In this episode of Justice Takes Courage Podcast, Host Bishop Julius C. Trimble and Bishop LaTrelle M. Easterling talk about the challenges of today’s political landscape. They discuss moving beyond prayer to action, giving voice to issues that touch our communities, sustaining justice work over the long haul, and more.

Bishop LaTrelle M. Easterling is the Resident Bishop of the Baltimore Washington / Peninsula-Delaware Episcopal area. Bishop Easterling also serves as an At Large Executive Committee Member of the Board of Directors for the General Board of Church and Society.

Welcome to Justice Takes Courage, a podcast hosted by Bishop Julius C.

Trumbull, General Secretary of the General Board of Church and Society.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Church and Society's Justice Takes Courage podcast.

I'm your host, Bishop Julius Trumbull, General Secretary of the General Board of

Church and Society. My guest today is Bishop Latrell Easterling, the resident Bishop

of the Baltimore, Washington, and Peninsula Delaware Episcopal Area. Bishop Easterling

also serves as an at -large executive committee member of the Board of Directors of

the General Board of Church and Society and is an active board member. Today we're

going to talk about current geopolitical environment impacting peace and social justice

issues at home and abroad. And of course, what is the spiritual and theological

needs that impact this current environment? Welcome my friend,

Bishop Luttrell. It's a pleasure to have you on our podcast. Bishop Trembel, it is

my joy and honor to be here with you today. I'm so looking forward to this

conversation. And more than that, I'm so proud of the work that the General Board

of Church and Society does on behalf of the United Methodist Church and for the

world, you call us into action consistently. Thank you. My first annual conference in

home to Indiana to be the bishop who preached for us and I never will forget that.

We've known each other for quite a while and so welcome to the podcast and we're

so glad that you're here. When we think about the current environment, the

geopolitical landscape, also the spiritual environment of the United Methodist Church,

I wonder if you would just weigh in on how you're feeling right now. Seems like

things are changing so rapidly and not always in a positive way.

What's your sense of the landscape, if you will, of human society?

I don't know, that's a big question, but-- - It is a big question, but I understand

the essence of what you're getting at. Yes, it seems that we awaken every day to

more rights being jeopardized, to more freedoms being taken,

to more populations being made vulnerable both here and abroad by the actions of

this administration and again administrations across the geopolitical landscape.

And so we find ourselves having to fight battles that our parents and grandparents

fought for and we thought had won. And so it's daunting to find ourselves in the

same place that folks were 20 years ago, 25 years ago and beyond. But I'm reminded

of the words of Coretta Scott King that every generation must rise and fight for

liberty and justice. These things are not always given. We must rise and fight. And

that's what we're finding ourselves having to do. I think about, you know, some of

us were, as we came into ministry, we entered congregations that were thriving. We

entered congregations, we didn't really have to break too much of a sweat to be

able to say we were doing good ministry because the landscape was solid.

Some of us probably again thought we wouldn't have to fight these battles. We

wouldn't find ourselves needing to march the way that we are needing to be the kind

of public witness that we're being called to be and yet here we are. My God,

our book of discipline and the mandate for the church for church and society is

that we would help to advance the societal issues that we've spoken about to bring

a more just and equitable society and to be better stewards of God's creation.

Why does the work of the United Methodist Church and United Methodist General Board

of Church and Society, why does it matter when you, as a board member, why does

that work, why does our work matter? - And so again, yes, the general board has

been on the forefront, calling us into the social holiness that our founder, John

Wesley, right, helped to establish as a part of our Wesleyan principles and our

ethos. And Miroslav Wolf said something that I quote often,

there is something deeply hypocritical about praying for a problem that you're

unwilling to solve. So we pray about poverty. We pray about those migrants who are

being displaced. We pray about those who are unhoused. We pray about these things,

but until we put our feet to prayer, right? There's something missing.

It can almost become performative. Board of church and society through your social

principles has spoken to almost every human issue that lies before us.

You give us the foundation. You give us the theological and the social principle and

witness that then can propel us into action and help us understand,

you know, especially today in our climate, we've got folks taking scripture and

contorting it. We've got folks saying things that are certainly not in line with our

Wesleyan principles, but our social principles help us to be able to rightly divide

the Word of God in a way that is liberative, in a way that lives in to get to

those scriptures, we quote all the time, whether it's Micah, whether it is Luke

quoting Isaiah, you help us to be able to discern those things appropriately and

then give us the courage and the foundation to act. I'll tell you, I'm right now

in my conference having days on the district. And I was sharing with them that the

statements that I write always begin with a scriptural grounding. I said,

but then you will often see me immediately move into the social principles of the

United Methodist Church because while they're not the law of the church, great

discerning minds from across the theological perspective have undertaken these topics

and given them deep consideration. And when we stand on what's in our social

principles, we know we're on good footing. - Praise God, praise God. Like a number

of your colleague bishops, bishops each to thee, you have been charged with being

responsible for more than what annual conference, Baltimore Washington annual

conference, Penicillor Delaware annual conference. Can you share how the social

principles and the work of peace and justice is being lived out or being encouraged

in these two conferences. - Certainly, and so I'm sure you can understand there's a

broad constituency in those conferences. We are certainly not of one mind in either

conference, but certainly the two conferences when you look at them are very

different. And so what one wants to avoid is, again,

approaching our call, approaching our work, approaching our advocacy from anything that

sounds like a partisan political position. It has to be grounded in the Word of

God. It has to be grounded in the mission and ministry in person of Jesus Christ.

And again, our social principles, we know they're always coming out of that

perspective. And so I'm not gonna engage talking about the administration and this

administration. Here's what we should be standing against. I'm gonna begin with,

again, the scripture, the social principle and say, and isn't this what Christ would

call us to do? I don't know many people when confronted with the human condition of

abject poverty. If they're living into their baptismal witness, if they've at all had

a relationship with Jesus Christ, I can't imagine that they're not moved by that. So

I don't care whether you're a Democrat, a Republican, an independent, a progressive,

a conservative, if that's what we're dealing with, people are moved and willing to

act. When folk look at the ravages of gun violence, so if you just start from the

Second Amendment and what we should do there that might become divisive. But you

talk about young people losing their lives and you're able to look in people's eyes

and have that conversation. There's movement there. And so again, although there's a

broad constituency, when we come at it from what Christ has called us to do and

who we are as a Wesleyan people, I am able to see us galvanize and be willing to

make a difference to bring transformative relief to our communities.

Praise God. I often say we're not a Democratic church or a Republican church,

but we do want to be at least a Matthew 25 church. And so I often say,

and I'd love you to comment on this, while we don't encourage, in fact,

we discourage partisan endorsements and so forth. We also encouraged churches not to

avoid the difficult conversations and challenges that public policy plays in our local

communities and nationally. We need to know, oh, we need to know if our state's no

longer gonna have federal support to feed children in school programs,

lunch school lunch programs. We need to know these things so that we can speak out

on that and whether it's in our state legislature or local council meetings. So how

do we manage that, balance that by saying certainly we want pastors to be freed up

to preach from the gospel and if they're electionary preachers, but not to be afraid

to say we do have specific positions that the church has endorsed in terms of these

are things we feel strongly about, whether it's creation care, whether it's the end

of violence, whether it's mental health support, so pastors need not avoid those

difficult challenges. Absolutely. And it's actually,

I think, theological negligence if we do.

To be positioned to silence about the very issues that those that sit in our pews

are grappling with day by day because someone would accuse us of being partisan,

right, is a misnomer. Those are folks that are probably trying to maintain the

status quo. And we know the status quo always is in favor of those who are in

power and seeking power, to preach the gospel is to understand that those letters

that were written, Christ's words were being spoken in a particular time, to

particular circumstances and issues that were going on, many of them coming from the

powers that be, right, from what we would call the state or local governments. And

so Christ and the disciples were speaking directly to the political movements of

their time. Why would we do any less? The ruling that just came down in July from

the Internal Revenue Service about congregations being able to endorse particular

political candidates, that I have made known to my conferences, I hope we will

resist. I hope we will resist that at all costs. The church is called to be the

conscience of the nation, not to be so embedded in partisan politics that we cannot

objectively speak to our elected officials about whether or not we think the way

that they're dealing with education is ethical. The way that they're dealing with

those who are incarcerated is ethical. The way that they're dealing with the medical

crises that confront us is ethical. And so while we should never be,

as far as I'm concerned, partisan, We must be engaged in what's happening in the

polis and nothing in scripture and nothing about the witness of Christ Says that

that we can't be involved in that way. I heard a sermon recently I actually went

back to Colorado another place where I've spent a good number of years in my life

And I won't name the church or the denomination, but it was not a United Methodist

church Let me say that my husband and I had an opportunity to attend, and the

pastor preached and said nothing about what we're going through today. And I thought,

what a shame. Those people sitting there, some of them may be afraid, some of them

may have lost their jobs, some of them may be questioning for themselves, where is

Christ in all of this? As a Christ follower, how should I be discerning this? And

that pastor offered them nothing. I think we have an obligation to speak to the

issues of the day and understand what God and what Christ would say because do we

not realize God is still speaking. That sounds like pastoral negligence,

theological negligence in and of itself. I live and work with people who live in

the Washington DC area year -round. I'm here quite a bit and spend a good deal of

time living here now. But recently, the federal government under the current

presidential administration has embedded National Guard and additional ICE and other

policing. In fact, I have a typically do a daily walk, Bishop,

he should lean to the train station. I remember it was just a couple of weeks ago,

I was doing my walk and all of these military vehicles were surrounding the train

station and you can, the stress, you could cut it with a knife. And these national

guards, soldiers, I mean, I could look at them and tell them some of them didn't

want to be there, but, you know, they have to obey orders. Can you say something

about what the DC environment has been and how the Christian witness has shown up

how pastors and laypeople have shown up to say, this is DC, these are our streets.

And if we want to address crime, there's a more ethical way to do that.

Can you say anything about the involvement in DC and the current environment? - I I

will, but I hope you'll indulge me just a moment to back up a little bit from our

current milieu, because the strong witness and advocacy and fight for justice that

our congregations in the district are demonstrating didn't begin with the actions of

this current administration. We've always been at the forefront, living our baptismal

United to Love rally, I became aware that the Unite the Right group that had held

a rally in Charlottesville, Virginia the year before, unfortunately, where a couple of

police officers and the civilian were killed as a result of that rally. If you

remember, someone drove into the crowd and lives were taken. Well, Virginia would not

allow them to have a permit. So they said, well, we'll go to DC. Well, once I

found that out, I said, absolutely not. And there were some who said that we should

go and protest at their rally. I said, no, what I want to do is I want to call

us together to be united to love. And I want our numbers to be so vast that we

overwhelm what they're doing to show that there's more love in the nation's capital

than there is hate. It's reported that they had about 50 people at their rally, we

had 1 ,500. - I got it. - And so the ecumenical peace march that we led from Asbury

United Methodist Church to St. John's Episcopal when the Black Lives Matter signs

were torn down and burned by the proud boys is another time that we were actually

in the streets, boots on the ground, walking as a visible witness. We participated

in the People's March and the International Rally, I think the first in January and

the second in March here in the nation's capital, to offer smaller acts of protest

and witness. And so we've always been a very visible presence of advocacy, resistance

and justice. So then even though what's happening now in terms of this occupation,

if you will, might be new, our presence in and among the people being affected by

it isn't new. And so we have held prayer vigils since the occupation has begun.

We've been a part of protests in the streets of Washington DC and we've also been

and often doing this in concert with the Board of Church and Society in the halls

of Congress expressing our displeasure that you overrode the will of the mayor.

Mayor Bowser did not ask for this kind of presence. She asked for the resources to

be able to make sure that those who police the streets on a regular basis, who

know the people in the neighborhoods, right? Who have relationships that they would

be able to expand their presence, but she didn't ask for this kind of military

presence. So we've spoken up to our elected officials as well to let them know that

we're displeased with them stepping that kind of home rule autonomy.

So we have been out there, we will continue to be there. And at the same time,

I've told our pastors and our lay leaders to be careful. I don't want us to be in

fear. I don't want us to be silenced. But the landscape is different right now.

- Yes. - Before you might've been engaged in a protest police might say something to

you, you know, try to restrict you to a particular area or even if you got

arrested, they may let you go. We don't know whether or not that will be the case

now. We don't know whether people will actually be charged and whether or not then

they will have to go to trial and have someone represent them and perhaps end up

with a criminal record. And so while we are present and will continue to be

present, standing with the most vulnerable and the least of these. I want people to

be well informed as they're offering that public witness. - Wow, I understand that

some of the funds that were designated for DC were with Hale, I mean, as much as

a billion dollars of some astronomical amount. It's almost like you can't spread a

cold in a community and to ask people for coffee. - Absolutely. - So you can't

withhold resources and then say, well, we want to come in and correct the problem.

Well, why not support the community that's doing that? - Absolutely. - Sometimes I

wonder if we also need to help undergird our leadership, clergy and laity in this

current environment is a need

this and on the board with the board of directors as well around, creating an

atmosphere of resilience and disciplined hope, sacred resilience along with resistance,

but a sense of the Galatians text that we not grow weary in our well doing,

and that we pray for one another and encourage one another. Sometimes I've said to

folks, if you're not feeling well, if you're not feeling safe, don't feel compelled

to coming to the Methodist building, if things are happening and they have all the

streets blocked around. How do we import and impart a spirit of sacred resilience?

Brene Brown, I know you're familiar with some of her writing and reading, she says

that daring leadership is leading from the heart. So how do we impart a spirit of

sacred resilience and discipline hope for a better environment? one of the comedians,

a couple of comedians, I've heard say, you know, it seems like we take three steps

forward, then two steps backward. But we're in the business of,

as Bishop Tutu used to say, "I'm a prisoner of hope." So how do we expand that

and be ambassadors for hope and spiritual leadership? Absolutely.

And you know what? And it's critically important, because while being a pastoral and

a scriptural presence to people as things like this occupation occur,

we have to have longer term strategies to be able to confront some of the

situations that have caused the factors that the administration claims it wants to

help us correct, like, again, homelessness and poverty. So we have to have long -term

strategies for hunger, for health crisis, for immigration, and the churches in there

against some phenomenal work going on in the DC area around those things. Emory

Fellowships doing phenomenal work, Mount Vernon Place with their intentional homeless

ministry, offering showers and meals on a regular basis. I tell our pastors,

first of all, do what you and your community feel called to do. Don't operate

outside of your calling because if you do that, I mean, you know, you and I know,

if we preach outside of what God has given us to preach, now we're just ice

-eating. We're doing our own thing. We're not working within the spirit, right? And

they may not be the same covering for us if we begin to operate outside the

spirit. So I never want folks to do more than they feel called to do. And I think

there's enough to be done for everybody. Those who want to be on the streets, those

that want to write to uh, Congress persons, those that are engaged in intentional

and fervent prayer. So do what you feel called to do, but then also understand,

you never stand alone, right? You do not stand alone. So we don't want you to

succumb to justice fatigue. When you need to take a break, take a break. And we

need to trust that there are persons to our right, to our left, and even behind us

who will step up and then begin to do the work as we refresh ourselves, as we

mentally and spiritually just take a break. I don't know about you, but I cannot

watch the news every day right now. I cannot, it becomes overwhelming. It becomes

draining. I have to take it in particular doses. And so I want our leaders both

lay and clergy to do what they feel called to do as much as they can and then be

willing to take breaks. Also, the work is made lighter again by these social

principles that we began talking about and the work of our board and agencies. I'm

so grateful that already General Board of Religion and Race and I believe it was

Board of Church and Society has already written a statement about what the Supreme

Court ruled in terms of it's okay to stop someone based on their race, based on

speaking a foreign language, based on being in an area that they know is populated

by day laborers. And so if a pastor or a lay team wants to take up these issues

and they have fear about how do we do so, it becomes taxing if you're not sure

exactly how you ought to approach that, but the church is providing you resources to

be able to do it. So again, you don't do this alone. You've got some things to

stand on. Sometimes those kinds of whether it's a Bible study or whether you're

holding in a Saturday afternoon gathering to discuss some of these issues, they can

become contentious. That wears on a pastor. That wears on a lay leader. But when

you've got these other voices that you can bring into the conversation and let them

be your conversation partner, that helps to lighten the load. and again, should give

you the courage and the hope to keep on pressing. Wow. Howard Thurman said the

contradictions of life are not final, but they sure are obvious. When you think

about the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court says, well, okay, race cannot be used if

you're trying to expand diversity in college campuses and job environments because

that's discriminatory, But race can be used if you're looking for somebody to arrest

and detain and deport without due process. I mean, the contradiction is if it wasn't

so dastardly and painful, it would be funny. It would be humorous. Bishop Trumbull,

you know that prior to coming into ministry full -time, I practice law. I am a

lawyer. I can assure you that the rulings that are coming down from this court,

turn everything I learned in constitutional law on its head. I cannot,

I cannot make sense of the rulings that we're getting from our Supreme Court, which

is another thing, of course, that then creates fear in the hearts and minds of

people. There were some things that we thought would be stopgaps to some of what

any administration, I don't care who it is that we thought would be stop gaps would

be checks and balances on what's happening in our democratic republic.

We just knew that those those safety rails would be there guard rails and they're

not. And so that instills another level of of of fear and can again paralyze us if

we're not careful. So And that's why we need the full coalition of the willing to

come together, to pray, to be in solidarity and to wrestle with these topics in a

meaningful way and then be called into action. - Breeze, I'm so thankful.

Periodically, I don't listen to the news. I put on my Pandora station or my gospel

playlist, my Spotify gospel playlist. There's a couple of songs that are like,

"One is a gospel song. It's not over. It's not over till God says it." So another

one is, Jehovah has the final say. And they sang this the last time I was at

Africa University to acquire their saying, "Jehovah has the final say." I'm so glad

that in spite of what we hear and so forth, that God has the final say.

You open the door, so I'm going to go in there and make a confession that I

preached recently this past Sunday in Nashville, Tennessee, part of promoting Africa

University, Africa University Saturation. And I went out on a limb and I said,

the sermon was about God's grace. I went on a limb, I said, "I know there's some

lawyers in this congregation." I said, "I'm going out on a limb now." But I believe

God's grace is, I think the Latin term is starry decisis. I said,

"I may not even be saying it right. I said, but it's supposed to mean "settle

law." Yes, sir. Settle law. I said, so God's grace is settle law. Amen.

You know, our human dignity is settle law. Mago Dio is settle law. Yes. And then

later I found out they were some lawyers. They didn't interrupt me, sir, I figured.

But aren't there things that we as the church should be promoting? This is settled,

friends. God has said, you know, we shouldn't be debating whether or not based on

your color or your gender or your sexual orientation, whether or not you are God's

child. You are absolutely right. And your use of that Latin term was exactly

correct. All of us being created, again, you use the term in the Imago Dei,

in the image and likeness of God means that we are image bearers.

Now that is not for the baptized alone, that is not for those who are Christians,

everyone that has been created is an image bearer of God.

And so as I look at anyone, why should I believe that based on how and who God

created them to be, they are less than anyone else. If I do that I stand in

disagreement with God, because the way God created us, we need to be in agreement,

whether I am melanin rich or not, whether I'm short or tall, whether I was born on

this shore or another, whether I'm gay or straight, this is the way God created me.

And I stand in agreement with that. So yes, there should be some stare decisis on

some of these things. I like the way you say (laughing) - They should be settled.

- They should be settled. Where you find hope? You've shared some of that already.

I used to use the term, I still use the term glory sightings. I'm always looking

for glory sightings. So where do you find, you're doing a lot of traveling because

you're doing district visits. And you have two annual conferences and you've been in

this ministry, you've been in ministry for a long time now. Where do you find,

where does Bishop Latrell Easterling find her swell of hope in the United Methodist

Church and in the U .S. and around the world? I know you travel internationally as

well. So you brought up music. Music has always been a deep part of my

spirituality. When you gave me the privilege of coming a home to my Indiana home

and being able to preach at annual conference. I was then also invited to go back

into my church home, University United Methodist Church, where I sang in the choir,

the children's choir, then the youth choir and then the adult choir and the women's

chorus and all of those things. Music has been my deep connection to God and

spirituality. So the first thing that comes to mind is, I ain't no ways tired,

Ain't no ways tired and that's because my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus

blood and righteousness My hope is not built on the machinations of humanity. We are

fallible. We will fail We will make mistakes. Our understanding is so limited right

now, but God never fails And I really do believe that the harmony that God Created

in creation back to that image of the garden, right? That through now,

Jesus Christ, God is constantly leading us back, leading us on the path to that

harmony, leading us on the path of everyone having life and life abundantly, leading

us on the path of unity. And so again, even though humanity may continue to fail,

that's where God is leading us. So again, that famous quote of, what is it?

The arc of justice is long, but it always-- - Binge towards truth. - Well, it must

start differently than that. - Arc of the Moor universe is long and wide, but it

bends towards justice. And I believe that the spirit behind that is God,

always leading us to a place of justice. And so that's where my hope is And,

and I never fail, I don't care where I am, whether it's in the Baltimore,

Washington or the Peninsula Delaware Conference, I never fail to find folk who are

committed. Some have been on the battlefield a long time. Some have experienced

personal disappointment, disappointment in this denomination, but I look in their eye,

and I see their joy. I see their commitment, I see their devotion and I say,

how can I not keep going? How can I not continue to rise every day and say yes

to God? Because there's always a committed remnant ready to continue this liberative

work. - Well, I hope you'll do what I did this summer and you may have that

opportunity. We had five interns here, a seminary intern and for ethnic local church,

young adult interns. And I was inspired. I made sure I went out to lunch with them

and made sure that I heard from them because their energy and their hopefulness was

contagious. It made me realize God has not finished calling people or using people

of all ages. And this was a great opportunity for those of us here at GBCS.

We believe that the United Methodist Church, we don't have to make up the gospel.

It's already there. We just need to proclaim it. And we don't have to make up our

work here because the church has already decided through General Conference action, we

should be promoting the social principles and those other issues and decisions that

are made that appear in our book of resolutions to help local congregations live out

their witness Jesus and live out their baptismal vows. Sometimes, Bishop,

we seem to have strayed away from our baptismal vows. Can you say anything about

that? And as a way of closing our time together, our baptismal vows and anything

else that we can say that would encourage those who are listening to this podcast.

- Absolutely. So first I wanna say that Monday evening was my first day on the

district. And we were going through the presentation and talking about, you know, the

excitement that I have with the possibilities that are before us. And when I opened

it up for questions, a young lady, young, she's not 20, stood up and said,

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm excited about what I'm here. And not

so we can stop right now. A young person, Someone under the age of 20 has said

they are excited about what we're doing. We yearn for our young people to say that

they do see something inspiring and exciting in the mission and ministry that we're

trying to do. And again, that gives me great hope. Our baptismal vows,

when we made that covenant before God and the congregation and entered into those

waters and rose up. We rose a new creation. My God. And we must continue to allow

God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit to break us open, to continue to mold and make us

into the disciples that God desires that we would be. And so if we take them

serious, If it was more than just something that we did because our parents baptized

us and then we confirmed it during confirmation because that's what everybody's doing

as a good United Methods. If it is to mean something more than that, and we truly

have laid our all on the altar, we have to,

we have to rise against evil and injustice, wherever they show themselves.

That's what we said we would do. That's what we committed to. And we are hypocrites

before God and the people if we're not willing to live into that. Seems like if

we're not willing to live into that, we are simply fans of Jesus, not really

followers, followers of Jesus. Amen. I want to close. I can hear in the back of my

head, my granddaughter a couple years ago, two things she shared and one was she

said, "Papa, we were leaving Dunkin' Donuts to drive through and I just paid and

was driving away." She said, "Papa, aren't you going to say thank you? Aren't you

going to say thank you?" So I want to say thank you to Bishop Latrell Eastland, my

friend and colleague, board member for General Board of Church and Society for your

leadership. The other thing, she caught me off guard, my granddaughter Corinne said,

she caught me off guard with discourse discourses, she said, "Papa, what is your

superpower?" And I was trying to think of something profound to say, and all I

could do, I couldn't come up with it. Finally, I said, "Love." She said, "Good

answer, good answer." 'Cause her superpower was running real fast, running real fast.

- Okay, amen, amen. - Says you wanna know what papa's superpower. And I wonder, what

is your superpower? - Oh my goodness. Well, first of all, thank you for having me.

And I mean that sincerely. Before I became a bishop, before I had the honor of

being elected to this episcopal role, you were one of the bishops that I admired

from afar. We had not met. I think the first time we met was we were both in an

airport, right, in another part of the world. And I was able to make your

acquaintance. But I have had such respect and hold you in such high esteem,

because you really have been one of the bishops yourself on that front line, calling

and embodying a witness for justice, but also leading others. Oh my goodness,

if I had a superpower, I think my superpower is my love of words and what God

allows me to do with words, whether I am writing poetry or prose,

which I love to do. I think super power is just using language to be able to,

I hope, inspire and encourage others along the way. Any encouraging words for our

listeners? What would you encourage them to do and embrace their superpowers? Well,

absolutely. And remember, you know, my verse that I go back to all the time,

Jeremiah 12 -5, if you have raced with men on foot and they have weary thee, how

can you compete with horses, and if you stumble in a safe place, how will you

manage in the thickets by the Jordan? I would encourage us to stay connected to

God, stay connected to Christ, stay connected to the Holy Spirit in deep and fervent

prayer, be awash in prayer, spend some time tearing in the spirit that you're not

operating under your own power or authority, but you're operating under the power and

authority of Almighty God, stay close to that and allow that to empower you as you

move forward. Thank you so much. Thank you for joining us on Justice Takes Courage.

Thank you. God bless. Thank you for listening to Justice Takes Courage, a podcast

hosted by Bishop Julius C. Trimble, General Secretary of the General Board of Church

and Society.