Another Atlanta Perspective by Battle Brown

[David Virtue]

ANOTHER ATLANTA PERSPECTIVE

BY Battle Brown

            I saw Satan fall like lightening from heaven as armies of
demons screamed in angry defeat.

            Had Jesus come again?

            No.  It was only one sinner confessing his sin to another
before the Lord.  A simple act, "Brother I've sinned against you.  I
ask your forgiveness."

            "Brother I forgive you in the name of Jesus Christ.
Receive the forgiveness He has won for you on the cross."  Then a
question, "May I pray for you?"

            The answer, "Please."

            The first man kneels.  The second marks the first's
forehead with oil in the sign of the cross, then placing his hands on
his head.  Now joined by a third man, the two pray for the first.

            The same thing is happening in three or four other small
circles of men up on the platform behind a makeshift alter in a
borrowed Baptist church.

            Now the men on the platform finish their prayer for the
first man.  He stands and embraces the other two men.  Now the second
man he too dressed in purple kneels before the first.  The pattern is
repeated.

            Finally five other men mount the platform. They've been
hearing the confessions and prayers of the vast majority of some 200
faithful sojourners.  They join the small circles of elders on the
platform and the familiar pattern in now repeated again, a bold
prophetic act striking at the spiritual heart of darkness.  A simple
quiet act of confession of sin against one another, asking forgiveness,
receiving forgiveness and the laying on of hands with prayer and
anointing oil.

            Who are these men?  Why have their quiet actions
reverberated to shake the very foundations of hell?  Why are angels
dancing in heaven and singing the praises of Jesus.

            These men?  Sixteen bishops mostly from competing
jurisdictions that have been estranged from each other.  Are they
announcing to the world that each others orders are valid and that they
are in total agreement theologically?  Perhaps issuing a modern Nicene
Creed or twenty-first century 39 Articles of Faith?

            No.  Much more important.  These men declared to the world
and to heaven and hell that they are brothers in Christ and that the
sin of pride that has kept they apart has been repented of and
forgiven.  These sixteen have now committed themselves to see the
kingdom of Christ ushered in by working together by ignoring structural
boundaries.

            Has the battle been won?  No, there are more tears to be
cried and more blood to be shed.  But each man now with the smell of
gunpowder in his nostrils and having seen his own blood is prepared to
fearlessly march into spiritual battle to see the kingdom won for
Christ.

            Who are these brave men?  They are in need of our prayers
for the counter attack of the enemy has already started.

            Robert Duncan, Pittsburgh, Episcopal Church USA

            Ray Sutton, Dallas, Suffragan Mid-America, Reformed
Episcopal Church

            Leonard Riches, Presiding Bishop, Reformed Episcopal Church

            Jack Iker, Forth Worth, Episcopal Church USA

            John Rodgers Jr,, Anglcian Mission in America

            Keith Ackerman, Quincy, Episcopal Church USA

            Donald Perschall, American Anglican Church

            Richard Boyce, Missionary Bishop of the West, Anglican
Province of America

            Daniel Morse, Coadjutor Mid-America, Reformed Episcopal
Church

            Maurice Sinclair, Presiding Bishop of the Southern Cone of
America

            James C West Sr., Diocese of the Southeast, Reformed
Episcopal Church

            Peter Brewer, Anglican Province of America

            Walter Grundorf, Presiding Bishop of the Anglican Province
of America

            Malcolm Harding, Brandon retired, Anglican Church of Canada

Alden Hathaway, Pittsburgh retired, Episcopal Church USA

            Bernard Malango, Arch Bishop Central Africa

            Francis Lyons, Bolivia

            Charles Murphy III, AMIA

            Thaddeus Barnum, AMIA



Pray for these warriors.  The counter attack shall surely come.

Battle Brown is a businessman in the Diocese of Pittsburgh

END