This is a formal invitation.

Tonight is New Year’s Eve.  Andrea and I have been pondering this day, and what we would make of it for quite some time now.

Yesterday, Andrea looked online for somewhere we could go feed the hungry.  Turns out, there is NO WHERE in Atlanta tonight that is doing that.  Can you believe it?  Christmas Eve and Christmas Day people turn out in record numbers to ‘feed the homeless’.  Only one week later, there isn’t even an organization to volunteer with.

Tonight Andrea and I will be throwing a little party of our own.  In Luke Chapter 14, Jesus says, ” “When you put on a luncheon or a banquet,” he said, “don’t invite your friends, brothers, relatives, and rich neighbors. For they will invite you back, and that will be your only reward. Instead, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. Then at the resurrection of the righteous, God will reward you for inviting those who could not repay you.”

We are going to be making sandwiches and taking bottled waters downtown.  We think we know a place to find a good bunch of people who have nothing to eat, and maybe more importantly, nothing to celebrate for.  (I think we can give them both) We are welcoming anyone in Atlanta who wants to come with.  Leave a comment here, or twitter me, or something, and we will work out the details.

I have a feeling this is going to be an awesone New Years.  Wanna help?  Let me Know.

AND:
If you find yourself drinking and in a bad situation.  Don’t drive.  Call us.  We will not be drinking, so we can and will come get you.  The city of Atlanta has already passed it projected death toll this holiday season.  Let’s keep that down.  If you don’t have my number, again, leave a comment, or Twitter me or something and we can definitely figure out a way to keep you from behind the wheel, or from a car with someone who has been drinking.  Please.  Just make that phone call.

This is my personal blog, and I have been on one hell of a journey recently.  I have learned a lot about churches, people, Jesus Christ and The Church.

While I write this blog, I know sometimes my opinions might change, and even my attitude towards somethings.  I have a tendency, especially here lately, to be overly cynical and exaggerative. I can sometimes take a minute feeling and blow it up into something huge.  I think we are all like that from time to time.  I enjoy being like that.  I call it imagination, other people might call it something else.

Of all of the things I say here that might change, I hope to God no one gets the wrong idea.  There is one thing that will never change, and that is the steadfast love of Jesus Christ.  That is what I am here to talk about.  The saving grace and mercy.  For you and for me.  For George W. Bush, and For Osama Bin Laden.  Jesus loves all of us, the same.

Pray for something today.  Pray for something awesome.  Pray for salvation.  Pray for our words out here in the interwebs.  Pray for life.  Pray for a family.  Pray for something.  I’ve been doing a lot of that myself lately, and it’s refreshing.

I’ll probably get back to some more ‘essay’ type posts at the beginning of ’09.  What I want to do now, is pray, confess my sins, and pray.  I’ll be posting but it won’t be anything to intense.  Just updates and such. So.. WIth that said, I love my wife SOO much it’s insane.

This week has been, for the most part, great.  My only complaint.  Some people just need to learn to bite their tongues.  Some people need to think about other peoples feelings before speaking. (myself included)  It’s happened numerous times this week.  Hurtful things have been said.  For the soul purpose of hurting someone.  In what should be a celebration week, people can only act on their fear and anger.  If only we could act so easily on love.

What a glorious world it could be!

Well.  Just like I predicted, it’s Christmas again.  I knew it would happen, and I’m so good, I even pinpointed the date!  But, seriously.

Tomorrow is Christmas, and I want to take a time off from cynicism.  Some of the people who read this blog, I have never met in person.  Some of you I have, and I’m sorry.  I want to take this time off and say, Merry Christmas.  It really has been an amazing year, and I feel like I was able to share it with all of you.

So, I want to take this time to just say, no matter how wrong ‘The Church’ has it.  We are doing something right.  We are forming communities across the world.  We are trying to help ‘the least of us’.   I really feel like, more and more people are getting it. (including myself)  And more and more people are really starting to hear our saviour Jesus Christ.  This time of year, we are reminded about how much God loves us.  It’s really hard to think about.  It’s really hard to wrap our heads around, but this time of year, we all try.

It’s a pretty amazing thing.  All of us, screw ups, addicts, envious, vain people, and he came to this Earth, to die for us!  Amazing.  I can’t believe it.. I don’t know that I will ever fully understand it.  But, I will try. AND.. I will try to remember in July as much as I try in December.

Anyway guys.  Thank you all for being influences and impacts in my life.  I love you guys.

This is an open letter I found on Jesus Manifesto.  I am going to print this up and send it.. and  would ask you to do the same thing.. Even repost it on your own blog if you can.  It’s a pretty huge deal.  Here is the exact copy and paste from Jesus Manifesto

“Dear friends,

Please distribute this open letter to friends, government officials, and media for us. We have sent it to two blog posting sites for Obama, but we also found a mailing address for him. It would be fine to have a flurry of people sending this letter to him at

President Elect Barack Obama

PO Box 802799

Chicago, IL 60680-2799

Thanks, the CPT Iraq team

* * *

Dear Senator Obama, President Elect of the United States,

Since 2007 the US military has provided military intelligence and opened Iraqi air space to Turkish forces along the northern border of the Kurdish Regional Governorate for operations against the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party). Because of these military incursions, thousands of civilian villagers have been displaced, many killed or wounded, and a great many endure inadequate and deplorable living situations.

Members of our organization, Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT), an NGO with offices based in Chicago and Toronto, have been living and working in the Kurdish North of Iraq for over two years, and for four years before that, in Baghdad. We have had regular contact with the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and local Kurdish NGOs that have assisted these Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

Our members have visited IDP tent camps and witnessed the hardships of those living there as well as visited mayors and security personnel of communities to which thousands of men, women and children have fled for refuge. In some areas we have been able to visit the remains of Muslim and Christian villages destroyed by the bombing and talk to villagers who still live there or come and go to care for crops or animals under the threat of random attacks. We have interviewed a twenty-seven-year old woman who lost her leg, families of persons who were killed in these bombings by Turkish military, and a man whose two brothers were taken from their villages and tortured by Turkish soldiers.

Testimonies of villagers and government officials have confirmed the destruction of civilian infrastructure such as homes, schools, mosques, churches, and hospitals. Turkish bombing has killed sheep and cows?animals many families depend on for their livelihood. The Turkish military has bombed bridges and planted landmines?as well as internationally prohibited weapons as cluster bombs?to prevent human movement in areas where civilians live. Explosions from bombs and rockets (some rockets and shelling also from the Iranian Military along the Iranian border) continue in villages still inhabited and are audible from some areas where IDPs now live.

These things have been verified by the 2008 KRG government report of the fact-finding committee mandated by the Council of Representatives Presidency Board. We also saw five of the numerous Turkish Military bases positioned within Iraqi territory, as far away from the Turkish border as eighteen miles. According to Kurdish officials, Turkey established these bases under an agreement between Turkey and KRG officials in 1996 during the Kurdish civil war, but refused to leave years ago when the agreement expired.

According to villagers still living in areas currently being bombed, and Iraqi Kurdish security officials, Turkish military at these bases watch their movement, strike during the time of planting and harvesting, anytime they observe displaced villagers returning to their homes, or if there is movement around their villages at night, and do not let Kurdish residents use their land adjoining the bases or hunt on the mountains nearby. They experience the Turkish presence as an oppressive occupation. They say Iraqi Kurdish officials have asked the Turkish military at the bases to leave, but feel helpless in enforcing this. For these reasons the people are afraid of the impending agreement between the Iraqi Central Government and Turkey.

According to an official from the Turkish foreign ministry (to Hurriyet daily news source on 18 November, 2008) describing the effects of this agreement, “If an operation which is deemed as crucial for Turkey is needed, then Turkey can present it as a ‘fait accompli.’” They see this as allowing Turkey to increase its occupation of the northern areas of Iraq, a fear put into perspective by the far more intense nature of Turkish military aggression there in the 1990’s.

As we talk to Kurdish people, we hear a call for the United States to abide by international law and the Fourth Geneva Agreements, standards to which it holds other countries: not to kill or injure civilians, and that an occupying power is responsible to protect and care for the civilians who are under its control.

On a larger scale, CPT has observed a dramatic change in the Kurdish population from unapologetic support for the U.S. military presence in Iraq to anger at the way in which the United States has treated one of its most loyal allies in the Middle East. Kurdish people, who have experienced the Anfal genocide under the Saddam Hussein regime now fear U.S. support will encourage Turkey to move even more aggressively against Kurdistan.

Therefore, we urge you to:

1. Reverse U.S. policies that aid Turkey’s attacks on Kurdish Iraqi civilian populations and put diplomatic pressure on Turkey to pursue diplomatic and peaceful solutions to the PKK/Turkey disputes.

2. Refuse to support new agreements that would expand the rights of Turkey’s military to send more troops or establish more bases northern Iraq and put pressure on Turkey to remove existing bases.

We would also invite you to come here and visit some of these villages and IDP camps and talk with the people. They are very welcoming and hospitable. We would be glad to introduce you to them and be of what assistance we can.

Sincerely,

Peggy Gish, Craig A. Kite, Chichun Yuan, Bob Holmes, Anne Montgomery, John Lynes

CPT

Suleimaniya, Iraq”

Do this.