Sobriety

Sobriety


Let me tell you about High School. I was not sober. Ever.

Neither was I drunk. Ever. The word "sober" is used many times in the New Testament. It is always a commended virtue. It does not always mean "not intoxicated"; nor does it always mean "humorless". It simply means "sane". Sanity and intoxication are, of course, mutually exclusive for the otherwise sane person. Sane people do laugh, however. The sober person is one who laughs when something is funny, and who does not laugh when something is not. We may then say that sobriety is accurate judgment. The adjective "sober" can modify many different nouns. Within the scope of this essay, I would like to apply it to a concept that seems most difficult to achieve: a sober self image. My proposition is best stated in this text: Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. On the other hand, some of Paul’s comments to Timothy indicate that he may have underestimated his abilities. This is not sober either.

My 5 year high school class reunion was an epiphany. Of all people, they asked me to be the emcee. I wasn’t planning on attending and thought that I would not be missed. Now you must understand that I had the most nonsober self image of anyone in my whole class. There were only around 30 of us. This class contained virtually the same people from 1st grade through high school. I said "virtually". I was an exception. We moved to that school district when I was in the 6th grade. I was the "new kid in school". No big deal. Lots of people change schools. The insanity was that I viewed myself as the "new kid in school" for the next seven years.

I did find one kindred soul who truly was a kindred soul. He and I seemed cut from the same cloth. I fear that I monopolized his social "circle". Mercifully for the sake of my own conscience, he is a successful and well adjusted person in his own right, and doesn’t seem to have been damaged much by our association.

What made my 5 year reunion so epiphanous was that my classmates weren’t at all how I remembered them. I was treated like an old friend. They couldn’t have changed that much in 5 years! Not that I was mistreated by them. I just didn’t think that I was a factor at all in their collective self identity.

I got the emcee invitation a few months before the event. My first reaction was; "This can’t be right." I wasn’t close friends with anyone except the afore mentioned. I didn’t participate in extra curriculum. I have the shortest "bio" under my picture in my senior annual. For all practical intents and purposes, I was invisible! Then it dawned on me that they knew I had become a preacher, and they probably asked me because I was used to public speaking. O.K. That made sense. I still thought it a bit bizarre, but I decided to do it.

The night came and they were almost all there. It seemed they had done well quickly. New, shiny cars and expensive clothing. Had it not been for the stunning wife on my arm; she whom I had gotten from a far country (Ohio); I may have turned around in the parking lot and headed out. I figured people would think, "Well, he must have something going to have wound up with her."



May I digress for a moment. The preceding is a personal illustration, but in counseling with people all these years, I have seen that it is far from unique. Our self image is determined largely by what we think that other people think of us. We tend to use them as our mirror. We could begin by realizing that we probably occupy less than a percent of others' thoughts; even those close to us. Everyone has their own world with it's concerns. I overcame my fear of public speaking when I realized that people remember less than 10% of what you say, and less than 1% of it 24 hrs. later! Can you give me an outline of the last sermon you heard? Quick! Can you even tell me the main point? Probably not because the cares of your own struggle have swept it to the periphery of your mind. It's there. It has registered in the mix of your thoughts and hopefully altered those thoughts slightly, but it's far from the center. Since our self image is generated from what we think others think of us, let us lose it by realizing that they don't think about us much at all. I could be pious and say that we should view ourselves only through the Lord’s lenses; but thankfully, even He chooses to view me through the "rose colored glasses" of the atonement. That is a positive image, but still fortuitously slanted. If our view of what others think of us is skewed, so will our self image be.

I was in a nursing home visiting an elderly lady. Neither of us knew the other very well. I concluded my visit by asking if I might pray for her. I took her hand and she sat straight up in bed. "Oh, Violet" she said to her roommate. "Listen." I thought nothing strange about wanting someone else to listen to a prayer. I prayed. "Oh". she said. "I thought you asked if you might propose to me." We misinterpret the intentions of others toward us easily. She was auditorily challenged. Not only is our reception imperfect; the transmission is garbled too. We’re working with humans, after all.



Back to the reunion. I entered the banquet hall and it was surreal. It was full of friends. Friends I had never gotten to know. I sat and enjoyed conversation with people I had never spoken to before. Then the truth hit me like a cannon ball. These people had always accepted me. It was ME who had decided that I was unacceptable! If "sane" or "insane" can be used as opposites, then my self image through high school was insane! I was not being "poor in spirit", humble, meek or anything virtuous. These require sobriety and are not of the flesh. They require conscious, willful decision and effort. My problem was born of fear. Fear of rejection. Fear of obligations I may be burdened with as a result of relationships. I chose to be a loner.

I am not a fatalist. We are not the Lord’s pawn and He didn’t want us to be. He gave us will. It is our decision to hold ‘em or fold ‘em. To wit, we say we wouldn’t have changed because we think we couldn’t have. I don’t believe that. God has always known the decisions we will make and has determined His responses according to His promises, and in this way He has predetermined history; but He does not make individual decisions for us. I have second guessed some major decisions in my life and am pretty sure they were mistakes. If I could go back, I would change them. The way I behaved in High School was the result of a nonsober self image.

Someone may say, "Now Kenny, you know things turned out just the way God wanted them to." I may ask, "Why sayest thou?" They may say, "How do you know you wouldn’t have fallen into the wrong crowd and been led you astray?" I will beg to submit an alternative possibility; "How do you know that I wouldn’t have rendered much greater for the Lord if I had opted to interact socially in high school?" I may have influenced many of my classmates in the Lord's direction. It is highly unlikely that I would have strayed. I had a Daddy and Mommy who wore their knees out praying for me, and I was inextricably woven through the fabric of a good church. It would have given me a head start in college. As it was, it took two or three years of college just to coax me out of my shell enough to accept an invitation to substitute preach for a classmate who was ill. Until that time, I figured the military would be my future; and if I made it through that, I was going to find an abandoned house in the sticks, live off of the land and be a recluse; perhaps the subject of scary stories around a campfire. Really.

I preached and people did not walk out on me. God bless the people in those congregations around the Bible college! They put up with a lot of amateurish preaching, knowing that they were helping us "cut our teeth". I fancied a young lady who wanted to marry a preacher. That was my call into the ministry.



That night at the reunion rocked me back on my heels. Though I wasn’t outgoing, I knew I was acknowledged in college. We were all aliens in a foreign world and saw ourselves as equals. Now I know that I was acknowledged in High School too, but I never saw it. Now what do I do with my self image?

The football player can undergo tremendous pain during a game. Not until the next morning does he realize how bad he hurts. His mind was somewhere other than his pain during the game. Would a similar tactic work with a painful self image? How about being so externalized that we have no self image at all?!? I realize that a psychologist would scoff at that notion and he would be correct. Trying to view one’s self apart from one’s self is an impossible conundrum. Were it not that I had seen my face in a reflective substance, I would not recognize an objective image of me, such as a photograph. We don't know what our voice sounds like until we hear a recording of it. In fact, this very essay is polluted with subjectivism. It is engorged with personal pronouns and handicapped attempts at self analysis. Living in a body demands egoism to some degree. Even Jesus conceded to hunger, thirst, sleep, pain, and other needs of the fleshly self. Perhaps we should say, "How about striving toward the minimal self awareness possible. How about practicing the attitude that we are assimilated and diffused into the essence of Christ?" I think someone already thought of that.



Col 3:3 For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.

Matt 10:39 He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it. Rom 6:6-7 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin.

Gal 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. Etc., etc. You get the point.

So I stabbed a dagger through MY ego…. But it healed in an instant! I threw it under the train; but it popped back up after the train was gone! I went to the steel mill and threw it into the furnace. It emerged like the Hebrew boys, without even the smell of smoke. So deeply engrained was this ego problem that it blocked out most of the universe around me. The reunion showed me that there was a universe beyond my skin. Not just the people there, but how far off the mark my perception of them had been. I knew that the indwelling Holy Spirit wanted to turn me inside out. And it is a long task. It is a life long progression, usually with many setbacks. All I know is: the ego is a terrible thing to be alone with. The longer we stare into a mirror, the uglier we become.

Ministry was a gift from God to me. It slammed me straight up against other people. I got involved in their lives. I had a preacher friend who told me, "If you’re feeling stalled and stale, you’re probably sitting in your office too much. Get out and be with other people. Talk. Presume that others like you until they prove you wrong. Do something constructive for them and let them do for you." Good advice. Doing for others is actually the best thing you can to minimize your own self awareness.



The "me" voices are still there, but my hearing is not so good anymore. The worse my hearing gets, the better my vision gets. I can actually think now. I think I am dying now, and I feel much better. I’m getting less insane and more sober; and I feel much better.

Did he just slander me? I think so, but "me" is out right now. Did that guy just honk his horn and shake his finger at "me"? I think so, but I don’t know where "me" is. Did that lady just cheat "me"? I think so, but I can’t get in touch with "me" right now.



It’s O.K.; for I say again: the ego is a terrible thing to be alone with. If it has to be there, may it be an ephemeral presence; and may it always be firmly chaperoned by sobriety.

Sunday at Lolie's

Sunday at Lolie's

  With the help of my wife, we have pieced these 43 year old memories together.

 

  Lolie drove a 1953 Ford like the chariot of Jehu over the blacktop and gravel roads of North Central Missouri .  In 1970 Schuyler was a poor county with no Mounties so she got away with it.  She was a septuagenarian at the time, and the most active member of my very first pulpit assignment.  I don’t think she was ever married, but the church treated her as a “widow indeed” according to I Timothy 5:5.  I think she had a brother but I knew not of his whereabouts.  She and the church lived in symbiosis, and methinks the church came out on the better end of the deal.  They helped Lolie with groceries and house repairs, and kept that car running, and she reciprocated with all her might.

  I was still in college, and made the 90 mile drive on Sundays.  I preached both morning and evening, and drove back to school Sunday night.   I didn’t have to worry about not being there all week, for I knew that old black Ford would be roaring around, evangelizing and pastoring.  When I got there, Lolie briefed me about her week’s exploits and advised me of people that needed my attention on Sunday afternoon.  

  One day I got a phone call from one of the elders.  “Well, she’s finally done it!  I kept tellin’ her to slow it down.  Shor ‘nuf, she put that car in the ditch and broke her leg!”  On Sunday, I was first to arrive at the old church building back in the white oaks.  I was stunned to hear the gravel crackling like bacon grease and pinging in the wheel wells.  Before I looked, I knew it was Lolie.  There she came, followed by a cloud of dust that completely limed some lucky farmer’s field.  The mighty ‘53 had come through with the passenger door slightly cavitated and a lot of grass stains and mud but otherwise as ornery as ever.   The grill had a big horizontal piece of steel a few inches above the bumper that looked like a smirk.  It seemed to be saying, “Is that all you’ve got?  Bring it, baby!”  Lolie emerged, complete with crutches and cast.  I think the Ford had a manual transmission and I couldn’t figure out how she drove it with a cast.   Evidently, it’s possible.   “Well, ya beat me here today, preacher!”   I put my arm around her shoulder and said, “Lolie!  I thought I’d be seeing you in the hospital this afternoon!”   “Aw, nah.  Ah cain’t sit still.  Folks calls me ‘the unsinkable Molly Brown!’”

 

  After worship, it was the custom to eat dinner at one of the members houses.  It was a small congregation so we had been in all of the members’ homes several times;  all except Lolie’s.   One Sunday after the sermon the men approached me with a solemnity that aroused my apprehension.  “We thought we’d ought ta warn ya, preacher.  You’re eatin’ at Lolie’s house next Sunday.  She’s been a pesterin’ us ta let her feed ya.  We been puttin’ her off ‘cause…..well….she ain’t like normal folks.  She ain’t slow or anything;  she’s just a little different.  She’s so good hearted and does so much for the church that we finally said ‘OK’.  We figured it’d be alright so long as you were prepared.”

  That next week wore my imagination out.  I had driven by her house in Lancaster several times and knew it was sort of ramshackle on the outside.  The grass in the little front yard was knee high and headed out.  I assume she preferred it that way because I’m sure the church folk offered to mow it.  It would  have taken only ten minutes.

  Well, Sunday came and for some reason, after preaching I was as hungry as a black hole.  Lolie had left a little early to go home and get everything ready.  We drove to her house and knocked on the front door.  We could see her inside waving us around to the back.  By the way, we were on Summer break and it was a blistering Missouri day.  She had no air conditioning, not even a fan.  All the windows were shut and covered on the outside with plastic.  We walked around to the back and there was a chicken coop and several fowl clucking around.  For some reason, that sound comforts me.  It reminds me of happy, sweaty, lazy days on my grandma’s farm.  The back door opened and I beheld a tunnel.  Old newspapers and magazines, tied into bundles with baler twine, completely filled what was presumably the living room.  Every inside wall in the house had been torn out.  I could see why the roof sagged.  No support except for the outside walls.  The bales of papers went all the way to the ceiling and I figured that was the only reason it had not collapsed, but I wondered how the joists held under what must have been tons of papers.   I scooted sideways through the narrow canyon, finally emerging into…..the bathroom/aviary.  There were large areas where the ceiling plaster had fallen off the lath.  The walls had been torn out around what used to be a bathroom and all that was left was a toilet perched on a pedestal squarely in the middle of the house.  It was truly a “throne”.  Mercifully, a tattered shower curtain hung around it.  There was no shower or sink.  Just that commode.  I don’t know how, or if Lolie bathed herself.  Surrounding the throne were cages and cages of Parakeets.  “My goodness, Lolie!  How many parakeets do you have here?”  “About 50” she said.  I saw a couch sitting propped against the mountain of papers, as if to prevent a landslide. 

  The ceiling above the bathroom and kitchen was festooned with…..model airplanes!  Big ones, small ones, biplanes and tri planes, fighter jets and commercial liners, even a huge Saturn V rocket complete with command module.  Men had landed on the moon the year before.  “Lolie” I said “Who made all these for you?”  “Oh!  I made ‘em.  I just love to make model airplanes!”  I didn’t ask but it was a safe bet that she had never been on an airplane.  Dreams.  That’s what they were.  Dreams hanging from her ceiling.  And birds that could fly.  Something I’m sure Lolie never could do until she left this life;  though I bet she got that car airborne a time or two topping a sharp hill.

  I walked to the couch and sat down.  It was a good thing I sat before my wife because my rear hit the floor so hard that the window panes rattled.  Had my wife sat first, her dress would have flown clear over her head.  There I sat looking between my knees with my wife balancing tentatively on the very edge.  I reached around and pulled one of the papers out of the pile.  My jaw dropped when I saw that it was a perfectly preserved 1956 “Life” magazine.  I was amazed at how old it was, but now I know she probably had a fortune there.  Collectors will pay good money for stuff like that.

  Lolie worked busily at the kitchen sink washing dishes.  My wife said, “Can I help?”  “Oh yes, honey.  Can you get the gravy down?”  “Where is it?”  “In that cupboard above the sink.”  My wife reached high and opened the door.  A “grand daddy long legs” scurried away and my wife was done.  There, inside that high cupboard was a huge roaster almost brim full of chicken gravy.  I don’t know how Lolie got it up there.  I stood on one of the rickety wooden chairs and carefully pulled it out and lowered it onto the table.  “My, Lolie!” says my wife.  “That’s an awful lot for just us three.”  “Oh, honey, we won’t eat it all today.  It’ll last me for a week!”

  That was our meal.  Mashed potato buds smothered in chicken gravy.  Not bad.  “Now, I’ve got some dessert.” says Lolie.  “Frozen cream pie.”  My wife got up to get it out of the ancient refrigerator.  It wasn’t in the freezer.  There on the lower shelf of a refrigerator that didn’t work were two cream pies….. liquefied.   She brought them to the table and we ate them with soup spoons.  Not bad.

  We sat and talked a while and Lolie gave me my assignments.  We walked out to the car and headed out.  My wife said, “Let’s not go see anyone just yet.  Take me out on a country road because I don’t feel so good.”  Funny.  I thought it was “Not bad.”

 

  Now I hope you have enjoyed Lolie’s story, but don’t miss the application.

  Instead of disqualifying herself, Lolie saw her purpose in the kingdom.  God doesn’t throw us on the scrap heap, but we cast ourselves there.  We don’t see many results from our efforts and we censure ourselves.  We may quit serving, we may quit praying, we may turn our backs on our profession of faith altogether.  Or we may view God as a W. C. Fields in the sky.  We feel He has said, “Get away, kid!  Ya bother me.”  We look at ourselves and say, “No wonder God has benched me.  I’m not that smart.  I’m not pretty.  I just can’t seem to win friends and influence people.  God, if you only want to bless the ‘elite’, then I guess Idon’t belong.  I’m out of here.”

  Lolie was an eccentric old woman who evidently never had those thoughts.  She kept on stroking.  Perhaps she had read  1 Cor 1:27-29   But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;  And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:  That no flesh should glory in his presence.

 

   C. S. Lewis was already a celebrated author and educator.  He and his brother, Warren, walked each Sunday to a little stone church building not far from his English country home outside Oxford.  There sat one of the most brilliant men of the 20th century, humbly listening to simple sermons from comparatively simple men;  because they quoted the wisdom of God which is beyond all the wisdom of men.

   I have always had a heart for the “underdog” for I am one.   I make no secret that I am uncomfortable with “consumer oriented” congregations.  This is an age of narcissism, and these congregations only feed it.  How shall a man die to himself there?  It is too easy for a person to think he is being a Christian there without divesting himself of his pride.  Some people are there to be seen by others, not to commune with Christ.   Humility is the first attribute one must assume in order to be saved.  Unless Naaman gets down off his high horse, he shall remain a leper.  That’s why God often hides His jewels in a brown paper bag.  That’s why Jesus said, Matt 11:25  I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes .  That’s why Paul said, 1 Cor 1:26  For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble , are called:  Of course Paul was master of “tongue in cheek” and Jesus used metaphor.   They were jabbing barbs at the “fleshly” or secular world’s estimate of Christians.  

  And that’s probably what God was doing when He carried good will and the benign influence of the kingdom all over Schuyler county with an odd old lady in a ‘53 Ford.  If you would be truly wise, you dare not overlook people like these.

The Third Virtue

I’m not sure how we developed the idea of "rank" among the Trinity. Probably because of the order they are mentioned in Matt. 28:19. They are all the same entity that we call "God", but we usually see Father as first, Son as second, and Holy Spirit as third. We get into real trouble if we imagine that one is lesser in power and authority.

We do, however, have scriptural evidence for rank among the three great virtues: 1 Cor 13:13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity , these three; but the greatest of these is charity. Charity, or love is #1. It envelopes faith and hope, for if we do not love God and neighbor, we will not exercise faith and hope. Actually, they are interdependent. We study much on charity and faith, but it seems to me that hope is not the subject of nearly as much meditation.

Of late, I have seen the tremendous importance of hope, and I would like to sing it’s praises in this essay.

THE PIT



The place where I work has a lime pit. It is a lagoon where the city water plant deposits lime which is used in the purifying of water. We dredge the lime and pump it into large holding tanks where tanker trucks are loaded. They take it to spreaders which apply it in fields to "sweeten" the soil and make it more productive. We use a raft to move around and position cables to guide the dredge and position the pipes behind the dredge. We all must wear life jackets. In the case that we should fall into the lime, we are instructed to fall backward, spread eagle, and wait to be picked up. The worst thing we could do would be to stand, for the lime is like quicksand. We could quickly sink to a point between the naval and chest. At this point, suffocation happens because you can no longer move the diaphragm that pulls air into your lungs. People caught in quicksand are dead long before their head goes under. Even before that, an attempt to pull one out would dismember the body. Sometimes we must flop down flat on the promises of God. Help will come. The Spirit will move to rescue us. Soaked and muddy we may be, but we are moving again. A cleansing shower and dry clothes await if we make our rescue possible.

Sometimes the water is very shallow. The lime is piled almost to the surface. Therefore, the dredge does not power through the lime with a propeller. It has a bull wheel that pulls it at a steady rate along a cable which is anchored securely to the shore. A diesel engine turns the wheel and keeps the dredge moving at a snail’s pace, even through the shallows. Our hope is the engine and cable; and we have an anchor, that saves the soul. Steadfast and sure while the billows roll. Anchored to the Rock which cannot move. Grounded firm and deep in the Savior’s love.

THE BLACK DOG

Churchill called depression and despair the "black dog". The "black dog" came and went throughout his life. It is not so amazing that a man like this could lead Britain through her darkest hour. It is not so amazing that he could say, "Never, never, never, never give up!" He had seen his own dark hours many times, and he knew that they did not last forever.

Long ago, the black dog came and sat on my porch. Then he moved into my house. Then he got into bed with me. Then he crawled into my head. Ministers deal with long stretches where they have a steady diet of dysfunction, suffering and death to deal with. It is no one’s fault. That’s just the way it is in a fallen world. Each ring of the phone would send a shock up my spine. Someone else has been rushed to the emergency room. Someone was contemplating suicide. Someone was on the verge of divorce. A wise elder gave me the best advice. He ran his gnarly fingers through his thin hair and said, "All I know to tell you, Ken, is just to keep working. Things will get better. I’ve been in this church a long time and these things always blow over." In other words, move on with the hope that things will get better.

Leaden sky, collar up, hands in pockets, hat pulled low against biting wind; my head was down because I was watching the Spirit move my feet. Through one hospital door after the other, up the steps, down the steps. The hope that things would get better was what kept me moving. And things got better, and the next time it got bad, the Spirit moved me again. Now I know He is faithful. When things get tough, He gets tougher. Sometimes He is a gentle dove; but if need be, He turns into a Pit Bull. The black dog is handily dispatched. I know the black dog will come again, but I fear him no more.

The black dog has run off. I have not seen him for a while, and I have carried the message of hope to those whom he has visited.

THE TUMOR

On 10 Sept. 2013, my wife brought to my attention that it was the 1 year anniversary of her surgery to remove a malignant tumor. I thought back on our saga with this issue; a great test of our faith. It has elevated the virtue of hope to a new level in my practice of the virtues, and I have developed a new respect for hope and a greater understanding of it’s importance.

From the time of the diagnosis, her doctors have not only been practitioners dealing with the physical aspects of our situation, but they have also treated the mental and emotional side, and their main purpose in these has been to give hope. The Stephanie Spielman center in Columbus, Ohio, where we have gone for treatment, is not a dark and foreboding anteroom of the doomed. It is a happy place. It is decorated with bright wall coverings & carpet, large windows overlooking the bustling city, flowers and balloons, and heavy emphasis on the word "survivor". The halls are decked with smiling, victorious pictures of those undergoing treatment. The staff members have continually given us statistics and probabilities; assurances of the low expectations for recurrence and life threatening consequences. Free cappuccino machines are everywhere. The patients who sit waiting, some of them in bright colored head wraps to cover their bald heads, are friendly, talkative, and cheerful. I enjoy their company while I sit and wait. I think this, as much as any of the other treatments, has done the most to help us weather the storm thus far. There have been many hugs, pats on the shoulder, and positive nods because the cancer was detected early and remained localized. The employees, from receptionists to doctors, radiate with hope.



Through this experience, I have also gained a greater respect for hope in our spiritual lives. Heb 6:11 And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end: The Christian’s hope is solid assurance. Many worldly hopes can be dashed. Not the hope that we have in Christ. I know the answer to the riddle of what would happen when the irresistible force met the immovable object. The immovable object would prevail. God is the irresistible force and His promises are the immovable object. Since it is impossible for Him to lie, under no circumstance will He break a promise; therefore, the promise stands. Our hope is anchored in His promise.

Each 3 foot thick cable of the Golden Gate bridge is anchored into a 60,000 ton concrete block buried in earth. Even they could conceivably fail in an earthquake. When Jesus picked Himself up by His own bootstraps and walked out of the tomb, hope became anchored in that which is immovable under any circumstance. Hope is the fuel in our tanks. Hope is what keeps our feet in motion, continually putting one in front of the other. Without it, we slow down, finally stopping and sinking into despair. If we dwell there, our demise quickly follows.

THE SUBMARINE

I heard the story of a submarine that sunk in about 250 feet of water. The crew waited for endless hours. Hope of rescue was dwindling as the air inside became low on oxygen. Finally, the clanking of a diver was heard on the hull. In Morse code the message was: "Is anyone alive in there?" One of the trapped seamen ran to get a pipe wrench and tapped a code from the inside: "Is there any hope?" "Yes" came the reply. "We will lower a rescue chamber which we can attach to he hatch. We’ll bring you up a few at a time." Hope brought 33 crewmen safely to the surface. Later, even the sub was salvaged.



THE SONG

The late singer, Waylon Jennings, may be an unlikely source for wisdom; but he had a song that I have sung to myself over and over for years: "Storms never last, do they Jessi; Bad times all pass with the wind; Your hand in mine stills the thunder; You make the sun want to shine." Now I don’t know who "Jessi" is, but I know Whose hand in mine stills the thunder. He stills it with hope.



THE WEATHER


Many may see that hope is in the promise of Heaven, and that is certainly true; but I don’t think hope is only in Heaven. Hope is also in the fact that our condition in this life is much like the weather. Here in Ohio, weather changes rapidly. Yesterday morning when I got up to go to work, it was 43 degrees. Today we hit 96. The day after tomorrow the predicted high is 64. Sometimes in Winter it can be wet and gloomy for two weeks. Some days are so dark that the street lights stay on; but we know the sun will shine again. That’s what keeps us truckin’ through the fog. Things will get better. We must see our lives in the amalgam. When we do, I’m sure we will conclude that we’re not that bad off after all.

THE ABSENCE OF HOPE

I love baseball. In basketball or football, there comes a point before the end that you can safely head for the parking lot. In baseball, there is hope until the last putout of the last inning.

The poet, Alighieri Dante, pictured the gates of Hell with an inscription above: "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here." To him, this was the most exquisite torment. No one will pay or pray us out of a non existent purgatory. Separated from God irrevocably. Abandoned to an eternal cauldron. Contemplating this makes hope the first straw I would grasp for. If someone would only promise me that it would last for just 1000 years; or a million; or a billion! If only someone would tell me that I would just go out of existence!

When we think of the absence of hope, the presence of it becomes immeasurably precious.

　

Practice Charity, for it is the purest imitation of God. Have Faith, for without it, it is impossible to please God. Don’t neglect hope, for it is anchored to God, and it will surely bring us safely through, and eventually home to Him.

these kids today!

These Kids Today!

 

  I will say right off the bat:  There are some exceptional young people today.  Against the backdrop of the “normal”, they are nothing short of heroic.  If you are one, please know that I recognize, value, and salute your existence.  You have more “grit” than I.

 

  Solomon observed;     Prov 22:15  Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him. 

  By “children” I am speaking of teen to early twenties.  A certain amount of “foolishness” is unavoidably bound in their hearts but I chalk that up to childish irresponsibility, not malevolence.  Wisdom takes time.   However, the environment in which today’s kids live allows them to take that foolishness to depths unprecedented since perhaps the days of Noah.

  Now humor me as I tell you what it was like “when I was your age”.  The rod of correction was used on me.  Mom and Dad stayed together.  I was the first to an “old time” church each time the doors were opened and the last to leave.  I was kept very busy.  I had a paper route, mowed yards, was in Boy Scouts, 4H, dug ditches for the city, milked cows, helped my grandpa with farm work, and handled tens of thousands of hay bales over a 7 year stretch.  When night fell, I was in bed because I was tired.  I went straight from High School into a Bible College with strict rules, and straight from there into the ministry.  So was I a paragon of virtue?  Maybe not.  Foolishness was in my heart also, but providence didn’t give me a chance to explore it.  I have always said that I would have had to work as hard to get into trouble as today’s kids have to work to stay out of it. 

  Current youth have no more propensity toward foolish behavior than my childrens’ generation, nor my generation, nor any preceding;  but again, several factors in our modern culture have enabled them to take the propensity they do have to extremes.  Some of these factors are as follows:    Access to media that exploits foolishness//  Technologies to access evil//   God free school environments//  Fragmented families// Churches that go shallow on Biblical teaching and pander to narcissism//  A relativist culture//  Tarnished “role models”//  Less parental sacrifice, vigilance, intervention//  Laws prohibiting kids from laying block or working concrete all day.  No more yards to mow or ditches to dig.  Too much fear of liability by potential employers.  Farmers don’t make many small bales of hay anymore and have the youngsters buck them and wrestle them under a tin roof at 140 degrees.  You can probably name others.  A lot of those “juices” that make the young vulnerable can be “sweat out”. 

  Were I to say about today’s youth, “Aw, they’re just being kids!” or something like “Well, we were all young once.” I would be in denial.  The majority of them are just plain bottom feeders.  Hyperbolic?  If you think I am, then what percentage of 15+ year olds would you say haven’t been gassed on Bud Light or huffed or puffed or snorted or popped or shot up?  What percentage do you think are still virgins??   If they are, what percentage would you say are ashamed of it??  In any case, you dare not spank them.  You may cause a brain injury. 

  Their language is a bellwether because:  Matt 12:34  for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.  I have noticed a shift from profanity to obscenity.  I think this has been led by most forms of media.  I am curious about this shift.   I define profanity as blasphemy, a violation of the 3rd commandment.  I define obscenity as that warned against in Ephesians 5:4 Neither filthiness (aischroitees), nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks.   “Aischrotees”  in the Greek denotes offensive or filthy language, not necessarily a taking of the Lord’s name in vain.  Aischrotees may vary from culture to culture, but it is designed to be offensive to other people. My generation was into projecting a “devil may care” personae by poking God in the eye with profanity.  It was God Who took the brunt.  Today’s obscenities are aimed specifically at  other people.  To rankle them.  To show not only a lack of respect, but an attitude of hostility toward others.  The young need to be careful of their belligerence, for some elderly are growing hostile toward the young.  Our “system” is reducing old folks to the point that they have nothing to lose, and that makes them dangerous.  Very dangerous.  Many have lost their faith.  There is nothing left to intimidate them.  Prison or the Nursing home makes no diff.  They have nothing left but an M1 semi automatic and plenty of ammo.  They may decide to go out in a blaze of glory by wasting an obstreperous young person.   Remember:   2 Kings 2:23-24  And he (Elisha) went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.  And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them.

 

   Despite all this juvenile decadence, I am not ready to hang my harp on the willows yet as the Israelis did when they finally knuckled under to the Babylonian captivity.  Let me offer some reasons why.

 

  I am not evolutionist to the point that I preclude the necessity of God as the original cause and present sustainer;  but I do believe that the world He has made tends to “cull” the herd.  I believe it because I have seen it.  Humans do not want to be “culled”.  Not wanting to be culled is called “survival instinct”, and wanton behavior will put a man in touch with his survival instinct.  Witness the prodigal.

  Part of the “foolishness” bound up in the heart of a child is that he believes the avenue to freedom is through anarchy.  He entertains fantasies that he would survive and thrive under such an economy, and achieve the greatest amount of fulfillment from life.

  In 1979 an Australian movie called “Mad Max” was made.  The plot is about how the world would be when oil supplies were depleted.  Governments collapse.  There is no law.  Only the strongest survived, until someone stronger came along.  The herd was culled until there was no one left except the most deviant and violent and they were battling down to the last man standing.  This movie spawned a genre of movies called “dystopian” (characterized by human misery brought on by overcrowding).  Many video games built on this concept have also proliferated.    The hero is the survivor and that survivor is the most ruthless.

 

  Children are foolish enough to believe that they would be that survivor.

 

  My generation was the 60’s and early 70’s.  “We” (comprehensively speaking) tried “it” (anarchy).  Free drugs, free sex, “free” food (usually stolen).  “Woodstock” became the signature microcosm.  Several other microcosms called “communes” were attempted;  but evolution ensued. One person was full and the other one hungry.  All the women only wanted to sleep with the handsome guys and all the men only wanted to sleep with the pretty women.  Humans just cannot tolerate injustices like these.  One worked blisters on his hands while the other sat in the shade stoned on his drug of choice.  The communes were short lived because sooner or later, there had to be “rules”;  the very things “we” detested.  “Who will make these rules?”  “Who will interpret these rules case by case?”  “Who will enforce these rules?”   “Let’s take a vote.” “Oh oh!  Oh oh!”  Sounds like a democracy to me.  A self appointed tyrant said “We ain’t votin’!  I’m the biggest guy here and I’ll make the rules!  Any objections?”  “Oh oh!  Oh oh!”  Sounds like a dictatorship to me.

  Then one day “we” looked into a mirror and saw our first grey hair (or lack of hair where there used to be some.)  “We” got to counting the Winters we had weathered, and there had been 30 some.  The commune had long since dissolved.  Billy decided he didn’t want to play anymore and took his VW van home.  And “we” found ourselves alone. We looked down and our ribs were sticking out like those of a P.O.W.  The drugs didn’t make us feel good any more, but “we” had to do them just to keep from feeling like we had been stripped and dragged through prickly pear behind a scared horse.  “We” were going to have to knock off another liquor store.  “We” decided to make one more score, and swallow the whole bag, and that would be it.

 

  But some of “us” decided that breathing is nice.  “We” took the cure.  “We” took that job cleaning toilets and windshields at the truck stop.  “We” saw the truckers get out on hot Summer days with sweat on the back of their shirts.  “We” got an idea.  “We” thought of a wicker seat cover that had thin nylon tubing woven through it.  A tiny circulating pump could be plugged into the power point.  A little reservoir of water could be mounted in front of an air conditioning vent.   “We” would call them “Cool Backs”.   We set up a hand made sign with a slogan:  “No cool front ahead? Put a ‘Cool Back’ behind”.  “We” thought that we could make them and set a few up in the truck stop for sale.   “We” kept cleaning toilets and lived in a tent and soaked pinto beans until we had saved enough to have a grub stake. We made a down payment on a little shop and we started a business.  “We” worked all day there and slept a few hrs. there.  Word got around that our seat covers helped. “We” started turning a profit.  We plowed the money back into R&D and refined our product.  A big truck stop chain called and ordered a thousand to display in their stores.  “We” found some of our old friends who decided breathing is good.  “We” hired them. 

  Time passed and one day “we” met this other person that we liked so much that we wanted to be with them alone and they wanted the same, so we saw the Justice of the Peace.  And “we” wanted to give another person life.  And another.   And “we” put on some weight.  And “we” got more grey hairs.  And “we” got wrinkles beside our eyes from smiling often.  And “we” became what “we” used to curse;  all because breathing is better than not breathing.

 

  If no one else will take the responsibility of whipping you, life itself has a way of whipping the foolishness out of you;  and that’s why I haven’t hung my harp on the willows.

 

  If you are a teen or twenty something, “we” were the people you are.  “We” are the people you swear you will “never turn into.”            Oh oh!

The Ultimate Evil

The Ultimate Evil
When I read a book you will most likely get an essay on the subject if it is good. Not a book report; just my thoughts on the subject. The most recent book I have read is D. A. Carson’s "The Intolerance of Tolerance". I would recommend it highly. Mr. Carson has characterized the "new tolerance" of our present "post modern" society very accurately and thoroughly documented it’s evolution. The "old tolerance" said, "I respect your right to hold beliefs that differ from mine." (my quote) The "new tolerance" of post modernism says, "I respect everything except a belief which embodies absolute truths." (my quote) This rationale is in keeping with relativism; a firm conviction that there is no absolute truth. Absolute truth is that truth which is eternal and immutable.

Absolute truth is that truth about which it can be said; "there are only two options: one person can be right and one wrong, or both can be wrong, but in no case can both be right." There are absolute truths in the "hard sciences"; i.e. mathematics, physics, chemistry, etc.; but these are outside the scope of this discussion. We are speaking of absolute truths within the social sciences: Theology, Philosophy, Sociology, etc; especially when these disciplines deal with morality. The new tolerance is a conviction which is itself a belief system with an absolute truth: that there is no absolute truth with respect to the social sciences. This new tolerance is especially intolerant of those who find absolute truth established objectively; outside the parameters of the collective human "conscience" of a given culture.

Today, there are 3 big targets of this intolerant tolerance. These targets all claim that there is truth in the social sciences and that they have found it. They are Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, specifically the branches of these three who tend to interpret their holy book literally and hold to ancient doctrines as truth. To the disciple of this new "tolerance", the "ultimate evil" is to hold beliefs that consider some behavior as wrong. By the way, "ultimate evil" is a term coined by Carson. The "tolerant" would never use the word "evil" because it betrays their zealotry.

Carson’s book intentionally begs many questions, and one of mine is: "When has Christian fundamentalism ever been tolerated by the rest of the world?" Or fundamental Islam or Judaism for that matter? To hold beliefs to be absolute truth necessitates rejection of other beliefs with opposing "truths". There is no escaping it.

This ideology is far from new. This "toleration" that becomes intolerant of the intolerant has always morphed into the worst kind of totalitarianism that the world has had to endure. It’s seeds are being sown again.

As Carson points out, the bloodiest century in human history was the 20th. Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, etc. wiped out close to 100 million people because their skin color was not right, their heritage was not right, they needed vengeance wrought upon them, or because they held to beliefs that could not be tolerated by those bent on fascism. These people were considered a threat to the peace. (the peace as defined by the fascist.) What do you do to people who threaten the peace? You commission their genocide! You eventually turn into the most intolerant and violent of people.



Jesus warned: Mark 13:13 And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake : but he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. I have said before and will say again; the reason is very simple. Christians are hated because they hold to a belief that some natural urges of the flesh are "wrong" AND that that wrong will be divinely punished if not expiated by Jesus, the Christ, and Him alone. It is not an act of physical violence that Christians have perpetrated; it is simply a belief that they hold; but it appears that even holding the belief that something is immoral is not to be tolerated.

Our preacher, who is an avid golfer, told a true story about a pro golf tournament in which Billy Graham participated as a guest. One pro golfer was so upset about Graham being there that he finally said, "Why does he have to be here and shove his religion down my throat?" An interviewer said, "What did Mr. Graham say to you?" "Nothing, yet. I haven’t seen him." said the golfer. "It’s just that he’s here!" Apparently, we have committed the ultimate evil just by being here and holding to certain beliefs.



What I hope you have seen thus far is the oxymoronic nature and self contradiction of those who claim to be tolerant. As long as there is absolute truth, some will not align with it. In order to make everyone OK, they must abolish absolute truth, and censure everyone who believes in it. In so doing, they become the very thing that they reprimand.

As Christians, we have the Bible which we believe to be truth. We have the truth personified in Jesus. Jesus and the apostolic writers say that we should be peacemakers, patient, kind, longsuffering, people who suffer persecution. So far, so good. The scriptures also show that Jesus was intolerant of the temple moneychangers and the hypocritical Pharisees. It shows that the fornicator was not to be tolerated in the Corinthian church. The Thyatiran church was not to tolerate Jezebel. Some acts of the flesh are called "abominations". Clearly, toleration has a limited context. There comes a point when a line must be drawn in the sand. The preacher was right when he said Eccl 3:8 (there is) A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.

The advocates of tolerance in our society have labeled intolerance as wrong. If it is wrong, they have indulged in that wrong themselves by being intolerant of those who draw lines in the sand, even though they have drawn a line of their own in the sand against people who draw lines in the sand.



It is impossible to tolerate everything. Many cry "Don’t judge!" But we must. All of us make hundreds of judgments a day. Many of the people I hear crying "toleration" are those who are gay or have gay friends or those who want to have sex with anyone anytime and have that ace in the hole of an abortion to get out of a pickle. They are people who don’t want freedom of religion but freedom from religion. Now wait a minute! You can’t hate me for saying that. You must tolerate!

Tolerate this next paragraph if you have the stomach. Many of the cries for intolerance of people with absolutist belief systems emanate from our college campuses. We have male and female on their own for the first time and at their most vulnerable, then we throw them together into co ed dorms and hand out condoms and let them hang "do not disturb" signs on their dorm room doors while they are having sex. Then we exonerate and banish guilt by teaching them that there is no right or wrong. We infer that they have now left the knuckle draggers behind and are on their way to becoming the avant garde of the brave new world ruled by more highly evolved members of the species. Room mate wants to study but has to do it in the student lounge because his room has become a brothel. He gets jealous because he’s not getting any sex, so he comes out of the closet and says "I’m gay! See! I don’t need you girls anyway!" Small wonder that they demand toleration!

Don’t tell me I’m in la la land! I’ve seen too many of our good young boys and girls come out of our churches with promising futures. I go to visit them on the state funded campus to see how they are getting along, only to see them being destroyed before their freshman year is over. Their professors only use textbooks that support the "tolerant" lifestyle. They revise history to prove that this is the way our progenitors behaved. Many of these kids are so buzzed and confused that they can’t hold a job of any kind; they become a part of the 47% of Americans living off the taxpayer. Too few of them come to their senses before it is too late.

Tell me what "tolerant" man’s toleration would not end when another man was holding his little daughter at gunpoint. I think we need to revisit the old tolerance at the very least. A respect of persons’ rights to hold beliefs differing from our own, and our right to peacefully challenge those beliefs. As "un peaceful" as it sounds, the public square should be like Mars Hill in Athens, a free marketplace of ideologies. I don’t want a theocracy like many Muslim states have. Neither do the "tolerant". Let each individual decide for himself what rings true. Of course I am not advocating violence to get our various points across. If violence arises, it is the duty of government to shut it down, violently if need be. He does not bear the sword in vain. This goes for Christians who become violent as well as people of other belief systems.



The crusading Catholic of the 11th and 12th centuries was misguided to think that people could be coerced to become Christians. The militant Muslim of today is misguided to think that people can be coerced to become Muslim. If a person is brainwashed or tortured, can it truly be said that he is converted? Only a sick mind would affirm that.

I don’t try to "hard sell" my beliefs anymore. Now I know the wisdom of not casting pearls before swine. I know when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em. I don’t put thumbscrews on a person and force the good confession out of him. If I do that, I have not "converted" him at all. Paul said Rom 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth I tell the gospel. The gospel seed converts if the soil is good. All I can do is tell the old, old story and all I want is the freedom to do so whenever and wherever an opportunity presents itself. Let there be an open market place of ideas, and let me have my say there too.

How do I think Christianity will fare in a free marketplace of ideas? About as well as Paul fared on Mars Hill (Acts 17: only two, Dionysius and Damaris wanted to hear more). The Epicurean hedonists certainly couldn’t be bothered. They had to get down to the baths with their wine to meet their prostitutes. Christianity teaches that some carnal things are "wrong" (a word the "tolerant" cannot use) and so the carnal appetite and those ideas that sanction it will always be more popular.

When the dust settles and the smoke clears, that is what this issue of "tolerance" is all about. It is all about forcing people to accept and help pay for the results of the whole society’s carnal behavior. It is about allowing the postmodern hedonist to indulge his appetites with no consequences, no repercussions, no guilt.

And so, fundamental Christianity will never be popular in a fallen world. Only people who are willing to deny themselves and take up their cross will accept it; and those are few. I suspect that there are more of those than we realize, but still few in comparison to the whole. Does their scarcity mean that they should be disallowed and excluded from the public forum? California has 37 million citizens and Wyoming has 560,000. Should we then deny Wyoming representation in congress? Really now! Only an intolerant society would do that.

I am in the same situation as Peter and John in Acts 4. The powers had told them to shut up. I suppose I shall have to answer like they did. Acts 4:19-20 But Peter and John answered and said unto them, Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.

What will the intolerant "tolerant" do to me? In other countries, theocratic governments are allowing Christians to die at the hands of radical Muslims. In Western European countries where Atheism prevails, some have suffered light jail sentences. I don’t think it will happen in America. There are too many believers who represent too large a voting bloc for the policy makers to ignore. As the tolerance people turn up the volume, so do the evangelicals. These believers may not be of the same stripe as I, but they would go to bat for me and I for them. For the foreseeable future, I believe the intolerance of the tolerant will continue to manifest itself in condemnation from the state funded academic community, the media, and the popular culture in general. So what’s new? I plan to keep on committing the "ultimate evil". There are lines drawn in the sands of my conscience. I will behave within those lines. I will vote for the candidate who most closely aligns with those lines. I will speak about my lines and be able to defend them verbally and in written word. I will withhold my support from those who cross those lines. I believe this is right in the sight of the Lord.