“WHEN YOU PRAY that the will of God be done on earth as it is in heaven, envision conflict being resolved, marriages and families healed, truth told and people faithful to one another, initiatives that break through the vicious cycles of retaliation, and love that creates new community among people through forgiveness, reconciliation, and peacemaking.”
- Glen H. Stassen, Living the Sermon on the Mount

Mark 6: 1-13
     Jesus returned to his hometown and his disciples went with him. On the Sabbath, he gave a public lecture in the Nazareth synagogue. Many of those who attended were surprised and impressed by what he had to say. “Who would have guessed that a local lad would have done so well?” they said. “Where did he pick up such wisdom? And look at the miraculous things he does with just a touch of his hands!”
     But the next minute they were getting their noses out of joint. “Who does he think he is? Mr Big-shot! He’s just a carpenter — Mary’s boy — no better than any of us. We know his brothers — James, Justin, Jude and Simon. His sisters all live here, and they’re no different from us.” So they ended up resenting him.
     Jesus responded to all this, saying, “It’s always the way: prophets are appreciated everywhere except among the friends and relations they grew up with.”
     There was very little he could do there. He laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them, but that was about it. He couldn’t get over how stubborn and sceptical they were, so he moved on and did a teaching tour through the neighbouring towns.
     Jesus called his chosen twelve together and sent them out in pairs. He commissioned them to deal with any spirit of evil they might encounter. He gave them orders to travel lightly and live simply — no carting luggage around or buying things along the way. He told them, “If anyone invites you to stay in their home, do so until it’s time to move on. No shopping around for a better place! And if you arrive somewhere and they refuse to welcome you in or hear what you have to say, just move on. Turn your backs and walk away. Scratch their names off your map and forget them.”
     So they hit the road. Everywhere they went they preached with enthusiasm, calling people to turn around and get their lives on track. They flushed out numerous demons, and healed a lot of people of various illnesses, anointing them with oil and praying that God would make them whole.
©2000 Nathan Nettleton www.laughingbird.net

Blogging toward Sunday: More rejection
Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 9)
2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10; Mark 6:1-13; 2 Corinthians 12:2-10
The Gospel is always proclaimed by flawed mortals—otherwise it would never be proclaimed at all. The Gospel is also always heard by flawed mortals—otherwise it would never be heard. Hence there is a beautiful and incarnational link between the two pericopes that make up this week's Gospel lesson.
http://theolog.org/

Power source
2 Corinthians 12:2-10
Unfortunately, I have an inbred cynicism that makes religious experience particularly tricky for me. I reflexively wonder whether it's really God I'm feeling or something I'm just imagining or inventing. Maybe what I need is a religious experience as potent as Paul's. God granted Paul a tour of what ancient Jewish cosmology labelled the third heaven: the place where God Almighty dwells. In the lectionary passage, Paul refers to another man making this heavenly journey, but most scholars believe that Paul is describing himself. He just doesn't want to brag about it.
http://www.christiancentury.org/article.lasso?id=2162

The Text This Week
Lectionary, Scripture Study and Worship Links and Resources
http://www.textweek.com/

AAANZ Members’ Tele-Chat with Angie O'Gorman
7:30 pm, 12 August 2009 – Angie has had wide experience in nonviolence on many levels. She is currently teaching a course, Theology for Peacemakers, at the Department of Theology, St Louis University , as well as being as advocate for immigrant services. Check the AAANZ website for more details.
http://www.anabaptist.asn.au/index.php?type=calendar&ID=1567

Prayer For Social Justice
Grant, O God, that your holy and life-giving Spirit may so move every human heart, that barriers which divide us may crumble, suspicions disappear, and hatreds cease; that our divisions being healed, we may live in justice and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

What will emerge from the Great Emergence?
Declining church membership; the breaking down of denominational loyalty and barriers; the rise of new ‘emergent’ churches that blend ancient rituals, litanies and hymns together with contemporary forms of worship and calls for social action—something is happening out there. But what is it? And why is it happening now? What’s happening is as old as religion itself, says Phyllis Tickle, author of the new book, The Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why …People are looking for a new and different encounter with God. The strength of Protestantism was its rationalism—it took religion to the head. But today people want religion that also touches their hearts. It’s not anti-intellectual; mind and reason are still very important. But people want more than just an intellectual challenge. They want something that moves them emotionally, as well. It is bringing the heart and the head together.
http://canadianmennonite.org/   ( Volume 13, No. 12 Jun. 8, 2009)

[The author’s “Age of Four A’s” is a good description of the world young adults live in today.  The author lists some good questions for young adults to consider.  I’m not so sure about the rest of the article.  What do you think?]
The Third Place
We live in a time of tremendous societal upheaval. While history is often cyclical, showing both change and continuity, there are times when change is so systemic and deep that we enter a fundamentally new era. These changes are of such profound magnitude that they are redefining how life is lived in many areas we assumed were unyielding givens. In broad terms, we might think about boundary shifting, permeability, and cross-religious and cultural appropriation as the motifs that characterize this age…For shorthand, I refer to our contemporary era as the Age of Four A's: anything, anyone, anytime, anywhere…This shorthand description of our times captures well-described attributes of daily life, if not precisely for boomers, then increasingly so for Gen Xers and Millennials…
http://www.alban.org/conversation.aspx?id=8062#atabc

Creation Stories
A Jewish friend startled me into a new way of thinking about creation stories. We were talking about ways that the faith-based environmental movement looks at the stories which begin the book of Genesis. She pointed out that -- for Jews -- the real creation story is the Exodus. Earlier pieces of biblical history are just prologue. It is the Passover that is enacted in a yearly ritual, and which solidifies the creation of the Jewish people. The Exodus is the story that tells of their birth…My Jewish friend helped me realize that we also need to study and evaluate the other creation stories that shape our individual and collective lives. I encourage church communities to take that on as a part of their ministry.
http://www.eco-justice.org/E-090626.asp

South Korean churches push for no-strings aid to the North
A South Korean grouping of churches is urging its member churches and organizations to join a campaign to give North Korean children milk and bread "without any precondition". In a recent statement, the National Council of Churches in Korea said it would start "to advocate the necessity of urgent support to people in North Korea in the situation of the present critical antagonistic political arrangement on the Korean peninsula and to mobilise its member churches".
http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/9753

Honduran coup leader a two-time SOA graduate
The general who overthrew the democratically elected president of Honduras on Sunday is a two-time graduate of the U.S. Army School of the Americas, an institution that has trained hundreds of coup leaders and human rights abusers in Latin America…The events came as no shock to Maryknoll Fr. Roy Bourgeois, founder of SOA Watch, which has sought for years to close the school, renamed in 2000 as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. “We’re not surprised. Vásquez is one of the key players, an SOA grad” who’s keeping alive the school’s nickname, “ School of Coups .”
http://ncronline.org/news/global/honduran-coup-leader-two-time-soa-graduate

CPT reservist, others face littering charges
On June 1, Christian Peacemaker Teams reservist John Heid and two other companions placed three dozen gallons of water on an active migrant trail in Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge, southwest of Tucson, Arizona .  The three were confronted by a Fish and Wildlife officer, escorted out of the area and face possible prosecution for littering. This year, migrants crossing this desert are dying at a record rate; 89 bodies have been recovered to date, eight of these from the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge.
http://www.themennonite.org/issues/12-12/articles/CPT_reservist_others_face_littering_charges

Israel's Man of Conscience
I will be sentenced on the first of July after being found guilty of assaulting two police officers in 2007 while struggling against the demolition of a Palestinian house in Um El Hir, located in the southern part of the West Bank .  Of course the policemen who accused me of assaulting them are lying. Indeed, lying has become common within the Israeli police force, military and among the Jewish settlers…Because I am a provoker the state subjects me to continuing harassment, and yet I have remained persistent. What strengthens me and gives me energy is the widespread and constant support I have always received from political allies. When I was beaten by settlers, when my car was stolen, when I was arrested, I never felt alone. I know that thousands of people, both in Israel and abroad, support what we in Ta'ayush (Jewish-Arab Partnership) are doing against the occupation. "Ezra" in Hebrew means help, and I know that in times of trouble I can rely on my friends for help.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090713/nawi?rel=emailNation

Henri Nouwen Meditation: Downward Mobility
The society in which we live suggests in countless ways that the way to go is up. Making it to the top, entering the limelight, breaking the record - that's what draws attention, gets us on the front page of the newspaper, and offers us the rewards of money and fame.  The way of Jesus is radically different. It is the way not of upward mobility but of downward mobility. It is going to the bottom, staying behind the sets, and choosing the last place! Why is the way of Jesus worth choosing? Because it is the way to the Kingdom, the way Jesus took, and the way that brings everlasting life.
http://www.henrinouwen.org/home/free_eletters/

Anabaptist Story : What a Jesus centered approach to the bible means to me
The Bible is not primarily a source for doctrine or a set of beliefs for us to ascribe to. Its a story in which we are all actors, not passive recipients. Jesus lays out a way of being in and relating to all of creation rooted in redemption, not just of our souls, but of our lives, our communities and our empires. The Bible is the story of God coming along side humanity in that struggle. It is a story that we are all invited to join.
Click Here


New Missio Dei available for download
What is an Anabaptist Christian (PDF)

Mary and Mark Hurst Blog
http://greetingsfromozontheroad.blogspot.com/