The Ethiopian Church Journal Blog

Being the People of God Interview with Dr. Girma Bekele - Final   You raise liberation theology. Perhaps you had in mind the argument for God’s “preferential treatment for the poor.” The same God who dealt compassionately with Hagar, however, was also compassionate to Abram. Should we not be wary of overemphasizing God’s charity to those on the margins and not also to those at the center blighted by sin no less? Not just structural sin and liberation but also personal sin and conversion? Don’t you see how theologians often are found romanticizing the poor. God’s mission is intrinsic to his being as a compassionate God and the God of the god-forsaken. The Bible declares: “For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, who executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and who loves the strangers, providing them food and clothing. You shall also love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of

By RA Torrey, 1856-1928 [Revival Addresses] You and I some day must meet this holy God. The prophet Amos cries, “Prepare to meet thy God!’ (Amos 4, 12). Every man and woman here must some day meet God. The rich man must meet God! The beggar must meet God! The scholar must meet God! The illiterate man must meet God! The nobleman must meet God! The king must meet God! The emperor must meet God! Every one must meet God! The supreme question of life, then, is this: Are you ready to meet God? None of us can tell how soon it may be that we shall meet God. The king of Spain, as the bulletins flashed across the wires to-night, has been very near meeting his God to-day. Some of us may meet Him within the next twenty-four hours; more within the year; many more within five years; and within forty years almost every man and woman in this audience will have met God. Are you ready? If not, I implore you to get ready before leaving this hall tonight.   How can we meet God with joy and not with dism

 A Christian Vision of Beauty "A Christian understanding of beauty runs directly into the wisdom of the age by suggesting that the beautiful is simultaneously the good and the true and the real . This goes all the way back to the conversation of the ancients—especially to Plato, who understood the good, the beautiful, the true, and the real as being essentially reducible to the same thing. If there is one good, then that good must also be the true, which must also be the real, which must also be the beautiful. So the good, the beautiful, the true, and the real— the four great historical transcendentals—are unified in the One. For Plato, however, the One has no name... Augustine, the great theologian of the Patristic Era, identified the One as the one true and living God. Taking Plato’s metaphysical speculations into the very heart of the gospel, Augustine suggested that Christians uniquely understand that the good, the beautiful, the true, and the real are indeed one, becau

They Have Together Become Corrupt The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, and their ways are vile; there is no one who does good. God looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. Everyone has turned away, they have together become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one. Will the evildoers never learn-- those who devour my people as men eat bread and who do not call on God? Psalm 53:1-4 "Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other. Is 45:22 This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: "In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it. Isaiah 30:15

Being the People of God Interview with Dr. Girma Bekele - Part ll Before proceeding with the next portion of the interview, do you mind clarifying your response on the oft-repeated “religious freedom” in our country in light of state-church relations stated in Paul’s letter to the Romans, Chapter 13? It is unlikely that the Ethiopian church will find herself again facing state enforced persecution. Certainly, not to the degree comparable to those dark years of the communist regime. And it is my prayer that this freedom will last and be used effectively. Regardless, the church should be true to herself and her mission “in season and out of season” [2 Tim. 4:2]. Her freedom would be meaningless, and in fact, unbecoming, when she behaves contrary to her identity as the unique community of God.  The church should not seek to please powers nor should she blindly endorse socio-economic and political programs without due scrutiny just for the sake of ‘freedom’. A shallow

Revival Addresses by R.A. Torrey [d. 1928] The first thing the Bible teaches us about God is that God is. “God is”—two short words. Tremendous significance! “God is.” If that simple truth gets hold of your mind and heart it will move and mold your entire life. It will determine your science, it will determine your philosophy, it will determine your daily life, it will determine your eternity. “God is.” The psalmist tells us in Psalm 14.—“The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.” Please note where he says it—“in his heart.” That is, he says there is no God simply because he does not wish to believe that there is a God. Now, there is a God, and a man that denies a fact simply because he does not wish to believe it is a fool. There is abundant proof of the existence of God, so abundant that no man can sit down and consider the proof thoroughly and candidly without acknowledging the existence of God. Nature proves the existence of God. All through Nature there are marks of creat