We often hear about the "Christian Right," or "Conservative Christians." Yet, if you think about it, Jesus was the original liberal.  He cared about motives more than the deeds themselves (Matthew 23:5 & Mark 12:41-43) and more about compassion than adhering to rules (Luke 6:1-11 & Luke 13:10-17). This blog will reflect liberal Christian values of compassion, tolerance, mercy, charity, a thirst for knowledge & understanding, and, above all, love.

Friday, August 5, 2022

Sources of Inspiration

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All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, ~ 2 Timothy 39:16 (English Standard Version).

Here, the author of 2 Timothy is telling readers to trust scripture; to lean on it, teach it, and take inspiration from it.  And I do.  The Holy Bible is a very inspiring text, let's get that right.  But I find inspiration from other sources too. 

  • Good poetry inspires me, the poems of Robert Frost being among my favorites (although, if one more person quotes the line from Mending Wall, "Good fences make good neighbors," to support building a border wall, the men in white may have to fit me for a "special" coat).
  • Watching two hard fighting, clean fighting boxers duking it out for twelve rounds can be very inspiring. 
  • I'm constantly inspired by the people, family & non-family, who selflessly take care of my physical needs.  It's not an easy job and the do it with love every day.
  • The Vlogbrothers
A record screeches and the room falls quiet.

| Subject: Vlogbrothers - John on the left, Hank on the right | | Date: 06/22/2021 | Photographers: Vlogbrothers | | Permissions: This screenshot was part of a video originally uploaded to YouTube under a CC license. Their website states: "YouTube allows users to mark their videos with a Creative Commons CC BY license." |
Don't feel bad if you don't know who John Green and his brother, Hank, are.  I'm probably the only member of their YouTube audience who remembers Bill Clinton's presidency.

John writes novels for young adults.  To promote his brand, in 2007 John and Hank began posting five-minute videos, addressed to each other, to help young people understand the world around them.  

Today, 3.4 million young people, known as "Nerd Fighters," belong to an online collective called Nerdfighteria.  Rather than using the videos to simply promote John's books, and subsequent movies, the brothers use their unique celebratory status to, in their words, decrease "world suck."  In other words, they actively work to make the world better place. 

And I don't mean making the world better by advocating for one political party, or religion, over another.  Since dropping their first video, in 2007, the brothers have raised millions of dollars for such causes as Save the Children, The Against Malaria Foundation, The Ocean Cleanup, and so many more.

I guess I'm a fan because they're actively trying to make the world a better place.  Perhaps if more of us took their lead the world would actually be a better place. 

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. ~ James 1:22
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