"Blogging Flash Mob" fairly describes the 5 minute free write Kate Motaung hosts every Friday on Heading Home, her home in cyberspace. This time we get to write about News!
Add a trailing letter "s" to the adjective new, and you get the noun news. Newspapers and news journals offer recent information that might interest their particular readers. The εὐαγγέλιον – good news, good message – of the gospel started as an upside-down version of the gospel of the returning Roman general's victory announcement of the death and vanquishment of his enemies. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the victorious proclamation of resurrection from the dead, the primacy of life over death. But in a broader sense the gospel is almost any reversal that God enacts, subverting, challenging, and nullifying society's generally accepted and expected.
In response to an actual invitation in response to my many many emails, during early August 2014 I rode the AmTrak up the California coast from Previous City to what's become Current City. I remember taking the short bus trip from Union Station to the subway station on 7th, the number of perfection in Hebrew numerology – 7th surrounded by Flower and Hope. I knew the outcome of this week finally would be a full response to the hope I'd held for a couple of decades. Whether five minutes' worth or fifty, it's too long a narrative to write more here, but like dozens of other situations I knew would work, my hope, expectation (I've previously explained that in Spanish, hope and expect are the same word), for that week-long visit evaporated. Imploded.
Yesterday evening I made my way downtown and had an overwhelming sense of déjà vu—vujà dé as some would say. Here was the same subway station. 7th, Flower, and Hope Streets. When I arrived at the gathering place – a meeting of the professional design organization I belong to – I immediately knew this was good news, a resurrection from the death of my dreams and hopes and expectations the outcome of my summer 2014 excursion had become. Friendly, welcoming, fun, hospitable, conversational—even free food and free drinks! Last Sunday in Sunday School as we discussed Isaiah 55:1-9 I explained,
We live in a world of economic exchanges where we expect to pay something (legal tender, labor, in-kind) for everything we receive. We don’t believe in free lunches; God does believe in free lunches and provides them, too!Thursday evening was such gospeled good news, an exceedingly good message for me, without any cost to me, or payment from me. Newspapers and news mags offer content their readers might like. Thursday evening so was the reversal of countless past experiences of bad news. Content I might like? A resurrection to new life from all those deaths along the way.
Great post. I'd much rather read the Good News than hear the current news full of such hatred, war etc.
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