Brian’s Reflection: Friday, October 12, 2007


We must begin to make what I call "conscious choices,"
and to really recognize that we are the same. It's from
that place in my heart that I write my songs.

- John Denver, singer, who died on this day,
1997, age 53, in a plane crash.



Yes, John did write his songs from “that place”. From a heart that understood that “we are the same”. That is, brothers and sisters in the family of the God of Love.

Christians must start living our lives from that place. Because too many of us don’t. Too many Christians are subverted by their culture and their politics. But that is very often a culture of tribalism, and a culture of the politics of the Kingdom of This World - which is, we are reminded by the Bible, the Kingdom of Satan - and not the Kingdom of God. The “church” exists only to build God’s Kingdom.

Love is the basic “conscious choice”. It is an act of the will. Just like Jesus, we choose to love, even when we are faced with betrayal and with evil and with the “sin that lives so close” in us. Every one of us has the capacity to side with “Satan”, i.e., the path of anti-Love. But into every age comes a prophet, a seer, a Child of God, a Truth-teller, who reminds us of who we truly Are - Glorious Beings of Light and Good, who boldly calls us to be faithful to our true nature. Yes, that “true nature” lies deeply hidden at times - but that only makes its voice more powerful! After a thousand betrayals, but one hard word of Truth cancels all the voices of deception. Jesus heard the voice of Satan in the Wilderness - and rejected it as Lies. Love of “Christ” - i.e., of Divine Love, manifest in so many Beings and Faiths, anchors us in the path of Good News.

Life is Politics. That’s a given. We must make “conscious choices” about the character of our politics. For Christians, our politics are grounded in the Cross. In a Love that transcends Self for the other.

And so are the songs we sing.

Brian+