My favorite quotes (paraphrased a bit, I'm sure...I didn't have a tape recorder =P) from the Hispanic Ministry Director (or some such title) for the Evangelical Free Church, the denomination that Castle Rock, my new church, belongs to. Whew! That was a mouthful. Here we go:
"I tell Dante (African American Ministry Director) all the time that he gets no credit from me for loving black people. He's supposed to do that. But when he empathizes with my Latino brothers and sisters, when his heart breaks over issues of immigration and the modern economic slavery of America, when he reaches across that barrier, that's when we start fulfilling the Church's mission to be a body of believers of every tongue, tribe, and nation."
"I'll be honest. At first, I didn't want to send a Hispanic pastor to New Orleans. We have so few of them right now and I wanted them in other places. But Pastor Gerhardt told me something that rebuked me and made me change my mind. He said, 'I'll be his friend.' He said, 'I'll watch our for him. I'll pray with him. I'll be his friend.'"
"Look over to your neighbor on both sides of you. You see that person? That person is A MESS. And you are A MESS. And this church is A MESS. That's why Jesus came."
"Is it potluck Sunday? Is it potluck Sunday?!?!?" (Okay, that one wasn't from the pastor, it was from a very excited 7-year-old after service.)
In the immortal words of the little orphan Annie, "I think I'm gonna like it here."
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1 comments:
I thought Castle Rock was pretty neat, especially in how well they were integrated, not just racially but culturally as well.
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