When God Says:“Excuse-me?”

I believe in miracles!
What is a miracle but a divine intervention in human history?
That’s why I believe even more. I believe that sometimes we are surprised by miracles without even realizing. Our day-to-day is full of God’s care. God is in control of our history and this is one of my greatest certainties: the universe is not like a runaway train… it walks up the rails of divine sovereignty. There is a loving God that rules and relates with the world he created. There is a Father that takes care of his children and for sure he wants their best.
It was the incarnated God himself, Jesus, who said: “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?” (Matthew 7:11).
The problem is in the very fact that theory is too easy to be said, preached  and taught, but too far to be experienced by us, who so like to exalt the “sovereign God”. Our words and songs about God’s wisdom and sovereignty are not consistent many times to our willingness to dominate our own lives.
We have the natural tendency to move away from God, to declare independency from his will and to walk our own paths.  It was like this in Eden and so it is until today. And the consequence, millennia later, still is the same: death!
Not only physical death, but the death of dreams, projects and wills. It’s unbelievable how we don’t enjoy God’s blessings (peace, happiness, delight, etc) for we establish our will superior than God’s. We make our plans and don’t consult God. And some, for the sake of conscience, say a prayer when they already made their decision (without prayer) what to do. We are hypocrites… in fact we already made our decision but still want a “stamp” from God for our human plans.
Some time ago I read a book that which is a Christian Best Seller, “The Power of Your Words”, one of the worst and most poisonous books I ever read that calls itself Evangelical. This book goes far from what the Bible really teaches about God’s sovereignty. At some point of the book, I remember I read something we could call “Blank Check Theology”. As if God would give a sheet of blank signed check for us to write whatever we wanted and God would have the incumbency to answer.
What the Bible teaches about God’s sovereignty and Christ’s Lordship is exactly the opposite. We are those who sign the “blank check” and deliver it in God’s hands as if we were saying: “take it Lord, that’s my life”. That’s what the psalmist says in one of the most known Psaltery’s verses: “Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in Him; and He shall bring it to pass”. He is the one who does the work.
I firmly believe that in certain moments God intervenes and says: “Excuse me? From here on I take care of it!” And he does that for so many times for we are reluctant to surrender totally to him the control of our lives. Deep inside (though our word and songs say something else) we think we know better than God what we really need. We knock down God’s will. The result is always the same: tragedy!
“To man belongs the plans of the heart, but from the Lord comes the reply from the tongue.” (Proverbs 16:1) God’s word is clear. As it would say a Brazilian football arbitration commentator: “The rule is clear”. And it’s so clear that we can’t even understand. We like to complicate simple things. The gospel is something simple: it is Christ being the Lord in our lives. It’s God intervening in our history, making our lives a daily miracle. God wants to give the best to his kids, it suffices that we open our hearts and our will to his Lordship, to his command and to his sovereignty.
God is in control! He is totally sovereign! He, more than anybody, wants to intervene in our lives and take our heart’s throne. So let’s trust for “Since ancient times no one has heard, no one has perceived, no one has seen any God besides you, who acts in behalf of those who wait for him” (Isaiah 64:4).
In him who was made flesh, and because of his intervention the history of humanity was divided in before and after him,
José Barbosa Júnior

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Brazil is a Country that Provokes

“I came to the midst of my life tired

I walked so much! I got tired!

Of a strange country that I never saw

I’m in this huge world an outcast.”

(Florbela Espanca)

Brazil is a country that provokes mixed feelings. There are reasons of honor in being Brazilian however the dishonor reasons prevail in the balance. There are many people who don’t conform before the chaotic Brazilian State. I know that the majority lacks the critical size to refute the contrasts of our country and in case they have it, they don’t use it.

I didn’t even come to half of my life and already I feel tired. I didn’t even walk a lot bur feel tired. What I know is as if I knew nothing. To live here is totally strange. I have opposite feelings. T he country of diversity, of exuberant nature, of human warmth and joyful spirit attracts me. However, I reject the country of impunity, of bribe, of social disparity, of scrapped education. I’m tired of knowing that nothing will change for many are those who feed this system. Convenience lone is a strong fuel for the maintenance of this status quo.

But change is possible. And it must start from education. Educated people change any deplorable state of reality. The question is that there are many informed people out there but poorly educated. People who form, obtain information, but do not transform. Diploma does not educate anyone. Brazil needs civilized people on the streets, the roads, trades, congress, hospitals, churches, schools. Never before the number of colleges was so great in this country, yet, education was never so infamous. Education that civilizes people is missing in Brazil. It doesn’t work for us to have many superior level institutions graduating thousands of people every year if the civilization level among the graduated population still is lower than the necessary to keep an ethic society, cohesive and well structured.

In case the reads gets interested, look for data on violence, corruption, health and education. According to IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics), Brazil has a big number of illiterate, in the order of 14, 1 millions (people with 15 years old or more), what corresponds to a rate of 10% of the population. We have enough reasons to worry. We cannot believe the welfare programs. We cannot believe the deceiving publicity. We cannot believe the utopian Program to Accelerate the Growth when the majority of the job they promised is stoppage.

I make an appeal to the youth: let’s not accommodate, on the contrary, let’s feel bothered. Let’s not be busy with the pleasures of this life but let’s be responsible for life as well. We need the balance between pleasure and responsibility. Let’s associate ourselves to those groups that fight this country’s evils. In our society, in our neighborhood, in our church, anywhere, there is always a way to denounce, a way to be and make different. Let us remember: only the thinking beings are provoked.

Ivan Cordeiro is 26 and is an administrator and theologian who live in Vitória da Conquista-BA. He is responsible for the websites www.bomlider.com.br and www.ivancordeiro.blogspot.com.

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Who is not found by grace… end up hunting God!

…and there came the man, at the dusk, at the cool of the day, rummaging through bushes and branches from bigger trees, when all of the sudden, the prey was made by unsuccessful: “I got you, God! What a shame! Are you running away from me?”

We all know that it was not like this, but this is the scene that comes to my mind when I hear the term “God’s hunter”. A cornered, God with nowhere to run but to the arms of the one who will welcome him. Reversed roles? Of course! Distorted word? Undoubtedly!

Man, who were always seeking God, always “hunting” God… and all his attempts to pursue the divine element inexorably ended up in religion. This is religion: man seeking God, seeking his desperately on his own efforts and sacrifices, in the attempt to shut this same God to his system of rites, doctrines and human conventions.

Religion is, therefore, inherent to the human being. The existential void, the black hole in the soul that looks for something to fill it, are all calls for religiosity. It does not come as if it was salvation to man. Man doesn’t surrender himself in his sought for God, making him the prey, the goal to be reached, hit and then imprisoned, under your whims and pleasures.

Instructions given to God, decrees on which God is nothing more than a servant, prayers that command God’s arm, magical words that “release” God’s power, it’s ok for witches, masters,  bishops or apostles. Witchcraft will always be witchcraft, doesn’t matter from where it comes, especially from the representatives of religion.

Evangelical witchcraft isn’t different. It comes from the presumption of some that with magical words (gospel abracadabras) to manipulate God’s arm. God, then, according to his “theology”, faces himself obliged to do whatever his “prophets” command.

God is imprisoned!

God is cloistered!

God was hunted!

God is dead!

I seems like Nietzsche was right. God is dead! We killed him!

But there is something new, always new. It’s called gospel. And gospel is something totally different from religion. Religion enslaves, the gospel is the good news of freedom… it’s the good news!!! Always new… always renewed!

Gospel happens backwards, in the opposite of religion. In the cool of the afternoon, in the absence of color for the continuing of the day it’s God who takes initiative: “Adam…where are you?”  This is gospel, this is grace!

Man sinned… Adam sinned… I sinned in Adam. But God… and this “but” make all difference. This “but” is the difference between religion and the graces’ gospel. We were dead in our offenses and sins, but God… and this changes history.

The initiative for hunting is his! And this is not a hunt to exterminate the hunted object. We are a target of God’s love. This hunt is what brings us life! We are hunted for live and not for death. Salvation was, is and will always be God’s initiative. Cross resonates since eternity… over the manger in Bethlehem was already looming the shade of a cross, the cross prepared since eternity and over it the lamb sacrificed for us since the world’s foundation.

This is grace! I don’t deserve it… I don’t look for it, I don’t hunt God. He loves me… looks for me… finds me… opens his arms for me… and I just rest in him… and the work he keeps on doing until his own day.

I was seduced… I let myself be seduced!

I was bound in his grace!

I was cloistered in his freedom, there is no way not to be free!

I was hunted in the cool of the day… I don’t know what night is without him.

I’m dead!

He is alive in me!

God is alive!

The Bible is always right! My redeemer lives… and in the end he will stand upon the earth.

Why do I need religion if I have the gospel of grace?

With loving care,

In him, grace was made a person.

José Barbosa Júnior.

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Turbocharged Generation

We live the era of specializations. The post modern legacy brings us as a gift in all its content the personalization, or, better yet, the specialization. It’s not enough to be simple, it must have specialty. Time signs, some say. Modernity, others say. Whatever it is, one thing is right: that’s reality!

Nobody anymore looks for, for example, a general practitioner. The right thing to do is to look for the “pinkie finger” specialist for the left foot, for if you are not careful you may end up going to the “big finger” specialist for the right foot. If we go deeper, this specialization will inexorably lead to individualization. And the individualization leads to arrogance and isolation. Thus, we enter the postmodern whirl. Everyone does what they want… buy what they want… and there are goods for every taste. If today someone thinks of buying a green anise-flavored in a yellow packing, if they look for it, they will find. If they don’t, just contact the Customer Service Department of the company, if you are in the mood. The company will make your custom chocolate just to win over a customer. Is that good? Yes, it is! When it comes to business, yes! But when it comes to church…

We are living the accessories era, which is a reflection of individuality. Do you want to have a basic car (from the masses) or do you want accessories (from the individual)? Do you want a factory model, those that anybody can have, or you pay more to have a car with windshield wiper, double rubber and integrated perception rainfall system?

As a friend of mine who also is a journalist, Fábio Nazareth would say (to whom I owe the idea of this text), it’s like buying hot-dog at anybody’s hot-dog’s cart: “do you want just ‘bread and sausage’? (basic model)”, “or the madam wants it ‘complete’ (with the accessories)?”. For the accessories you understand corn, peas, mayonnaise and many other things that can “enrich” the sandwich.

A great fast-food Brazilian company (though it’s fast-food it’s Brazilian), to try to conquer the market against the main competitor, which is foreign, announces that “here you make the sandwich!” In the end what matters is to offer “something else”, or, in the business language, your Company’s differential. Good for business… bad for churches…

Even the women today don’t complain that much about the “misfortunes” in their bodies. Little breast? Turbine them! Shriveled “bum”? We fix it! Then they are all happy… feeling like they were Danielles Winnittz and Sheilas Mellos, ready to be the object of the most various xebecs that they themselves reject, but enjoy listening to. Nowadays we no longer know who the originals are… I’m not questioning if the woman is or not supposed to put silicone implants, it’s up to them, do not condemn yourself by what you approve. Good for women? Maybe! An example for churches? Not so…

We are living the turbocharged generation! It’s not worth it to be basic. You have to be “fashion” You have to have something more… the differential!

And that’s how it starts (or continues) our NONFEPC (NONsense FEstival Plaguing the Churches), the “gospel” version for  the NONsense FEstival Plaguing the Country, from the time of dictatorship, since everything now (good or bad) has to have a “gospel version”.

We are no longer looking for a simple worship. It has to be a “prophetic” worship. Though the praise is directed to God, and for God we do not prophecy, for all prophecy ends in him, there we go… what matters is to turbine.

I no longer want to be a common worshiper I have to be a Levite worshiper, though this “caste” no longer exists. Even though the Levites cease existing, when the temple stops being just the building to be the body and the priest stops being the leader, we all experience the blessings of being ourselves the real priesthood.  

I don’t look for a simple church anymore, but for a church with “purposes”. Nevertheless, a church with no purpose is not a church! If there are no purposes, what are we doing there? Am I on purpose in a church with no purposes? What’s the purpose on that?

Churches’ war for merchandising is something lurid. Churches sell themselves as beer brands. One “goes down round” the other one is “the one that everyone deserves” there is also another that is “the number one” and so on…

Nowadays churches are coupling titles on their names.

This Church – the one that lives by faith! Of course it does. If not it wouldn’t be a church.

X Church – the communion church! If there is no communion is there church?

Y Church – the church with the Lion’s face… the church is supposed to have the Lamb’s face for we are given to death everyday just as sheep to the slaughter… at least that ‘s what the Bible says…

So and so Church – a word’s church. The church that cherishes for the word doesn’t have to announce it on the label, the people will see it. It will be an honored church will fall in the sympathy of the people or in total persecution because of its faithfulness that bothers. But it’s not needed a neon label but people for they truly live the gospel. This works better than any propaganda.

A Church – the church that has wings like an eagle! The church was not called to have wings like an eagle, but legs like a man. Blessed are the FEET of those who announce peace! The word says that he who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow… not he who goes soaring… the church is called the follower of the Way… and this is the way we have to walk…

Today there is no more simple adoration. We have “war worship”, making us more bellicose than we already are… and fighting for peace.

We no more want the sheep shepherd but the nation’s apostle.

It does not serve to worship in Spirit and in truth but to do the “extravagant worship”, that from extravagant turns to be extra leaking, leaking from all sides the biggest quirks in God’s name, whom we are supposed to worship not with extravagance but with a contrite and sincere heart.

God’s Logos does not make that sense as positive’s confession’s Rhema: that’s the turbocharged word! The word itself is not enough… it must have the “revelation”.

But … I still believe we can go back to pure and simple Christianity… there are more than 7.000 that didn’t bow down to the turbocharged Baal.

I just don’t want to see, in a feel years, an advertising showing a malnourished turtle saying: “I’ve already done many TV commercial… but at that time they just wanted to know about numbers, lions, bears, eagles and some other animals… but it sucks!”

And actually it really does!

A hug,

José Barbosa Júnior – With no adds.

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The Last Shall be the First

It was harvest time for an agribusiness that produced wine. The owner came out to the streets early in the morning to hire workers to pick grapes in his vineyard. After combining with them 40 reais per day, he sent them into his vineyard. At about nine in the morning, while walking through the square, he saw other standing idle workers waiting for service and sent them into his vineyard after it was agreed with them that it would be paid what was fair. At midday, the owner found other workers in the same condition and told them the same thing he had said to the previous ones: go into the vineyard and I will pay you what is fair. At three o’clock p.m., the same thing happened, other workers were in the street waiting for work and the owner also signed them by promising what was fair. In the evening, at five, the owner was surprised to find unemployed workers in the street. Then he asked them “why did you spend the whole day there without working?” and they answered  “it’s because no one hired us”. “So you’ve just been hired”, said the owner. Let’s walk, go pick grapes in the vineyard.

At the end of the day, at six o’clock, the owner called the manager and asked him to pay the all the workers the same ammount with no differende between those who started first from those who started last. Then the manager, at the behest of the owner, paid the employees that started at five in the afternoon the same as the morning laborers had agreed to start working in the morning, 40 reais. When the other workers came to receive their payment, they were certain to receive more because if the last men had worked only one hour and received forty, then logically those that started at three o’clock would probally receive 120 reais. Those that worked since midday, 240 reais and the first group would make the fantastic ammount of 480 reais, which would mean that the values were proportional to the amount of hours they worked.

However, all of them received the same 40 reais which was the agreed amount for the service of a day. Then they gor outraged and complained to the owner, alleging that  they had worked much more than the last group and had received the same ammount of them. In response, the owner said  “didn’t I arrange with you to pay forty reais? Why  do you complain if I’m acting with justice and kindness?. I want to give to those who worked only one hour the same that I gave to you who have worked all day, because in fact they have suffered much more than you. They spent the day with anxiety and distress, concerned about returning to their homes without what they need for survival of their families, while you in the first hours of the morning had been reassured by being hired. All  of you deserve what is necessary for survival, so I paid the same to all  and acted with true justice”.

The story we’ve just read was told many, many years ago to a Jewish community converted to Christianity. The evangelist Matthew wrote this narrative to try to explain to those Christians what is the Kingdom of God and what is it’s Kingdom’s logic. The evangelist taught that  in the Kingdom of Heaven, the first shall be the last and the last one, shall be the the first. This seemed to be awkward to that audience with Jewish background, who considered themselves privileged before God, as they were part of the chosen nation.

Perhaps the greatest hindrance to our Christian walk is exactly because we haven’t understood the logic of God’s Kingdom. We didn’t understand yet how this should be: the last being the first and the first being the last. The Kingdom of God, unlike our world,  is a Kingdom of union, equality, sharing, cooperation, coexistence, inclusion and plural. The Kingdom of God is first of all a Kingdom of grace! In it there is no hierarchy, no prizes for those who demonstrated greater productivity. The great gift of the Kingdom is the abundant life He gives us, is his release of grace extended to all who need it.

To live the logic of God’s Kingdom is to give graciously to all, is to fight so that everyone has the needs of a decent life fulfilled and not simply to get accommodated cynically saying that if they don’t have is because they didn’t want to work. The logic of this world excludes all considered unfit, explores people, strip them of their dignity and transforms them into coal for the production machine. Make no mistake: unemployment, poverty, violence and other ills that exist in our world are small defects of the capitalist system, on the other hand, are required for its maintenance. It is the exploitation of many that fosters wealth of a few.

To proclaim the good news of the Kingdom of God requires a deep denial of the present logic  of this world and to assume a new posture in front of him. We must pursue the path towards the construction of a new human being and a new world, where the last are the first and the first are last, where who is big is the servant, where justice and goodness go together, guided by grace and mercy.

Messias Brito

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Christian Commitment

I grew up hearing my mother talk about the history of our country. I heard from her things that my teachers should have spoken in classroom but they didn’t. I heard of Brazilian military dictatorship, which was responsible for the disappearance of many politicians, students, priests and other. In our conversations, she always taught me about politics and I began to outcrop my critical thinking about it in Brazil.

But politics is a subject that does not please many people, especially Christians. Because I am a Christian since I was 8, I know a little about what goes on in churches and what goes on in the minds of many Christians concerning this issue. Many beat their chests and say they do not like politics and do not want to get involved in any way, not knowing they are already involved. They take all the politicians and “put them in the same bag”. They don’t know how to separate politics from policy. Bertold Brecht’s poem has an answer for such people. He calls it a political illiterate. See:

“The worst illiterate is the political illiterate, he doesn’t hear, doesn’t speak, nor it participates in the political events. He doesn’t knows the cost of life, the price of the bean, of the fish, of the flour, of the rent, of the shoes and of the medicine, all depends on political decisions.
The political illiterate is so stupid that he is proud and swell the chest saying that he hates politics. The imbecile doesn’t know that her political ignorance is born the prostitute, the abandoned child, and the worst thieves of all, the bad politician, corrupt and flunky of the national and multinational companies.” (The illiterate political – Bertolt Brecht)

Here I could end my review, but I believe that a reflection about the Christian paper in politics is always welcome. Today, unfortunately the majority of evangelical churches is empowering the capitalist system, which generates many issues in our country. It seems that we Protestant Christians in Brazil, do not really understand what it means to be Protestant. Today we don’t protest about anything! We forgot our role in society. On learning that we are “citizens of heaven” we are not thinking of the world in which we live. We are not thinking or acting to change the reality that surrounds us. We find we do not need to fight, because if we go to heaven in the end, there is nothing else to be done. And so, we go on suffering, accepting the ills and conforming with all unrighteousness. This is how everything turns to  be so normal. And talking about acceptance as I remembered the movie “Olga”. There is a scene that really caught my attention. One day Olga comes home all dirty, with marks of beatings from the police after attending to a protest in the streets of her city. When his father sees her, he asks “daughter, what do you want for your life?” And she answers “father, I do not know what I want for my life, I know what I don’t want”.

One day, while reading the parable of the rich young man, I discovered something that made me more passionate for Christ. I discovered that Jesus was against the unequal distribution of income. He tells the young DIVIDE all you have with the poor. He is against all social inequality.

After I met the genuine proposal of Christ, I knew what I wanted for my life. The day I don’t think like this any longer, something is wrong with me.

Glauce Souza Santos

Christian / Baptist Church Hosanna

Vernacular literature student – Coordinator of the Academic Center of Arts in the  State University of Southwest Bahia-UESB, Jequié Campus.

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Cultos ao vivo todas as quartas!

Sorry, this entry is only available in Portugues.

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Por um Evangelho mais humano

Sorry, this entry is only available in Portugues.

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