Unlearning Empire 7.19.2026

[00:00:03]So good to see you. I'm glad you're here. Welcome to Vinings Lake and happy uh World Cup Sunday.

[00:00:11]>> Yeah. I don't even know what I'm talking about. Don't watch soccer. All right. Um hey, just curious though. Is it is this because I don't know who to pull for because I'm not really not my sport, but is it a Spain day?

[00:00:27]So, whoever that was in the middle, Argentina. All right. Um, amazing. Okay.

[00:00:32]Um, either way, whoever wins is who God wanted to win. So, [laughter] cuz I don't know if you know this, but God steps in and intervenes in sports uh situations. Um, but the hungry, he's not Okay. Um, how we doing?

[00:00:51]All right. All right, we've been in this series right here called Unlearning Empire, discovering a new way to be human. And what we've already learned is that Jesus steps into a very volatile political, religious moment in the first century and he gives some of the greatest teachings to this day the world has ever encountered. What Matthew does in his gospel, chapter 5, chapter 6, chapter 7, is he collects those sayings and he places them in a central part of his book. This is called, if you've been around church, the sermon on the mount.

[00:01:31]Now, the beginning of the sermon on the mount is where we are. We're going to methodically walk through verse by verse this entire sermon on the mount that Matthew gives us. Um, I don't know how long it's going to last. We're just getting started. This is part five and we're in what is called the biatitudes right now. Okay, most of you are familiar with the biatitudes. What it is essentially is Jesus um not giving us a commandment, not giving us um a new list of things that we have to do. Jesus begins his sermon with a good news announcement. He puts himself on the side of the underdog and the outsider.

[00:02:10]Jesus gives countercultural God bless you to people who are in god awful situations. And so I want to read those to you and then we've been going through line by line and talking about each one of these biatitudes. So here's how he starts the sermon. Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

[00:02:40]Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. And then here we are this week, and here's what Jesus says.

[00:02:51]Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. Now, I used to read that and think, huh, first of all, I don't know what mercy means. I have ideas in my head of what it means. Uh my kind of modern conceptions of that word mercy would be something like not giving someone what they deserve. Right? Now, here's what's interesting for a lot of us. We come into this room and we are um coming from uh a world that has understandings when it comes to certain words. Right now, most of you know this. uh the Bible wasn't written in English, so it's been translated. And even when these words are translated, you have to understand sometimes when they're translated, those words meant something different then than they even do now. I mean, language is is fluid, right? It's constantly shifting and changing meanings. I mean, if we were to write a Bible right now, I've often thought about this, how would it read? What would it say? What words would we use that we wouldn't have used a hundred years ago? Right? And so when you hear this word mercy, I would imagine if you're like me, like all kinds of ideas come to my mind. I often think of mercy being I should feel sorry for someone else. So I see someone in a situation and my heart breaks or then I'm like, "Oh, I feel bad for that person." Or mercy.

[00:04:20]Here's one. Um just being nice. And those aren't bad definitions. I'll be honest with you. We should probably hear a good sermon on what it means to be nice, right? I used to think that was mercy. Some other modern conceptions would be letting somebody off the hook.

[00:04:37]Right? Have you ever been let off the hook? I know I have a few times. I have been pulled over speeding and the officer say, "I'm going to give you a warning this time." God, do y'all not love warnings?

[00:04:52]Anybody else in here love a good warning? I used to get even as a as a growing up in school teachers would I'm going to give you a warning. I'm like God I love a warning.

[00:05:02]What I don't love is when it's not longer it's no longer a warning. You know what I'm talking about where you had your warning but now you deal with the consequences. Yes. This is what I thought. It's letting someone off the hook. Uh growing up I [clears throat] I remember this would have been uh God I hate I'm embarrassed to say this. Kids do not follow this example. I was freshman in high school and somehow and I don't know how this happened and I have gone through it, you know, processing this stuff uh in therapy, but somehow the answers to a test that we had yet to take landed in my presence, okay?

[00:05:41]And it was probably by and large the people I was hanging out with.

[00:05:45]But I specifically remember doing the class a solid and printing out the answers to this test.

[00:05:56]I remember thinking you can't carry a whole paper cuz we had the desk, if you know what I'm talking about, uh where the chair was separate from the desk, but you had the desk, but inside there was a space you could put your books between, right? And it would stick out just a notch. Okay, so I thought, how do you do this? So the test is going to come. I have a piece of paper with all the answers to the tests. So, how do I get it? Because I don't know if it was like this for you all, but you would be lines of desk and often the teachers would walk through the lines, right? So, I did go, this isn't even in the notes, but I'm just going to get this off my chest. It's World Cup Sunday and I need some help here.

[00:06:36]I decided I got it. Here's what I'll do.

[00:06:38]I cut a small piece of paper like maybe this thick and in very fine print I wrote as many of those answers as I could like number one answer A the answer is going to be A. Number two the answer is going to be C. And then I couldn't fit all the answers on the smallest piece of paper. So I did what would be next which is there's no way the teacher would see this. I took a pen and wrote it on the inside of my hand.

[00:07:02]Right?

[00:07:04]So, I am in the middle of taking a test and I specifically remember thinking, "Oh my god, I've done it."

[00:07:13]I mean, I'm burning through this thing.

[00:07:15]I'm glancing down at my hand periodically. I'm looking down at this little piece of paper that has the answers on it and then something happened. And maybe you've had this experience before. I feel a hand on my shoulder. Do you know that feeling? My god, is there a more eerie feeling than when you don't know someone is standing over your shoulder watching you, but I feel the hand and then all I hear is come with me.

[00:07:46]And that is where my panic attack started.

[00:07:53]I distinctly remember going up to her and her looking at me in the hallway saying, "Where did you get these answers?"

[00:08:04]And I had to make a decision because I knew exactly where I got these answers.

[00:08:09]And they did not come from me. They came from a friend.

[00:08:14]And she said, "Hold on." grabbed another person out of the room, stood us both together in the hallway, and she said, "I'm going to ask you both one more time. Where did you get these answers?"

[00:08:26]And I remember saying, "I'm going to be honest." And I did. Now, it was a lot easier to be honest because it wasn't me, but I remember looking at her going, "I'll tell you exactly where I got these answers from Justin, right?" And I remember her looking at me and she saying this, "Thank you for your honesty.

[00:08:48]I'm going to give you a warning this time."

[00:08:52]Now, for years, I always thought, "Oh, that's mercy.

[00:08:59]That makes sense." And the church I grew up in told me, "God is a God of mercy."

[00:09:04]So, I grew up with a framework. Perhaps you're familiar with this. The framework is you've been born broken, rotten, sinner, putrid. God can't even look at you. Are you familiar with this?

[00:09:23]Is there greater good news than that?

[00:09:26]Do we wonder why churches are empty? The entire evangelical construct like, "Please come join us. By the way, first thing you need to recognize is you're an awful human.

[00:09:37]Now, here's what's fascinating about that. Two things. First, isn't it interesting that fundamentalist Christians, they will say about the fetus that it's beautifully and wonderfully made, but the moment you're born, they tell you, "You are absolutely a disgusting rotten sinner."

[00:09:55]That's slightly confusing, right? But I remember growing up in that framework.

[00:10:02]And so what I was told about ultimacy, God, the divine, was that God is so good that even though we are awful humans, God looked at us and we deserved eternal conscious torment.

[00:10:23]But God had here it is mercy on us.

[00:10:28]Right?

[00:10:30]This was my understanding of mercy. Now, here's the question, though. When you read something like this, blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. If you understand it in that framework, then here's what you hear. Okay? It's a bit problematic for a lot of evangelicals because it feels very works based, but here's what you hear. Blessed are those who show mercy to people now, for they will receive mercy later.

[00:11:00]You're familiar with this, right? No, that is the, as Richard Roar would say, that is the lowest level of consciousness out there. Bribes and threats. If you've ever raised kids, you know the lowest level of consciousness is bribes and threats.

[00:11:18]Now, that's not a judgment. Sometimes you have to cuz sometimes people are at the lowest stage of consciousness. That doesn't mean you're better. It just means you recognize hopefully your children grow up to where they don't need bribes and threats anymore, right?

[00:11:34]But sometimes when they're a child, you operate in that world. Hey, if you do this, I'll get you this.

[00:11:44]And if that doesn't work, it usually starts with bribes, but then it is threats ultimately. If you don't do this, I'm going to do this, right? Yeah.

[00:11:55]Yeah, you you know how that works.

[00:11:57]That's what you do with children. By the way, um I don't think it's that far off to understand when you're looking at an adult or let's just say the leader of the free world and you recognize, hear me, you recognize what stage of consciousness that that leader of the free world is emanating to the world.

[00:12:15]And then you learn, oh, one of the ways that you can kind of help uh carve out the abuse of the authoritarianism is you go back to what children needed and you use bribes and threats, right? And so this is what you so so you could look at someone like leader of the free world and say, "Hey, if you help people with health care, we may let you have the Nobel Peace Prize." [laughter] Do you understand what I'm saying? That is funny, but also kind of real life.

[00:12:47]>> Because here's the thing. Never confuse age with maturity.

[00:12:52]I mean, come on. Pastors preaching now.

[00:12:55]>> Cuz all of us in this room know people in their 60s that act like children.

[00:13:01]>> You know, some of y'all are like, "Mhm, ex-husband." All right. Yeah. [laughter] You know, you know, Yeah. Yeah. Age doesn't mean wisdom. Age doesn't mean maturity.

[00:13:14]Yeah. And and so for me growing up, the entire structure of my religion was bribes and threats. It was. Think about it. If you if you follow the way of I tell you, I was going to say the way of God. They called it the way of God, but it was really the way I tell you. Check it out. You will not even just go to heaven. Although that's kind of a big deal cuz when you're a kid, you're like, where? I don't want to be separated from mom and dad.

[00:13:44]But if you do these things, you'll go to heaven. But even more so, here's even wild. You'll you'll experience bribery here because God will bless you.

[00:13:55]And by blessing, we've already talked about it. Blessed are the blessed are.

[00:13:58]By blessing, that meant, hey, listen, you you'll have nice things. You will have a middle class life and you won't have to struggle with your bills. Yeah.

[00:14:09]You know what that is, right? That's bribing.

[00:14:13]But then the other side was full-on threatening. And let me tell you friends about the evangelical world, they have mastered the threat game.

[00:14:22]>> The whole structure, and I know this because I pulled the foundation up. The whole foundation of the evangelical industrial complex is built on fear.

[00:14:35]And this is why when they meet progressive spaces like ours and they're like, "Wait a minute. Wait a minute.

[00:14:41]That guy is a heretic." I'm going to tell you why. Okay? It has little to do with theology. It has more to do with the fact that they don't know what to do with spaces like this. And this is why spaces like this are so important because here's what we're showing the world. You can actually operate [snorts] as a decent human being who cares about universal human flourishing and not have bribes and threats involved.

[00:15:11]That's possible.

[00:15:16]But but the reason they're so threatened is because I'll stand up. We will in here talk about things like this. I do not believe in eternal conscious torment. In fact, not only do I believe it's unjust, I actually believe it is heretical, I actually believe it is the greatest abomination of who the divine could actually be. Right now, fine, who cares? Well, the evangelical industrial complex does because here's what happens when you remove eternal conscious torment. Then it begs the question, why do people come?

[00:16:02]Why do people listen?

[00:16:04]Why would anyone give? Think about giving in most churches. We rarely talk about it here. Every now and then we'll have something pop up. We got something coming down the way, by the way, I'm going to mention to you because we need to like the building needs a little love. We'll talk about that later. But we rarely talk about it right Now, that's intentional for many reasons. One is a lot of us grew up in churches and we all got weirded out by money. Totally get it. All right. But but a part of it, too, is what are we going to say about it? Cuz I grew up in a church where um they passed plates in front of your face. Okay. And everybody on the pew looked over like, "Did they give? Did he give?" I remember as a kid feeling so much guilt that I would go at my mom going, "You got a dollar?" [laughter] >> And mom like, "Why you want a dollar?" I was like, I'm going to give it to the Lord.

[00:16:50]But honestly, it was because they passed the place and I wanted people to see me.

[00:16:54]I'd pull but then I'd wad it like it looked like it was more than a dollar.

[00:16:57]Do you know what I'm talking about? You know, I' I'd wad it up and then I just I would just throw it in and look around like this is this is my life growing up.

[00:17:07]But a part of that a part of that was built in the framework which is if you give Tell me if you've heard this and I know there are people watching right now. Well, technically the Bible says, my God, the Bible says all kinds of things. All right. [clears throat] But there are people like if you give to the church, man, you will not struggle with your bills. [laughter] And here's what's tragic. You still have it today. People showing up in churches and they're in debt to their eyeballs and going under but giving their money away to the church. Now, I know this contradicts everything I'm saying. And my God, don't stop giving here, but here's what I'm trying to tell you.

[00:17:45]>> [laughter] >> I am going to say this as clear as I can. If you are in financial trouble, do not buy into a lie that you need to give your last dime to a church.

[00:17:55]Do you understand that?

[00:17:58]Friends, keep every dime you have. Go get a Five Guys burger, eat some fries, and say, "You know what? I don't have much, but I'm enjoying these fries, and I get to go to church for free." All right. like yes yes yes blessed are the merciful for they will receive mercy so the construct was if you give God will give back to you what is that low-level consciousness because evangelical world knows that if they don't offer something bribes or threats then I don't know what's going to happen people may not give and what we're doing here is an experiment. I'm standing up going, I want to show the world that you don't actually have to use bribes or threats.

[00:18:51]People will give when they simply believe that what they're giving to is making a difference. Period.

[00:18:58]>> People, check it out. Paul said this.

[00:19:01]Paul said they will give out of the overflow of their heart.

[00:19:07]So my my one of the things I love about viting is like and my dream and my passion has always been imagine going to a space where those like black boxes or whatever you do online you're giving um you didn't do it like [laughter] or you didn't even do it like I know somebody else is on my shoulder tapping and it's God and he's watching every dime I spend so I want to make sure he sees because when I die and I stand before the divine and he looks at me. Oh my God, I hope he pulls my Bank of America account [laughter] and I hope God looks and like look at that 25% to the work of the Lord.

[00:19:53]No, Paul's like, what what if you didn't what if you just did it and it was like an overflow because and here's a here's a big idea. What if you did it because you just wanted to?

[00:20:07]Wow. What? Let's go a step further. What if you didn't murder someone because you just didn't want to?

[00:20:16][laughter] I'm always blown away. I'm blown away in America right now how we're like, we got to put those Ten Commandments in every classroom.

[00:20:25]>> Like, first of all, can we just stop here? You're not abiding by any of them anyways.

[00:20:30]Every person that wants the Ten Commandments in those classrooms or in anywhere they want them has cheated on their wives, has had multiple affairs, has most of them been charged with sexual abuse time and time again, have lied on multiple occasions, and quite frankly, we may not see it yet, but I'm sure there's some murder involved. You know what I'm talking about, okay? Allegedly, we don't want lawsuits.

[00:20:53][laughter] All I'm saying is is what if we lived in a world where you didn't have to like like okay I get it as a child. Yes. But you grow you mature. You develop to a place where you didn't need these bribes and threats to navigate you.

[00:21:11]Yeah. That's called growing up. And I hope you see it in your own kids that we're trying to create. Here it is. I dare use this word spiritual maturity here.

[00:21:25]We're We'd love for Vinings Lake to be a place where we're like, "Hey, meet these adults.

[00:21:31]Does anyone else in this room long for adults?"

[00:21:36]I've been longing for adults for a decade now. I watch the news and my dominant question that comes out is not I can't believe this. I can't I keep returning to this question over and over again. When [clears throat] I watch whatever it is I'm watching, I look at our politics. I look at every a lot of fields and I the question I keep coming back to is where are the adults and someone please do some homework to help me understand how whatever happened three generations ago they did not raise adults.

[00:22:05]Somehow they raised a generation of people that made lots of money off capitalism but they had zero emotional and spiritual maturity.

[00:22:15]And this is why a lot of that generation looks at younger generations and they're going, "Don't talk to me about therapy.

[00:22:23]They're embarrassed by it. You only go to therapy if you're sick or if you're weak."

[00:22:30]But what what I think is happening on a larger scale, you're having a generation come behind a generation going, "Oh, that there was an entire world that missed what it meant to grow up emotionally and spiritually and relationally."

[00:22:51]And let me tell you why you keep hearing a lot of people talking about the body in our generation and how the body keeps the score. You keep hearing that, right? I'm telling you, part of that reason is what the task is of our generation is to find emotional, spiritual, relational healing that an entire generation skipped over.

[00:23:16]And and if you're in here going, why is there so much mental illness? My theory is that it skipped a whole group of people and we got double and triple the amount of stuff passed on to us. But here's the good news. It can actually end with us.

[00:23:33]And if we don't do anything as a generation, may it be said about us as a generation that we stop some toxic patterns from being handed down to people behind us. Do you understand that? That is the hope. And this is my prayer and [clears throat] this is my hope for us as a generation of people.

[00:23:56]And so when I meet people all the time like, man, I'm just doing like deep inner work. I'm like, yes.

[00:24:02]Yes. You know what you're doing? You're looking at your kids going, may this not be handed off to you, God. Isn't that our hope? I think about uh Rachel and Lauren in the back every Sunday. day. I think about them. I think about the fact that I hadn't even gotten five minutes into my notes in this sermon. And I think about the fact that we're back there and we don't think about them. But I often think after I finish a sermon, my god, what did y'all do back there?

[00:24:31]What happened back there? Because I want it to be true. I want it to be said about our kids at Vinings Lake that that they had to unlearn so much less than what we had to. And I want them to know not that they were born broken.

[00:24:48]I want them to know they are made in the image of the divine. And I want them to know it's good to be them.

[00:24:58]And thi this is this is what we do. I tell Rachel and learn all the time, man, if you can help it, try not to use bribes and threats.

[00:25:09]It'd be easy to be like, if you don't stop, I'm going to go in the auditorium.

[00:25:12]big church and get your parents.

[00:25:15]Yeah, sometimes it's necessary. But what if we didn't use threats? What if we didn't use bribes? What if we what if we help train? What if we help mold them?

[00:25:22]Hey, check it out. You can actually trust your intuitions.

[00:25:26]You you we we you actually it's good to be you. What if we taught them at an early age to learn to listen to that inner guide, those nudges, the voice of the divine? What if we got them whittleled in where they could hear the distinction between the voices around them and the voice of God that is deep within them?

[00:25:47]Yeah, this is the hope. But for a lot of us, we grew up in a framework and all we knew was mercy as in thank God he gave us mercy.

[00:26:04]But that's first century understandings.

[00:26:06]The dominant question is not how you and I would have understood mercy. The dominant question is how would that first audience who have heard this understood mercy? If you take the ancient Old Testament Hebrew scriptures and you take the New Testament scriptures, here's what you'll find. In the ancient world, mercy was not just about letting somebody off the hook.

[00:26:23]Mercy showed up in concrete ways. It was about when you talked about mercy, feeding the hungry. Do you hear that?

[00:26:31]caring for widows, forgiving debts, visiting prisoners, welcoming strangers, caring for the sick. Here's how they understood this English translation of mercy. Mercy is not pity.

[00:26:47]Mercy is active.

[00:26:50]Mercy is compassion that moves toward suffering. Mercy is seeing pain and refusing to walk by. The root idea of mercy is not feeling bad for someone but acting on behalf of someone. Mercy confronts suffering, moves toward suffering, and attempts to relieve that suffering.

[00:27:21]So translation in modern English, if we wrote our own Bibles today, it would not say, "Blessed are those who feel bad about suffering." Because I know a lot of people who look at situations and just feel bad.

[00:27:35]That's a great start, but if all we do is feel bad about the suffering around us, that suffering will continue.

[00:27:44]The right translation is blessed are those who interrupt the suffering.

[00:27:51]Now, the American Empire survives by explaining away the suffering in the world. Have you noticed this? When someone is hungry, the American Empire says they should have worked harder.

[00:28:07]When someone is poor, the American Empire says they made bad choices.

[00:28:13]When someone loses health care, the American Empire says that's just personal responsibility.

[00:28:20]When migrants flee violence, empire says, "Oh, they're criminals."

[00:28:26]When people sleep under bridges, you've heard this. The American Empire says they're just lazy.

[00:28:34]Their pain, their suffering becomes their fault.

[00:28:41]The logic of empire is that here it is.

[00:28:44]They got what they deserved.

[00:28:49]Why?

[00:28:51]Because the moment suffering is explained as personal failure, those with power are relieved of responsibility.

[00:29:01]The system in that moment is declared innocent.

[00:29:08]The suffering person actually becomes the problem. And this is why, hang with me, empires love a good charity.

[00:29:21]Now, I want to pause here. I love a good charity, too. And if you're here and you work for a charity, I love what you do.

[00:29:29]It is necessary. Keep doing the good work. But I have a theory of why the American Empire refuses to tax 501c3s.

[00:29:43]Okay? They love a good 501c3.

[00:29:48]I've often asked why. Because it's not hard to get, by the way. It's a little too easy to get. This is why people are always filing for 501c3 so they don't have to pay taxes. Okay? I've often wondered why. Here's a theory.

[00:30:05]Because charity gives a hungry person a meal, and that is necessary.

[00:30:14]But mercy, as they understood it in the first century, goes a step further and asks why billionaires keep getting richer while children go hungry.

[00:30:26]Now we need both.

[00:30:29]But can you see why an empire would prefer the first one?

[00:30:34]So give us all the charities. Yes, we we need more charities. But at some point a generation of people are going to stop and say why do we have so many charities? What is happening upstream that is causing the reason for us to have all these charities? Why? Someone tell me why all of these churches in America are using everything they have to help the poor, which is lovely, but at some point we have to stop and ask, why is it just the burden on us? And then we have to go a step further and say, what is here it is, what is creating the river that flows to create what we are experiencing right now? You've heard this. This isn't new, but systems are designed to give you exactly what they give you. Jesus said it like this.

[00:31:27]You'll know a tree by its what? Fruit.

[00:31:29]We'll get to that in the sermon on the mount. What is he saying? If we are experiencing something in America, yes, deal with what's happening. There are dead bodies floating down this river from starvation, hunger, immigration, whatever it is. Okay. Yes. Why is that happening? But we're going to need some folks to move upstream to say, "Hey, where did this start?

[00:31:51]And why does it keep happening?"

[00:31:54]And this is what I think you're experiencing right now. Yet again, you probably saw it this week. Yet again, a 26-year-old killed by ICE.

[00:32:06]Did I not just say this last week?

[00:32:09]Houston, Texas, Lorenzo.

[00:32:12]Now we have another one.

[00:32:15]And if it doesn't make matters worse, this one had a God, this does something in my heart. But a three-year-old child present with them watching this happen.

[00:32:32]I'm told from many news sources that this three-year-old daughter keeps repeating a phrase and she can't stop saying it. And it's this, where's papa?

[00:32:48]And I think that's a great question.

[00:32:50]I'll tell you what my heart is. I would love for that three-year-old girl's question to be presented to the commander-in-chief.

[00:32:58]Mr. Trump, I hope you hear the cry of this three-year-old of a man who was taken yet again by your personal militia. And I hope you hear the cry and give us an answer. Where's papa?

[00:33:18]But at some point as this continues to happen, you start to say, "Where did this start?"

[00:33:25]And so you move people upstream. This is the idea of mercy and I believe it's happening.

[00:33:35]Charity is amazing, but I think we have to be very careful with it because sometimes it lets us feel like generous people. And sometimes it feels like that's enough.

[00:33:50]But where charity lets us feel generous, mercy forces us to ask why people are suffering in the first place.

[00:34:00]The merciful don't just care about victims.

[00:34:03]they begin questioning the systems that produce the victims. And I want to just applaud you all.

[00:34:10]Honestly, it's one of the reasons I am in love with this space called Vining Slate. Uh just this week, I finished my first, well, I'm turning in my first round of edits on this next book. And I want you to know upfront the book is largely about you people. All right? So, uh, it's got some really, really funny stories, but also as I've walked through them, things that I have forgotten that has happened over the last 20 years here. And I have to tell you, um, God, I [clears throat] I've been so moved revisiting the stories of this space.

[00:34:51]And then you people, I said to our group this morning in the back, uh, it's mid July.

[00:34:59]This is the first year since I've been pastor that this many humans and there not even that many in this room have been present in a summer month.

[00:35:08]And so we don't measure our metrics of success isn't by how many attend but it is a metric. It's just not the metric.

[00:35:16]But I have to tell you uh just looking out today I'm like uh so many of our people I know this is why we take off a lot in summer because I'm like yeah do your thing like go vacation. It isn't always about this space. We'll see you when you get back. But then you people show up midsummer and and you're here and you're not just here to like listen.

[00:35:33]I mean, I can't tell you how often this is the case. You're here going, "Okay, um, what do we do?

[00:35:41]What do we do?" And and this this I think what is happening in this room is just a microcosm of who I believe is a macrocosm of the people in our community.

[00:35:54]I do. I think we are a good healthy representation of what this part of the world looks like. And I couldn't be prouder. And I also want to say this. I think I think we're moving the needle more as a church than you probably realize at a local level. And then dare I say, I think we play a very small part of moving at a national level. And that's why I think continuing to gather matters. Now, how do you know this? I got excited this week. I haven't been excited in a while, but I got excited because I was in the middle of working this week. I mean, sun up, sun down. I'm in this corner office.

[00:36:36]I moved my office downstairs because I needed more light. And uh I moved I said Katie Katie will come in and out of the door every now and then and she's just she just shakes her head at me. Like you've literally been sitting in that spot all day. But the project we're working on right now and sermons and all this kind of stuff, it's like I'm not leaving my computer like just going for it. And and I got excited because um I would every now and then I'm I'm shutting my phones down during the day right now because I'm in the middle of something, but I'll pop it open. But it's been really refreshing not to have my phone open, you know, but I'll pop it open and there's just like one or two people that I look at real fast to make sure nothing major has happened, right?

[00:37:10]And I pop my phone open on I don't know it was like Monday or Tuesday. I popped my phone open and it said, "Uh, President Trump is going to give an address Thursday night."

[00:37:21]And I popped my phone open and I was like, "Oo." I was like, "Oh." And immediately I was like, "It must be like Iran. It must be like Iran war because I don't Are y'all aware of this?" But it's closed and it's open. It's closed and it's open. Then it's closed and it's open. We have a deal. We don't have a deal. We have a deal. Oh, we have a deal. Bombs fall. You know what I'm talking about? Like I'm like, "Oh, at some point you start going, "Oh, no one knows what's happening. Oh, no one's in control. Oh, there are no adults.

[00:37:44]That's actually what's happening here.

[00:37:46]Right now, all that said, it pops open and then I start reading and I'm like, "Oh." And then it becomes like, as everything has in America, just explosions because um ABC, NBC, they're all like, "Yeah, we're not airing it."

[00:38:01]Which if you want to talk about something that I race a narcissist, >> yes, >> tell them you're not getting prime time.

[00:38:06]It's like, I'm sorry. And as you would expect, proper response, the man with the power says, I'm going to find accountability for every one of those news agencies that didn't uh have me on television, right? All that said, I was like, well, what's he going to talk about? What's happening? Because I want to I want to stay in touch. And turns out, and this is what this is what excited me, it had something to do with Georgia. When I first heard it, I thought it was like Georgia, the other Georgia. And I was like, "Oh, wait. It's our state." Well, I'm a pastor in Georgia, so I'm like, "What is this? Why did we make it on the radar screen?"

[00:38:42]And as you probably already know, here in Georgia, yet again, we've watched another attempt to undermine confidence in our elections, our state that you are in right now. I mean, guys, you got to kind of smile at this. of all places. Cuz some of you been all around the world. All around the world. I meet people all the time in here and I'm like, "I'm sorry, what?"

[00:39:10]People are like, "Yep, I lived in Zimbabwe for 25 years." And I'm like, "And how did you find Mapleton?"

[00:39:18]Do you if we walked around this room like, "Tell me where you're from." And I am just I am a gasast at this. How did you find here? Because there's a lot of places to be in the world, but you are here.

[00:39:32]And in Georgia, we've watched yet another attempt to undermine confidence in our elections. Our state largely, I would argue our community is terrifying those who want to preserve the status quo.

[00:39:51]And that excites me.

[00:39:55]I got even more excited when I heard the speaker of the house, Mike Johnson, recently warn the nation that if Democrats take the House, they'll investigate Trump and his allies and all of us will go down and be a target.

[00:40:16]I paused, and he said this more than once, twice. I paused my phone and thought like many of you, who says things like that? And then it occurred to me, people who are guilty of breaking the law say things like that. I've never met anyone who didn't break the law, who was worried about accountability. When that teacher touched me on the shoulder, I was worried.

[00:40:44]Can I tell you why I was worried?

[00:40:46]Because I cheated.

[00:40:49]Had I not cheated, news flash, wouldn't be worried. [laughter] This is basic 101 childhood development.

[00:41:00]>> You in here and you have kids, you know this.

[00:41:04]If your kid messes up, they're only worried because they've gotten in trouble for messing up. If they never messed up and you confront them, be like, "Wasn't me. Bye.

[00:41:19]What I would like to say to Speaker Johnson who's concerned that maybe the power will shift and then he's worried that there might be impeachment.

[00:41:32]I would just like to say to him, my friend, impeachment's not going to be your problem when the power shifts.

[00:41:42]What you will experience is what I would hope you would value as a speaker of the house and as a proclaimed Christian, which is one word, accountability.

[00:41:56]If public officials have broken no laws, investigations should have nothing to fear.

[00:42:08]And I would like to add, justice isn't persecution.

[00:42:13]Accountability isn't oppression.

[00:42:18]Authoritarians don't fear voter fraud.

[00:42:25]They fear voters.

[00:42:29]>> They fear, and here it is, elections they cannot control.

[00:42:36]They fear the people whose voices have been ignored finally having equal power.

[00:42:45]And that's why Georgia matters. And when you look at the state of Georgia, it goes even deeper because it's not just the state of Georgia that is a threat to the authoritarianism in this moment.

[00:43:01]It's actually specific counties in Georgia that are a threat to the authoritarianism of this moment. And turns out, don't know if you've done the homework, there is a particular county within those counties that is a threat to the authoritarianism and the toxic ideology coming out of this administration. And it happens to be one of them, Cobb County. And oh friends, gets even better. When you zoom in on Google Earth, it moves from Cobb County to you look at certain regions within the county. And I don't know if you're aware of this, but turns out there are particular areas that can actually shift everything in a direction that will give more accountability to the authoritarians that are in office right now. And this is why they're terrified.

[00:44:00]So when you boil it down, some of the names of those locations are, check it out, Smyrna, Vinings, Mapleton. Now check it, gets even better. When you zoom in on Mabelton, you look at Mapleton, which we're now an official city. Congratulations.

[00:44:22]But when you zoom in, you start to look at how people have voted in the past and you go, "Oh, this particular area is an actual threat to this current administration because we could decide by and large what count of a what part of accountability they're going to receive in November." And then when you zoom in a little bit more, you [snorts] start to see that's it.

[00:44:49]There is a church with a steeple inside of Mabelton.

[00:44:56]And here's what's even better about all this. They don't even know right now we're on the radar.

[00:45:05]But here we are inside. And please hear me. This has nothing to do with partisanship, my friends. This is about real humans losing their lives even again this week.

[00:45:16]Enough is enough. If there is anything central to the gospel, it is let's stop the killing of humans on our streets.

[00:45:28]And not even stop it, let's run all the way upstream and let's hold accountable the people that are killing these innocent people on our streets. I don't know about you, but I say this with hope. I close my eyes almost on a daily basis so I can see the image. But I long for it. I see it. I believe it. I'm not even so sure it's far off from what John Patmos was doing when he wrote the book of Revelation. And he said, "I see a new heaven and a new earth." And inside that new heaven and new earth, there were no more liars, adulterers, cheaters. What is he saying? I think he's longing. He's longing for a just world. And I see it when I close my eyes. I'm telling you, I've started taking my own notes. I wrote down the officers involved in the last five ICE killings. just in case no one in office is keeping a tab because I want the receipts because I long for the day a decade from now, five years from now, this November, December, January, as fast as it can happen where every one of those actual officers who pulled triggers on innocent people are televised being found guilty for what they have done.

[00:46:58]I long for it. I dream for it. Not because I want revenge. We have to be careful. Not because my ego is like, I want to win. Hopefully, the longing and the drive is simply justice. I want a world that is just. A world that doesn't just talk about being just. I want it to actually be just. And I long for that day when we are watching on television where Speaker Johnson and all of this administration is questioned and held accountable for the actions that are being done right now. This is what I think a new world, a new humanity could look like.

[00:47:47]And so Jesus says, "Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy."

[00:48:00]Friends, mercy looks at the poor and ask why.

[00:48:05]Mercy looks at the prisoner and ask why.

[00:48:07]Mercy looks at the refugee and ask why.

[00:48:10]Mercy looks at the sick and ask why.

[00:48:15]But we have to pause here and ask our modern's understandings of mercy don't threaten empire because it's just feel bad for him have pity on him but the ancient understandings of mercy threatens empire. Now I want to show you a video and we'll close right after this video. Uh for those of you watching online uh we won't air the video for copyright purposes but there will be a link for you. You can watch it. Most you have already seen this video. It's 2 minutes 30 seconds. So hang with me.

[00:52:21]I have to tell you, sometimes mistakes are made and sometimes it's right on the money. And reading that without an audio might have been one of the greatest things I've ever seen.

[00:52:30]>> Yeah.

[00:52:33]Did you notice what she asked for?

[00:52:36]Mercy.

[00:52:38]That's it.

[00:52:39]If you took that sermon and placed it anywhere else, you'd be like, "Oh, that's a good homaly."

[00:52:43]All she did was ask for mercy. But context, she asked for mercy in front of power.

[00:52:52]And that thing had a moment.

[00:52:57]Mercy as we understood it. Showing pity wouldn't have bothered anybody. Yeah, give us more mercy. Take care of those people who are sick. But that kind of mercy, oh man, I was busy reading, so I didn't get to see it. But if you go back and watch it, JD Vance keeps moving over to his wife, whispering in her ear. And what I love about his wife, she doesn't even acknowledge his presence.

[00:53:19][laughter] Because even she's like, "Stop acting like a child. Why don't you listen? Why don't you actually listen to what's being said?" Right? I mean just moving around in his seat, right? You just I just pause there not to embarrass or shame. I pause there to just say the kind of mercy I understood growing up would never move someone like that.

[00:53:40]But this is a different understanding of mercy. Why is mercy so threatening to empire?

[00:53:48]Because the moment we stop blaming the wounded, we start questioning systems that keep wounding them.

[00:53:58]When we start asking why people are suffering, you inevitably begin asking who benefits from their suffering.

[00:54:07]Which is why Empire has always preferred blame over mercy.

[00:54:13]Because friends, blame protects the system, but true mercy exposes it.

[00:54:21]And so ultimately, Vinings Lake, I want to leave you with this this morning.

[00:54:27]I do not believe mercy is just something God does.

[00:54:36]I believe mercy is who God is.

[00:54:40]Which means every time we move towards suffering, every time we interrupt suffering, every time we refuse to explain suffering away, we are participating in the very heart of God.

[00:54:55]So, Bing's Lake, may we make the news again this week and the week after that and the week after that and come November.

[00:55:13]May Al Jazera TV know [laughter] not just about Georgia but about Cobb County, about Mabelton, but a little place called Vinings Lake.

[00:55:29]May we all be merciful, not in the way we understood mercy growing up, but in the way the great prophet just told us about mercy.

[00:55:42]And not because mercy is easy. It isn't.

[00:55:45]But because mercy is what God is like.

[00:55:48]May we refuse to explain suffering away.

[00:55:52]May we have the courage to move toward pain when others walk by it. May we interrupt suffering wherever we find it.

[00:56:01]Because mercy is the refusal to let harm have the final word.

[00:56:07]And may you not forget how Jesus started his sermon, all of you people that are giving mercy, blessed are you. Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

[00:56:33]Uh, Vonnie Lake, happy World Cup Sunday.

[00:56:38]May May God have mercy on Spain.

[00:56:53]We'll be here next Sunday. We'll talk about the next beatitude. Peace be with you.