I'm sitting in the computer lab at Liberty University right now after just hearing the daughter of Martin Luther King Jr. speak at convocation. I should be doing an assignment for my History and Philosophy of Worship class, but instead I'm drawn into the conversation that is going on behind me. There are 4 or 5 students (I don't know the exact number because I don't want to awkwardly turn around) and they are discussing a variety of different things (who's dating who, finals coming up, etc.) but the their discussion continues to come back to the words that we heard from Bernice King this morning. And quite frankly, it's disturbing me.
Let me explain...
Dr. Bernice King spoke today about Kingship, and how as children of the King of kings we are to live lives as kings and take authority over things that we have influence over. She referenced President Obama several times and made similarities between him and God ("God spoke this world into existence, and Obama spoke his presidency into existence.") Obama's campaign slogan "Change" is apparently a revelation from God for us to repent, and she says that it is sad that the Christian community wasn't able to cling on to this before the election. She likens Obama's presidency to the Promised Land since her dad represents "Moses" and his 40th death anniversary parallels the 40 years the Israelites spent in the desert. Some things that she said like this bothered me, but other things I believe had merit. She mentioned that we need to be willing to take a stand against morals that are not biblical even when those people are your loved ones (like she did in 2004 when her mother took a stance to support the gay and lesbian community). Overall, I believe that she had a lot of good things to say, as well as some unbiblical things to say (like her dad being the only national prophet that america has ever had.) But moreso than what she said, what the Liberty students behind me are saying bothers me just as much.
"She's friggin' retarded", "I wanted to punch her in the freakin' face", and "She looked like she had a headache at the beginning and it might've been, like, God trying to smite her" are just a few of the phrases that the fabulous 4 (or 5) have been tossing around in this convocation rebuttal. They have criticized everything about Bernice, from her hair style to her voice. It seems to me that their critical analysis of what happened earlier is every bit as disturbing to me as what the speaker said today if not more so.
I've been reading "The Unlikely Disciple" (since it's pretty much the 'new thing' on campus to do) and it's behavior like that of those behind me that line the pages of that book with colorful characters that shock even me, as an evangelical Christian. Not to say that I am a perfect Liberty student that has never given the name of Christ or Liberty a bad rap, because through reading this book I have felt much conviction about similar things that I have done that could have caused a non-believer to think that I am no different morally than most of his friends at secular school. I'm just frustrated that we cannot evalute critically what is being spoken to us without pulling apart more than just the falsity of the words. It's been my expereince more than once after convocation where someone will attack a person rather than their words.
I guess Liberty can be a tough crowd.
Please know this though, this post is not intended to bash Liberty or its students (or Bernice King for that matter either.) I am typing this up so that we can all realize that we do need to analyze what is being said and filter it through the Bible and if it's not true, we need to make sure to take note of that, but we also need to analyze our own speech and filter that through Scripture and see if what we are saying is meritted through it.
Well, it's nearly noon... I should probably get a few minutes of work into that project before lunch.
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