Ponder Anew

“Blessed are the peacemakers , for they will be called children of God” Matthew 5:9

“But to those who are listening, I say., ‘Love your enemies, and do good to those who hate you.’” Matthew 6:27.

I am a Mennonite who is a pacifist. I believe that whenever we go to war, we have failed as a society and community. None of us want to go to war, but we often do not use the resources of peacemaking that we have, to lessen the chance of going to war.  I am not telling the government to become pacifist, because that is not what nations are called to do. But, if the government of Canada is going to have a military, then I believe that we have the obligation to make them accountable for their actions.

The United States has been at war with Iraq and Afghanistan since 1991 and 1993. In Iraq, 4,486 U.S soldiers have been killed, and in Afghanistan 2,345 soldiers have been killed. Many more have been injured during these wars, and they are maimed for life . Soldiers are honoured for their service, but are treated badly by the Veterans Administration, when they arrive back home . It is estimated that between 1.7- 4 trillion dollars have been spent. We have killed Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, and yet we have not won anything. The U.S. ( and Canada ) still have troops in both countries helping to train the local militaries. In the other conflicts( Syria, Egypt, Yemen ) in the area, we might have spent  $6 trillion altogether . And now Canada wants to spend more on the  military,  to solve the problems of the world.  

On Monday morning on CNN, a U.S. military officer said that all the land you see in the distance is controlled by the Taliban. And they come into the city everyday because we do not know who they are. After 14 years , spending trillions of dollars , having thousands of troops killed or injured, the same land is controlled by the same people. If we were running a business, and the government is not a business, we would have stooped this kind of spending with nothing to show for it, a long time ago. And now Canada is going to increase its spending on the military in order to attempt to bring more peace.

So , why do we continue to fight ? We want to win. We want to  have power over others. We think that our superior military prowess will make people fear us, and then they will do what we want them to do. And we are addicted to war. We want to test out new systems, so that we will know that they work. War correspondents are addicted to war as well. They get the adrenalin rush when they are in a war zone. I am addicted to conflict and war . While living in Thailand I was addicted to the war in Cambodia. While the war in Iraq was at its most intense, I had a US soldier death counter on my computer , so I knew everyday how many soldiers had died.

Jesus models for us a different way. It is the harder way when the society is telling us to kill all those Afghans and Iraqis. We have billions of dollars wrapped up in defence spending. What would it look like for us to use it to love our enemies. That is too naive, we will just go on ,as usual, killing the enemy, and not getting any closer to peace.

“Moses. Isaiah, Jeremiah are all people from the Old Testament who were reluctant to to take their call. At first calling, they did not want to follow God. Jesus invites some friends to come and “follow” him

Shirley and I visited with my childhood friend , Pippa, and her family on Sunday night. Pippa moved into Niagara-on-the -Lake two years after our family had move their from St.Catharines. We graduated from high school in 1977, and then our lives took on  different roads. Pippa got an architecture degree, but did not find good work. She got a call from CUSO, wondering if she wanted to go to Nigeria to work with the government in Architecture . She served there for a year, and then she traveled the world. During that time, she visited us in Thailand , while we were working there for Mennonite Central Committee.

We then lost touch for a few years. In the meantime , she got a degree in nursing, and looked for work. She ended up in Afghanistan for , I think, eleven years . This is where she met her future husband. They lived and worked when it was really dangerous in Afghanistan. They worked for Save The Children and Care, and a few other NGO’s . then she got a job with the United Nations.

I found her again in 2003, and she was working for UN World Food Program in Georgia ( the birthplace of Joseph Stalin ). This was post Soviet time , and Georgia had been on its own and struggling in everything. She was in charge of keeping large parts  of the population fed everyday. I visited her there for two weeks, and experienced her work there.

From there she went to Syria ( before the civil war ), and was in charge of feeding all those Iraqi refugees who were at risk because of the US war on Iraq. Next place on her journey was South Sudan and Ghana. I began to work for MCC late last year , and was looking at the results of the Nepali earthquake of 2014, and came across Pipoa again. She was still with  World Program Program working in Nepal . She had arrived there just before the earthquake. Their house was not livable after the earthquake , and have since moved a few times in Kathmandu, the capital city . What an amazing life Pippa has lived after she left Niagara. She has two lovely children that were born when Pippa was in her forties.

After we had supper together Sunday evening, she said that she had always admired me because I had wanted to work for the church and be a minister all my life, and and stayed on course. I always saw her, as being able to adapt to the circumstances around her, to do good work among refugees and other people who were at risk. I admired her tenacity , and her ability to live and work in new cultures.

I do not think we would change our lives, but we are able to appreciate the different callings that we have had in our lives.  Do not conform to what others might do, but follow your calling and stay the course, even if that course changes all the time.

I just left the endodontist’s office in Oakville to head home. The doctor had told me that I needed a root canal on one or maybe two of my front teeth. I had known that this might be the case, but it is not a pleasant subject, but it would be done in a week. Then, I would be feeling better, after the swelling goes down. I was thinking about all of this , as I drove on Trafalgar Road towards the QEW. I was going under the train underpass, and I saw a guy edging into the crosswalk with the the following letters on his t-shirt, “ Jesus saves “. I did not know if he was going to walk out into the intersection, but he did stop after taking one step into the crosswalk.

The man was wearing sunglasses, and was of of medium height and weight. As soon as I saw the t-shirt, I wondered what he meant by the statement. Did he mean that Jesus saves us for heaven, or was he saying that Jesus saves us right now ? Was the shirt an invitation to conversation, or was this an ultimatum, believe this or we do not have a relationship ? And what what church does this guy attend, or did he attend a church or not ? And what Jesus does he mean ? The one that wants us to go heaven or the one that wants us to work for justice and peace and compassions while we are living on this earth ? Jesus is a complex guy, who teaches, does miracles, rattles people’s chains , is executed as a criminal, and then rises from the dead. Some people believe all of this , or some parts of it. I wonder what the man believed who was wearing the t-shirt on that corner in downtown Oakville, at around noon on Monday morning. I will probably never know.

What do I believe about Jesus ? I believe Jesus was human being, who lived a long time ago. There are four books in the Bible that record some of the events of his life here on earth. While on this planet, he taught about what the kingdom of heaven was/is like through his stories. He did some miracles, healing people, feeding people and changing the minds of people. He needed his friends to help him while on this earth, men and women. He came to Jerusalem to die. He was arrested, and convicted as a danger to the society. He was a great danger to the powerful politicians and religious leaders of his day. He was killed, and after three days, he came back to life . He then returned to heaven, and the church has waited for 2000 years for him to return ( this is a long time to wait ).

I believe I receive salvation before I die. I live in a relationship with Jesus and the Spirit of God now. The Kingdom is in the here and now. I am not waiting for heaven to experience Jesus’ love. Jesus’s life here with us has nothing to do with heaven. I need to be loving and compassionate to all people here while I am living . Jesus loved the outsiders of his world, and we must do the same today.

Next week, I return to Oakville to get my root canal done. I hope I see the guy in the T-shirt.

Fred Redekop

“ Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God, in Christ Jesus for you.”  I Thessalonians 5:16-18

I have never wanted to be a truckdriver. My dad delivered milk house-to-house for 20 years in a very small Divco truck. It was interesting to work on truck with him, but I had no desire to do that for a living. I do not enjoy driving, especially in snow. I did not get my driver’s license until I was 23, right before I got married.  I have only my G license , so there is no threat of me getting behind the wheel of an 18-wheeler.

So, from a distance, I admire truck drivers. They maneuver that large piece of steel and wheels into small places . When I was pastor at Floradale, I went with a driver to deliver sawdust to farmers. In the farmyards,  there are fences, feed bins, sharp turns to get around to put the sawdust in the right place. This driver never hit anything. Then, there are the long distance truck drivers that go all over North America, dropping off freight and picking up other freight, for on the way back home. There are many pressures on this kind of job. They have to be on time, and yet cannot drive over a certain numbers of hours in a day. They have to wait to be unloaded , and time is money on the road. It must be stressful to be a driver, and his/her family being gone for long hours. Then, all those unsafe drivers on the road, and you have to evade bicyclists in downtown Toronto. So, I invite you to pray for truck drivers and their families, because there are a lot of them in Canada ( over 300, 000 ).

I work for Mennonite Central Committee. By the generous donations of many people , we are able to send  material aid to places of war, famine and disasters. We have used over 40 million dollars worth of aid to respond to the crisis in Syria and the surrounding countries that have all those refugees. We work in Congo, Nepal, and Nigeria who have needed emergency aid in order for their citizens to  survive. And always the aid is trucked into these dangerous places. They drive between warring factions. They drive through areas hit by earthquakes. They also drive to places, and wait for the material aid to be released by governments. In many cases they are accompanied by military , so the aid will get to where it is needed most. I think it a dangerous occupation to be a truck driver in some countries in the world. There is a road that goes from Syria to Iraq. It is a drive through the desert. According to Google maps that it takes more than nine hours. Trucks went along this route during the Iraq war, and still travel this road with supplies. I have heard that it is safer at night, because people cannot see you coming. There has been  danger from robbers and from airstrikes during the war.  And yet, truck drivers drive it everyday with aid that is needed.

Pray without ceasing for our truckdrivers of this world, and their families.

God is assumed to listen to our prayers, and answer them. Jesus says in his most famous sermon ( found in Matthew 5 ) that “ we should ask, and it will be given ( added ) to us. I believe that we are comfortable in asking God for many and all things. We sometimes, I think, treat God like at ATM machine. We punch in the numbers , and we pick up our money. We ask, and God answers.

We know that this is not quite true. I asked God to heal my mom, and my Mom died. I have asked God to bring peace to Israel and Palestine, and it has not happened. I have asked God to lessen the violence in Turkey, so that I might visit there again. Did I actually write such a selfish prayer in that last sentence ?I want peace to come to a country, so that I might visit there safely. I have prayed that .God did not and should not answer that one, ever. I would hope that God would bring peace to Turkey, but not so I can visit there again.

How do we listen to God ? We like to speak our prayers out loud. Or , we might like to say them silently, still thinking God can hear them. I believe God hears everything. When, we sit or lie down, and try to listen to God, our minds usually continue to race. So, how do we slow our own mind down to listen to the thought or words of God.

The other night I had a “Samuel experience”. In the Old Testament, there is the story that Samuel is woken three straight nights by a voice. After the third night, he figures it out that the voice is God. It happened to me twice in one night. I am sure there was a voice calling “Fred” outside our bedroom. I got up. Nothing. I may have been dreaming, but I do not think so. I have waited for a third time in the night, but nothing. Silence, but what is God saying in the silence. if God was there at all.

I have an interesting journey with silence and God. Early in my years of ministry I was quieter, and but not really engaged with silence. Then in about 1998, I was introduced to silence at Loyola House in Guelph. It is a Jesuit/Catholic retreat Center. In the early part of 2016, I had a difficult time with silence at an eight-day retreat there. I have not been able to go back there. Am I afraid to meet God in silence, anymore ? Is God going to speak with me in a different way now ?

God might not speak into the silence. I need to know what God wants me to be, and do. No words needed. Jesus went away to pray sometimes, and he talked much to his disciples. Maybe he didn’t need silence . When he came from being alone, he seemed to know what to be about.

God might speak to me through you !! I am a little confused right now about how to listen to and for God. Where do you meet God ?

Fred Redekop

The title of the article this week goes around on the internet/facebook every week or so. Last week they had a picture of the comic actor Robin Williams. Williams was a fine actor, and was loved by talk show hosts. He was a great interview. He committed suicide a few years ago. You just do not know what a person is having to deal with in their lives. We should not rush to judgment with anyone. We should be compassionate to everyone.

In the last two years, I have been in judgment of the policies and character of Donald Trump. I find his bullying nature to be counter-productive to being a good citizen. His policies on  trade agreements with the world, and his attitude towards other countries is not helpful. His attitude in relation to women has a history of harassment .

But, what personal battle is Mr. Trump going through, that often does not allow him to be understanding , compassionate or patient with people ? Mr Trump has gone bankrupt six times . I would think that kind of history would have an affect on your self-confidence. Mr Trump was helped by his father to get into the real estate market in New York. Depending on how you read the financial numbers, Mr Trump has not done as well as expected .

I do not want to deconstruct the personality of Mr. Trump, but we are all dealing with some stuff out of our past. The Apostle Paul, the early church teacher, preacher and leader, killed some Christians before he became a believer in Jesus Christ. That would have shaped who he was as a leader of this movement. Some Christians would never trust him in the church. How did he deal with criticism from those people. Read his second letter to the church at Corinth, to see how he deals with people who are disappointed in him.

In the church where I grew up, we were one of the poorer families . I felt it at times, but for the most part I did not think about. How has that affected me as a person in the way that I relate to people on the margins , and to the people who are wealthy  ? We are the sum of all of our experiences that we have in life. I am not sure what it all adds up to in my life. I am still looking for the sum total, and then something happens in my life, and I have to rearrange the totals.

Paul wrote many letters to early churches. We have quite a few of them in the New Testament . At the end of most of these , he tries to sum up the letter by telling the communities should be about in their activities . In the letter to the people of Philippi ( in Greece today ) he tells them to, “ .. Let your gentleness be evident to all … do not be anxious about anything …and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds…

Let your hearts be guided and guarded by God. You never know what your neighbor, your friend or your foe might be dealing with in their lives. You know what your are dealing with everyday.

Shalom and strength,

Fred Redekop

“ And he sat down and called the twelve, and said to them, ‘ If anyone be first, he must last of all and servant of all’ “  ——– Mark 9:45

My wife and I travelled to Pennsylvania last weekend for a family wedding. We crossed the border at the Queenston-Lewiston bridge near Niagara Falls. I am fearful every time I have to cross a border and show my passport. I have crossed borders thousands of time, and no one has stopped me, and not let me in the country that I have wanted to go. But, I still live in fear. I know where the fear comes from. In the 1960’s during the Cold War between Russia and the United States, our family was denied entry into the US. My dad was born in Russia/Ukraine, and he had to carry his naturalization papers when he travelled to the US. One Sunday, we headed to the Buffalo Zoo. When we go to the border, my dad had forgotten his papers. He told the official that he was born in Russia . He had to go inside the terminal, and they decided that we could not go the the zoo. So, I am anxious every time I cross a border.

Last week when we crossed there was no problem. We showed our passports, and he asked where we were going , and said have a good time. It took about ten seconds. For other people it can be a difficult experience. I am white, look middle class, am a man and I drive a 2012 Toyota Hybrid. I am safe. I have white ( or Elmira ) privilege. Fish do not know what water is because it is natural. I do not know what my privileges are because it is so natural. I do not happen to think about being a woman and walking at night. I do not not have to think about being black, and being watched in a store, I do not have to think being Muslim, and being seen as a possible terrorist.

What do I do, now that I am slightly aware of all the privileges that I have because of my colour, gender and social class ? I can try to remember what these privileges have given me. I can name if for myself, but can I really change it.

As we crossed the border, if I would have been seen to be Middle Eastern, what would have my experience been ? My passport says that I was born  in Canada, but what if my wife had been wearing a hijab ? These are questions I do not even have to think about, when I cross a border. And what if I had been born in one of those seven countries that President Trump has named in his travel ban ?

How can I serve the world, when I am part of all the power structures that enslave people ? By my being present in situations, I am part of the problem in society. What can I do ? How can I be part of the change ? Can I help make it easier for all people to travel safely in this world ? Just by naming it, I am on the way to changing myself.

Fred redekop

People are not poor because they are lazy. I wish it was that easy to explain that people in Waterloo Region go to bed hungry and in inadequate housing. There are many factors that shape the need for affordable housing in our Region. There is a long list of people who need better housing in our area. We live in one of the best areas of the country ( and the world ), and yet people need better places to live, and houses, and apartments that are more affordable in our neighbourhoods.

It is understood that Jesus depended on his community to have a place to sleep. Although, in Mark’s biography of Jesus, it seems to imply that Jesus had a home in Capernaum. At other times, he says that the Son of Man ( that is another name for Jesus ) had no pillow to lay his head. Jesus must have depended on his friends, people from the synagogue , and strangers that he met while travelling for a good place to stay.

I have always  had a place to stay. I have never had an inadequate place to stay. I have always been able to afford a place to live. I knew I could depend on family, friends or the church to help me, if I ran into money problems, and could not afford my housing. I never talked to them about it , but it was understood. This is what community is all about.

But, some people who live in our neighbourhoods do not have the same kind of support that I have had . They might be new immigrants. They might have lost their job . They might live far away from family. They might suffer from mental illness.

My dad worked as a milkman for over 25 years. His day included 12 hours on the truck delivering dairy products from house to house. I think he worked very hard, but he was always considered to be poor. He bought his first “new” car when he was about 80. He did not pay off his mortgage until near his retirement. He had good support from family, his church and the community.

So, we in Elmira are the community support for those who need affordable housing. They need us to provide help  for them. Near the corner of Arthur and Church Street a new three story building  is almost finished. I am so impressed with the Elmira people, who have not said , “ Not in my backyard … NIMBY ) . The people who will be residents there, offer to the community the gifts of friendship and caring as well. The Woolwich community will learn from them what it means to be part of the community.

I will be biking to raise funds for this project . I do not actually raise the money. I am inviting you to be generous towards this project . My biking does not really mean much. But this project will make a difference in the lives of its residents, and it will change all of us. Housing makes all aspects of life better. It keeps kids in school. People eat and sleep better . Make a difference in our community. I am riding for MennoHomes on June 17 at Elmira Mennonite Church. Come out and see us, and GIVE GENEROUSLY.

Fred Redekop

“ Learn to do right., seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the orphan, plead the case of the widow.”  Isaiah ( a Jewish/Christian prophet 1:17

Another terrorist attack has taken place, this time in Manchester, England . This is evil, and this time it seems that children were targeted. There is no justification for targeting women or men either. I cannot imagine thinking that bombing innocent people is right in a religious or secular sense, ever. In recent years , there has been more terrorist attacks in Turkey. I have travelled to Turkey nine times, and now I think about whether I can return to Istanbul for a tenth visit. This means that terrorism, and its fear has changed my life. Suicide bombers are often from ISIS, the Taliban and Hamas. These bomber are radicalized through politics from the margins, and then secondarily through the religion of Islam. ISIS, the Taliban and Hamas are not Islam.

The United States uses drone warfare in the mountains between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Drone airplanes have no pilot, and so targets are identified and bombs dropped from the military  in rural Kansas, or anywhere in the world. The US identifies who is a threat and then tries to kill them with a drone. In other countries,  this might be called assassination. They become the police , the jury and the judge in one sortie of bombs . But the killing takes out terrorists, if you believe that the US have identified the right terrorist . And these drone bombs bring about collateral damage, This means they kill innocent people, at weddings, in markets and at mosques. Why do we not call this US terrorism ?

The state of Israel is completing a wall that increases their security, but does not release them from their fears. During the building of the wall, Israel took away land from the Palestinians. They build the wall through the farms of Palestinian as well. Beginning in 1948, Israel killed or deported 750,000 Palestinians. But 6 million Jews were killed during the Holocaust. That is right, but they were killed by Western European Christians ( with possible blind permission of North American Christians ). Palestinians are a vulnerable people. They are refugees in Syria, Lebanon, Egypt and Jordan . They have no friends in the area of the Middle East . Israel harrasses the local Palestinian population through arrests, identity checks and many other demeaning activities. Their  economic blockade of Gaza Strip is so awful and illegal. Why not call this slow daily terrorism ?

And why do we think that 110 billion dollars of arms sales to Saudi Arabia will bring about peace and security ?

Isaiah is a Jewish prophet. He spoke and wrote 2500 hundred years ago. I think he tells the truth. Israel is God’s people, but that does not give us or them the right to do anything. To act like the people of God, we must defend the “least of these”. Why do Palestinians get treated like the worst of these ? When we treat people as second class humans, how do you think they might react ? How would you react ?

Fred Redekop

In September 2008, time changed for my soul, mind and body. I had my heart attack in late November 2007. After about nine months of recovery, something changed. For me, time began to slow down. The days of the week began to drag along, that I would say, to myself “ … it is only Wednesday .” .There have been weeks when my sense of time returned to normal, but this week has gone very slow.

I shared this with local ministers after it began to happen, and they told me to treat it as a gift from God. Most people experience that life goes by too quickly, so God might be telling you that you have a lot of time, since God saved your life ( my wife, the firemen and the surgeons had something to do with it as well ). That is a great suggestion, but I have not treated it in this way. It still bothers me.

I have asked God for an answer or a response; I have heard nothing. I might not be listening or I might be listening too closely, and missing the obvious answer. But, why can’t I treat it as a gift ? Time in my head and soul has slowed to a crawl, but my mind cannot wrap around it. What might God be teaching me to be about with time being so slow. If I am waiting for an appointment to happen on Friday, it almost never arrives. It is so weird. Does anyone else have this experience, post heart attack or other illness ? A friend has the same feeling for about six months, and then it left his heart, soul and mind.

In Sunday School I heard, over 50 years ago, that the sun and the moon stood still for a moment in time. I found the passage again in Joshua ( a book in the Old Testament ). It says in chapter 10:13, “ So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged its enemies “ The church where I grew up made a big deal, that God could make the moon and the sun stop. If God is God, then God can do anything and everything, so for me it is no big deal that God did it. The question I always ask, is why does God do things. Usually, answers do not come.

So, do I have to avenge my enemies here in Elmira, so that time for me will go faster. That seems like a bad thing to do. Jesus says that I should love my enemies, so I will continue to do that. Maybe I should love my enemies even more. Maybe this might be the thing for me to explore about my life. I might be holding in too much anger, strife and unbelief ? Ouch, I do not want to go there, but I might have too. Thanks for listening.

I will try to treat the slowness of time as gift. What would you do ? What do you do, if you cannot explain or change something that is part of your life ?

Fred Redekop