Sermon No. 1

Psychic Overload

"On a bright spring morning, three days after Easter in Oklahoma City, a clean-cut but lonesome drifter with a pathological hatred for the U.S. government drove a truck packed with homemade explosives to the front door of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building and blew a gaping hole in the myth of the American Heartland.

"Bottle-fed on Hate Radio, and estranged from everything and everyone, including himself, this crusader against the Evil One has finally shown us what the politics of fear can produce: sow enough bad seeds, and eventually you harvest a mutant crop,

". . . the 'militias' which breed the Timothy McVeighs of this world do so with the Bible in one hand and a gun in the other. The word Christian is now being attached to the most violent, the most paranoid, the most dangerous elements of society. Clinic workers are murdered by people calling themselves 'pro-life.' Under the banner of Jesus, Prince of Peace, we hear more hate-filled rhetoric, see more homophobia and witness more suspicion of women than from any other group. Christianity has been hijacked and the ugly joyride is far from over." (from Robin R. Meyers)

How can a person perform such vicious acts in the name of religion? In my generation we have seen the holocaust, "ethnic cleansing," apartheid, and here in the "land of the free," segregation! Where is the sense of decency, social conscience? Most of those atrocious blights on society have been perpetrated in the name of Jesus Christ. You've heard of him -- the Prince of Peace!
Here in the warm and hospitable seclusion of our lovely sanctuary, we are completely isolated from the ugly scars of Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Kosovo . . . Here in the safety of suburban luxury we see little of the violence of the inner-city.

That's the good news? The bad news is that we bear a responsibility for the psychic overload which motivates so much hatred and violence.

What is psychic overload? And what causes it?

Some time ago Robert Jay Lifton wrote of "psychic numbness" as a by-product of life under the threat of the nuclear mushroom cloud. Many of us have become so numb, so insensitive to life and society that we require more and more stimulation to "feel" anything. So . . . there are more alcoholics, more drug addicts . . . people want more action-packed (read violent) TV and sports and movies. They want louder and faster music, wilder dancing, less restraint.

Human beings can take just so much stress. Maybe we were meant to live in rural quiet and peace, but we have been urbanized. Modern life is intruding. So in response to the psychic overload we simply shut down our mental/spiritual apparatus.

Most of us no longer enjoy the unity of community. Lucille and I live in what was country when we moved here 38 years ago. Now we are in a virtual city, and we feel lucky to know only our closest neighbors.

Miroslav M. Kis credits much of the violence in our world to the loss of this community closeness. "Distance is of the essence in creating and maintaining animosity. It is nearly impossible to kill someone at 'close range.' Closeness is almost always an antidote to enmity."

So who is my enemy? Is my enemy anyone, everyone not close to me?

Kis counsels us to dismantle the walls that divide us. One of those walls is indifference. "Am I my brother's keeper?" YES! I am my brother's keeper.

My rich, rewarding life is only possible because many, many lovely people have blessed me with interest and concern. Now, as a Christian, I owe others my interest and concern. Jesus taught us that we must take an interest in that poor man in the ditch!

Albert Speer, Hitler's minister of armaments, said of the Jews, "If I had continued to see them as human beings, I would not have remained a Nazi. I did not hate them. I felt indifference to them."

Dear saints, if we are to be genuine Christians we absolutely cannot be passive bystanders. We must take an active role in the work of justice. We must break down walls that divide us.

There are evils which divide us in our wonderful land. Our Christian duty is to dismantle those evil dividing walls.

Timothy McVeigh was angry that the government did not handle Waco and Ruby Ridge as they should have. So am I angry about those blunders!
But bombing the building in Oklahoma City simply built walls of separation. Better he had joined in conversations with people and movements designed to establish community.

Walls of separation are all about us. Racism is a wall. Sexism is a wall. Is there racism in this country? Absolutely. Am I a racist just because I am white? Absolutely not. I left Vanderbilt in the late 50's when the only black student in the university was expelled because he participated in the dime store sit-ins.

Is there sexism in our country? Absolutely. Am I a sexist just because I am male? Absolutely not. I am an unabashed feminist.

Am I a homosexual? Absolutely not. Am I homophobic because I am a heterosexual? Absolutely not.

Why do I align myself with those who oppose prayer in public schools? Don't I believe in prayer? Of course I do. But I believe the atheist has as much right not to pray as I have to pray.

Back to Kis: "There may be those who hate me because of something I do or do not do. But they are not my enemy, because they do not hate me: they really hate my behavior."

"There may be those who disagree with my beliefs or my theological orientation, but they are not my enemy. They dislike my ideology and the views I hold.

"Finally, there may be a distance between my neighbor and me. But there need not be any distance between me and my neighbor . . ." Think about that.
"Believers must also be in dialogue, in listening respectfully. Dialogue between Christians and Marxists, Christians and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, between neighbors can happen only if the two sides take each other seriously."

That, my friends, is why I am active in Greater Detroit Interfaith Roundtable, and in the Dearborn Area Ministers Association — Jews, Muslims, Christians, Catholics, all species of Protestants!

Today is our occasional time to consider the Holocaust and related atrocities. I have a commitment to preach about this at least once a year.

On this day to remember atrocities, I am ashamed of the kidnapping and enslavement of black Africans, of the exploitation of American Indians and Cubans, Mexicans, Central Americans and others. I am ashamed that much of the good life we live now is because of material blessings we have gained at the expense of people whose descendants are still inexcusably poor because of unjust treatment by American society.

But the past is past. I didn't buy slaves. I didn't steal land from the Indians. I don't participate in the exploitation of Third World countries. I don't approve of the starvation wages and of our unbelievable profits. I don't shoot "enemies." So do I bear any guilt?

It is to prevent psychic numbness that I insist on remembering the atrocities of the past.

Ellen White said "We have nothing to fear for the future except as we forget the way the Lord has led us."
That principle is relevant not only in religion, but in secular relationships.

The age-old problem of evil has confronted and confounded us since the beginning of time. How can a good God create a world in which evil exists?

I would like to solve that mystery this morning. Unfortunately, I can't do that. I can no more solve the riddle of evil than I can explain the beauty of a rose, the majesty of Mount Rainier or the sweetness of a strawberry.

Nor can anyone else! No one! If by our intelligence we could explain God and goodness and beauty and love, then scholars would be saved and the rest of us would be lost! So it is with evil. Scholars cannot explain evil, much less can you and I!

We can only study and pray and emulate the life of Jesus. Each of us can light his own little candle.

I have told you about "Hemi" Baxter, who realized that the fast lane was not for him. He gave it up, cared for the lost and the wayward in what became the Jerusalem Community. He spoke in London; he walked in the processional. With the ministers in their robes, the archbishop in his purple robe and miter, there in his coarse clothing, beard and sandaled feet, came "Hemi" Baxter.

The next morning the newspaper account of the service closed with a question, "Which one looked more like Jesus?"

Do we look like Jesus? Do we act like Jesus? Do we love like Jesus?
You and I can never solve the problem of evil. You and I can not effect peace in the world. We can not prevent bigotry and prejudice, anger and evil. But we are not excused from being concerned. We can vote. We can write letters to our legislators and to editors. We can pray.

And we can take an active interest in community. We can build relationships, which will in time dismantle walls of separation. We can . . . and we must.

Luther described sin as "the heart all curved in on itself." We don't want to be sinners, so let's open our hearts, first to the Holy Spirit, then to our neighbors.

A social worker said, "If you stop what you're doing, even for a moment, and dare to think about the big picture or ask yourself the big questions, you'll go crazy. The problems are just too big, the human needs so overwhelming."

In our Gospel for today we learn that when Jesus challenged his followers to think about the big picture, ask the big questions, "many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him."

Our UCC Statement of Faith challenges us "to accept the cost and joy of discipleship," We dare not ask for the joy unless we are willing to pay the cost. Philosophers have noted what they call "the onlooker consciousness," the stance that is characterized by distance, detachment, disengagement, precisely what Kis calls walls that divide us.

Remember Israeli historian Yahuda Bauer's quote on the wall of the Holocaust Memorial: "Thou shalt not be a victim; thou shalt not be a perpetrator. Above all, thou shalt not be a bystander!"
If you think that over, you may ask, as I did, Is it not better to be a bystander than to be a perpetrator? If you do ask that, then you better read Victoria Barnett's book, Bystanders: Conscience and Complicity During the Holocaust.

Her thesis matches Bauer's: "In the long term, Nazism was powerful not just because of the numbers of party stalwarts, but because millions of Germans were prepared to inform on one another, obey orders, and remain passive while others become victims."

As I walked thru the Holocaust Memorial in Oslo, I cried a lot, and I asked, "How could that happen?" I had the same experience as I walked thru the Holocaust Memorial here in West Bloomfield. How could that happen? How can human beings persecute other human beings just because they are a different color or different nationality or different religion?

Those of us who are of German ancestry are especially ashamed of the Holocaust. How could Germans, the "super race," act out such inhuman and inhumane atrocities?

Before the rest of you throw any darts at us, remember: "On November 29, 1864, approximately 700 soldiers, under the command of Colonel John Chivington, approached a Cheyenne encampment near Sand Creek in Colorado.

"Chivington knew that in an attempt to demonstrate that they were no threat, the Indians of this village had voluntarily turned in all but their hunting weapons to the federal government . . .

"This highly respected man -- a former Methodist minister, still an elder in good standing in his church, recently a candidate for Congress -- had already stated in a speech that his policy toward Indians was that we should "kill and scalp them all . . ." (from Derrick Jensen)

But of course he was just one loud-mouthed voice, right? Wrong! The Rocky Mountain News had editorialized 10 times within the previous year, urging "extermination against the red devils . . . a dissolute, brutal, ungrateful race (who) ought to be wiped from the face of the earth."

I will spare you the gory details. Those "Christian" soldiers swooped down, killed and mutilated every Indian in the camp.

Jews were not considered human by Hitler and his despots, Indians were not considered human by those "Christian" Americans. O, for shame!

Last week I got an e-mail from my atheist friend, Don Stevens, who reminded me that Voltaire (in "Micromegas") wrote that humans are, well, human! You can concentrate on either their infinite capacity for evil, or their infinite capacity for good. He went on to say that a wise person concentrates on the good.

In last week's sermon ("Com-Passion") I emphasized the good; today I am talking about the evil!

This reminder of the evil in us is designed to be a warning to emphasize the good! We must remember our history lest we be "doomed to repeat it."
Rene Descartes ("I think, therefore I am") taught us that within ourselves is everything we need to know. Don't bother with the world. Dig into yourself. Keep your neighbor at a distance. In our emphasis on individuality it's everyone for himself. Each of us is a perpetual tourist, just passing thru, uncommitted to anything outside the self. Descartes all over!

We use "onlooker consciousness" as an attempt to put life in perspective. We want to keep our distance, what Kis describes as dividing walls. So we knock ourselves into unconsciousness and move thru life and the world in sort of an aloofness.

Dear friends, it is not my purpose to make you feel guilty for what others have done. I don't feel any guilt for the savage brutality of my forebears. Yet, if we forget the past we are in danger of repeating it.

You and I can't imagine that we would ever treat others so inhumanely. Oh? Don't forget Michael Servetus, French physician and theologian. The Catholics sentenced him to the stake just because he did not accept the doctrine of the Trinity. He escaped and fled to Geneva. There, he was questioned by John Calvin. Because he still didn't accept the doctrine of the Trinity, Calvin burned him at the stake! Oh, how we persecute people who disagree with us! Still! Pharisees are still with us.

As followers of Jesus we can and must be more than onlookers. Our involvement is costly --- we are not violent like the militia, not reductionistic or simplistic, like the Timothy McVeighs. But, like the Good Samaritan, we must be willing to chance personal risk to make the world better for those in the ditch of life. That poor fellow in the ditch is, after all, my brother.

Don't forget Martin Luther King's last sermon, the night before he was assassinated. He reminded us that we must not ask what might happen to us if we stop to help the man in the ditch, but what might happen to him if we don't stop.

Jesus told me to love Timothy McVeigh. That isn't easy. Jesus told me to love Hitler. That isn't easy. Jesus told me to love all my enemies . . . and I have some! That isn't easy.

We can learn to love even our enemies if we attack the job them one at a time! Don't try to simply inject a love potion into your system. Pick one enemy and pray intentionally and systematically until you learn to love that person.

A boy was picking up starfish on the beach and throwing them in the ocean. A stranger watched him for awhile, then asked why he was doing that.

The lad answered, "The starfish were washed up on the beach. The tide is out now and they will die here."

"Son, there are thousands of starfish on this beach. This beach is only one of thousands of beaches. How do you think you can make much difference in all that?"

The boy picked up another starfish and threw it into the ocean. "It makes a difference to that one!"

In no way do I imply that you and I are responsible for the dastardly behavior of Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, or Americans who have behaved in unamerican ways or Christians who have behaved in unchristian ways.

But in no way are we innocent of the evil of others unless we make a deliberate effort to stop the evil. It is hard to battle the evil and still love the evildoer, but that's where the Holy Spirit comes in.

I am a preacher, charged to preach the message of Christ and his kingdom with all the passion I can muster. With my charge of two small churches, I will never make much difference in this big world. But dear saints, if I can inspire one person to join the campaign to save death-row inmates, the campaign against domestic violence, the cause of violence against women in developing countries, the campaign against militarism . . . I say, if I can enlist one person to work for world peace, then perhaps I will have accomplished all God wants of me.

If, on the other hand, I give up because the task is overwhelming (and it is) then I will die of psychic overload.

Let us pray . . .



		Psychic Overload
		"On a bright spring morning, three days after Easter in Oklahoma City, a clean-cut but lonesome drifter with a pathological hatred for the U.S. government drove a truck packed with homemade explosives to the front door of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building and blew a gaping hole in the myth of the American Heartland. "Bottle-fed on Hate Radio, and estranged from everything and everyone, including himself, this crusader against the Evil One has finally shown us what the politics of fear can produce: sow enough bad seeds, and eventually you harvest a mutant crop, ". . . the 'militias' which breed the Timothy McVeighs of this world do so with the Bible in one hand and a gun in the other. The word Christian is now being attached to the most violent, the most paranoid, the most dangerous elements of society. Clinic workers are murdered by people calling themselves 'pro-life.' Under the banner of Jesus, Prince of Peace, we hear more hate-filled rhetoric, see more homophobia and witness more suspicion of women than from any other group. Christianity has been hijacked and the ugly joyride is far from over." (from Robin R. Meyers) How can a person perform such vicious acts in the name of religion? In my generation we have seen the holocaust, "ethnic cleansing," apartheid, and here in the "land of the free," segregation! Where is the sense of decency, social conscience? Most of those atrocious blights on society have been perpetrated in the name of Jesus Christ. You've heard of him -- the Prince of Peace! Here in the warm and hospitable seclusion of our lovely sanctuary, we are completely isolated from the ugly scars of Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Kosovo . . . Here in the safety of suburban luxury we see little of the violence of the inner-city. That's the good news? The bad news is that we bear a responsibility for the psychic overload which motivates so much hatred and violence. What is psychic overload? And what causes it? Some time ago Robert Jay Lifton wrote of "psychic numbness" as a by-product of life under the threat of the nuclear mushroom cloud. Many of us have become so numb, so insensitive to life and society that we require more and more stimulation to "feel" anything. So . . . there are more alcoholics, more drug addicts . . . people want more action-packed (read violent) TV and sports and movies. They want louder and faster music, wilder dancing, less restraint. Human beings can take just so much stress. Maybe we were meant to live in rural quiet and peace, but we have been urbanized. Modern life is intruding. So in response to the psychic overload we simply shut down our mental/spiritual apparatus. Most of us no longer enjoy the unity of community. Lucille and I live in what was country when we moved here 38 years ago. Now we are in a virtual city, and we feel lucky to know only our closest neighbors. Miroslav M. Kis credits much of the violence in our world to the loss of this community closeness. "Distance is of the essence in creating and maintaining animosity. It is nearly impossible to kill someone at 'close range.' Closeness is almost always an antidote to enmity." So who is my enemy? Is my enemy anyone, everyone not close to me? Kis counsels us to dismantle the walls that divide us. One of those walls is indifference. "Am I my brother's keeper?" YES! I am my brother's keeper. My rich, rewarding life is only possible because many, many lovely people have blessed me with interest and concern. Now, as a Christian, I owe others my interest and concern. Jesus taught us that we must take an interest in that poor man in the ditch! Albert Speer, Hitler's minister of armaments, said of the Jews, "If I had continued to see them as human beings, I would not have remained a Nazi. I did not hate them. I felt indifference to them." Dear saints, if we are to be genuine Christians we absolutely cannot be passive bystanders. We must take an active role in the work of justice. We must break down walls that divide us. There are evils which divide us in our wonderful land. Our Christian duty is to dismantle those evil dividing walls. Timothy McVeigh was angry that the government did not handle Waco and Ruby Ridge as they should have. So am I angry about those blunders! But bombing the building in Oklahoma City simply built walls of separation. Better he had joined in conversations with people and movements designed to establish community. Walls of separation are all about us. Racism is a wall. Sexism is a wall. Is there racism in this country? Absolutely. Am I a racist just because I am white? Absolutely not. I left Vanderbilt in the late 50's when the only black student in the university was expelled because he participated in the dime store sit-ins. Is there sexism in our country? Absolutely. Am I a sexist just because I am male? Absolutely not. I am an unabashed feminist. Am I a homosexual? Absolutely not. Am I homophobic because I am a heterosexual? Absolutely not. Why do I align myself with those who oppose prayer in public schools? Don't I believe in prayer? Of course I do. But I believe the atheist has as much right not to pray as I have to pray. Back to Kis: "There may be those who hate me because of something I do or do not do. But they are not my enemy, because they do not hate me: they really hate my behavior." "There may be those who disagree with my beliefs or my theological orientation, but they are not my enemy. They dislike my ideology and the views I hold. "Finally, there may be a distance between my neighbor and me. But there need not be any distance between me and my neighbor . . ." Think about that. "Believers must also be in dialogue, in listening respectfully. Dialogue between Christians and Marxists, Christians and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, between neighbors can happen only if the two sides take each other seriously." That, my friends, is why I am active in Greater Detroit Interfaith Roundtable, and in the Dearborn Area Ministers Association — Jews, Muslims, Christians, Catholics, all species of Protestants! Today is our occasional time to consider the Holocaust and related atrocities. I have a commitment to preach about this at least once a year. On this day to remember atrocities, I am ashamed of the kidnapping and enslavement of black Africans, of the exploitation of American Indians and Cubans, Mexicans, Central Americans and others. I am ashamed that much of the good life we live now is because of material blessings we have gained at the expense of people whose descendants are still inexcusably poor because of unjust treatment by American society. But the past is past. I didn't buy slaves. I didn't steal land from the Indians. I don't participate in the exploitation of Third World countries. I don't approve of the starvation wages and of our unbelievable profits. I don't shoot "enemies." So do I bear any guilt? It is to prevent psychic numbness that I insist on remembering the atrocities of the past. Ellen White said "We have nothing to fear for the future except as we forget the way the Lord has led us." That principle is relevant not only in religion, but in secular relationships. The age-old problem of evil has confronted and confounded us since the beginning of time. How can a good God create a world in which evil exists? I would like to solve that mystery this morning. Unfortunately, I can't do that. I can no more solve the riddle of evil than I can explain the beauty of a rose, the majesty of Mount Rainier or the sweetness of a strawberry. Nor can anyone else! No one! If by our intelligence we could explain God and goodness and beauty and love, then scholars would be saved and the rest of us would be lost! So it is with evil. Scholars cannot explain evil, much less can you and I! We can only study and pray and emulate the life of Jesus. Each of us can light his own little candle. I have told you about "Hemi" Baxter, who realized that the fast lane was not for him. He gave it up, cared for the lost and the wayward in what became the Jerusalem Community. He spoke in London; he walked in the processional. With the ministers in their robes, the archbishop in his purple robe and miter, there in his coarse clothing, beard and sandaled feet, came "Hemi" Baxter. The next morning the newspaper account of the service closed with a question, "Which one looked more like Jesus?" Do we look like Jesus? Do we act like Jesus? Do we love like Jesus? You and I can never solve the problem of evil. You and I can not effect peace in the world. We can not prevent bigotry and prejudice, anger and evil. But we are not excused from being concerned. We can vote. We can write letters to our legislators and to editors. We can pray. And we can take an active interest in community. We can build relationships, which will in time dismantle walls of separation. We can . . . and we must. Luther described sin as "the heart all curved in on itself." We don't want to be sinners, so let's open our hearts, first to the Holy Spirit, then to our neighbors. A social worker said, "If you stop what you're doing, even for a moment, and dare to think about the big picture or ask yourself the big questions, you'll go crazy. The problems are just too big, the human needs so overwhelming." In our Gospel for today we learn that when Jesus challenged his followers to think about the big picture, ask the big questions, "many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him." Our UCC Statement of Faith challenges us "to accept the cost and joy of discipleship," We dare not ask for the joy unless we are willing to pay the cost. Philosophers have noted what they call "the onlooker consciousness," the stance that is characterized by distance, detachment, disengagement, precisely what Kis calls walls that divide us. Remember Israeli historian Yahuda Bauer's quote on the wall of the Holocaust Memorial: "Thou shalt not be a victim; thou shalt not be a perpetrator. Above all, thou shalt not be a bystander!" If you think that over, you may ask, as I did, Is it not better to be a bystander than to be a perpetrator? If you do ask that, then you better read Victoria Barnett's book, Bystanders: Conscience and Complicity During the Holocaust. Her thesis matches Bauer's: "In the long term, Nazism was powerful not just because of the numbers of party stalwarts, but because millions of Germans were prepared to inform on one another, obey orders, and remain passive while others become victims." As I walked thru the Holocaust Memorial in Oslo, I cried a lot, and I asked, "How could that happen?" I had the same experience as I walked thru the Holocaust Memorial here in West Bloomfield. How could that happen? How can human beings persecute other human beings just because they are a different color or different nationality or different religion? Those of us who are of German ancestry are especially ashamed of the Holocaust. How could Germans, the "super race," act out such inhuman and inhumane atrocities? Before the rest of you throw any darts at us, remember: "On November 29, 1864, approximately 700 soldiers, under the command of Colonel John Chivington, approached a Cheyenne encampment near Sand Creek in Colorado. "Chivington knew that in an attempt to demonstrate that they were no threat, the Indians of this village had voluntarily turned in all but their hunting weapons to the federal government . . . "This highly respected man -- a former Methodist minister, still an elder in good standing in his church, recently a candidate for Congress -- had already stated in a speech that his policy toward Indians was that we should "kill and scalp them all . . ." (from Derrick Jensen) But of course he was just one loud-mouthed voice, right? Wrong! The Rocky Mountain News had editorialized 10 times within the previous year, urging "extermination against the red devils . . . a dissolute, brutal, ungrateful race (who) ought to be wiped from the face of the earth." I will spare you the gory details. Those "Christian" soldiers swooped down, killed and mutilated every Indian in the camp. Jews were not considered human by Hitler and his despots, Indians were not considered human by those "Christian" Americans. O, for shame! Last week I got an e-mail from my atheist friend, Don Stevens, who reminded me that Voltaire (in "Micromegas") wrote that humans are, well, human! You can concentrate on either their infinite capacity for evil, or their infinite capacity for good. He went on to say that a wise person concentrates on the good. In last week's sermon ("Com-Passion") I emphasized the good; today I am talking about the evil! This reminder of the evil in us is designed to be a warning to emphasize the good! We must remember our history lest we be "doomed to repeat it." Rene Descartes ("I think, therefore I am") taught us that within ourselves is everything we need to know. Don't bother with the world. Dig into yourself. Keep your neighbor at a distance. In our emphasis on individuality it's everyone for himself. Each of us is a perpetual tourist, just passing thru, uncommitted to anything outside the self. Descartes all over! We use "onlooker consciousness" as an attempt to put life in perspective. We want to keep our distance, what Kis describes as dividing walls. So we knock ourselves into unconsciousness and move thru life and the world in sort of an aloofness. Dear friends, it is not my purpose to make you feel guilty for what others have done. I don't feel any guilt for the savage brutality of my forebears. Yet, if we forget the past we are in danger of repeating it. You and I can't imagine that we would ever treat others so inhumanely. Oh? Don't forget Michael Servetus, French physician and theologian. The Catholics sentenced him to the stake just because he did not accept the doctrine of the Trinity. He escaped and fled to Geneva. There, he was questioned by John Calvin. Because he still didn't accept the doctrine of the Trinity, Calvin burned him at the stake! Oh, how we persecute people who disagree with us! Still! Pharisees are still with us. As followers of Jesus we can and must be more than onlookers. Our involvement is costly --- we are not violent like the militia, not reductionistic or simplistic, like the Timothy McVeighs. But, like the Good Samaritan, we must be willing to chance personal risk to make the world better for those in the ditch of life. That poor fellow in the ditch is, after all, my brother. Don't forget Martin Luther King's last sermon, the night before he was assassinated. He reminded us that we must not ask what might happen to us if we stop to help the man in the ditch, but what might happen to him if we don't stop. Jesus told me to love Timothy McVeigh. That isn't easy. Jesus told me to love Hitler. That isn't easy. Jesus told me to love all my enemies . . . and I have some! That isn't easy. We can learn to love even our enemies if we attack the job them one at a time! Don't try to simply inject a love potion into your system. Pick one enemy and pray intentionally and systematically until you learn to love that person. A boy was picking up starfish on the beach and throwing them in the ocean. A stranger watched him for awhile, then asked why he was doing that. The lad answered, "The starfish were washed up on the beach. The tide is out now and they will die here." "Son, there are thousands of starfish on this beach. This beach is only one of thousands of beaches. How do you think you can make much difference in all that?" The boy picked up another starfish and threw it into the ocean. "It makes a difference to that one!" In no way do I imply that you and I are responsible for the dastardly behavior of Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, or Americans who have behaved in unamerican ways or Christians who have behaved in unchristian ways. But in no way are we innocent of the evil of others unless we make a deliberate effort to stop the evil. It is hard to battle the evil and still love the evildoer, but that's where the Holy Spirit comes in. I am a preacher, charged to preach the message of Christ and his kingdom with all the passion I can muster. With my charge of two small churches, I will never make much difference in this big world. But dear saints, if I can inspire one person to join the campaign to save death-row inmates, the campaign against domestic violence, the cause of violence against women in developing countries, the campaign against militarism . . . I say, if I can enlist one person to work for world peace, then perhaps I will have accomplished all God wants of me. If, on the other hand, I give up because the task is overwhelming (and it is) then I will die of psychic overload. Let us pray . . .