as we forgive

as we forgive documents the attempts of two Rwandan women to forgive the men who murdered their families during the genocide of 1994. Filmmaker Laura Waters Hinson sought to portray the reconciliation that is going on in communities still rebuilding from the conflict:

One balmy Rwandan afternoon in August of 2005, Laura Waters, then a master’s film student at American University, met Anglican Bishop John Rucyahana. Bishop John, a leading advocate of reconciliation in Rwanda, described a reconciliation project he had established that seemed radical and, frankly, unreal. Ex-prisoners were building homes for those who not only survived the genocide, but the family members of those they killed. Laura’s interest was peaked as she imagined a film that could capture for Western viewers the profound message communicated by genocide survivors and perpetrators who are reconciling and living together again as neighbors. Laura spent the next ten months raising money from family and friends, and the following summer, she returned with a small crew of student filmmakers to accomplish one goal: to test the claim that genuine reconciliation was occurring in Rwanda.

To say that this film is powerful is an understatement. I saw it a few weeks ago at The Falls Church and was hit with a range of emotions: anger, shock, pity, humility, regret.

You see not only the pain that the surviving family members are living with, but also the desperation and shame of the men who destroyed their families and are asking to be forgiven.

There is a short trailer and list of upcoming screenings on the website.

August 11, 2008 | Filed Under Rwanda, Christianity | 3 Comments

Awesome Testimony of God’s Grace and Changed Lives

Very powerful testimony of God’s grace and love.

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. — Romans 5:6

(h/t BeyondJEMS)

July 22, 2008 | Filed Under Christianity | Leave a Comment

A Reminder to Pray for Persecutors

Chuck Colson, of Prison Fellowship Ministries, writes today of the persecution of Christians in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge dictator Pol Pot and how more than 2,000 of his followers have since converted to Christianity, many after hearing stories from those who survived persecution and torture. Colson tells of one former Khmer Rouge official:

One of the major Cambodian officials cited for crimes against humanity is named Duch. He directed the “notorious S21 prison, where some 14,000 people are thought to have been tortured before being sent to their deaths in the killing fields outside Phnom Penh.” Unlike other former Cambodian leaders, Duch has actually admitted his part in the killings of nearly one-quarter of Cambodia’s population. He has spent the last eight years in a military prison.

“I have done very bad things in my life,” Duch told Religion Today back in 1999. “Now it is time to bear the consequences for my actions.” You see, before Duch surrendered to authorities, he surrendered to Christ. And he was not alone.

Ninety percent of Cambodia’s Christians may have been slaughtered during the reign of Pol Pot, but as human rights advocate Kristin Wright reported, more than 2,000 Khmer Rouge who once followed Pol Pot now follow Christ! Many of them converted after encountering the faith of those they murdered.

“It is a testimony,” says Wright, “to the courageous lives of Christians like [one Cambodian named] Haim, who used their final words to witness to Khmer Rouge soldiers before being dumped in a mass grave.” And now, years after nearly being exterminated, Christianity is growing in Cambodia, despite the new government’s clamp-down on non-Buddhist religious activities.

Jesus commands us to pray for our enemies. In Matthew 5:43-45, He tells us,

43 You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

Paul, echoing Christ, reminds us in Romans 12:14 to “[b]less those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.” In Romans 12:20-21, he counsels us to repay evil with kindness:

20 To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” 21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

How can we possibly do this, in response to those who trangress daily against us, let alone in the face of the evil that the world is capable of? How many times have I repaid someone’s unkindness towards me in kind, rather than with love and kindness? And how many times have I rejected the kindness offered to me by someone I have treated unjustly?

John Piper, in a sermon on Palm Sunday in 2005, says that Paul is following Christ:

Paul’s call to us Christians to love our enemies (in Romans 12:20) and to overcome evil with good (in Romans 12:21) is based on what Christ did for us. Christ loved his enemies, and (in that way) he overcame evil with good. Not one of us would be a Christian if Christ had not loved his enemies and overcome our evil—our insubordination and willfulness and self-centeredness—with his great good—his death and resurrection.

So we are to love our enemies because Christ loved and loves us, who were and are at enmity with God; who were and are, indeed, enemies of God. And we are not to despair when our enemies fail to see the love of Christ in our love for them. Again, Piper:

This is the way God’s love works for his enemies, and it is the way our love works for our enemies. Our desire is that they would repent and come to a knowledge of the truth. But if they don’t, the very love that we are showing increases the weight of wrath on their head. The more of God’s mercy that people reject, the more wrath they heap up upon themselves.

It is likely that Duch, the former Khmer official, has repented and turned to Christ in part in response to the love of Christ he saw in his captives.

October 25, 2007 | Filed Under Christianity | 1 Comment

Another Stott quote

Another quote by John Stott, this one on God’s love and His wrath:

God’s wrath is not incompatible with his love. The contrast between verses 3 and 4 of Ephesians 2 is notable: “we were by nature children of wrath … But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us . . . ” Thus Paul moves from the wrath of God to the mercy and love of God without any sense of embarrassment or anomaly. He is able to hold them together in his mind because he believed that they were held together in God’s character.

–From “The Message of Ephesians” (The Bible Speaks Today series: Leicester: IVP, 1979), p. 75.

September 18, 2007 | Filed Under Stott, Christianity | Leave a Comment

Lauren McCain’s Testimony

Lauren McCain was one of 32 people murdered at Virginia Tech on April 16th. Judy Nelson, writing at Common Grounds Online, describes a meeting she had with Lauren’s parents, in which she learned how God has comforted the McCains in the wake of Lauren’s death. Nelson also writes of a video interview for Campus Crusade for Christ in which Lauren presented her testimony. I highly recommend viewing the video and reflecting on this young woman’s love for Jesus.

September 10, 2007 | Filed Under Christianity | Leave a Comment

Register to win free books!

Tim Challies is holding a contest to give away free copies of the Reformed Expository Commentary series, care of Monergism Books. If you sign up, like I did, please use my referral number, 12672, or just click through the following banner:

which will give me another chance to win. Hint: You can do the same once you register! (H/T: Rebecca Writes)

September 8, 2007 | Filed Under Christianity | Leave a Comment

A Favorite Quote from John Stott

Earlier today I mistakenly attributed the post referred to below to the blog’s owner, Justin Taylor; instead, the author of the post was Tullian Tchividjian, who is guest blogging for Mr. Taylor this week. My apologies to both. And, please read Mr. Tchividjian’s explanation for his interesting name.

~~Justin Taylor~~ Tullian Tchividjian at Between Two Worlds expresses his appreciation for the work of John Stott and provides a few of his favorite quotes.

For the past few years, I’ve subscribed to a mailing list that provides a daily quote from Stott’s writings. Over the course of a week or so, the quotes address a particular theme, such as “Politics and the State” and “Christianity, Religion and Culture”. Here is one of my recent favorites, filed under “Evangelism and Social Action”:

Evangelism is the major instrument of social change. For the gospel changes people, and changed people can change society. (Issues Facing Christians Today, London: Collins/Marshall Pickering, 1990, p. 71)

Justin Taylor also linked to an essay on Stott by the New York Times’ David Brooks a few years back that is a great description of the man and his work.

July 31, 2007 | Filed Under Stott, Christianity | Leave a Comment

Christmas in July

My order from Desiring God’s recent “All Books for $5″ sale arrived yesterday. It includes

I will try to post my thoughts on a few of these as I read through them.

July 31, 2007 | Filed Under Christianity | Leave a Comment

Three Great ESV Bible Tools Added

I’ve added three tools, all based on the great web services provided by the ESV website, to this blog that each help the reader experience God’s word.

The first is a daily RSS feed of a verse from the ESV Bible, just below the search box on the right side. I learned of this feed from the ESV Bible Blog, which described Paul Klenk’s reasons for displaying the feed on his blog. Paul explains how the feature “sets the tone for all my other content”.

The second, also inspired by Paul’s blog, is a search box for the ESV. You can enter a book, chapter, and verse from the Bible, or keywords from a favorite verse, and the relevant verse(s) will appear in a new window. Thanks Paul!

The third feature is a WordPress plugin, written by Chris Roberts at Exploring the Mystery, that recognizes and formats Bible verses in blog posts. Chris provides a good description of how the plugin works, but as a quick example, by simply including a verse in a post, like Romans 10:9, the plugin will create a hyperlink to the verse at the ESV website. The plugin was easy to install, and Chris’ instructions are clear and easy to follow.

July 27, 2007 | Filed Under Christianity, Blogging | 1 Comment