“Setting the pace for the world” (January 14th, 2007)

Scripture: Ephesians 2:1-10, Hebrews 2:8-9

I walked away from our worship gathering last Sunday really really glad to be a part of our church family. Then later that day, that feeling was reinforced for me that even while my New York Giants were in the process of choking like they’ve made a habit of the last few years, the Church Board met for over three hours, and in the midst of good discussion where folks weren’t always agreeing with one another, I walked out of that meeting feeling like we’re developing something tremendous with one another that, if continued, WILL bear fruit over the long-haul.

And I know that I suggested we’d be looking at the beginning of Romans chapter 13 today, but as I spent some time in prayer this week, something kept popping into my mind over and over again: and that is this…

How many of you have been at a family reunion or at your workplace or in a conversation with someone where you moved past just talking shootin’ the bull (so to speak) and one or the other said something that the other disagreed with immediately. What happened after that? (oftentimes, immediate tension arises, emotions rise, people get angry, we might think that someone’s disagreeing with one of our stances means they don’t like us)

And you know, in a society where challenge is not viewed as a healthy thing, many times we spend much more energy running away from others who disagree with us than we do staying and hashing some things out respectfully. This popped into my head as I thought about last Sunday and marveled at the reality that we talked about some things that not everybody agreed about, but I felt like it was fruitful, and people had something to offer to the conversation from their unique perspectives. And you know, that conversation is incredibly unique in our society, and I would add, sadly, unique in churches as well.

Because the reality is this, there are (number) people here today, and because each one of us is unique, we’re at (number) different places spiritually today. There are different political views sitting here today, different economic views, different moral views, and many other differences…but more often than not churches spend their time trying to pretend like they agree on everything, only to head home and express their disagreement with their family or a close friend that agrees with them. And you know, I’ve often wondered if the sermon doesn’t make that problem worse if a pastor stands up for a certain period of time and he or she says their piece, everyone listens, we all pretend we agree, sing a song and go home. That might be why folks put pastors on a pedestal today, because they’re often the ones talking about what God wants for us, and because they’re the only significant voice folks hear on a Sunday, they assume the pastor is somehow sin-free or above falling flat on their face. Or they assume that the pastor does the hard work of Biblical study to prepare a sermon, and they get to just sit and enjoy listening.

But I don’t think that’s a healthy approach to the reality that we’re all different today. You have called me out as a leader and expect of me to put in work to prepare a message that builds us up as a people, calls us to account as a people, something you can depend on each week. I recognize the responsibility of that. But I don’t think it’s healthy if that approach either makes me swell-headed cause I’m the only one talking or that encourages you NOT to read the Bible or do significant study and prayer because you’ll get it on Sunday. The Bible is best studied in community, as the community (which is full of individuals with a heck of a lot to offer: colorful personalities, unique perspectives, and stories that pop up in our memories as we read together) gathers around God’s desires for them.

And that’s all fine and good to say until we take a risk to say something we know someone else is going to disagree with. We immediately interpret disagreement as "fighting" and we get tense when a discussion starts to look like that, so we step back from the picture or withdraw quickly from the conversation. We often take the knee-jerk response of cutting off the tension by saying, “We believe different things” and move on, and we think we're doing something healthy because we don't want to "fight" with each other or have tension in a relationship

Now that kind of approach to conflict may seem to work in the short-term, but I think it's a very unhealthy approach for three reasons:

1) In our society where folks walk around saying, "Whatever you believe is ok," or “Never talk about religion and politics,” their hearts are really crying out, "There has GOT to be something more than this life, something more than this emptiness!" Our society is literally begging someone to care enough about our emptiness that we creatively think of ways to both challenge our and listen to them. But the only way we’re going to be able to do that is if we’re committed to making our church the kind of place where we meet together and pursue faithfulness together along with being honest with one another. And the goal we place before each other is that we agree and disagree knowing that we all want to follow Jesus more today than yesterday; and we’re committed to listening to God first.And THAT is another way that we are to stand out from our society. A people not afraid of challenge. And that is DEEPLY connected to my second point,

2) When it comes to followers of Jesus, growth ALWAYS takes place more rapidly and more deeply when we're a part of an honest, healthy community of grace AND challenge. But it is often in churches in our society that the most surface relationships exist, as folks hop around from church to church to avoid those deeper relationships, and

Again, we are called to create a place in our church where we value the fact that we're all different, that we're all not perfect, but we live life together, and that means taking a risk in relationships to trust others with the questions and the stuff of life. That cannot happen, I emphasize, CANNOT HAPPEN, if we turn tail and run when others start to get too close or someone disagrees with us. And I guarantee you, you WILL NOT find this vision for this sort of community anywhere else in the world.

So if we don't want this sort of community; if we're satisfied with where we are now...we settle for the "belief" that this is all we can ever expect from the church. A bunch of folks hopping around to get entertained, and if no churches in our area can provide such a service for us, we stay at home and fill the void with movies and TV and Xbox 360s.

3) Now the third and most important reason why we should stand up and face challenge is that God comes to us as an alien, as a mystery, as an immigrant, if that gives a better idea. We could imagine God as that immigrant to our world, who has his own strange customs, languages, and lifestyle that don’t seem to make sense to us. And this God has the audacity to tell us that the meaning of our lives will be found in our willingness to listen to Him, to repent of our self-centeredness and pride, to turn out of our rebellion, and let him turn our lives upside-down as we submit to spending the rest of our lives unlearning our old ways that were leading to death and instead relearning the new way that God places before that leads to life.

And in this process, God declares us righteous as we pursue him and love others. A righteousness that does not come from ourselves. But this does not come without a cost, because it’s not just all about grace and what God is doing, but it demands a life-altering response from us. One of the most famous batches of verses about God’s grace that is quoted ALL THE TIME by those who would claim that it has nothing to do with works is Ephesians 2, verse 8 that says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith- and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God- not by works, so that no one can boast.”

So salvation is God’s action, right? We can’t earn it. That’s true, BUT what follows that verse? “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ to what? (Do good works), which God prepared in advance for us to do…(later in the letter, Paul writes) You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

So while you and I have done nothing to deserve this gift, and this salvation comes from outside of us, from a loving God, we also have to deal with the reality that the lifestyle God calls us to, expects from us, is also alien to us. And the faithful response is the obey God, listen to God, and through hard, consistent work, seek to have our lives line up with his desires for us.

So change, and a willingness to change (Jesus often said, "Those with ears to hear") is built in to the life of the people who have said "yes" to God. And I think we have to ask ourselves some important questions today that can guide us as we live our lives that can change the perception that others have of our lives so we look different from our neighbors in ways that are good and faithful.

And you might laugh at the first question I suggest we look at before everything else:

Who is God? And what is He all about?

The way we answer this and where we go to answer this will define our lives, and I don’t think I’m overstating this: Our picture of God affects our picture of Jesus, which affects our lives because God expects us as his people to follow the example of Jesus. And oftentimes, when people ask “Was Jesus God?” they usually think they know what the word “God” means, and are asking whether we can fit Jesus into that. I think this as deeply misleading. And if you’ll bear with me, I can perhaps make my point clear by a simple story from a guy named Tom Wright.

“For seven years I was College Chaplain and Worcester College, Oxford. Each year I used to see each of the first year undergraduates individually for a few minutes, to welcome them to the college and make a first acquaintance. Most were happy to meet me; but many commented, often with slight embarrassment, “You won’t be seeing much of me; you see, I don’t believe in god.” I developed a simple response: “Oh, that’s interesting; which god is it you don’t believe in?” This used to surprise them; they mostly regarded the word “God” as always meaning the same thing. So they would stumble out a few phrases about the god they said they did not believe in: a being who lived up the in the sky, looking down disapprovingly at the world, occasionally “intervening” to do miracles, sending bad people to hell while allowing good people to share his heaven. Again, I had a simple response for this very common perception of God: “Well, I’m not surprised you don’t believe in that god. I don’t believe in that god either.”

At this point the undergraduate would look startled. Then, perhaps, a faint look of recognition; it was sometimes rumored that half the college chaplains at Oxford were atheists. “No,” I would say; “I believe in the god I see revealed in Jesus of Nazareth.” And so, the truth is, what most people mean by “god” in late-modern western culture simply is not the mainstream Christian meaning.

I mean, what are some of the temptations we might have in thinking about who God is and what he cares about?

And the most twisted thing that results often in our lives as Christians, and this is probably more of a personal confession on my part today, is that we have the life of Jesus right smack dab in front of us: everything he cared about, the way he lived, how he loved, how he faced evil, how he interacted with those he disagreed with, how he loved people…it’s all there; BUT, and this is a HUGE BUT…I still try to put God into a box where his person is defined by me, what he cares about is defined by me, and what he does is defined by me. I, as a human being, do NOT want my life turned upside-down, even if the way I live is really the upside-down life and God is calling me to live right-side up. I DO NOT WANT MY LIFE TURNED UPSIDE DOWN.

But that’s the big problem here, because Jesus, in his coming, refused to accept the human definitions of who God is and what he is about; even though I STILL today try to reduce the meaning of the life of Jesus by calling him a good teacher, and focusing on his compassion while skipping over his hard teachings as if they didn’t exist often. Personal confession again!

And this is why we need to have the space in our church family where we can not only laugh together and share sorrow together, but challenge one another without being afraid of the other person throwing in the towel and quitting in the relationship. This space comes when all of us recognize our imperfection and limited understanding, when all of us pursue God to the best of our abilities, and when we talk on a deeper level about what that life looks like, knowing that we’re going to disagree along the way. Now THAT’S a vision for real community, people that trust each other.

Even though it can seem terribly complex to figure out what it means to abide in Jesus sometimes, there are multiple places in the Bible where we get real simple, straight-forward comments about what that means:

“Here is the test by which we can make sure that we are in him: whoever claims to be dwelling in him, binds himself to live as Christ himself lived.” (1 John 2:6)

So, even though life can be hard here on this earth, and it seems like everything is falling apart, we are reminded in Hebrews, “In putting everything under Jesus, God left nothing that is not subject to him. Yet at present we do not see everything subject to Him. But…” in all that, as complex and tough and seemingly meaningless as life can be, we are given an example, a picture of what it looks like to live according to the purposes and desires of God, “But we DO, we DO see Jesus…now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death…he shared in our humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death- that is, the devil- and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

There is something that’s been at work in my head for a decent while now, and it is this: no matter how large or how small a church is, the most important thing and the thing we will be held most accountable to when we stand before the judgment seat one day is the kind of people that this church is making. Our eternal legacy as a church will be whether we produce disciples of Jesus who pursue loving God and their neighbor passionately or whether we produce surface, what I call scratch and sniff Christians. They say all the right things on the surface when they’re around the right people, but there’s no depth, no consistent inner reality. In light of eternity, will we have made a positive impact on our world? Will we have made a difference? These questions should drive us as a church and as individuals whether we’re a ditch-digger or a lawyer…

And in order to be shaped into a people who passionately pursue the desires of God first, we have to create a safe space here in our church family not only for us to sing together and read Scripture together, but also to recognize that we are all at different places, and we need the room to challenge one another as well as show grace to one another. Otherwise we’re stunting our growth together AND as individuals.

(In Christ Alone)

In Christ alone my hope is found

He is my light, my strength, my song

This Cornerstone, this solid ground

Firm through the fiercest drought and storm

What heights of love, what depths of peace

When fears are stilled, when strivings cease

My Comforter, my All in All

Here in the love of Christ I stand



In Christ alone, who took on flesh

Fullness of God in helpless babe

This gift of love and righteousness

Scorned by the ones He came to save

'Till on that cross as Jesus died

The wrath of God was satisfied

For every sin on Him was laid

Here in the death of Christ I live



There in the ground His body lay

Light of the world by darkness slain

Then bursting forth in glorious Day

Up from the grave He rose again

And as He stands in victory

Sin's curse has lost it's grip on me

For I am His and He is mine

Brought with the precious blood of Christ

No guilt in life, no fear in death

This is the power of Christ in me

From life's first cry to final breath

Jesus commands my destiny

No power of hell, no scheme of man

Can ever pluck me from His hand

'Till He returns or calls me home

Here in the power of Christ I'll stand

January 7th, 2007


Scripture:

Romans 12:14-21
(Intro to John Drescher and chapel service where he impacted me so much)

Drescher: “A young pastor once wrote me, telling me that he had been upset and publicly taken me to task some years ago in a conference because I put so much emphasis on the cultivation and discipline of the inner life. He felt we should get busy in the work of the church. I did not remember the incident. Now, he confessed, that he realized his inner emptiness and how essential it is to get to the source of spiritual strength and service. In cultivating his own spiritual life, a whole new spiritual world began to unfold before him. In John 15, Jesus tells us twice that unless we abide in him and he abides in us we will accomplish nothing of spiritual or eternal worth.

Strength of the Anabaptist church from the very beginning was a deep emphasis on being Biblical people, on taking Jesus at his word as to how we are to live, and on service, humble service and obedience to what God expects from us, no matter what the cost…and our ancestors in our heritage paid a terrible cost with their lives for this commitment. And you know, as we have existed in a society of comfort and affluence, as centuries have passed, on some level in the Church of the Brethren, the deep emphasis on being Biblical, God-centered people has passed by the wayside as we have become so caught up in our daily lives and expectations today that we often neglect Biblical study and prayer, or just choose to ignore the expectations of God because we think we know better, and as time has passed by, we’ve lost the emphasis on taking Jesus at his word, especially in his harder teachings, because some of the things he taught just downright don’t make sense or line up with the goals that our society demands of us today, but as time has passed by, the Church of the Brethren still maintains a tremendous legacy of service to the world. Disaster Response and real practical mission work is a strength of the Church of the Brethren. The problem, though, that exists is when the willingness to serve as people doesn’t have a Biblical foundation of what is faithful and what is not and doesn’t carry that basic, simple commitment to following Jesus even if it seems to not make sense or lead to “success” as the world terms it, and we can find ourselves serving in places where we think we’re needed without considering the deeper question of God’s expectations for us. The Church of the Brethren is mostly a blue-collar, working class group of people that carry a tremendous willingness to hop to and serve, and so the challenge that faces us as a denomination, and the challenge that faces us as a church family here at Middle River is this: can we take this foundation of service and expand our vision to think about the role we can play as those who are willing to love and serve and care for others surrounding us in the name of Christ, while pursuing being a deeply Biblical people who listen to God and act according to his desires for us first, can we take Jesus’ simple teachings as instruction for our lives that rises above anything else we may hear or see? Would this provide a vision for us as a church as we pursue an identity in rebuilding?

These consistent questions that God brings before us: Do you want me first? Are you committed to me first? Will you listen to me first? Do you love me first, and most? Will you love this world and work for transformation in this world the same way I do? is deeply important for us as talk about Romans 12:14-21 today, as we stand on the brink of Romans 13:1-7 next week, and look ahead to Romans 13:8-14 on January 21^st. It is my belief that Romans 13:1-7 is the most misunderstood, poorly thought through piece of Scripture facing the church today, especially in countries of tremendous power and influence in the world. And Romans 13:1-7 says some pretty straight-forward things that seem obvious if the passage stands alone by itself. But it doesn’t. It is preceded by our passage of study today on love, and what that looks like practically, and it is followed from verse 8 on with the reminder again that we are to love as Jesus did, no more, no less. And so we have to take what we see in verses 1-7 and put it context if we really want to understand the meaning it carries for the people of God.

Vv. 14-16: Bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice, mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited

There are many great goals here in this batch of verses; living in harmony with others, showing the ability to share joy and grief with others in our lives. Being a safe place for our friends to laugh with, listen to, and weep with. But I’d like to focus on the phrase in verse 16, “but associate with people of low position,” This phrase was meant to jolt the church in Rome. Literally it is “be carried away with the lowly (things and people).” And the only other two places where the word “carried away with” is found is in Galatians 2, where Barnabas is “carried away with” Peter’s hypocrisy, and 2 Peter 3, where people are “carried away with” the error of lawlessness. In other words, Paul chose a phrase that would not only shock us, but compel us to action. We are not just choosing to associate with the poverty-stricken, we are affected, we are compelled to care and invest our lives in them. This is what it means to be Christian. What is a priority to God should be a priority to us. And the Bible is filled to the brim with the truth that God cares deeply about the poor and the suffering, and cares deeply about his people investing their lives in them.

Psalm 72: Vv. 1-4

Give the king your justice, O God,and your righteousness to a king's son. May he judge your people with righteousness, and your poor with justice. May the mountains yield prosperity for the people, and the hills, in righteousness. May he defend the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the needy, and crush the oppressor.

Vv 11-14
“May all kings fall down before him, all nations give him service. For he delivers the needy when they call, the poor and those who have no helper. He has pity on the weak and the needy, and saves the lives of the needy. From oppression and violence he redeems their life; and precious is their blood in his sight.”

Caring for the poor is JUST AS MUCH a part of the whole gospel message as sharing your faith with someone. Just as much.

Vv. 17-19: Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge, I will repay, says the Lord.”

God’s Wrath: Let the apostle John remind us of how terrible and eternal the wrath of God is with just one of his most dreadful images. In Revelation 19:15 he describes Christ in his second coming: “From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.”

First: God is “almighty.” We are dealing here not with a mere world ruler, like the president of the United States or Prime Minister of Britain. They are as nothing compared to the power of the Creator of the Universe. “Almighty” means that God has all the power in the universe.

Second: this almighty God will pour out his wrath. God’s great love includes not only his mercy, but is full of holiness and justice and wrath. His wrath is full of fury. John speaks of “the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.” The wrath is not cool opposition. It is furiously angry opposition against those who have corrupted and rebelled against God’s good rule and intentions for all of creation. That means that those who ultimately rebelled and did not repent are like grapes under the feet of the fury of Christ, and are crushed until their blood runs like wine from the press. NOT a G-rated movie. If we know God—really know God—for who He is in the greatness of his holiness and justice and wrath and grace, we will tremble in his presence. And this is not something we will grow out of. In fact, the immature must grow into it.

And ironically, we can take comfort in that if we are committed to following Jesus because we’re not living in rebellion; we put ourselves in the position where we hold the highest respect for God’s expectations, we listen to God and act accordingly, and there’s security in that!

But the central things Paul is calling us to here as God’s people is to separate the action of God from our calling as followers. God is righteous and just and perfect in his action; we are not, we are flawed and inconsistent and twisted…so what do we do? What did he just say to us before here? (do not repay evil for evil…do NOT take revenge)

If you say—which you should—“But doesn’t the Bible teach us not to fear? Aren’t there many commands like, ‘Fear not, for I am with you’? What do they mean? They mean once central thing; Don’t fear man, fear God. Jesus made this very clear in Matthew 10:28, saying“do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” We should tremble at the prospect of distrusting God, not displeasing man.

So instead of repaying evil with evil, what do we do?

Vv. 20-21: On the contrary: ‘If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

If you do these things, you’re stupid. There’s no other way around it. Which person in their right mind would act in such a manner to their enemies? (Jesus did, Paul did, Peter did, millions of Jesus’ followers throughout the ages have.) Why? If we would identify ourselves as Christians, then we are the follower of one who died for his enemies. And as a follower of him, we are commanded, expected, to be conformed into the image of, follow in the footsteps of Jesus. If we want to know how to respond to evil, we look to Jesus.

So when we’re being mistreated is our workplaces or schools, or a catastrophic event takes place on a national or global scale, we are called to stop and think: Who is my king, my leader, who governs my life? Who’s ultimately in charge? What does he expect out of me? So when someone does evil to us, we should say, “You are not my Lord. I will not have my attitudes and thoughts and actions dictated by your evil. Christ dictates my attitudes and thoughts and actions.

This has immediate relevance for yours and my life for two immediate reasons that may
carry intense emotions in you and me.

This connects first to the fact that September 11, 2001 occurred when our church was in the middle of a week of revival meetings, with Chester Fisher’s son in law Tony Baker preaching (speak of Tony’s comments of his knee-jerk response to the terrorist attacks and how his commitment to Christ put his initial feelings of hatred in a different perspective)

The Saddam Hussein hanging could be another example (How should we feel upon hearing of his death?)

But overcoming evil with good, what does that mean? Does it mean that, if you give your enemy water when he is thirsty and food when he is hungry, he will always repent and become your friend? No. We know Paul doesn’t think that. Jesus’s enemies do not all respond positively to his love for them. One thief on the cross repented and the other cursed. Peter repented. Judas hanged himself. The centurion said, “This was the Son of God.” The Pharisees plotted to kill him. The love of Christ does not produce repentance in everyone. And your love won’t either. But we do it anyway.

But the challenging aspect of this love is that some will not be changed, and in fact will HATE the fact that we love everyone in this way, and their hearts will be hardened, and their lives will be further twisted, and our lives will be a constant and consistent reminder to them of how twisted their lives are, and how far they fall short of what they’ve been created for. They will HATE that, and they will treat you like a pile of dirt, because YOUR LIFE shows them the truth of theirs.

And the tough part of this teaching is that we can be the ones living with an inadequate definition of love, and someone else’s willingness to live with unconditional love can make us bitter and hardened. That’s one of the primary challenges of life; recognizing our imperfection, having the humility to admit the specifics of it, and submitting ourselves constantly to growing into the image of Christ. Sometimes the lives of others will challenge us deeply with our own inadequate approach to life. And we have a choice in those cases to either stay in our imperfection or continue to grow.

You see, if I’m listening to God first, I deal with the reality that I deserve death JUST as much as Osama bin Laden and JUST as much as much as Saddam Hussein.

Dirk Willems: “Dirk was caught, tried and convicted as an Anabaptist in the later years of harsh Spanish rule under the Duke of Alva in The Netherlands. He escaped from his prison by letting himself out of a window with a rope made of knotted rags, dropping onto the ice that covered the castle moat. Seeing him escape, a palace guard pursued him as he fled. Dirk crossed the thin ice of a pond safely. His own weight had been reduced by short prison rations, but the heavier pursuer broke through.

Hearing the guard's cries for help, Dirk turned back and rescued him. The less-than-grateful guard then seized Dirk and led him back to captivity. This time the authorities threw him into a more secure prison, a small, heavily barred room at the top of a very tall church tower, above the bell, where he was probably locked into the wooden leg stocks that remain in place today. Soon he was led out to be burned to death. Some inhabitants of present-day Asperen, none of them Mennonite, regard Dirk as a folk hero. A Christian, so compassionate that he risked recapture in order to save the life of his drowning pursuer, stimulates respect and memory. Recently Asperen named a street in Dirk's honor.

Now how did Dirk’s action heap burning coals on his enemy’s head?

What positive benefit did Dirk reap by turning back to save that man? (what are some possibilities?)

(Nate's idea) Because of his fear of God that drove him to faithfulness (knowing he would have to answer for the life of the man), he realized he had no choice. And because he feared God, he paid the human price at the hands of the authorities there. Dirk made his decision in light of eternity, because he knew the most convicting, most awe-inspiring, most fearful moment he would ever face would be before the judgment seat of God, and he wanted to obey God first and foremost no matter what.

And so it is with you and the enemies you love: the more mercy they reject, the more coals of fire will be heaped on their head. This is NOT our desire or our aim. Our aim is in verse 14: Bless and do not curse. Pray for your enemies. Paul sets the pace in Romans 10:1, “My heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved.”

Our responsibility is to love. God’s responsibility is to administer ultimate judgment someday.

Bill Clinton is no pillar of morality for us to look up to in life (though the failures of his life should shed light on the failures we all experience), but he said something beautiful and true at the funeral of assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin,

“Your prime minister was a martyr for peace, but he was a victim of hate. Surely we must learn from his martyrdom that if people cannot let go of the hatred of their enemies, they risk sowing the seeds of hatred among themselves. I ask you, the people of Israel, on behalf of my nation that knows its own long litany of loss- from Abraham Lincoln to President Kennedy to Martin Luther King- do not let that happen to you.”