February 7, 2013
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Speaking Boldly
Last night was my turn to lead the discussion of our Life Savers’ study group…a 2nd installment since I led it last week too. The last two weeks we explored Acts 4 and discussed praying and speaking boldly. I used, as an example for this lesson, the recent news report and interview of Malala the 15 year old Pakistani girl who was targeted and almost killed by the Taliban for her campaigning and speaking boldly about the right for all girls everywhere to go to school to learn and be educated. Here is an excerpt:
Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani girl shot in an attempted assassination by the Taliban in October, has spoken publicly for the first time of her recovery in Britain, saying God has given her “a second life” thanks to the prayers of those who supported her around the world.
In a short video recorded in the days before her most recent operations on Saturday, Malala said:
“Today you can see that I am alive. I can speak, I can see you, I can see everyone and … I am getting better day by day. It’s just because of the prayers of people. Because all people – men, women, children – all of them have prayed for me.
“And because of these prayers God has given me this new life … and this is a second life. And I want to serve. I want to serve the people. I want every girl, every child, to be educated.”
What a wonderful witness to the power of prayer….and for speaking boldly, not backing down, and refusing to be intimidated. This young girl has more true grit and courage and humanity in her than all those who attacked her put together. It was such a good example of how witnessing to your beliefs and standing up for them in the face of danger takes a great courage and faith.
We also talked about the different ways we witness our beliefs whether political, humanitarian or religious. We read in Matthew 5:16 “Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven” and we sing “This little light of mine I’m gonna let it shine.” But we remember that light has no sound and that ”actions speak louder than words.”
I also reminded our group that witnessing can take on other forms and offered this as an example of making a statement:
Comments (6)
you know that last one reminds me of t-shirts I see Christians wearing with Jesus on it. Like Jesus;he’s the real thing.
Amen!
Really? Jesus would not own a weapon? I guess its his Father who says, Beat your plowshares into swords! No..that’s not quite right is it? Anyway, I heard a rumor that Jesus was really hung on the cross because he was packing heat in the temple.
Lord, I hope this person has a sense of humor…
Sail on… sail on!!!
@dreadpirate - You are in luck! I am seldom the answer to anyone’s prayer, but I DO have a sense of humor. Am laughing. It is, by the way, ”beat your swords into plowhshares” and Jesus certainly DID stir things up in the temple, turning over the tables of the money changers, etc.and causing things to really heat up quite a lot among the high priests and civil authorities too. We all can look up to him as one of the best known, beloved and worshipped by many….rebels in history and certainly was not afraid to speak truth to power and stick up for the outcasts and poor….and still today offers hope to all us sinners….Amen.
@Gma_Joyce - Amen!
I read with interest as well as heard the young Malala speak, but she spoke alone, certainly a couragious young woman, though a part of me sees her as a political pawn to as why we should keep up war anywhere in the Middle East. I am fully a pacifist and still have not forgiven Andrew Jackson for lying to Native Americans. Maybe a Jewish Xangan will help me to understand this; For I wish to know why there was not more resistance in the form of non violence as happened in Poland. I cannot go back and prevent The Holocaust; but Jewish people are brilliant, and news was getting back in Hitler’s final solution. In my naieve thoughts; There were not guns for resistance, but to save my family I would have given up all that I owned, gathered in open places and begged for mercy. The tribal nature of the Jewish people is alive and well in the USA, and beginning after Crystal Nacht; Then and there was the time to have gone arm in arm to the German public. One Uncle of mine had to photograph – I believe Dachau, and it took him many years to return to a church. My older sisters have seen some pictures he brought out after the liberation, but a cousin keeps them in his family Bible. Ghandi and Dr. King are our primary messengers of the power of peaceful resistance;
Yet with each Holocause movie – Our Spielberg lessons for all time, It was cattle to slaughter. Hundreds of bodies alive on a train could have feasibly derailed trains from within, for bodies are mass. Almost all of Jewish celebration, in truth — According to Jewish friends involved one great battle or the other; but the lessons I have learned from reading and the movies appears that Jewish people, at the time, just did not know that relocation by Hitler was as probable as American Indians being given the state of Texas for their own.
I am so sad to say that as couragious as this exquisite 15 year old girl is, I fear she is a poster child for continuing the war. I do not wish for the extremist Muslims to take over again, but they have managed to for thousands of years. How many more years, and how many more sons and daughters of America shall we loose before we lay down our swords. I beg for American forces all to be out before Mr. Obama finishes his presidency. Otherwise, he did not understand the message of Dr. King.
For the peace of all nations; “Let us pray unto the Lord.” Barbara Everett Heintz, Author, Amazon, KDP “Pinkhoneysuckle.”