There’s an uneasy disquiet in my spirit this Sabbath. On this day in which the Sovereign rested I am fraught with tension and dismay and there is no leisure within or without me. The atmosphere menacingly punctuated and saturated with dread.

Unlike the times afore – for my soul is no stranger to the vicissitudes of languor and lassitude – I see no port of  harbor safe on the shore nigh or horizon distant.

The alluring and seductive sirens of despair and hopelessness beckon for the mariner to abandon ship. But what does a life marooned in headache, heartache and hypertension bring this melanated man than madness and the loss of peace, hope, and self-identity? Is it not madness that changes the Macbeths, defines King Lear, destroys Ophelia, and leads but to irrationality, disorder, folly, and destruction?

The familiar channels of distraction seem but mere trifles - of which they have always been - however now seen backstage with curtains drawn without their masks of hypocrisy – distractions from the oars and onslaught of life’s withering storm. “Like a ship that’s tossed and driven battered by the angry sea” it seems as though the mythic gods of antiquity are once again at play with my insidious insanity and misanthropic misery as their merriment and mirth.

But I must shake myself from this cacophonous menagerie, mustn’t I? Thirty, yes, 30 souls shot in this city today; 2 perished, 3 in critical condition and dozens of others with scars no shea butter or meaningless words we utter can erase or undue.

Asleep? Samson, O' mighty one, arise, shake yourself, for the Philistines of deceit and subterfuge are upon us!

The Church with all of her quickening power must not fall prey to the baneful rhetoric of those who would criticize her for preaching a gospel of true power and victory.

Did not the Savior call us to ‘feed the hungry, clothe the naked, take care of the orphan and widow?’ What, dear Friend, does that have to do with soteriology, that is, the salvation of the soul from the eternal flames of hell? Yet, these mandates honor we must.

Humanity is tri-parte – body/soma/physical; mind/pathos/psyche; and spirit/soul/pneuma. Just as the body must be fed in order to survive so must mind and spirit, for we 'cannot live by bread alone.’

Dear Reader, I hope you will join me and working to make a difference in this Beloved Community. I pray that you will sign up and spread the news that we are determined to hoist the shorn, worn, torn sails of uncompromisng love and peace once again.

We can do this. We must do this! The ship has been adrift for far, far too long, we must reject every insult to our own soul, launch out into deep, “rescue the perishing, care for the dying tell them of Jesus, Mighty to save.”

This is our mantra!

NOW, dear Friend, is our true day of Liberty and INTERdependence. Now is the time to transform Pain into Purpose, Purpose to a Plan and the Plan into Power. Our new song is an old song, and we simply begin with the beatific line, "O' Freedom, O' Freedom, O, Freedom, over me and before I'll be a slave I'll be buried in my grave and go home to my Lord and be free."

Eerily yet earnestly the dawn peers just over the bow. A new day awaits. Warriors arise!