Sam and I had the opportunity this past weekend to participate in a father-son work party in support of Sacred Road Ministries in Yakima. I had been learning, in the past and now, the terrible exploitation and extermination of the Indians* in North America. Howard Zinn wrote a book on history with a view to see it from native peoples p.o.v., but the book has the problem of Marxist Revisionist influence. I will still read it because I will now have a new book to compare it to from a professor of our own University of Washington. I need to get more information on the book, and then I will report on it here. Anyway, terrible things were done to the Indians, but it is the Church (the universal invisible church; and for all you pedantics out there, I mean those who are true Christians) that needs to hold out the gospel and love our neighbors. As Chris Granberry likes to say, the Indians were neighbors to the church first when the pilgrims showed up under-equipped for North America; they literally saved their bacon.
Sacred Road Ministries seeks to heal these past wrongs the only way we can (unless someone invents a time machine), that is to bring salvation and a new hope. Understand, this is in the context of a more enlightened church that does not seek to eradicate another culture, but rather to understand this other culture and tell about the hope and solution of all the cultures of mankind; it is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ that is this hope.
Please check out the ministry website above to see what they are about and to pray for them. I will also have their blog linked in my blogroll. They have some new people on staff including an excellent young Christian woman who will be their graphic designer and will likely keep their blog updated for Chris Granberry. As anyone knows who has studied how missionary ministries work, all the new staff there in White Swan at the Yakima nation will wear many hats. We wish them well and I am thankful for the opportunity to help in their mercy ministry. This aspect of the ministry was to help out one of the people, a Christian widow who has no sons or grandsons available to cut and split her year's supply of firewood; we had the opportunity to step in and do this small work for her.
I hope to help out more in the Sacred Road ministry in the future, but for now I urge everyone to pray for this ministry.
Novo Visum, Neue Ansicht.
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A number of the Yakima people refer to themselves as Indians, rather than "Native Americans". So, when you talk to a liberal or a spineless jellyfish Anglo-American, you can use the term "Native American", otherwise to some of (to use the Canadian/Australian phrase) the "First Peoples", they call themselves Indians.
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