Beginning at  5:30pm, we will meet at Berean Baptist Church, which is located at 4822 N. Vancouver Avenue  in Portland.

Please bring a dish to share at the potluck and eating utensils for yourself.

This year marks the 2-year anniversary of the John 17:23 Network.

The purpose of  The John 17:23 Network is to “encourage, exhort, and equip the multi-ethnic Body of Christ in the greater Portland area to fulfill Jesus’ prayer in our midst that we might all be one.”

See you Sunday-

At last month’s Justice Conference in Portland, Ore.,

Shane Claiborne, a Christian activist for nonviolence and service to the poor, shared a story of his outreach visit to Iraq during the war.

“We were having a birthday party for a 13-year-old girl when bombs started falling, and we thought we need to end this party, but another girl said ‘Our laughter is more powerful than bombs,’” Claiborne recalled. Later he said, “We need to be known for love.”

Claiborne was joined for his talk at the conference by Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream. Cohen was also against the war, and, though he and Claiborne may not share the same faith, they agree on their belief in nonviolence, which is a justice issue for them.

Said Cohen, “I got the same vision, but I ain’t got the preacher in me.”

He and Claiborne were two of dozens to speak on a variety of justice issues, from war to sex trafficking to poverty to gender equality to race issues. And, though the speakers and attendees hailed from diverse backgrounds, they agreed upon the universal theme of making the world more just.

The second annual Justice Conference drew 4,000 strong, quadrupling the number from last year’s inaugural event in Bend, Ore. And it’s going to the East Coast next year.

Ken Wytsma is the visionary behind the conference, holding last year’s event in the city where he lives and works. He has been teaching classes on justice at Kilns College-School of Theology for years, and he has preached on the topic of justice at Antioch Church, where he is the founding pastor.

But last year he wanted to dive into real life.

“I had a desire to look beyond the text book definition of justice, to actually practicing it,” Wytsma said.

He shared his vision with fellow pastors, teachers, theologians, professors and activists, who then joined him in a conference setting for communal dialogue on what it means to live a just life.

Wytsma’s 2011 Justice Conference convened 1,000 people, with attendees from dozens of countries. Something resonated with those who attended, and he decided to make it an annual event.

This year, the two-day Justice Conference brought people from 41 states and 20 countries. Besides Claiborne and Cohen, other recognized speakers included Miroslav Volf, founder and director of Yale Center for Faith and Culture and Henry B. Wright Professor of Theology, Yale University Divinity School; anti-sex trafficking advocate Rachel Lloyd; Michael Wear and Max Finberg with the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships; spoken word poet Micah Bournes; and John M. Perkins, whose brother was murdered in a racially divided 1950s Mississippi.

“I have long wished for this kind of gathering. Thank God that we have moved to this moment. God is raising up this post-racist generation,” said Perkins.

Stephan Bauman, the CEO and president of World Relief, the co-sponsor with Kilns College of the Justice Conference, believes this could not have happened five years ago.

“There is a tipping point and the information flow is instant. Women have been raped in the Congo for a long time and today we know that. I think this conference is a move of God. Justice is being de-politicized,” said Bauman.

Wytsma couldn’t be more pleased with the response, noting, “It is the right thing at the right time.”

So, why did 4,000 people come to this, a clearly Christian-faith-based conference on justice?

“Because they are courageous and not willing to turn their heads anymore,” Bauman said. And Lynn Hybels, who raises awareness of injustices in Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, thinks that the Justice Conference is resonating with so many because people are searching for depth.

“There is a realization that greed is not all that it is cracked up to be, and that self focus is kind of empty,” she said.

Chinese American author/activist/pastor Francis Chan echoed those words, targeting the older generation: “What are you doing buying all this stuff? Give it away.”

He quoted the Bible verse James 1:27: “This is true and undefiled religion, to take care of widows and orphans,” and offered an example of a 60-year-old couple in his church doing just that, by taking in foster care children.

“That makes sense, based on my reading of the Bible,” Chan said.

Other practical examples of people living out justice were offered, from large humanitarian efforts to neighborhood stories.

Rwandan Celestin Musekura, the founding president of African Leadership and Reconciliation Ministries, Inc., told the audience how he is transforming African communities; Bauman spoke of how World Relief has helped with community banking and small loans for disaster relief in the Congo since 2002; and Lloyd shared stories of girls rescued being trapped in sex trafficking.

Finberg shared how church members stepped forward to serve at a government-funded summer food program for kids: “Government just cannot do it all. We need everyday people and faith based groups have come forward.”

In a panel discussion led by Multnomah Biblical Seminary professor Paul Louis Metzger, Ph.D., John Canda said he is not waiting for government to make a dent in Portland’s gang problem, so he has rallied 100 men to show up weekly with him in a troubled area where youth hang out.

Steve Carter, pastor of Rock Harbor Fullerton Church in California, shared how church members are helping disadvantaged youth start businesses.

And Imago Dei Community Pastor Rick McKinley noted how one lady in his church created art programs for elementary students, one guy fixes things for people at no charge and another group is hosting barbecues for refugees at low-income apartment complexes.

“They don’t understand each other’s language but they are sharing these great meals,” McKinley said.

Food is always a justice issue, and justice does not need an interpreter.

“We are trying to speak the language of our culture addressing justice issues,” said conference founder Wytsma. “Justice is universal, meaning if you labor for justice people will care.”

Said Perkins, “This is a movement happening today. If you follow history, there were awakenings among church people. John Wesley and Wilberforce saw injustices. Concern for the poor came out of Moody Bible Institute. And, the YMCA came out of the church movement. It was there in the past, and now we are getting it back.”

“It is a new day,” said Perkins.

The third annual Justice Conference moves to the East Coast, and is scheduled for Feb. 22 and 23, 2013 in Philadelphia, Pa.

(Originally published March 15, 2012 HUFFINGTON POST- The Justice Conference)

My teenage son walked in the door the other night and told me emphatically that I needed to watch this video on Kony 2012 produced by Invisible Children.   ORIGINAL VIDEO- KONY 2012

Some of the students at his high school are mobilizing to support the movement and its attempts to make Joseph Kony famous/infamous all over the world. Their hope is that the authorities will be able to find and take Kony into custody and bring him to justice before 2012 is over. The movie has already been watched multitudinous millions of times, even though it only aired several days ago.

Who is Joseph Kony? If you don’t know already, he is the leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army. The LRA emerged in northern Uganda. Kony and the LRA have terrified and brutalized villages, slaughtering thousands, kidnapping scores of African children, turning boys into soldiers, and girls into sex slaves over the past few decades in various parts of Africa. Kony has been wanted by the international criminal court since 2005 on charges that include crimes against humanity.

The Invisible Children movement and its Kony 2012 campaign have received widespread critical attention based on their advocacy strategies, accuracy and selection of information, and financial practices and use of funds. You can read more about the movement, as well as Joseph Kony and the LRA, by going to these links:

Invisible Children Info

Invisible Children- Story in Guardian – Facebook

Invisible Children – Huffington Post story

Attention is also given to the movement’s success in mobilizing scores of people, especially youth, to take global civic action to draw attention to Joseph Kony in the effort to bring an end to his reign of terror (here are two links to the movement’s leaders’ interview with Piers Morgan on CNN: Piers Morgan YOU TUBE     Piers Morgan You Tube

By no means am I in a position to give a definitive critical and constructive assessment of Invisible Children and their video, Kony 2012. However, I am able to add additional perspective. Certainly, the nearly half hour movie, Kony 2012, lacks complexity and nuance and sufficient facts, among other things. However, it speaks to a youthful idealism and enthusiasm that young people can make a significant difference in our world today to confront horrific injustices. The movement has garnered support from leading politicians and celebrities. Invisible Children has witnessed Washington and the Pentagon getting involved, no doubt for various reasons, and countless people are now aware of Kony and are longing for him to be brought to justice.The aging cynic in me easily scoffs at youthful naiveté. Instead, I need to encourage that idealism and support it with wisdom. Wisdom without zeal leads to apathy and paralysis, while zeal without wisdom leads to stupid actions being taken. Those of us who claim to possess wisdom must shepherd youthful idealism so that the young idealists become critical idealists, not aging cynics once idealism gets a taste of bitter reality. However, we sagely ones also need shepherding: many of us need a fresh dose of youthful idealism to guard against cynicism taking over our imaginations entirely.

The youth may soon find that Kony and the LRA are rapidly on the decline (long before the movie was aired), that the Ugandan military is not run by the Boy Scouts, that America’s national and economic interests and many politicians’ own political agendas drive a great deal of their involvement rather than global altruism, and that British and Western colonialism’s impact extends beyond the 19^th century to the present. As my Ugandan friend and colleague, Michael Badriaki, says, the British divided up Uganda into north, south, east and west (part of a divide and conquer strategy) under their late rule in the region. The north was often on the losing end of this division because the south possessed so many more resources than the north. The rage that emerged in the north, including the likes of Kony, resulted in large part because of long-standing grievances bound up with widespread imbalances and inequities that the West generated. In the end, the critically-engaged youth may just find that while Kony deserves to be brought to justice, he must not be made to function as a scapegoat (nor as a celebrity, for that matter). Perhaps the movement’s next video will show that in one way or another many parties, perhaps all of us in some way large or small, are goats who need to repent and move forward toward reconciliation that is truly just.

As the complex reality takes hold and the youth become increasingly aware of the situation, my fear is that they, too, may become cynical and be less inclined and hesitant to get involved in the future. As I said above, those of us who are older and who claim to possess wisdom need to shepherd these youth with their idealism. One of the ways that we can shepherd them is to introduce them to Ugandans like Michael Badriaki. In fact, this is what I plan to do: introduce my son and his friends to my long-time friend, Michael, and other African friends like him.

Michael and I are not alone. The film’s narrator, Jason Russell, has a longstanding relationship with a Ugandan youth named Jacob, whose brother was murdered by Kony’s forces. One of the deepest impressions the film made on me is that Jason promised years ago never to abandon Jacob and that he would do everything he could to bring Kony to justice. Regardless of what one makes of Jason’s strategies, one should extol his commitment to his Ugandan friend. How often have I made promises to people, including those of other countries, to stay connected, and have not followed through on my promises? I affirm Jason for his faithfulness to Jacob.

I will affirm Jason and his young American companions all the more when they clearly visualize how much they and we need Jacob and Ugandan youth like Jacob to shape our lives and stories. While I am not saying Jason is to be faulted for his posture, all too often, we Americans portray ourselves as Messiah-like figures who can solve the world’s problems. We should not give up our enthusiasm and idealism that fuel philanthropic service here and abroad. Indeed, we can make a profound difference for the good, if we do things right and wisely. Here is where the problem lies. Often, we act without sufficient sensitivity to conditions on the ground. Our ideals need to be able to fly high yet allow us to scope out the terrain. In this situation, we need Ugandans in the control tower; they will be able to help us land our U. S. and U. N. planes well.

Many past colonialists in Africa saw themselves as bringing good to the Africans, civilizing them, and delivering them from darkness. But they often crashed into villages rather than taxiing down runways. What are the long-term costs for acts of good will that lack sensitivity and that devastate villages and communities as our good will planes burn? Of course, we need to bring about good, but to do so in relationships that entail listening, sharing, and living and dying with and for one another. We must not fly the U. N. planes out of Uganda or Rwanda or elsewhere as soon as the going gets tough for us, as was the case in the account told in the movie, Hotel Rwanda. HOTEL RWANDA

My friendship with Michael Badriaki has taught me so much about what relationships entail, what justice entails, and what our shared faith in Christ entails. I am so in debt to God’s grace revealed to me through my relationship with Michael. He has helped me to get better at landing my plane, and better at staying grounded even while flying sky high with my ideals.

Of course, Joseph Kony must be brought to justice. But we must also be more just in our actions and relations. Inadvertently, I abuse the world’s resources as an all-consuming American. Unintentionally, I take away people’s pride as I throw my education, expertise and resources at problems. As an American, and as an American Christian, I go and “fix” problems. All too seldom do I go and share life and work to heal relationships that include me. When the going gets tough, all too often, I get back on the plane and head home. The Jesus who Michael Badriaki and I worship doesn’t escape. He’ll never leave us, no matter what the U. S. Embassy or U. N. tells us to do. The brother in Jesus I know as Michael teaches me how to live a fuller and more just life.

Social media geniuses like Jason and his colleagues at Invisible Children Social Media Power-Forbes Story  and Foreign Policy experts like President Obama and his advisors will never be able to replace the need for long-neglected relationships involving reciprocity and mutuality with Ugandans for the long-haul. True relationships will not allow us to separate from one another. This is one of the most striking aspects of the video, Kony 2012: Jason and Jacob are still connected, and seemingly far closer than they were when they first met. But still, it seems to me that Jason could advance the relational cause even more if he were to allow Jacob to tell his story for himself on his own terms. The video in question says more about Jason and Invisible Children than it does about Jacob.

Youthful idealists, politicians, and foreign policy experts certainly have their place. So, too, do the rest of us who must shepherd youthful idealists. But let us not forget that the most important people in this conflict are the Ugandans. We must learn to let them tell their story and listen to them share of how they are engaged in addressing the conflict (Please see this powerful video from a Ugandan blogger:  Ugandan Blogger Post)

We need to support these Ugandans in their efforts or we will continue to create cultures of dependency that create a vacuum for other “Konys” to emerge. We also are in need of these Ugandans’ help. In keeping with what was stated above, we need Ugandans to shepherd us, keeping us from taking ourselves too seriously, helping us respond well to the complexities of life, getting us to support the people on the ground in their efforts, building infrastructure with them, and building our own lives along with them. The endgame should also include youthful idealists becoming wise idealists, and foreign policy experts and celebrities, as well as old cynics, becoming actively involved in relational ways. In these various ways, we will guard against other “Konys” rising up and taking over this year and long after 2012 is gone.

Contact Paul Louis Metzger via NEW WINESKINS – Paul Louis Metzger

The Church is located at  9486 N. Buchanan Avenue in Portland. The church phone number is  503-247-8337.

Cliff Chappell will be sharing his  vision for “Man-Up” and  how it will help with the ongoing gang violence issue in Portland.

Says Cliff,  “I believe domestic violence is what fuels many of our problems that we face in our society: addictions, incarceration, suicide especially murder-suicide, fatherlessness and gang-violence just to mention a few.  The vision for Man-Up is an attempt to get out in front of these societal problems instead of reacting to them, by addressing the internal hurts and traumas in the souls of persons and see them healed from the inside out.  So often we address the symptoms of the problem but not the root cause of the problem.  I believe the problems start with trouble in the souls such as loneliness, hurts, trauma, distorted love and the need to be loved and accepted.

This is where Man-Up will focus its work.  Gang members prey on young people with these internal struggles as a major part of their recruiting efforts.”

For questions on Man-Up email Cliff at  cchappell55@msn.com

St John\’s All Nation\’s Church

What does it mean to be a woman? Does it even matter? 

How do these questions bear upon topics such as how we work together in society at large and the church in ways that affirm and promote us in all that God has created us to be? It is so important to seek clarity with civility in pursuit of biblical unity, diversity, and honor in a culture where our beauty as God’s human creation is so often endangered by physical, emotional, and spiritual abuse.

These and other questions will be addressed in  New Wineskins’ Gender  Conference Saturday March 3 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Multnomah Biblical Seminary,  8435 NE Glisan St. in Portland.

Topics  include gender roles, sex trafficking, pornography, gender non-conforming, masculinity, femininity, complementarianism, egalitarianism, the Trinity and gender, gender and social construction, headship, and ethnicity and gender.

For more info visit the New Wine Skin Website-

New Wineskins-Gender Conference

By Cornelia Seigneur

Ken Wytsma has been teaching classes on justice at Kilns College–School of Theology in Bend for years, and he has preached on the topic of justice at Antioch Church, where he is the founding lead pastor.

But last year he decided he wanted to take the topic of justice to the next level. Real life. “I had a desire to look beyond the text book definition of justice, to actually practicing it,” Wytsma said.

He invited speakers, fellow pastors, theologians, professors, and activists to join him in a conference format for a discussion on what it means to live out what they have preached on the topic of justice.

Wytsma simply called his gathering “The Justice Conference,” and it convened about 1000 people in Bend last February, with people attending from dozens of countries. It is now an annual event.

The second annual Justice Conference

that starts Friday is an international two day event sponsored by World Relief and Kilns College bringing together 3500 men and women to discuss and dialogue on issues related to justice, a topic that is not just a passing fad.

This year’s venue for the Friday Feb. 24 and Saturday Feb. 25 event is the Oregon Convention Center in Portland, and will triple the number of the inaugural function. Attendees are streaming to the Rose City from 41 states and over 20 countries, including participants from Asia and Africa.

“It has taken off, the heartbeat of the conference has taken off,” said Wytsma. “It is passion. Justice. The heart of justice. The passion of justice.”

This year’s speakers include civil rights leader and author John M. Perkins

whose book Let Justice Roll Down discusses his return to, and ongoing ministry in, Mississippi, where his brother was murdered; Ben Cohen, founder of Ben & Jerry’s, who will join peace activist Shane Claiborne to discuss “Jesus, Bombs and Ice Cream;” anti-sex trafficking advocate Rachel Lloyd, who was profiled by Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times; Joshua DuBois, the Director of the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships; Francis Chan, the best-selling author of Crazy Love; Richard Twiss, a

Richard Twiss-          Photo-Corrnelia Seigneur

Native American educator, author and activist whose ministry, Wiconi International, is based out of Vancouver, Washington where he lives, and Portland’s own Rick McKinley, lead pastor or Imago  Dei Community.

        Rick McKinley

Locally, 100 pastors have met together to support and promote The Justice Conference. And, the City of Portland has offered a warm welcome, added Wytsma.

With The Justice Conference, he wanted to bring in the best theologians, professors, authors, and activists to dialogue on ‘What does it look like to life a just life? To “getting beyond justice as a cause” to looking at real life stories of “how people are making justice a lifestyle.

For example, how are individuals and groups dealing with the reality of sex trafficking, gangs, race tensions, poverty, gentrification, and immigration?

“It’s easy to call people illegal immigrants or prostitutes, but then we do not connect with their story,” Wytsma said. “When our empathy is not involved we do not see them on the same level.”

“What we are trying to do is connect people to the universal story, the deeper story, that is not just a craze, but something necessary that makes claims on us whether we realize it or not,” Wytsma believes. “Justice is universal, like truth, and is in play all the time.”

One of the local theologians invited, Paul Louis Metzger, Ph.D., Professor of Christian Theology & Theology of Culture at Multnomah Biblical Seminary/Multnomah University, will moderate a panel discussion with leaders of diverse ethnic perspectives, focusing on gentrification and urban renewal.

“We have white justice issues, and justice issues of color. We all tend to pick and choose the justice issues that we find impacting our communities most dramatically,” Metzger said.

Paul Metzger-               Cornelia Seigneur photo

“My hope and prayer is that this conference is moving beyond such compartmentalization, toward a holistic framework for approaching the wide spectrum of issues that we should address as Christ-followers who seek to bear witness to Scripture’s call to be just in all our interactions.

He added, “Everyone is from the state of Missouri, the ‘Show-Me’ state. We need to ‘show’ the faith in which we believe to those who are cynical.”

One of those activists, John Canda, who is living this “Show-Me” life, is on Metzger’s panel. Canda’s 100 Men Campaign in Portland challenges men to “just show up” in order to make a dent in the chronic gang issues of Portland.

Canda said that the congregating of 3000 people to discuss justice is, “extremely significant because after all, we are all in this together. To gather individuals from across the globe to offer their solutions to me is monumental.”

“Justice to me is the belief in, and the practice of, equality for everyone without regard to the color of their skin,” said Canda.

John Canda-          Cornelia Seigneur photo

Wytsma appreciates the diversity of this year’s speaker line up. “Each of these speakers has a different but important take on the topic,” he said.

He is awestruck at the response, with the tripling of the numbers after just one year.

“It has been interesting to see how this thing is taking off. This topic of justice is bringing all these people together,” Wytsma said. “It is neat to see so many people care about justice. This is not a fashion thing, to hang on your Facebook page.”

(The Justice Conference takes place from 8:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Feb. 24-25 at the Oregon Convention  Center)

–For more info, contact http://thejusticeconference.com/

— Cornelia Seigneur: www.corneliaseigneur.com

For two and a half years the big blue rental house next door sat quiet.

Back in 2008, when angry late-night yelling moved out, so did the family that had lived there long before our family moved onto the block.

As it turns out, we knew the yelling far better than the people. Grandma barely gave a look our direction. The teenage girls knocked on the door every few months to borrow our phone when they were locked out. And though we tried making small talk about the weather and their latest jobs before they walked back onto the front porch, it was clear they barely trusted us.

One girl seemed to have a baby that was sometimes with her, sometimes not.

The grandmother and granddaughters left the neighborhood, and the on-again, off-again boyfriends that looked menacingly, lit things on fire and hollered cuss words did too.

So did the sorrow voices that wailed at night.  

It was quiet.

It made me feel sad.

I am still learning what community on this street means.

A few summers ago, I heard that being a good neighbor is partly about just showing up. Paying attention. Refraining from creating an agenda or a get-to-know-everybody-plan. Searching for what God is up to and joining there.

It felt true.

Soon after hearing this, we joined some neighbors to host a block party because the woman across the street (a long-time resident) wanted one last hurrah with the people on our street before she moved to Spain. We shared food. Kids swapped sidewalk chalk and bubbles.

During the party, and for another year after, the rental house on the corner sat quiet.

And then this past spring, the big blue house again filled with sound.

Clamored with unfamiliar words that rose and fell like music, utensils banging against the insides of metal pans, babies crying, drums beating, praise songs echoing from the shower and through the open windows.

The women wore brightly-patterned clothes and smiled. The men nodded respectfully. A young boy came to our backyard and helped us water our growing vegetables, played with our girls on the swing set. They were recent immigrants from the Congo and, just before coming to the United States through the sponsorship of a Portland church, lived in a refugee camp in Tanzania.

We brought them muffins, and they brought us a shiny purple bag filled with giant grapes, fried bread, sparkling cider and a note saying how thankful they were that God had given us to them as neighbors.

A month ago, the matriarch of the family — a woman with a broad smile and strong hands — walked door to door, delivering to the neighbors invitations to her daughter’s wedding.

The family was still barbecuing meat over bricks borrowed from our backyard when we headed to the Pentecostal church across town that looked like a converted bank. White tulle and red roses covered pew ends. Children ran between rows while we all waited for the service to begin.

We waited an hour and a half.

My girls and I took pictures on my phone and played in the church nursery. We talked to young kids.

A handsome African boy introduced himself to my daughters, then turned to me. ”Many people do not realize that being late is a part of the African culture,” the 10-year-old paused dramatically, as if to make sure I understood that this waiting was entirely normal. ”I have a good explanation for why it is difficult for me to make it to school on time.”

At 3:30 in the afternoon, our neighbors and the entire wedding party pulled up to the church in a long white limousine. The mother of the bride wore a cream colored suit that appeared to be second-hand. The young men from next door sported black tuxes with burgundy ties.

Women wearing head wraps and African dresses gathered close together.

Soon, accompanied by modern pop, the bride walked down the aisle to her groom — another recent immigrant to the United States.

The pastor’s sermon was translated into Lingala by a man next to him who held his son close.

When the bride promised to be faithful, to have and to hold, until death do they part, a small bell rang joyfully. When the groom promised the same, another bell rang.

When the pastor spoke of love and commitment, of the joy of marriage, the sanctuary filled with shouts of “Aye Yae-Yae-Yae-Yae-Yae!!”

Pulling out of the church parking lot, we waved to the mother-of-the-bride and her sister. Then, realizing we had not given the young couple their card with money enclosed for their new life together in Georgia, I circled the car around and headed back to our neighbor, standing uncomfortably in high heels.

“Could you give us a ride back to the house?” she asked in broken English.

Our neighbor sat with me up front, and her sister in the back seat next to my three-year-old. I asked their thoughts about the wedding, heard about their love of God and their journey to the United States. Told them how much we’ve loved living next door to their joyful family.

At times it was quiet, but for the sounds of the radio playing low in the background.

I let the women out in front of the big blue house and pulled around the corner. And I said a prayer, thanking God for the opportunity to share space with them and listen.

Share space. Listen. That is beginning to sound and feel more like community to me.

(Originally published in Christianity Today Feb. 16, 2012 – Written by Cornelia Seigneur- Christianity Today- Richard Twiss story by Cornelia Seigneur

When I went to hear Richard Twiss speak at a “Race Talks” event at a popular pub in Northeast Portland, I was struck by how he spoke of his faith.

“I am a follower of Jesus, though I would not call myself a Christian,” Twiss said. On several occasions, Twiss asked the audience to consider their own spiritual journeys. It was remarkable how naturally he turned the conversation to spirituality at a city-sponsored event.

“Native American people are in a unique position to talk about spiritual things while many evangelicals are not,” Twiss explained. “In this context in particular, they would likely be viewed as narrow-minded, religiously intolerant, and self-righteous.”

Twiss, 57, is a member of the Sicangu Lakota Oyate from the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota. His mission, as co-founder and president of Wiconi International, is to foster understanding and reconciliation between Native American people and other sectors of Americans. After years of speaking to national and international audiences, Twiss is turning the focus of his passion for empowering those with diverse backgrounds to his hometown of Portland/Vancouver.

His journey from the Rosebud Reservation landed Twiss and his family in Silverton, Oregon, in 1962, when, in the third grade, he began learning to navigate between two worlds.

In 1972, Twiss returned to the reservation and participated in the takeover of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Office Building in Washington, D.C., with the American Indian Movement, who were protesting the government’s breaking of treaties. During this time, he told me, he started to hate white people and Christianity.

Later, as Twiss began searching spiritually, he dabbled in everything from Hinduism to Buddhism; and, in 1974, he was also presented with the Christian faith while living in Maui, Hawaii.

“I was a beach bum, did drugs, partied, slept on the beach, chased girls, lived off of food stamps, and started over the next day,” he explained.

One day while hitchhiking Twiss was picked up by two evangelicals who shared Christ with him.

“But I didn’t want anything to do with their ‘white man’s’ religion; I cussed them out and told them to let me out.”

Yet, in 1974, alone during a drug overdose in Hawaii, Twiss recalls the words of the Christians. “I yelled at the top of my lungs, ‘Jesus if you are real, would you forgive me, would you come into my life?’ I immediately felt the most peaceful that I have in my entire life.”

Since embracing Jesus, Twiss has been trying to figure out how to live out his faith as a Native American while inspiring others to do the same.

He moved to Alaska where he met his future wife, Katherine, and was ordained through his local church. After moving to Vancouver, Washington, in 1981, he pastored a community church there from 1982 to 1995.

In 1997 he and Katherine founded Wiconi International. With their message of reconciliation, community, and spirituality, Twiss has spoken internationally and nationally , including invitations from Focus on the Family, Campus Crusade for Christ and Promise Keepers. In addition, Twiss has offered diversity staff training for the Immigration and Naturalization Service and he’s spoken as part of auxiliary events at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C.

“He has had an impact around the world,” said Randy Woodley, a Keetoowah Cherokee Indian and director of intercultural and indigenous studies at George Fox Evangelical Seminary in Portland. “Richard is known around indigenous people to challenge them to use their own culture to understand Christ and his kingdom.”

As Twiss has shifted his ministry locally in recent years, it is clear that it takes time to earn a place where one’s voice is heard.

For Twiss, it took significantly reducing his travel and speaking schedule to invest in Portland’s Native community, which he says numbers 38,000.

“Richard expressed a genuine desire to connect with the local Native American community and serve as a connector between individuals and organizations with interests in education, community development, service work, and all around wellness in our community,” said Donita S. Fry, Portland Youth and Elders Council Organizer within Portland’s Native American Youth and Family Center.

As part of his local work, Twiss is a board member of the NAYA Family Center and participates in the Portland Indian Leaders Roundtable, a group of executive directors or senior staff from the 28 Indian organizations located in Portland.

He’s presented an indigenous worldview framework for neighborhood planning for the mayoral staff of Portland, and regularly speaks at local higher education institutions both secular and Christian. He will also be speaking at the upcoming Justice Conference being held in Portland next week.

“The Portland-Vancouver area doesn’t realize what a rich gift this transition is for them,” said Woodley.

Twiss seeks to live out his Christian faith without compromising the protocols of his culture, and emboldens others to do the same.

“Along with many friends, we’re helping to inspire a cultural revitalization within a redemptive biblical framework,” says Twiss. “For the first time Native people could love themselves as Native people, whereas in the past the message was ‘God loves you, but He doesn’t like you. No more drumming music, no more powwows, no more ceremonial traditions of our culture.’”

Today, Twiss also chairs the North American Institute of Indigenous Theological Studies, providing education for the next generation of believers.

Adam Mury, a White Mountain Apache and Ph.D. student at Portland State University, said, “The fact that Richard is a Native who has earned an audience with a diverse group of listeners makes it that much more likely that future audiences will lend an ear to Native voices.”

Christians outside the Native American community have been inspired by Twiss as well. Jane Leong of Portland heard Twiss speak at a missions conference where he appeared in his full Lakota powwow regalia and braids.

“He spoke about how he was taught that God thought his culture was evil. He challenged people to not look at Native Americans stereotypically as just ‘drunks’ or people who need help, but instead as coheirs, co-laborers in God’s kingdom.”

Twiss and his friends led conference attendees for worship to the Creator with powwow drumming, singing, and dancing in full regalia.

“It brought me to tears,” said Leong. “I could picture the Native believers leading us in worship to God in the eternal kingdom.”

After that, Leong said, she began exploring her own Christian practices.

“Minority believers generally take a backseat in the wider Christian community,” she says, “so when Richard was featured in his full ‘Indianess’ as a Christian, it gave me great comfort …. My Chinese culture was not an afterthought of God.”

Twiss’s most recent project is creating The Salmon Nation internship, which launches this August, designed to train future spiritual leaders, business leaders, educators, politicians, and husbands and wives. The Twisses are purchasing a house in Portland near the Native American Youth and Family Center, from which they will serve the Native American community through existing programs.

Interns will volunteer in after-school programs for tutoring and sports, attend powwows, and spend time with native elders, church, government and business leaders.

Twiss said the internship will draw applicants from across the country but the focus of the program is serving the youth, particularly Native American youth, in Portland.

“We are talking about advancing education, culture, family and spirituality; ultimately, we are helping youth navigate the challenges of life successfully.”

Somber statistics for Native American youth is one of the driving motivations for The Salmon Nation, Twiss said.

“The [high school] graduation rate for Native Americans is one of the lowest in the nation, and we have among the highest numbers of kids in the foster-care system in Portland. We have huge economic disparities in Portland,” he said.

One of the projects that interns will undertake is developing an economic plan for the house.

“They have to have the skills to succeed in that world rather than feel victimized by it, so they will work with business leaders in the community in actually developing a business plan,” explained Twiss, noting that the details will largely depend upon the students.

Interns will also minister to the elderly, such as providing transportation for medical services.

“We want to serve the entire community, from youth to the elders, because that is how the community works,” Twiss said. “We want to ask the question, ‘How can a Christ-follower engage in loving conversation with those who differ religiously, culturally and ideologically?”

Richard has been able to energize that conversation, from Portland Oregon to Portland Maine, no matter the venue.

“Richard can speak with integrity as a follower of Christ, [even] in a bar,” said Woodley of his friend. “That’s the magic.”

Christianity Today- Richard Twiss story by Cornelia Seigneur

Cornelia Seigneur Website

Bob Wall will speak  about his experiences working with gang prevention communities in Portland.

Please plan to join us for this informal coffee gathering.

Regular formal gatherings next month, on Sunday March 11.

This evening, we have gathered together to remember, celebrate and act upon the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

We have unfinished business to which we must attend.

God is not finished with Dr. King’s vision being lived out in our midst. We have his God-given vision to fulfill. It is one of the greatest honors of my life to be asked to give this address.

For one, Dr. King  is one of my heroes for reasons that I will soon share. Moreover, so too is Dr. Leroy Haynes, Jr., Senior Pastor of this historic sanctuary and faith community, Allen Temple Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. Dr. Haynes has been a prophetic voice of constancy for justice in a culture ceaselessly consumed not by rights but by opinion polls, passing fancies, and profit margins. I wish to thank Dr. Haynes, Dr. T. Allen Bethel, Bishop Grace Osborne, Bishop-Elect Pastor William Turner, Reverend Clifford Chappell and other leaders here for their passionate commitment to the Lord Jesus and his kingdom values as modeled by his servant, Dr. King. To share in their struggle and all of you in the struggle for justice as African Americans is a gift from God to me. Tonight is one momentous moment and mile marker for me in that drum major march toward justice.

As individuals and as a community, your passion and commitment to the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. far outweigh my own. You live it daily. I share these reflections on the life and legacy of Dr. King given how much they challenge me personally and how much you have shaped me. I hope you find these meditations to be of some value and encouragement: your efforts in reaching out to me and the white Evangelical Christian community of which I am a member are making a difference. The irony is that we in the white Evangelical Christian community have only recently begun engaging in significant ways on matters of injustice that concern us all. And yet, we often think and operate as if we are the ones leading the charge. Please forgive us for our arrogance. Please keep modeling for us how to run this marathon race of justice and lead us forward to build the beloved community.

Dr. King was more than a Christian professional. He was a prophet. In fact, he sacrificed his profession for his prophetic call. Our society talks a great deal about making a profit, but not nearly enough about being prophetic. King, however, taught us how to be prophetic. King was a true prophet. He called people back to God’s Word and to our nation’s highest ideals, and he laid down his life to make it happen. Like Moses of old who led Israel to the Promised Land, King led his people at great sacrifice to himself. Just as Moses would die before the people entered the land, so King died before his people would enter the land.

Both Moses and King looked over the Promised Land and they overlooked themselves while caring for the people’s needs. King had more than a professional career. He had a prophetic calling. As in the case with all great leaders, the concern for the people far outweighed his own self-concern. How are we wired? What wins out in our lives? Self-concern to do more than make ends meet and to make it big, or concern to make things right for the people around us who are in distress?

 One of the most vivid examples of King putting his prophetic call and the people before his profession and his personal life is an event early on in the civil rights struggle. In 1956, during the Montgomery Bus Boycott, King came home late one night after a civil rights meeting. His family was asleep. The phone rang. King answered. The person on the other end of the line told him that he had better get out of town or he would be dead. After the person hung up, King recalls making himself a cup of coffee in the kitchen and sitting down at the table. He writes:

“I was ready to give up. With my cup of coffee sitting untouched before me I tried to think of a way to move out of the picture without appearing a coward…And I got to the point that I couldn’t take it any longer. I was weak…With my head in my hands, I bowed over the kitchen table and prayed aloud. The words I spoke to God that midnight are still vivid in my memory: ‘Lord, I’m down here trying to do what’s right…Now, I am afraid…The people are looking to me for leadership, and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter. I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I’ve come to the point where I can’t face it alone.’”

At that instance, King recalls, “I experienced the presence of the Divine as I had never experienced Him before.” King writes, “It seemed as though I could hear the quiet assurance of an inner voice saying: ‘Martin Luther, stand up for righteousness. Stand up for justice. Stand up for truth. And lo, I will be with you. Even until the end of the world’…Almost at once my fears began to go. My uncertainty disappeared. I was ready to face anything.” (The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., ed. Clayborne Carson {New York: Warner Books, 1998}, pp. 77-78.)

A few days later his home was bombed. Providentially, no one was hurt. Still, King knew that the day would come when he would meet the assassin’s bullet for meeting the people’s needs. Still, he marched on: the concerns of the people far outweighed his own self-concern. What about us? What bears the greatest importance in our lives? What preoccupies our attention—concern for the people or our own self-concern as professors, pastors, politicians, and people of various other professions? Remember Dr. King’s life. Celebrate his calling. And act it out. We have his God-given mission to fulfill.

 I first read this account during my visit to the King Center in Atlanta several years ago. I was struck by the profound prophetic life of Dr. King and my own pettiness. How often have I cared for my profession over against my prophetic call to give myself to the orphans and widows in their distress? (James 1:27) How about you? I will ask the same kind of questions of us, after I discuss King’s legacy in terms of his ideals.

Dr. King was about rights, but he was also about more than rights. He was about building beloved community that would benefit all people across the ethnic and economic spectrum. Just as there are far too many people concerned with their careers, and not callings to care for others, so too there are far too many people in our society concerned for their special interest groups rather than the common good and greater good of all. King was not simply about rights for his own people. He was about reconciliation that entailed justice for all people. That is why he said that he had a dream that “one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.”

King had a dream “that one day the state of Alabama, whose governor’s lips are presently dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, will be transformed into a situation where little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as sisters and brothers.” (Taken from “I Have A Dream”; http://www.mlkonline.net/dream.html; accessed on 1/16/12).

 King’s love of rights for all people and the right to love all people were powerful and omnipresent ideals that energized King’s quest for building beloved community. As King said in a sermon at Christmas in 1957 at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, “To our most bitter opponents we say: ‘We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We shall meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws because noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. Throw us in jail and we shall still love you. Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and we shall still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you. But be ye assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer. One day we shall win freedom but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process and our victory will be a double victory.’” (http://salsa.net/peace/conv/8weekconv4-2.html; accessed on 1/16/12; italics added)

Such conviction, courage and compassion flowed from Jesus’ call to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:44). The late Evangelical Anglican statesman John R. W. Stott claimed that King was the greatest model of Jesus’ ethic disclosed in this text in the modern age (“The Message of the Sermon on the Mount {Matthew 5–7}: Christian Counter-Culture,” The Bible Speaks Today {Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1978}, 113).

Do we have these same ideals?

Do we love our enemies?

Do we so wear them down with our love that we don’t simply win freedom for ourselves, but also freedom for them and for those who do not belong to our socio-economic and ethnic groupings, winning a double victory in the process?

A lack of practical love so often shapes my life. An unwillingness to reach out and forgive and accept forgiveness and move toward reconciliation and commitment to all people for the cultivation of the beloved community.

If Dr. King could forgive his white oppressors for the horrific harm they did to him, his family and his community, I can certainly forgive those hostile toward me. Otherwise, I have no business being here this evening paying tribute to King. Each of us must ask ourselves if we are sons and daughters of the King of kings and Lord of lords and servants of the King of Dr. King, or sons and daughters of thunder, like John and James who wanted to call down fire on a Samaritan town that opposed Jesus and his message (Luke 9:51-56). Jesus rebuked James and John for it. And he so often rebukes me, too.

 While Dr. King demonstrated incredible social etiquette in his public personae, there was nothing charming about the racism and classism he gave himself so tirelessly to address. And while he was engaged in battle at every turn, he fought hate with love. King was about the power of love, not the love of power. He was about redemption, not retribution. We must continue this fight. We will never attain the beloved community in Portland and the surrounding region if we do not continue to keep in place Dr. King’s inspiring ideals, vision, and exemplary life.

 In Oregon and Washington, we don’t face racism in the same way as King did in the South. We approach it differently, but not necessarily more redemptively. What was said by black leaders of the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s still rings true today: “In the South, the white man doesn’t care how close you get, as long as you don’t get too high. In the North, he doesn’t care how high you get, as long as you don’t get too close.”

For all our tolerance in the Pacific Northwest, such tolerance does not translate all that well into love. Love is tenacious. It does not endure “the other.” It pursues life together with the other. As the Apostle Paul writes, ^“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).

 “I would rather be loved than tolerated,” I once heard someone say. I am so thankful that John 3:16 does not say, “For God so tolerated the world that he chose not to send his Son.” Rather, it says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son” for us so that we might find eternal life through faith in him. God did all this, even though he knew the world would reject his love and hang his Son on the cross. Still, God’s love pursues us and breaks through our hate to transform our hearts and lives.

Will we respond to God’s love and love where there is hate? King did not simply tolerate people, including his enemies. He tenaciously loved them so that they would become his friends, and so that they could build the beloved community together.

 So, what does the beloved community look like, and what is the unfinished business to which we must attend in light of King’s life and legacy? The beloved community is a community of love and justice and peace and equality that breaks through the chains of racism and classism and abuses of various kinds. Beloved community requires that we connect the dots of those things that destroy beloved community and come together in solidarity to consume those dots and connections, just as King did. We learn a bit of how to connect the dots from Dr. King.

In King’s sermon on his opposition to the Vietnam War (delivered at the Ebenezer Baptist Church on April 30, 1967; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b80Bsw0UG-U&feature=player_embedded; accessed on 1/16/12), King spoke of the slave triangle of “poverty, racism and militarism.” King maintained that this triangle was enslaving America. Today, we are fighting a war right here in Portland with gang activity and violence. How will we fight it? What is involved? King’s opposition to the Vietnam War (not an opposition to the men and women laying down their lives) was based on conviction, not opinion polls, and it lost him a great deal of support in certain quarters, even among people who had celebrated his leadership in the civil rights movement.

But King connected the dots and saw that the war taking away from the civil rights struggle, dramatically draining the fight against the war on poverty for blacks and whites, and sending the poor in far higher proportion than the rich to fight the war in Vietnam. Many people could not connect the dots that King did in speaking of the relation of poverty, racism, and militarism. But he was right to make such connections in his efforts to build solidarity and the beloved community.

 In our day, we must connect the dots of problems like unequal access to quality education and economic inequality to the problem of gang violence. We must also connect the dots of the negative forces of gentrification to gang violence. According to a professor of urban studies at Portland State University, for many African Americans in Portland, urban renewal is Negro removal. Such vulnerability and transiency, where people are uprooted from their communities, makes a damaging difference.

We must also connect the dots involving these problems to a prison system so often based on retribution, not reformation. How are people to be reintroduced to society and make a vital contribution to society if they are never prepared to become vital participants and welcomed back through networks of support? We must come together to right the wrongs of a prison system that enslaves black men (it has been argued that the percentage of black men in prison far outweighs their proportionate presence in society).

We must also attend to the fatherlessness so rampant in our society. Do we honor the fathers and mothers in the home, the fathers and mothers in our churches, and the fathers and mothers in our society as a whole? We must make sure everyone is welcome at the table of beloved community and make sure that we bring honor not simply to Dr. King but to the fathers and mothers and sons and daughters who have marched in the band that King led as a drum major for justice. These marchers are here this evening. They include you. We must support one another in the ongoing efforts to build beloved community in our day.

 A political leader responsible for building vital connections between the faith community and civic leaders and activists in Portland asked me this past week: “Why don’t the white evangelical Christians and white Christians generally concern themselves with gang issues? Why is it simply an African American concern in so many quarters?

The white Evangelical Christian community is rightly concerned for addressing homelessness and the sex trade, but is not involved by and large in building the infrastructure that will bring an end to all the gang violence in our community,” this leader said. I responded by saying that it is because we in the white Christian community—especially white Evangelical Christian community of which I am part—does not connect the dots very well.

We do not see that all these forces have a bearing on one another. Nor do we think that the African American community’s concerns are our own. Nor do we sense that we ourselves—I myself—have been guilty in part of creating the vacuum and fragmentation that leads to gang activity and violence. For if I benefit from a system that keeps people underprivileged and do nothing to change the structures, I am causing that destructive system to become further entrenched and to expand. All it takes for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing. We must connect these various dots. Not only must we connect the various dots, but also we must become more connected to one another if we are to carry out Dr. King’s vision and build the beloved community. Each sphere is related to all the others, and so we must address them together, all of us together.

 We must continue to support the life and legacy not only of Dr. King but also of the late Rob Ingram, and his living contemporaries Robert Richardson, John Canda, Mark Strong, Clarence Larkin and the African American leaders in this sanctuary. We must continue to work with our political leaders and support them in their various efforts to bring an end to the violence and build the beloved community.

We must show gratitude to the often thankless labors of love of mothers who serve their families so sacrificially, fathering their children, holding down multiple jobs, teaching their children the value of hard work and how to stretch a dollar and stretch a hug to heal a family and a community. As someone once said, mothers are the cradle of our civilization. We must support them and learn from them and from the civil rights movement. In the civil rights movement, the people did not have much by way of financial resources. They had to stretch their resources, but they had one another. Look what they were able to accomplish as they stretched out their arms to heal their communities!

 What kind of leaders and community will we be and become? What kind of community will we build? Will we follow through on our prophetic calling to build beloved community and break through the divisions in our society together, divisions that are symbolized and further solidified by the gang violence tearing through our community? We must remember, celebrate, and act. We still have unfinished business to which we must attend. We have Dr. King’s Spirit-inspired vision to fulfill.

*This document is the final written version of the text that served as the basis for the keynote address.