day sixteen – a picture of someone who inspires you
Shane Claibornefrom Jeff Figearo's blog
I quoted him last month at length from an extremely challenging and encouraging book he wrote. You have got to check out his Letter to Non-Believers published on Esquire.com, I think it articulates very well a third way between Christianity and non-Christianity. Shane has reminded me what it means when Jesus says we can find him among the poor, downtrodden, and imprisoned. He lives a life that is socially and economically responsible, which led him to start making clothes for himself. He has a heart of courage to step out of his world and start sleeping with the homeless and now he lives in West Philly, a Black ghetto that I lived right next to for a month in 2009. Almost every night you would hear the police siren, and a few gun shots and quarrels.
Such a man is so charming, and I know that the person that I'm attracted to is not Shane, but the Jesus in him. In his The Irresistible Revolution, he wrote that it is important to grief and let your heart be troubled, for only grieving prophets know how to change the world, and how to dance hope into broken lives. And don't be afraid to use creative ways to get your voice heard, just as how the prophets in the Bible did. Sometimes people thought these prophets were crazy and ridiculed, sometimes murdering them even to shut them up since they kept preaching the truth that the people didn't want to hear.
Funny how I was thinking this morning about people who inspire me (though I didn't know it was today's 30day topic!). I'm glad I have many people who inspire me, many of them ordinary people, while others make their voices heard so that they can champion their convictions. The most recent one is India's Narayanan Krishnan, which got me thinking...could true wealth and freedom really mean only having two shirts, and then giving one away to someone who needs it? I get a little ecstatic thinking about it!
Such a man is so charming, and I know that the person that I'm attracted to is not Shane, but the Jesus in him. In his The Irresistible Revolution, he wrote that it is important to grief and let your heart be troubled, for only grieving prophets know how to change the world, and how to dance hope into broken lives. And don't be afraid to use creative ways to get your voice heard, just as how the prophets in the Bible did. Sometimes people thought these prophets were crazy and ridiculed, sometimes murdering them even to shut them up since they kept preaching the truth that the people didn't want to hear.
Funny how I was thinking this morning about people who inspire me (though I didn't know it was today's 30day topic!). I'm glad I have many people who inspire me, many of them ordinary people, while others make their voices heard so that they can champion their convictions. The most recent one is India's Narayanan Krishnan, which got me thinking...could true wealth and freedom really mean only having two shirts, and then giving one away to someone who needs it? I get a little ecstatic thinking about it!
May we begin beating our swords into plowshares now, and the kingdom will begin to be not simply something we hope for when we die but something we see on earth as it is in heaven, the kingdom that is among us and within us.
- Shane Claiborne
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