Words of Welcome

Last stop in Wyoming - Journey East 2008 Joshua 5:9-12 If you’ve ever moved across the country, you know what it’s like to finally arrive at your new home. Even if your furniture and housewares are a few days behind you, it feels good to enter the new house and begin to settle in.   We’ve made a few long distance moves as a family over the years, with the longest being the last one that brought us from Santa Barbara to Troy. It took a few days of travel to get here. We stayed in a few motels and of course ate at a variety of restaurants, including a few fast-food joints. We crossed deserts, rivers, mountains, and plains. When we arrived in Troy, we were welcomed with a good meal and a house that had been cleaned and prepared with food staples and paper goods. Yes, it was good to enter the house we would call our own.   

Mark 13:21-23 A little over a week ago Fred Phelps died.  If you don’t know who Fred Phelps is, he was the leader of a small fringe Baptist church from Topeka, Kansas.  Fred and his church, which is composed mostly of family members, are well known for picketing religious gatherings and funerals, especially military funerals.  They have a two-pronged message –  “God hates fags” and “God hates America.” I first encountered this group when we were living in Kansas.  It seemed like every time we drove to Topeka on a Saturday morning, they were just finishing up their protest march at the local shopping mall.  I’d never heard of them until I got to Kansas in 1995, but since then they’ve become an increasingly visible presence across the country.   They claim to represent God.  But do they?  Many claim to be prophets, but who really speaks for God?  How do you know who is speaking truth?  Does the message of hate proclaimed b...