Bless

If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.

We thought about these words on Sunday.

We ended with this remarkable prayer from a Serbian bishop and a World War II concentration camp:

Bp. Nikolai Velimirovich was a Serbian bishop in the last century who spoke out courageously against Nazism until he was arrested and taken to Dachau. This is a translated extract of his famous prayer:

Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them.
Enemies have driven me into your embrace more than friends have.
Friends have bound me to earth, enemies have loosed me from earth and have demolished all my aspirations in the world.
Enemies have made me a stranger in worldly realms and an extraneous inhabitant of the world. Just as a hunted animal finds safer shelter than an unhunted animal does, so have I, persecuted by enemies, found the safest sanctuary, having settled myself beneath your tabernacle, where neither friends nor enemies can slay my soul.
Bless my enemies, O Lord. They, rather than I, have confessed my sins before the world.
They have punished me, whenever I have hesitated to punish myself.
They have scolded me, whenever I have flattered myself.
They have spat upon me, whenever I have filled myself with arrogance.
Bless my enemies, O Lord, Even I bless them and do not curse them.
Whenever I have made myself wise, they have called me foolish.
Whenever I have made myself mighty, they have mocked me as though I were a dwarf.
Whenever I have wanted to lead people, they have shoved me into the background.
Whenever I have tried to build a home for a long and tranquil life, they have demolished it and driven me out.
Truly, enemies have cut me loose from the world and have stretched out my hands to the hem of your garment.
Bless my enemies, O Lord. Even I bless them and do not curse them.

One hates his enemies only when he fails to realize that they are not enemies, but cruel friends.

A Baptist President

Being attached to a label over which you have no control is an occupational hazard in many walks of life, including ministry.  Ask a Muslim, or a worker at Trump International, for example.

'Baptist' is a term that a vast range of churches can adopt so there are plenty of reasons to be wary of over-indulging it as a label.

Donald Trump is not a Baptist.  There have been Baptist presidents of the USA: four in all - which is four more than the number of Baptist Prime Ministers of the UK.  Given the new arrival in the White House I imagine the two that are alive - Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter (though he's no longer a Baptist) - are not feeling very happy just now.

But the one that arrests my attention is the one before them - Harry S Truman.  He was certainly not a Donald Trump.  In listings of US Presidents by wealth he occupies a very lowly position.  He grew up on a Midwestern farm and his parents could not afford to send him to College. But for the intervention of World War 2, may have stayed there but that war brought out leadership qualities in him that led to the Senate and at last to the Vice-Presidency.

And then, 82 days into a fourth term of office in 1945, the near-legendary President Franklin D Roosevelt suddenly died.  FDR had led the USA through the War following Pearl Harbor but also through the post-Depression 1930s.  His death was not on the radar.  And Vice-President Harry S Truman became President.

On his inauguration day he turned to the reporters and said, "Well boys, if you ever pray, pray for me now".  Within a few weeks he had to decide whether or not to drop nuclear bombs on Japanese cities with the intention of bringing the war to an earlier close.  It was a decision to take tens of thousands of lives in order to save more tens of thousands of lives.  The only person who has ever authorised the use of nuclear weapons was a Baptist.

There is amazing incongruity in that.  Baptists are often somewhat pacifist, sometimes committedly so, and rarely devotedly pro-military by comparison to many other people.  It is a reminder that whatever our stories in Sunday School the world thrusts difficult - perhaps cataclysmically difficult - decisions upon us.

We will all have a critical opinion on the decision that will forever mark his name.  But perhaps the lesson to learn is that we must pray for our leaders - whether they know we must or whether they don't.  Some of them have thought they are God, but none of them are.

Hear the trump proclaim the Day

The inauguration of a human being as the second most powerful man among men is not just another day.  His power is the more noticeable because of his bombastic, his unpredictable character and because of his great wealth and fame prior to taking office.  It is not easy to find people happy about the new President outside the USA and there are many unhappy people in the USA too.  Coming years are certainly unlikely to be boring.

Americans, deeply divided, cannot even agree on whether, or how, to pray for President Trump. The arch-liberal Washington Episcopal Cathedral has been heavily criticised for hosting its traditional Prayer Service for a new Presidential term.

The reason to pray - we should always pray - is that we pray to the MOST powerful man alive today.  By becoming President, Donald Trump moves into a key Biblical category.  He moves there in the manner of Joseph Stalin, Teresa May, Abraham Lincoln, Idi Amin, Harry Truman (more on him in another blog), Mao Tse Tung, King Henry VIII and Julius Caesar to name but a few.  He becomes a 'Lord' or a 'King' - a ruler for his fellow human beings.

This category has some reserved information provided in scripture.  If Jesus was a carpenter, he is nevertheless not called the carpenter of carpenters, nor described as the healer of all healers though he might be both.  He is, however, named the King of kings and the Lord of lords.

Donald Trump is suddenly very responsible, very directly accountable.  Does he know it?  Looking at the list above reminds us that some leaders grasp(ed) it and others didn't and don't.

But whether Trump gets to grip with his Boss or not - it would greatly help worried people the world over if they will embrace the Ascension truth that (whether in The Gambia or Washington DC) there is always Someone with more power than the one with apparent power.  And that Someone is going nowhere - until the trump proclaims the Day and He holds us all to account. 

London's Job Market

This programme [CLICK HERE] includes footage from our Soup Kitchen telling one not untypical client's story of life in a North London Car Park.