by | Nov 30, 2023 | Uncategorized
Adults with intellectual disabilities can have robust spiritual lives. Are we learning from them?
Every Sunday afternoon, my daughter and I join a Zoom call with her friend and her friend’s mom, who live a few hours away—for a special time we’ve come to call “God Talk.”
My 17-year-old daughter, Penny, and her 18-year-old friend, Rachel, both have Down syndrome. A while back, Rachel noticed us praying before meals and asked if she could join us. This led to a few conversations about what it looks like to follow Jesus. And eventually, as Rachel’s mother, Ginny, told me a few weeks later, every night Rachel extended her hands and said, “Thank you, God, for having us.”
That’s when the four of us decided to start reading The Jesus Storybook Bible together over Zoom. In our first chat ever, I asked the girls how God sees us—and without hesitation, Rachel said, “God just loves us to pieces.” The truth of God’s love and welcome seemed to sink into her being, as if we had simply given words to something she had subconsciously known all along.
I’m a 46-year-old woman with a master of divinity and credentials as a pastor—and I learn something new every week from reading and praying with Penny and Rachel. They have taught me a more expansive way to encounter God through the Bible.
I think about the time Penny hid her face when we moved from the story of the Crucifixion to the Resurrection because, in her words, she didn’t want to give away “the best part.” Or when we were reading about Jesus asleep in the boat during the storm, Rachel linked the chaos of the sea’s raging waters with Pharaoh in Egypt and the snake in the garden.
At the time, I happened to be listening to a podcast with Tim Mackie, …
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by | Nov 30, 2023 | Uncategorized
Adults with intellectual disabilities can have robust spiritual lives. Are we learning from them?
Every Sunday afternoon, my daughter and I join a Zoom call with her friend and her friend’s mom, who live a few hours away—for a special time we’ve come to call “God Talk.”
My 17-year-old daughter, Penny, and her 18-year-old friend, Rachel, both have Down syndrome. A while back, Rachel noticed us praying before meals and asked if she could join us. This led to a few conversations about what it looks like to follow Jesus. And eventually, as Rachel’s mother, Ginny, told me a few weeks later, every night Rachel extended her hands and said, “Thank you, God, for having us.”
That’s when the four of us decided to start reading The Jesus Storybook Bible together over Zoom. In our first chat ever, I asked the girls how God sees us—and without hesitation, Rachel said, “God just loves us to pieces.” The truth of God’s love and welcome seemed to sink into her being, as if we had simply given words to something she had subconsciously known all along.
I’m a 46-year-old woman with a master of divinity and credentials as a pastor—and I learn something new every week from reading and praying with Penny and Rachel. They have taught me a more expansive way to encounter God through the Bible.
I think about the time Penny hid her face when we moved from the story of the Crucifixion to the Resurrection because, in her words, she didn’t want to give away “the best part.” Or when we were reading about Jesus asleep in the boat during the storm, Rachel linked the chaos of the sea’s raging waters with Pharaoh in Egypt and the snake in the garden.
At the time, I happened to be listening to a podcast with Tim Mackie, …
Continue reading…
by | Nov 30, 2023 | Uncategorized
After trials and turmoil, the first Black lead pastor at the DC-area megachurch will be commissioned with a nod to his heritage.
Weeks before his installation as the first Black lead pastor at one of the most influential churches in the Washington, DC, area, Mike Kelsey came across a dissertation written by a distant relative, theologian and social ethicist George D. Kelsey.
His great-great-great-uncle detailed the clashes around race and integration among Southern Baptists half a century ago. A professor at Morehouse College, he wrote about how racism was especially problematic within Christian communities, disrupting the neighborly love that was supposed to draw together the body of Christ.
As the younger Kelsey steps up to lead McLean Bible Church, he represents an exceptional case in today’s US evangelical landscape—perhaps the most prominent example of a Black minister rising to the top position at a historically white megachurch. But he’s also lived through a contemporary version of the faith and justice fights chronicled by his forebear.
Over Kelsey’s 16 years preaching and pastoring at McLean, he watched the nondenominational congregation and its leadership grow more diverse as DC did. Across five locations, McLean counts members from over a hundred countries now. There were answered prayers, lessons learned, and moments of unity along the way, but it didn’t come easy. His wife remembers that even just a handful of years ago, people were saying Kelsey could never lead the church.
From the start, Kelsey experienced the culture shock of the megachurch setting. He felt the sting of congregants who dismissed Barack Obama’s election to the White House, the pressure of preaching boldly amid a string of high-profile Black deaths and the Black Lives Matter movement, and the tension from internal church conflict spurred …
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by | Nov 30, 2023 | Uncategorized
As foreign doctors left, funding dropped, and local healthcare improved, Bethesda weighs its future.
Growing up in the coastal city of Singkawang in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan province, Samuel Junaedi remembers that whenever he got sick, his parents would drive him to Bethesda Health Ministries, a missionary hospital in the remote village of Serukam. The 30-mile journey could take more than two hours due to the rough and bumpy road.
“But when we met with Dr. [Wendell] Geary and his team … we felt as if half of our illnesses were already cured,” the 61-year-old recalls. In a region on the island of Borneo where witch doctors have long required payments in animal sacrifices to heal the sick, the practice of Western medicine was similarly seen as transactional. Those with money, connections, and prestige would get help, while the poor and lowly were out of luck.
Yet Bethesda was different. No matter a patient’s class, ethnicity, or ability to pay, the doctors would see them. “They serve us not only with their expertise but also with their hearts. This has differentiated Bethesda from other health centers,” Junaedi said.
Today, although he has much closer options, Junaedi still drives more than an hour to get to Bethesda when he or his family members suffer from serious illnesses. “I prefer to come to Bethesda because of the professionalism, good communication, and loving care offered by the staff here,” he said.
Despite support from locals like Junaedi, the hospital may need a miracle to continue operating. Founded by the Conservative Baptist Foreign Mission Society (CBFMS) about six decades ago, Bethesda was once a lifeline for members of the indigenous Dayak people as well as residents of major cities in West Kalimantan seeking high-quality care.
Yet things have since changed. …
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by | Nov 30, 2023 | Uncategorized
Adam Sandler’s new kids’ movie is an entertaining musical with an unlikely lesson in intergenerational discipleship.
A recent conversation in my Bible study turned to how we interact with people who are different from us. I assumed we’d talk about differences of ethnicity or religion, but the discussion focused on generational differences instead. The group is all recent college graduates, and we considered how we talk about boomers and millennials—but also how they talk about us as members of Gen Z.
There are tensions in those differences, but believers of older generations have also discipled and prayed for us. And soon after that conversation, I was reminded again of the deep value of those relationships in a place I least expected: Adam Sandler’s new Netflix kids’ movie, Leo.
Leo centers on a class pet lizard (voiced by Sandler) who suddenly learns he has just one year left to live. The realization forces him to consider what he wants to do with his remaining time, and his initial idea is to escape the classroom and explore the world. His bucket list includes hunting a fly, seeing the Everglades, and showing his moves to a lady lizard.
Leo’s escape plans are thwarted when the teacher decides he’ll be sent home with a different student each weekend. Soon, he finds himself less focused on flies and ladies and more interested in counseling the kids in his class, talking them through social dynamics, grief, and even early puberty.
Some of this happens in song—Leo is an entertaining musical with songs both satirical and thoughtful. The animation style varies throughout the film, distinguishing flashbacks and hypotheticals from the primary narrative. (A family member of mine was an artist on the film, but that relationship did not influence this review.) For younger viewers, the plot is easy to follow—a …
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