think she was so pretty anymore." I felt her eyes on me again.

I didn't understand what she was trying to tell me, but I knew she was trying to give me an important message. Something in my childhood brain held on to that moment to interpret later.

Chances are that later that day I went back to the miniature golf course my dad and mom ran each summer and spent another afternoon with my friends Alan and Paul, who were black.

Later, it became clear to me what my friend's mom was trying to tell me. Playing with black boys will diminish you. Make you less than. Today, I understand she was a racist... Continue Reading Here.

Explore Good Reads 
 
 By O. Wesley Allen Jr.

Never before in our national history has the election of a president left the country so shocked and divided. How do you preach to a church and nation divided? Veteran teacher, preacher, and author Wes Allen offers a roadmap for addressing current events through a Gospel lens prophetically and pastorally--without engaging in divisive, antagonistic rhetoric.  CLICK HERE TO ORDER
White Parents, Black Son
by Cindy Cushman
"I would like to suggest some of the things that you must do and some of the things that all of us must doe in order to be truly free. Now the first thing that we must do is to develop within ourselves a a deep sense of somebodiness. Don't let anybody make you feel that you are a nobody. Because the minute one feels that way, he is incapable of rising to his full maturity as a person. ...Now this is all I'm saying this morning, that we must feel that we count. That we belong. That we are persons. That we are children on the living God. And it means that we go down in our soul and find that somebodiness and we must never again be ashamed of ourselves. We must never be ashamed of our heritage. We must not be ashamed of the color of our skin. Black is as beautiful as any color and we must believe it." Martin Luther King Jr.

As Christians, we are called to honor the somebodiness of all God's children, just as Jesus did. Part of doing so is acknowledging that their somebodiness, like our own, is not dependent on their behavior or any of their personal characteristics  In the wake of the acquittal of Philando Castile's killer, the King Center tweeted, "Extol #PhilandoCastile's virtues, but know: Even if he didn't love his family, he should still be alive."
True to the person the King Center represents, this tweet reminds us that the value of Castile's life, his somebodiness, was not rooted in his actions, but in the fact that he was a child of the living God. He was somebody in God's eyes, somebody whose life mattered to God, and somebody whose life must matter to us. Full Article Here
Keep Thinking...
"Our true nationality is mankind." 
Blessing Opportunity     ~ 2 Corinthians 9:7-8
Give Now to
Freedom Rising: A Fund for African American Males

The 222nd General Assembly (2016) voted to "take specific action, not just in word, but also in deed, to address and improve the worsening plight of the African American male in any of the five specified cities as a pilot initiative pointing toward future and further nationwide intervention. 

Micah 6:8, with its powerful words to 'Do justice, love kindness and walk humbly [with your God],' calls us to action and not only proclamation. 

Find more information and 

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