Jesus couldn’t get the horrific images of police brutality out of his mind. Walking downtown, Jesus was tired of seeing people assaulted and killed. Enraged, Jesus destroyed a police car and other properties. When officers started to show up in riot gear, Jesus gathered his friends together and confronted them. “Get out! Get Out! Get out!” they kept screaming in unison. Though everyone kept calling them agitators and thugs, Jesus and his friends refused to back down in their quest... Read more
Over a hundred times, the family of Jason Harrison reached out to Dallas police for help getting him to Parkland Memorial Hospital. Suffering from severe mental illness, Jason was often out of his mind. On June 14 of last year, police arrived at the Harrison residence. The body camera of one of the officers captured what happened next. Jason’s mother Shirley came to the door and declared, “Oh, he’s just off the chain. You can hear him, talking about... Read more
Recently, I read a story that the evangelical megachurch Briarwood Presbyterian in Birmingham, Alabama is petitioning the state for its own police department. For a second, I couldn’t believe what I was reading. The thought of a church or any other private institution being able to found and govern a police department is really problematic. Can you imagine the power that churches and private institutions would have to enforce their own moral judgments? Would those who don’t pay their... Read more
GOD is LOVE & LOVE is GOD. Love created us in Love’s image. We are created to be Love. In the beginning, we were Love. Unfortunately, we decided that Love was not enough. In our desire to control Love, we lost our way. We have been searching for Love ever since. In the person of Jesus, Love became flesh and dwelt amongst us. Truly, Love so loved the world that Love gave Love’s only begotten Love that... Read more
“What man doesn’t wonder about what it would be like to have sex with a man?” While dining at Cracker Barrel late one night, I asked the question of a friend. Before I could even begin to muse about my own question, Don Fulton looked at me in my eyes and declared, “I’m gay.” In the revelation of the moment, we found a joint love of God that we had never experienced before. In the darkness of the night,... Read more
In the stillness of the night, you know me. The mist reminds me. Though the mind might wander, you remain steady in the nothing that is everything. The absence of light paints a glorious portrait of mystery. The crickets speak the word. In the echoes of yesterday and tomorrow, you speak of today. The still waters create a symphony of unknowing. The trees protect me. I long to stay here forever with you. The darkness is your home. You... Read more
Once a month, I make the trip down to Livingston. The roads are long and lonely. Upon arrival, I go through numerous checkpoints and searches. When I finally get to the cold and sterile visitation room, I sit down in front of the thick plate glass window and wait. In the ensuing between moments, I always look around and wonder about the backgrounds and motivations of the other visitors on Texas’ Death Row. Sometimes, I am brave enough to... Read more
I posed a question to a group of people the other day, “Has God ever had an orgasm?” Everybody gets excited when you start talking about orgasms. The replies were wildly diverse. Slowly, a common theme emerged. I found that almost everyone believed there was a stark separation between God and sex. For most, it was almost as if God created sex to tempt us to be dirty. One man even went so far as to push that sex... Read more
For many years, Texans have worked tirelessly to litigate the case, guard the offender and secure the drugs. Now the moment is here, Kent Sprouse will be executed this evening at 6pm. From beginning to end, the cost of executing Sprouse will be millions of dollars. Apart from the moral contradiction of a state full of Christians executing someone, there is a huge moral problem with spending millions of dollars to kill someone when it is far cheaper to keep... Read more
*”…love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you…” -Matthew 5:44 Oh Lord our God, it is hard to pray for anyone that would shoot a man in the back. Walter Scott didn’t deserve to die. While I wonder why you didn’t step in to stop this atrocity, I will leave that for another day. Today, I only know that another black man lies dead in the streets of this nation and another cop pulled the trigger.... Read more
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