Just for a moment

This morning at church we held a combined service, with a focus of conectedness. Conectedness with each other. Conectedness with God.

It was set up differently, chairs around tables instead of pews all in rows.

We shared ameal together.

Everybody talked to everybody else.

And when we sang, music filled the room.

It was just how church is meant to be, and for a moment, I closed my eyes and I was back in China. Back at church in China. Held in a big room in a smelly hotel. People from all walks of life coming together,sharing their lives, their hearts with each other. With no predjudice, no walls. Just...church. Man, I loved it.

And today, finally Iwas back there, just for a moment.

Mourning vs Rejoicing

As surely as I live, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live.

Ezekiel 3:11

Yesterday we heard the news that Osama bin Laden, founder of Al Qaeda, and mastermind behind the 9/11 terror attacks on the US (amongst others), was killed in an operation authorised by the President of the States. What's more, is our televisions and newspapers were then filled with the sounds and images of rejoicing, as the news broke that the world's most wanted man was executed.

Rejoicing in a life lost.

Rejoicing in one of Christ's creations lost.

Let me clarify. The terror attacks that bin Laden was responsible for were horrific. But he is no more a sinner than I am. Are we forgetting, so soon after celebrating Easter, that Jesus bled and suffered for bin Laden also?

Being human, I for one am caught in the middle of mourning and rejoicing for this death. I would like to think, as a follower of Christ, that I sit more in the mourning side of things. I do not believe the world is a better place now that bin Laden has been killed, no way. Nobody has authority to take another man's life, regardless of their crime.

Martin Luther King Jr. once said "I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that."

What a man of God.

I'm going to stand with him on this one. I will not rejoice in the death of Osama bin Laden, I will mourn the loss life, as I mourned the loss of the nearly 3000 lives he took on September 11th, 2001, the lives he took before that, and the lives that al Qaeda will continue to take after their founder's death. They are all lives, and in God's eyes, we are all equal.