Like millions around the world, I am remembering Nelson Mandela today and giving thanks for his life on this earth. A few things I have learned from Nelson Mandela are:
+ God does not desire our occasional nod to the faith whenever it is we remember or have time to attend worship. Mandela teaches us that life lived in faith is worship and to so worship is to walk with God continually, which is God's greatest desire and reason for sending Jesus.
+ Most of us view the 27 years of relative solitary confinement in which Nelson Mandela was interred as an interminable sentence and one few among us could have endured. Mandela teaches us there are some things so meaningful in God that nothing on earth, including the walls of a jail, can stand in their way, justice and equality chief among them.
+ To offer solace to the widow of the man who confined you is to reshape the vision of how one human being is to treat another and expands the meaning of true forgiveness and mercy.
+ To those who initially opposed Nelson Mandela and the freedom movement, including the United States, while supporting the apartheid regimes of South Africa, Mandela offered understanding, inclusion, and grace, modeling the One who from the cross offered the words, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do."
+ The sign of a great leader is not the winning of an election, but transformation of the souls around them.
+ Nelson Mandela's legacy in this world is a paraphrase another great example who walked this earth among us, Mother Teresa, 'Not all of us can do great things, but all of us can do small things with great love.'
+ Nelson Mandela never claimed perfection in his life, but lived for mercy among all with whom he journeyed. We can do no less.
+ Nelson Mandela never demanded power, respect or authority, nor was it given him for most of his life. Yet, in the final analysis, I suspect the human race will discover that Mandela lived every single day of his life in the Power, Respect and Authority of the One to whom he bent his knee and in Whom he gained continual confidence and strength, regardless how humanity regarded him. Of such may be his greatest gift, freeing all people to live equitably, unafraid of how others might perceive them.
+ God does not desire our occasional nod to the faith whenever it is we remember or have time to attend worship. Mandela teaches us that life lived in faith is worship and to so worship is to walk with God continually, which is God's greatest desire and reason for sending Jesus.
+ Most of us view the 27 years of relative solitary confinement in which Nelson Mandela was interred as an interminable sentence and one few among us could have endured. Mandela teaches us there are some things so meaningful in God that nothing on earth, including the walls of a jail, can stand in their way, justice and equality chief among them.
+ To offer solace to the widow of the man who confined you is to reshape the vision of how one human being is to treat another and expands the meaning of true forgiveness and mercy.
+ To those who initially opposed Nelson Mandela and the freedom movement, including the United States, while supporting the apartheid regimes of South Africa, Mandela offered understanding, inclusion, and grace, modeling the One who from the cross offered the words, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do."
+ The sign of a great leader is not the winning of an election, but transformation of the souls around them.
+ Nelson Mandela's legacy in this world is a paraphrase another great example who walked this earth among us, Mother Teresa, 'Not all of us can do great things, but all of us can do small things with great love.'
+ Nelson Mandela never claimed perfection in his life, but lived for mercy among all with whom he journeyed. We can do no less.
+ Nelson Mandela never demanded power, respect or authority, nor was it given him for most of his life. Yet, in the final analysis, I suspect the human race will discover that Mandela lived every single day of his life in the Power, Respect and Authority of the One to whom he bent his knee and in Whom he gained continual confidence and strength, regardless how humanity regarded him. Of such may be his greatest gift, freeing all people to live equitably, unafraid of how others might perceive them.
On this Advent journey, what is it you are expecting, hoping, praying to find in Bethlehem? Take a moment and learn from those who, like Nelson Mandela, spend a lifetime in adoration of the One who comes, then go and do likewise: Serve.
Thank you, Nelson Mandela, for a lifetime of teaching tolerance, acceptance, and the gracious care of God for all. Rest now in the arms of the One who frees you from all chains which ever could bind you on earth.
Thank you, Nelson Mandela, for a lifetime of teaching tolerance, acceptance, and the gracious care of God for all. Rest now in the arms of the One who frees you from all chains which ever could bind you on earth.
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