Lost Crusader #147 Better Lepers

 “Then they said to one another, ‘We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news, and we remain silent’.”

2 Kings 7:9

 

I have been reading Plato’s Republic this past week and engaged in the philosophical argument between Socrates and his fellows about justice and injustice. Those favoring injustice, cloaked by an appearance of justice, advanced many of the arguments the new “Woke” crowd of today espouses. This position, they said, was more profitable and engendered more happiness than being just. The story I shared a line from today could be used by this crowd as a case in point.

I’m going to set the scene for you. The capital of Israel has been under siege. A cup of dove’s dung was selling for two ounces of silver—if you could find it. Living up against the city walls were four men. Neither side cared about them. They were lepers, cast out from society as unclean, disease-spreading vermin.

The king of Israel blamed the prophet Elisha for the entire situation, and as kings do, hatched a plot to rid the country of the voice of opposition. Meanwhile, the four lepers decided they would rather die by the sword than starvation. They went to surrender to the Syrian army only to find everyone gone. All the tents, animals and supplies were there but the army was nowhere to be found.

It's true that they ate all they could hold and took some treasure for themselves. But it dawned on them that such action was not right with an entire city starving behind the walls. So, they went and told it. The city was saved, but what of the lepers?

As far as we know, they went right back to living up against the outside of the city wall. They remained lepers. No one thanked them for their bravery or their sense of justice that moved them to share the good news. Their just action availed them nothing and cost them whatever treasure they might yet have carried off.

Do not expect the world to grant you the least kindness or imitate whatever right actions you model. Injustice, wearing the cloak of repairing past wrongs, is the rule of the day. Just action is for fools, clingers to old ways, and those who have passed from usefulness.

Closing churches in the name of the good of all or some misplaced sense of caring for neighbors is to negate the underlying truth that we need loyalty to God and right action more than vaccines and the departing from divine commandment. Better to be disgusting social lepers than the servant whom the king leans upon.

          “Therefore to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.”

If the Church truly believed 2 Chronicles 7:14 was an answer to the country’s ills, it would repent en masse for its shameful actions of the last two years. We need not expect to prosper until we do.

Maranatha

Know Jack #359 Ripples not Waves

 “There is a road, no simple highway

Between the dawn and the dark of night
And if you go no one may follow
That path is for your steps alone

Ripple in still water
When there is no pebble tossed
Nor wind to blow…”                           Jerry Garcia

 

I’ve made some waves in my time. I have also been caught in the riptide they created. All in all, I have very few regrets. This is no valedictory, and I don’t assume I have peaked. Some situations and subjects are simply too tempting for me not to blurt out a contradictory opinion just for the sake of sparking a spirited discussion.

 

My life goal, however, is to create ripples rather than waves. What’s the difference, ripples are just little waves, right? In a sense, that’s true. Besides size, I see the cause as a difference between the two. The Dead’s song about a ripple not caused by tossed stones or blowing wind strikes a chord with me.

 

What if each moment of life sends out a ripple through time and space within the universe and the sum of those ripples is the creation of our eternal existence? Of course, that idea (unlike those of the pure energy religions) presupposes a mathematician standing, above and independent of, time, space, and the multiverse. One who knows when things don’t add up and when they do.

 

I generally begin each day with a request for divine direction. If I stop and review those requests, I find each one has been answered in a positive manner. That does not mean I took the advice, or I didn’t try doing it my own way first, or that I even heard it, but I have not gone without direction. It means that the ripples I make are, in fact, of my own making. The consequences of those ripples and any possible correction of them rests upon my shoulders.

 

If my soul is scarred, the wounds were all self-inflicted. The pain I may have felt, however, has engendered divine empathy that affected mercy on my behalf. I believe that I have been granted a peek into my life beyond this body that I now inhabit. That I don’t charge off towards it shows I may have developed some patience after all. No one is more surprised by that epiphany than I am.

 

I have passed up some very tempting opportunities to make waves lately. To say I’m learning, I’m improving, or I’m more desirous of peace is premature. Let’s just say I am more prepared to watch people go over the falls than to warn them it exists. If they will not hear the roar of falling water, see the rushing surface, or feel the acceleration of the current, do they really need my voice?

 

I say that and then, each Sunday, don my crusader outfit. It doesn’t make me a hypocrite, just a fool. As the song said, it’s not a simple highway and the path is a solitary one.

 Maranatha

 

 

Lost Crusader #146 Remind Me, Lord

 “This second epistle, beloved, I write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance.”

2 Peter 3

In a type of open letter to Christians Peter hits upon an important truth—though his message is directed to those who are led by the Spirit of God, it is for everyone. That truth is that people need to be reminded more often than they need to be instructed.

Made in God’s likeness, there is born in us a knowledge of right and wrong. This knowledge is added to by family, society, and culture but it exists independently. Those who argue against this cannot escape the fact that they rely on this inherent sense of right and wrong.

“Liar!’

“Cheater!”

“You’re mean!”

These charges explode from the wokest of naysayers on a regular basis. Why? If a person’s truth originates within them and is unique to them, why charge someone else with ignoring it? It makes absolutely no sense unless they are somehow inferior and not entitled to a truth all their own that is as equally valid as the speaker’s truth.

We cannot say the law has brainwashed us because except under very limited circumstances, it is not illegal to lie, cheat, or be mean. Nevertheless, it is declared wrong by those being lied to, cheated, or bullied, and in such a way that the other person is expected to know these things are wrong.

Another objection is that right and wrong vary by culture. That is true to a degree, but the differences are not as many as the similarities. As C.S. Lewis pointed out, one culture may allow a man to have one wife while another culture may allow multiple wives, but no culture allows a man to have any woman he wants—especially one who is another man’s wife.

Look across the spectrum of those who maintain the existence of some deity and you will find a version of “love thy neighbor as thyself”.

Objective morality exists and its very existence argues for the existence of God. Even those who discount God in favor of a pure energy-derived universe, like that of quantum mechanics, will tell you that behavior influences vibration. They point to studies of plants and water subjected to various influences and the differences various stimuli produce. Yet they claim one of the stimuli produced a good or better outcome, and another produced a bad or distorted outcome. But where did the idea that one venation rate is good or higher, and another is bad or lower come from? They are tempted to answer that the observer creates the good versus bad effect. However, the observer is subject to the same affect, so they cannot be the source or origin of it.

We know the law of Right and Wrong. Yet, we break it. We don’t often need a lecture or sermon to do more than remind us that we are made in God’s image. Good lives in us. Peter was reminding his audience to let it shine.

This was also the message of James who wrote, “therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.”

Maranatha

Know Jack #358 Numbers Don’t Lie

 “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

Mark Twain

Twain’s observation makes me wonder where today’s world is headed. From pitch counts to pandemic infections, statistics are the new scripture, the gospel laid out for daily consumption on every “news” broadcast and talk show. In my experience, statistics exist for no other reason than to prove the point of the person citing them. Perhaps that’s why one statistic I read on the way to writing this post cited that over 73% of lies employ statistics in their telling.

Numbers really don’t lie. 2 always equals 2, πr2 always equals the area of a circle, numbers are objective truth. They neither change nor alter in meaning. The problem is that numbers are like guns. If you do not employ them, they won’t get up on their own and attack you. The evil they are capable of doing rests in the hands of the person(s) employing them.

One of the lines in Paul Simon’s song Kodachrome says, “My lack of education hasn’t hurt me none, I can read the writing on the wall. Now, I may not be good at math, but most of the time I can tell when things don’t add up.

Some of my Facebook friends and fellow “conspiracy theorists” are often heard to say things haven’t added up since March of 2020. I will agree the words and numbers official cite don’t agree with what eyesight and reasoning tell us. However, that doesn’t mean they don’t add up. It only means that the purveyors of those statistics have a different problem they are trying to solve.

Human beings are the wild card in reality and have the ability to bend the perception of it to suit personal desire. So powerful is this ability, they can make numbers lie and do so on a regular basis.

In my case, living as I do in make believe worlds, I have grown used to the fact that the narrative is meant to fit the author’s design. As a part-time editor anticipating where the author is taking me and spotting superfluous scripts is part of what I do.

As a result, I have come to the conclusion that many of those I know would take serious issue with. First, we are indeed being led down the garden path to the place where the van with the guy who lost his puppy and has free candy awaits. Since I also believe that God is the sovereign of all, I believe where we are traveling meets with divine approval.

In biblical history, when the masses have reached the point where only disaster will bring them to their senses, God obliges them. God didn’t just allow Nebuchadnezzar to raze Jerusalem; he sent the Babylonian king there for that purpose.

Numbers don’t lie, but the desired outcome generally determines how people go about working the problem.

Maranatha

Lost Crusader #145 The Faith Less Traveled

 “And when he (Elijah) saw that, he arose and ran for his life…and came and sat under a broom tree. And prayed that he might die, and said ‘It is enough! Now, Lord, take my life, for I am not better than my fathers!’”

1 Kings 19

If you’ve been in Sunday School or church much, you’ve probably heard the story. Queen Jezebel swore to kill Elijah in retaliation for his defeat and destruction of the prophets of Baal. So, Elijah takes it on the lam. Exhausted and out of Jezebel’s reach, he drops down in the shade of a juniper tree. This is the place where two paths of faith diverge in a wood.

The traditional rendering depicts Elijah, as a dejected, and depressed coward filled with self-pity sitting in the shade boo-hooing to God. Then, there’s the view of the situation less taken.

In this version, Elijah, in response to a message from God, challenged and beat the prophets of Ahab and Jezebel in a public showdown. The audience was amazed, crying out that God was great, then they promptly hung Elijah out to dry.

He’s left alone to face the wrath of the queen and her army. Having no word from God on how to handle this, he runs for his life. (Would teachers and preachers prefer he died?) Out of her reach, he sits in the shade wondering what the heck just happened.

He gave it his best shot, a miracle happened, and no one cares. He’s ready to call it quits—not because he lacks faith, but everyone else does. He takes a nap and when he wakes up an angel is there with food and drink. This happened twice.

Then, the angel chastises him and sends him back to face the music—wrong! The angel says for him to keep going further into the wilderness. He travels forty days without eating and arrives in the vicinity of the place where Moses saw the burning bush.

While he’s there, God sends a wind, an earthquake, and a fire across the front of the cave Elijah is calling home. But God is not in any of those things—this time. However, he has certainly deployed Elijah with similar signs before.

This time God shows up and whispers. Seems odd God would get so close to a despondent failure, doesn’t it?

It seems God still has 7,000 faithful people in Israel. At this point, Sunday School lessons ask how Elijah missed them. Perhaps the real question is how did they miss Elijah and where were they when his life was on the line?

Here’s the great part. Those same lessons say God still had work for Elijah to do. They are correct, but only in a sense. God sent Elijah to sort of whisper in the ear of three men who, each in his own way, would contribute to the death of Ahab, Jezebel and the unfaithful who left Elijah high and dry. Elijah, far from being the coward, accepts and carries out the assignment.

Elijah, however, was not granted his request to die. Instead, God sent a whirlwind to pick him up and transport him directly into heaven. James would say of Elijah later that he was a man of like passions as we are. He was very passionate about God and disappointed when others were not, but he always did what he was asked to do. He did not get out there on his own and do what he felt ought to be done. When he had a word from God, he acted. When he didn’t, he wasn’t foolish or brash enough to think he had the answer.

At first glance, victory doesn’t always look like it to our peers. To the masses, following the word of God doesn’t always look like the path to success. Thank God, we aren’t playing to the masses on this path less traveled.

Maranatha

Know Jack #357 The Modern American Cult

 “And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: that they might all be damned who believed not the truth...”

St. Paul to the Thessalonians

I’m going to step into the Crusader’s territory for a moment. It’s okay because we share a strand or two of DNA, and because what I am going to talk about here not only has a stranglehold on society but on many churches as well.

I was not raised in church. On the contrary, fellowship of any kind with churches was forbidden. How I ended up as a Christian and a member of one church or another for the last forty-seven years is another story. You can read that in my book, Experimental Christianity, or email me if you want to know. I’m not shy about relating the experience.

I mention my conversion to introduce the fact that I am not opposed to radical change. More recently, I dropped eighty pounds by changing my eating habits. However, I am persuaded that the modern Cult of Change—the adoration of change for the sake of change—is a deadly cancer growing on our culture, and our very thinking.

This laptop and the application I am using to write this blog is a case in point. Back in the dark ages, when companies like Hp and Microsoft were trying to sell us all on personal computing, their designers employed something called “ease of use”. That is, they set out to make their products easy to use in hopes of attracting reluctant buyers (like me). They were very successful, to say the least.

When did the last update you installed make things easier to use? I think possibly that was when dial-up ended. Now that we have bought into the need for the latest and greatest, change and innovation are no longer user-centered. Design has shifted to how it functions for the seller.

The Microsoft Word program I’m using right now just changed the process I use to make editorial comments on documents from one simple step into a two-step process with a block on further action until you obey. Change for the better, right? Sounds more to me like change or else.

When I worked for the Navy, each newly assigned officer in charge of our unit in the hospital had to introduce changes or they were likely to get passed over for promotion. It didn’t matter if the change made things operate more smoothly or increased productivity. Changes were made to return to ideas proven not to work. It didn’t matter. The important thing was a change was implemented and accepted.

We are told not only that change is inevitable, but that all change is good and embracing it proves we are proactive, progressive, and productive. This is the path to delusion. We are walking this path because we are being led down it. The Truth is unchanging. The only thing that changes is our willingness to see it.

Maranatha

Lost Crusader #144 Beginning at the End

 “Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned…”

St Paul

I’m going to let a bit of my bias show here. I first copied the verse above from the New King James. I then ditched it for the King James. (I became a Christian reading King James, and the language has stuck with me.) There’s no difference in the message, but I think there is a difference in the tone, and I like the word choices.

Paul in another place (Romans) said that Christianity should transform the lives of its disciples. In the verse cited above, he gives the short answer to what the transformation should look like.

The end—that is, the goal or the purpose, of God’s word is to produce actions of love that flow from a pure heart. That’s the destination; it is not the present state of affairs. So, it is to be expected that the typical Christian, if there is such a thing, is not yet perfect.

The world criticizes because they expect instant results. They expect the Christian, like Athena in mythology, to spring fully formed from the Father’s forehead. That this expectation is totally unrealistic is irrelevant.

Christian discipleship is a journey. It is begun in desperate sorrow and traveled by the weak along a road of challenges—sometimes painful challenges. It is not a question of if we have arrived, but whether we are going the right way. The trip will require course corrections along the way because the easy way and the fast lane are not always the best way to where we are going.

There is one immediate reward here though. Undertaking the journey and going in the right direction will produce a good conscience that will help steer us as we continue onward.

Unfeigned is not a word you hear much these days, newer versions use “sincere faith”. When you get right down to it the meaning is the same. The verb to feign means to pretend or to fake something. Christians are not to deal in faith for show or in comparisons with others.

If being the genuine person you are while being transformed seems to be contradictory, there is something you must understand. You are not being transformed into someone that you are not. You are being transformed into your true self—the you that will live a unique eternal life with God. There is no need to fake or pretend and neither is there any shame in being at our present, particular point on the journey. We are following Jesus and He alone defines the direction, sets the pace, and determines when we have arrived.

Knowing where you’re going makes the trip more pleasurable.

Maranatha