My mother and I have a renewed interest in our family tree. This was again sparked by my visit to our family cemetery in western PA last summer. The critical piece for me was my spiritual heritage. As a pastor who wants to see generational faithfulness I hoped that my family line would reflect a legacy of faithfulness. I was blown away by two of my forefathers, Rev. Moses and Elijah Embree. I just learned that Elijah wrote and published the first anti-slavery periodical dedicated to the abolition of the practice (entitled the
Manumission Intelligencer "Emancipator") on American soil in the 1700's while living in East Tennessee. The exciting part was this was done before it was popular to be against slavery. They were bold and courageous for Christ. This wasn't so much a political ideology, it was a theological one. They believed man-stealing and trading were violations of God's Law. These Calvinists had a legacy of defending the Truth of Scripture. I am proud of them and hope some of that spirit lives within me. One of the funny revelations was they left the PA/OH frontier because of the ongoing problem with the Abenaki Indians.
This week I am studying the last chapter of Acts and Galatians 5 for Sunday night. As our Acts study comes to a close I am beginning to think I will miss my constant companion for these last 2 years. I am entertaining the idea of preaching through Romans next after a short series elsewhere. It took 2 years for John, 2 yrs. for Hebrews and 2 yrs. for Acts. Romans will be longer...
My devotional reading is again in the minor prophets. I am certain the Church has under-appreciated these inspired books. If you haven't read your Bible today, turn off your computer and don't come back to it until you have...
