The Journal of the Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America January-March 2018 - 7

Peace BreakFasTs

We have to know who we are. We have to know
who we are. We have to know our spiritual and social
makeup, what motivates and calls us, what we know to be true
about ourselves.
When Isaiah was moved to take on the call, he confessed
to God, saying, "I am a man of unclean lips and I come from
profane people." This meant that he and his people were those
who had seen and said just about every-thing. Yet, it didn't
diminish his capacity to recognize the holy when he saw it, so
he responded that he was willing to not only go, but to go for
the long haul.
I know who I am, at least in part. I am a tall, black, middle-aged woman raised in the desert city of Phoenix, AZ, and
now a New Yorker...I've seen a lot...I have often sized people
up based on my assumptions and experiences of certain types
of folks...More than that, though, I am a disciple of christ,
and a minister of the Gospel of peace, which motivates me and
often transforms my assumptions and previous experiences.
I am an American Baptist by intention. I won't apologize
for my faith tradition, even when other Baptists or christians
embarrass and shame me. I was given a heritage of wonder
from my parents and church, who aren't perfect but did the
best they could with the messages they'd been given. I was
taught to reach high and wide for my own place in the world,
and to help push the world to live into its best self.
I do know what helps push me into my better self when
I feel myself slipping into grief. I pray and cry and read the
Bible and other sacred writings. I tell stories of the faith-from
the Bible and from our historic and cultural traditions. I sing
songs to lift my heart and spirit in order to remember what I
know is true.
I notice when there is no song my heart and ask God to
show me how to sing a song in a strange land. And then when
I find the strength, I will pick up my lyre that I laid on the
willows, pluck a few notes, clear my throat, and open a hymnal
when needed, to remember the songs tucked away in the heart.
Then I sing with my crackly voice until I remember who I am.
when peace like a river attendeth my way,
when sorrows like sea billows roll;

whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say,
"It is well, it is well with my soul."
If someone says "Why you are singing? It is noT well," I
say I am singing until I believe it's true. I am singing because,
as Brother Roger of the Taize community said, when you sing
you are praying twice. I say, "I'm practicing peace by singing
until it comes." you have to know yourself-when you are
depleted, and how to get yourself refilled.

"Then I sing with my crackly
voice until I remember who I am. If
someone says 'Why are you are
singing? It is NOT well,' I say I am
singing until I believe it's true."

We have to be able to strip away some things.
What are we being asked to strip away? Isaiah's obedience
to God's command to strip off his clothes and remove his shoes
speaks to his courage as well as to his faith. When Isaiah stood
naked, he was not starting a prophetic tradition, but he was
following in the footsteps of other prophets. Jeremiah did it.
Ezekiel did it. Amos did it. Hosea did it.
Sometimes what we have done in the past isn't enough in
extraordinary times. When a plethora of words to the forces
that be aren't enough. When a thousand or thousands of
tongues aren't enough
to proclaim and prophesy. When people and
institutions turn a deaf
ear. Then we have to be
willing to reveal ourselves
and strip away what is
usually hidden to others.
during the liberian civil war, leymah
Gbowee, a liberian
peace activist responsible for leading a women's
peace movement, led
protesters by threatening to strip naked in an
attempt to push warring
factions to agree on a
peace deal.

Please see "Practice of
Peace" on page 8.

Baptist Peacemaker

JAN-MAR 2018

Photo courtesy of Cheryl F. Dudley.

of peace with people from around the world. We are used to
critiques of uS government and culture, because we know
where we live, and we know how we tacitly benefit from the
spoils of empire.
We are in even more awkward spaces now, both within and
outside of our country, in the pursuit of peace. our usual pithy
pronouncements are not good enough. We find them flaccid or
arid in the face of current national and global circumstances.
What is there to do?
There are three things I believe one has to do, that we have
to individually and communally reckon with in our practice
of peace in these deeply divided times: we have to know who we
are, we have to be prepared to strip away some things, and we have to be
prepared to take some other things on.

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Journal of the Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America January-March 2018