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Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if is not accompanied by action, is dead….I will show you my faith by what I do. (James 2:15-17, 18b)
Prepping helps us to live out our faith by serving our neighbors as Christ served us. It is good to love our neighbors and wish them well, but if we are to help them, we must have skills to offer. Prepping supplies us with these basic skills. These would be desperately needed in the aftermath of a disaster. They are also needed now–there are many people who lack fresh wholesome food, or who need help with home repairs, or who need to learn how to mend and cook and plant. There are also many who need to be listened to, and the work of preparation–canning, weeding, quilting, building–lends itself to companionship and conversation.
Prepping also gives life to our faith by providing daily reminders of whom we mean to serve. Many of the physical tasks of prepping lend themselves to quiet prayer as well as to conversation. Paying closer attention to the creation, as we must in farming, wildcrafting, fishing, and hunting, reminds us of the Creator. Living in a way that may appear strange, silly, or irrelevant to many of the people around us forces us to stop again and again and consider why we made this unpopular choice in the first place. This can be lonely and it can be wearying. It can also remind us that we are not seeking popular approval, or success and security as our society understands them. We are working for the wholeness of our own bodies and souls, and for love of God, God’s people, and God’s world.
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Today in Christian History
May 9th
1619 – In Holland, the six month long Synod of Dort ended. Confirming the authority of the “Heidelberg Catechism,” the decisions of the Synod led to some 200 Arminian clergy being afterward deprived of their offices.
1828 – Birth of Andrew Murray, South African Dutch Reformed clergyman and devotional writer. His most famous writing was “Abide in Christ” (1864).
1905 – Birth of Merrill Dunlop, American sacred chorister and hymnwriter. He directed the Chicago Gospel Tabernacle for many years, and is author of the hymn, “My Sins Are Blotted Out, I Know.”
1961 – English apologist C.S. Lewis, offering an evaluation of English Bible translations, wrote in a letter: ‘A modern translation is for most purposes far more useful than the Authorized [i.e., King James] Version.’
1983 – John Paul II announced the reversal of the Catholic Church’s 1633 condemnation of Galileo Galilei, the scientist who first espoused the Copernican (i.e., heliocentric) view of our solar system.
Source for Today in Christian History: www.studylight.org
