Another cool emergent type forum published this letter, then shut down comments. I want to hear what people have to say, so keep commenting people! And Julie,you go, girl!!!
Today Rev. Silva posted a letter set to him by Julie Jones, the wife of Tony Jones. In a wonderful letter Julie Jones stands by her man, and in doing so stands by her Lord. I am posting the letter here because I allow for comments here and I wanted to provide a forum for people to let her know they appreciate her letter.
To Whom it May Concern:
In the spirit of Christmas, I ask you to do the righteous thing and post this. Please post at once or don’t you all want anyone of your readers to think Tony Jones might be a regular nice Christian guy. You don’t have a place for people to comment on your web page. You do have a place to donate. How come? I think if you are going to slander my husband as a devil worshiper it would be prudent to provide an avenue for others to paint with a broader stroke.
Tony Jones, my husband of ten years, loves the Lord Jesus Christ Almighty. I am sorry that may be a bitter pill for your group to swallow but it is true. Our family aims to be the hands and feet of Jesus and strive daily to bring up our three children as disciples of Christ and we didn’t even have to “spank them hard” to do it as Dr. Dobson suggests. In fact, that is called child abuse.
Above our threshold before we leave the house is our family verse, “Be the light of the world.”
We both can love Jesus in different expressions and both work for good and to fulfill his kingdom here on earth. It can look very different and yet how dare you say you have the corner market on my Lord and Savior…No, we share Him. I can go to Ashtanga yoga, which I love and enjoy the benefits of the practice and at the same time can faithfully follow Jesus. I can walk a prayer labyrinth and have in my mind over and over, “Be still and know that I am.”
The sheer effrontery makes you look pretty ignorant, if you don’t mind me saying.
I usually don’t respond to such nonsense but this is the father of my children who I fell in love with as he was living amongst the poorest of the poor on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. Tony so authentically lived and worked among them that they gave him the highest honor of an Indian name: “He who takes others into his heart.”
Have you ever even met Tony? Come to our house in Minneapolis and sit in our kitchen and let us agree to follow Christ perhaps differently with differing outward expressions but no less faithfully following and hopefully maturing to love all humankind more and more.
Groups like this just reek of fear. That must not be not at all liberating to be in such a tight box. Don’t you think our Lord is bigger than that? He loves gays; you bet he does! He wants a gifted woman up front or in our church in the middle and delivering the Good News. Humans have limited God to what she can and cannot do. Emergent tries to re imagine the essence of following Christ in its purest form. Free from all the trappings of human fear.
May the Lord Jesus Christ touch you mightily today.
Come on, be different than just one of the many Emergent opponents that never takes me up on the invitation for dinner and a shared love of Christ and never posts my posts and never has a function for comments.
Merry Christmas because I am sure I won’t hear from you but if I do…good for you.
Julie McMahon Jones
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