4 Comments

Mike Melendez
June 15th, 2011 | 10:56 am

Powerful.

Jerry Beckett
June 15th, 2011 | 2:35 pm

While I find these videos to be earnest and compelling, I am reminded of NFL Hall-of-Famer Gale Sayers’ 1970 autobiography, “I Am Third”. It was the inspiration for grown-men-will-cry “Brian’s Song”. The back cover had the following explanation from Sayers of the title:

“The Lord is first, my friends are second, and I am third.”

I think I like Sayers’ formulation better.

King
June 15th, 2011 | 11:27 pm

Jerry Beckett is onto something. Not to quibble with a fine campaign like “I Am Second,” but the order I know is:

God first.
Everyone else second.
Me last.

It’s a handy way to remember that our deepest desire should be for everyone to be saved, to imagine entering the gates of heaven last, after the rest of the world, after every soul that is or ever was.

“So the last will be first, and the first last.”

In this age of banal Christianity, we require constant reminders of the radicalism of Christ and his bold upending of the order of the universe. Thanks for this witness.

Mike Melendez
June 16th, 2011 | 9:36 am

There is great value in these expanded formulations, but in these times that first step may be the hardest. I call it the first principle of religion: “I am not God.”