The Fierce Urgency of Prophetic Hope

©Wendell Griffen, 2020 The July 26, 2020 issue of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newspaper contains an article based on an interview of U.S. Senator Tom Cotton, the junior senator from Arkansas.   The article written by that paper’s Washington, DC correspondent, Frank Lockwood, quotes Senator Cotton’s assertion during a recent interview that slavery “was the necessary evil upon which the union was built…”   Cotton made that assertion to support legislation he is sponsoring that would prohibit public schools in the U.S. from using material from the New York Times 1619 Project that traces U.S. history to 1619 and the enslavement of Africans (see, https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2020/jul/26/bill-by-cotton-targets-curriculum-on-slavery/?ne ). Senator Cotton’s view that slavery was “the necessary evil upon which the union was built” is flawed logic and flawed ethics.   It is flawed logic because morally competent people can choose good rather than evil.   A decision to act in

A FOURTH OF JULY SERMON FOR THE UNITED STATES OF PANDEMICS ©Wendell Griffen, 2020 July 5, 2020 (Fifth Sunday after Pentecost) New Millennium Church Little Rock, Arkansas Jeremiah 22:1-5 22 Thus says the  Lord : Go down to the house of the king of Judah, and speak there this word,  2 and say: Hear the word of the  Lord , O King of Judah sitting on the throne of David—you, and your servants, and your people who enter these gates.  3 Thus says the  Lord : Act with justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor anyone who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place.  4 For if you will indeed obey this word, then through the gates of this house shall enter kings who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they, and their servants, and their people.  5 But if you will not heed these words, I swear by myself, says the  Lord , that this house shall bec