A day for advocates

Today, 4 February, is the birthday of two prominent advocates: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Rosa Parks. Both are lights to follow in our individual and corporate callings to do what is just, to love tenderly, and to walk humbly. (Micah 6.8)

Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran minister living in Germany during the dark days of Hitler. The questions he asked of disciples are timeless --- what does your discipleship cost you and how important is the building and maintaining of community?

The most still-stops-me-and-makes-me-think quality about Bonhoeffer was that he came to believe that Hitler must be stopped and plotted with others assassination. Did you catch that? A devoted, discipled clergyman actively engaged in efforts to kill Hitler. In fact, it was the failed assassination plot that resulted in Bonheoffer’s arrest, imprisonment, and execution.

Bonhoeffer makes me think. Bonhoeffer is a living paradox that cannot easily be labeled, boxed, and neatly categorized and easily dealt with; he troubles the waters.

We know the story of Rosa Parks and on what would have been her 100th birthday; the US Post Office issued the “Rosa Parks Stamp.” The clean and tidy story from our school days presents a Rosa as a meek and mild woman who after a long day of work was tired and just needed to sit down.

Think again.

Truth be told, she was a fiery, committed activist completely engaged in the cause of civil rights and she had been chosen and prepared for this action. When she would not be moved, she had no idea how the story was going to end nor what might happen. She did it anyway. Her courage inspires.

What’s the gift for us received in the life-stories of these two advocates?
It’s that they continue to stir us and, if we get stirred enough, move us to respond.

Is your faith neat and tidy and mostly lived out in a pew?

What have you risked?

Do you see, hear, and feel any cause that stirs you to action?

The answers are found in how we live.

sj;