Wednesday Bible Study: the line and the door

So the next 3:16 is in the last book of the Old Testament- Malachi.  And I want to get to the point of our verse a little differently- by looking at the WHOLE book- albeit in a shortened form.

Malachi is one of my favorite places to be, for a few reasons.  One of them, and the crux of our story today, is the interplay between God and who He is directing the prophecy to- namely (from 1:6) "the priests who despise my name".  He gives them a statement, and they defend themselves with self-righteous "in what way?" statement- which, to their shame, God answers.  And every so often, He lets them know the consequence of the crime they have committed.

First, He starts out with "I love you."  To which they amazingly and absurdly give their first, "in what way?".  He explains to them on no uncertain terms- at the formation of this people, He had a choice of the twin sons of Isaac, and He chose their father Jacob, rejecting Esau.  That alone was evidence of the Love He would show them.  But they basically have rejected God and His love, and He delivers the consequence:  "You can build up, but I will tear down."  This will end up being a future prophecy, as the story leads us to believe that this was written in Nehemiah's day, and the sacrifice was being held at the Second Temple, before Nehemiah had to return from Persia to weed out the corruption in the priesthood that Malachi is addressing.

The second involves a pair of accusations from God.  First is, "If I am a High God, where is My Honor? Where is My reverence?"  This is where he names the priests who despise Him, and they ask their "in what way have we despised You?".  He points out that their offerings are defiled.  In a great way, the quality of the offering represents the Quality of God, which is why it needs to be unspoiled first fruits.  How do you feel about your tithe now?  More on that later, but in the meantime, THEY get the message and reply, "in what way have we defiled YOU?"  Not that they made God defiled, but by their worthless sacrifices, they have shown their low esteem of God.

God then explains what they are truly saying in their actions:  That the Table (altar) of the Lord is "contemptible", that it doesn't matter what they bring (aka what they think of God), and that the entire thing is "a weariness to them" (1:13).  And here, God returns with the greatest insult to them He could give:  That if they were going to treat Him thusly, He was going to give His Word to the GENTILES- and they would worship Him far more diligently!  Which, of course, is the same conclusion that both Jesus and Paul made.


The third accusation He doesn't allow them a response- He merely tells them, "If you won't glorify My Name, I will (and this is my literal from the Hebrew used) rebuke your offspring and cover your faces with the excrement from your sacrificial animals."  Wow.

The next wave begins with what God calls His second accusation- that despite their sins, and their lack of respect, love, or even effort, they "cover the altar with tears" every time things go bad.  But not only is God refusing to hear them, He is going to refuse the sacrifice as well.  Okay, people, here's where it gets real.  They ask Him, "for what reason are you refusing?" and His reply is, Because you divorce the wife of your youth, and I HATE DIVORCE."

Ironic, then that one of the reforms Nehemiah will institute is that the people have to put away their foreign wives...


Then He returns one of their sins against them- They have wearied Him.  When they ask why, He gives a response that He could give again today:


Mal 2:17  You have wearied the LORD with your words. But you say, "How have we wearied him?" By saying, "Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the LORD, and he delights in them." Or by asking, "Where is the God of justice?" 




At this point He lists the fourth and final consequence- The terrible judgment that will come upon them when Messiah comes.


Mal 3:2  But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap. 
Mal 3:3  He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD. 

His next accusation:  He has over and over commanded them to return to Him, and they have refused.  Their reply, typically, is, "in what way should we return?" Meaning in their self-righteousness, they don't think they have left- that just being a Jew is righteousness enough.  God accuses them of robbing Him.  Not only had they put up worthless sacrifice, they had neglected the tithe.  And God, rather than judging them here, explains on the benefits they are missing out on by NOT tithing- which I can attest to.  "Try me on it," God asks them.


Finally, God accuses them of being not only neglectful, but disrespectful- "You say harsh words to me".  Of course, they say, "What harsh things?", to which God replies,

Mal 3:14  You have said, 'It is vain to serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the LORD of hosts? 
Mal 3:15  And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.'" 

Wow, money again- there is no profit to us.  And that is where God has had enough of them, and turns to the true believers, in OUR verse at last- and what a beautiful way to send us into the New Testament:

Mal 3:16  Then those who feared the LORD spoke with one another. The LORD paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the LORD and esteemed his name. 

Piece by piece:  The people who love God separated from all this, came together, and prayed.

The Lord heard them, and in the next verse promises to protect them from the coming judgment of the self-righteous.

AND THEIR NAMES WERE WRITTEN IN GOD'S BOOK.

I listened the morning I typed this to a teaching by Ann Graham Lotz.  She pointed out how the original High Priest- a symbol of the coming Christ- wore the Ephod before God.  The ephod contained 12 different gemstones- one for each tribe- worn over his heart.  "How wonderful to know," she said, "That Jesus sits on the throne, and wears OUR names over His Heart."

I can see why this book got the assignment of coming last.  It is God's line in the sand to Israel- and the opening door to the Gentiles.  Which side of the line will you choose?

Warning: Offensive

You may have noticed I don't bring up politics anymore- or at least not much.  Not because I don't have opinions- you've heard 'em.  Not because I've "lost some friends" over politics- though I have, and it's on them, not me. 

But it isn't worth it anymore.  It's not entertaining, it's not informative, and it is far, far from constructive.  Today, I see Congressional eyesore Kamala Harris is going on yet another rant about how Trump should be impeached.  Have you ever noticed that out of ALL the Presidents who have had people yelling for impeachment, the only one who even came that close to getting turned out was the only one that did something to deserve it?  I mean, other than having policies the other guys don't like (See Andrew Johnson, Barack Obama) or got caught doing stuff others got away with in office (see Bill Clinton, Jack Kennedy, Warren Harding).  And of course, if one semi-senile radical says it, then all the other ones go right along with it.  When was the last time we got one with an ounce of sense to tell the others to act adult?  It does happen, but you barely hear about it.


And it isn't one sided.  I would like a buck (slang for DOLLAR) for every time I hit "hide post" on a low class dig at John McCain at or near his death.  (You'll note that just one week ago, I had some fun with McCain, but only because the cameraman shoulda had him standing a little more in profile so he didn't LOOK like he was peeing.)  Getting a bit tired of Hillary-in-prison-orange too, BTW.  AND the former-FLOTUS-was-a-man crap.   And while I get that about 90% of the stupid stuff our current POTUS says is just to distract idiots from what he's actually accomplishing, It would sure be nice if he didn't give vultures like Bob Woodward and the world-famous "anonymous official" so much ammunition.

So let's take a teenage not-so-victim of a massacre and turn him into something he's not- either a living symbol for people who don't get that neither side really wants to get rid of guns because they are a valuable tool in divide-and-conquer, or a whelp of the Anti-Christ (so said by many who wouldn't know a false prophet from a car salesman).  Or let's start a mass movement involving insulting half the population to make a point you could have made better by setting up a charitable foundation to help bridge the hate and prejudice- but then, if you did that, your lack of skills at football would have left you to sink into obscurity.  Or how about nailing a real weasel like Harvey Weinstein, beginning a movement to root out all the similar weasels- and then trying to lie your way out after it is learned you were the very same kind of weasel-ette.


Or how about telling everyone who succeeded in a previous administration, "you didn't build that," but when the next administration starts succeeding, saying, "I did that."


A FB friend who has inspired me in many things- not of them yet illegal- posted this today, and it inspired this post of mine...


I’ve decided to wrestle back a perfectly acceptable word from the English language. A word which has been co-opted by the LGBTQ community. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you “queer,” meaning “strange” or “odd.”
Wish me luck!


I agree with him, here.  Not about "wrestling back", but about the whole stupid thing about, you can't use x-word.  So a man gets fired for using the word "niggardly" in a sentence correctly.  Or I have to have PSAs warning me not to use the word "gay" as an insult.  I'll make you a deal- I'll cease using gay as "that (insert TV show/sport rule/shoe style) is so gay when YOU stop using it for "homosexual".  Until then, I just don't care.  I still remember Howard Cosell getting in hot water one Monday Night.  He was admiring the squirting-away ability of diminutive wide receiver Charlie Brown of the Redskins, and said with an inflection of pure amusement, "The little monkey".  99% of people knew there wasn't a bad intent anywhere in the comment- but after the next commercial, he had to apologize because some moron with nothing better to do complained it was a "racial slur".


Did you see what I did there?  "squirting-away", "Redskins", "moron".  I used those terms basically to demonstrate how many ways the Jackbooted Language Thugs (Oooh, there's another one) make life miserable by sitting in mama's basement (AND another) and picking apart every word that anyone says.  Like my friend, I am sick of it.  It is a queer thing to have to fight over language and I intend to gayly ignore it all.


So, did I offend anyone?


#MeToo.

Time Machine co-ordinates VILXII5039757

Today, we land in September 7th, 1957- and the night that the world first met the NBC Peacock.

This still pic debuted on the show Your Hit Parade, where a cast of singers, which at this point included recent Panel contestant Giselle McKenzie, re-created the top seven songs of the week.  Now me, I remember better the animated version that debuted on the western Laramie a few years later.  I also remember this much later, "trimmed down" version:

so trimmed down, in fact, that I remember Jay Leno making the joke that "henceforth, it will be known as the NBC Capon..."


**************************************

And with a "Ba-dum-DUM!" we open this week's Time Machine, which will have a couple new M10 debuts as we ACTUALLY hit the list's 4th year;  A guest shot from the Platters, and the greatest hits of Kal Mann (who?)!  So shake a tail feather and let's get at things!

******************************************************

Say hello to Karen Groteberg!  No, she's not a member of the Platters, but she IS the lady in the Jayhawks, and I bring her up because she sings lead on their latest M10 hit, debuting at #10....





**************************************

And now, welcome Herb Reed and Zola Taylor of the Platters!

Um, I'm not interrupting anything, am I?

Z:  Oh, good heavens, no!  

H:  Nah, just part of the act, my friend...

S'okay, I was just teasing.  So you were with the band from the beginning, and built a hall of fame career with songs like My Prayer.

Z:  Actually, Buck Ram brought me in a bit later.

H: Buck is the one that got us in with Mercury Records, and he's the one that made them release our songs on their regular label instead of their purple label for colored acts.

It still amazes me that anyone was stupid enough to believe that records should be segregated.

H:  Well, it was a lot like what you been tellin' us about your time.  People scared a what they say, that they might offend someone.  A lotta hate...

Z: It's just a wonder that they didn't have pink labels for the ladies...

Not to mention that musicians in general were a group often taken advantage of.

H:  Don' I know it!  Now, the way you all got things set up, singers are just in it for the money after a while.  Groups like us had to LOVE what we did...

Very true.  Okay, so this week is just like the last couple.  With only a handful of charts, I gave points for the chart positions of any of the songs that hit #1 8 of them in all on 11 stations.  And the chart positions are from Billboard this week, since as of last Friday the Cashbox archive has been down yet again.  So have at it you two!

H: Ladies first, Z.

Z:  Thanks, Herb.  Our first tune is Paul Anka's Diana, which is #2 on Billboard.

H:  I got Jimmie Rodgers an' Honeycomb, it's the #9 song.

Z: Buddy Knox rocks on Hula Love, which was all the way down at #49, but with a bullet!

H:  Heh, I like that, 'Knox rocks!'  Johnny Mathis is at #21 with It's Not For Me To Say.

Z: That there's a MAN, ladies!  At a REAL low #92 on it's way up to a peak of #52, we have Ron Goodwin, with one of the versions of Swingin' Sweethearts floating around out there...

H: Debby Reynolds is up next, at the top this week with Tammy...

Now there's a WOMAN, guys!

Z:  Hee hee!  Next up is Buddy Holly and the Crickets and That'll Be The Day at #5.

H: An' the last contestant is the Killer hisself, Jerry Lee Lewis an' Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On at #4.

Thanks guys!  So gang, here's your deal.  Three songs had 2 #1 votes apiece, but only TWO of 'em got in the top three point-wise.  So you try for which two of them will battle for the top, and I'll let you know if you're still in the game in a bit!.


**************************************

Okay, I gotta see our guests off, 'cause I got some spoilers ahead.  In the meantime, listen to the new debut at #8 from the new lp  Look Now from Elvis Costello and the Imposters...









******************************************

So I saw a story about later days for Ms. Taylor that was so crazy, I just had to share!  From wiki...


(Frankie) Lymon's troubles extended to others after his death. After R&B singer Diana Ross returned "Why Do Fools Fall in Love" to the Top Ten in 1981, a major controversy concerning Lymon's estate ensued. Zola Taylor, Elizabeth Waters and Emira Eagle each approached Morris Levy, the music impresario who retained possession of Lymon's copyrights and his royalties, claiming to be Lymon's rightful widow; Lymon had neglected to divorce any of them. The complex issue resulted in lawsuits and counter-lawsuits, and in 1986 the first of several court cases concerning the ownership of Lymon's estate began.

Trying to determine who was indeed the lawful Mrs. Frankie Lymon was complicated by more issues. Waters was already married when she married Lymon; she had separated from her first husband, but their divorce was finalized in 1965, after she had married Lymon. Taylor claimed to have married Lymon in Mexico in 1965, but could produce no acceptable evidence of their union. Lymon's marriage to Eagle, on the other hand, was properly documented as having taken place at Beulah Grove Baptist Church in Augusta, Georgia, in 1967; however, the singer was still apparently twice-married and never divorced when he married Eagle. The first decision was made in Waters' favor; Eagle appealed, and in 1989, the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court reversed the original decision and awarded Lymon's estate to Eagle.

However, the details of the case brought about another issue: whether Morris Levy was deserving of the songwriting co-credit on "Why Do Fools Fall in Love". Although early single releases of "Why Do Fools Fall in Love" credit Frankie Lymon, Herman Santiago and Jimmy Merchant as co-writers, later releases and cover versions were attributed to Lymon and George Goldner. When Goldner sold his music companies to Morris Levy in 1959, Levy's name began appearing as co-writer of "Why Do Fools Fall in Love" in place of Goldner's. Lymon was never paid his songwriting royalties during his lifetime; one result of Emira Eagle's legal victory was that Lymon's estate would finally begin receiving monetary compensation from his hit song's success. In 1987, Herman Santiago and Jimmy Merchant, both by then poor, sued Morris Levy for their songwriting credits. In December 1992, the United States federal courts ruled that Santiago and Merchant were co-authors of "Why Do Fools Fall in Love". However, in 1996 the ruling was reversed by the Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit on the basis of the statute of limitations: copyright cases must be brought before a court within three years of the alleged civil violation, and Merchant and Santiago's lawsuit was not filed until 30 years later. Authorship of "Why Do Fools Fall in Love" currently remains in the names of Frankie Lymon and Morris Levy.

And that's without going into all the lawsuits that Herb went through to get the Platters' name back!


**********************************************

Kal Mann wrote the 6D song- which, I hate to say it, was Elvis's Teddy Bear at  #3...

"Yeah, Ah'll just BET you hate to say it..."

Which got me looking into Mann, who with various partners wrote the lyrics to a TON of hit songs!  So I waddled on over to MusicVF, where I got the definitive list of the top songs of Kal's career, and doing just this top ten left a TON of good music off the list!  Anyway, here's the top ten songs penned by Kal Mann...

10- The Dovells, Bristol Stomp, which hit #2...

9- The Orlons, Don't Hang Up, #4...

8- Chubby Checker and DeeDee Sharp, Slow Twistin', #3...

7- The Orlons, The Wah-Watusi, #2...

6- DeeDee Sharp, Mashed Potato Time, #2...

5- Chubby, Limbo Rock, #2...

4- Bobby Rydell, Wild One, #2...

And the three #1s...

3- Charlie Gracie's version of Butterfly...

2- Andy Williams version of Butterfly...

and at #1...

That's right, Elvis and Teddy Bear, which is were the whole thing got started!


***************************************

So if you guessed Jerry Lee, Debbie, or Jimmie Rodgers, you would have the three with 2 #1 votes... but only two of them landed in the top on points, with Jerry Lee trailing both Buddy Holly AND Paul Anka!  So pick from Tammy or Honeycomb, and see if you get a winner!

**********************************************

So we're still in the 'slim pickins' side of our stat pack.  I knew 15 of 40 in the US and 8 of 30 in the UK, including the British chart topper, which was Diana.  Outside of that, I can only give you the big mover, which was...

The lovely Jane Morgan and the Troubadours with Fascination, zooming up 31 spots to #32. 

******************************************************

The remaining M10:

Quiet Hollers hangs in there at #9 with Addicted.

Cullen Omori moves to #7 with A Real You.

The Jayhawks' other tune, Backwards Women, goes backwards from 3 to 6 in it's 9th week.  That is something only 26 other songs have done- 7.8% of the songs ever to hit the M10.  Only three have beaten that, and one was the Jayhawks with Quiet Corners!

Dorothy still says Ain't Our Time To Die, but it is time to fall from #2 to 5. 

And on that subject, last week's top dog, ELO's Buildings Have Eyes, drops to #4.

Beach House follows a familiar path, going up from 5 to 3 with Equal Mind.

Vanessa Carlton leaps 4 to #2 with Lonely Girls.  And we might be approaching a new Iron Ceiling with the new #1...

...Blackberry Smoke and One Horse Town!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And the winner of the Panel, with a 367-349 margin....

....Debbie Reynolds with Tammy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Next week, Debbie and me and 1958!

MWN mixed-up pics

Okay, so let's see if I can get some cheap laughs this week, 'cause God knows I could use 'em.  Like last week, let me start with something that is a bit outside the rules, but this particular meeting of caption and picture is a real Captain Obvious moment, so...

1- Fox News

Imagine that.  A passenger on a cruise ship suddenly found themselves in the middle of the ocean.  Real Brian Williams material here.


Moving on...

2- CNN


The picture...

The headline...

The first virgin 'Bachelor'

"But I won't be for long if you don't let go of that..."


3-  BBC

The picture...

The headline...


The Bird That Came Back From The Dead


"Wait a minute?  I'm dead?  Couldn't you let me get these darn slacks zipped up first?"


Or-

Will going vegan make you healthier?

Answer:  "It didn't help me..."


4- The Independent


The picture and headline actually go together, though I'm not sure Mr Cook, here, will like it...

5- More Independent


The Picture...

The headline...




Huge jet sent through the universe after two stars collide


With that face, you knew it had to be a fart joke...

Wednesday Bible Study- the power wash

A long time ago, I learned a valuable lesson.  If you don't put God where He deserves to be in your life, He puts you on a shelf until you are ready to.  Or, to put it in the words of rapper NF:

(They say) Leave me alone God, I'll call you when I need you again
Which is funny, everyone will sleep in the pews
Then blame God for our problems like He sleeping on you
We turn our backs on Him, what do you expect Him to do?
It's hard to answer prayers when nobody's praying to you


And in this section, we are going to see how that works.  For the third week in a row, we are in a three-chapter prophetic book, and it kind of fits a flow.  Three weeks ago (due to vacation), we were in Nahum, which took the attack to the Assyrians- and by application to the End Times.  That was more fully fleshed out last week with Habakkuk, where the judgment against the nations caused the prophet to tremble.  This week we go to Zephaniah.  Zephaniah was of royal blood- the great great grandson of Hezekiah, serving under the holy King Josiah.  As the beginning of his prophecy- indeed, all three chapters- deals with the sins of Jerusalem, my Bible dates his prophecy from the early years of Josiah's reign, before his reforms really got going- roughly 30 years after Habakkuk.

But I wonder if that is quite the indicator.  After Josiah, the people went right back into the old sins, and were destroyed.  Did Josiah's reforms really take root, or did the people just pay lip service?  In any event, this particular section is all about looking at the fear caused in the Habakkuk 3;16 story and calming them:

Zep 3:16  On that day it shall be said to Jerusalem: "Fear not, O Zion; let not your hands grow weak. 

Both sides of this verse is God telling them what will happen AFTER the cataclysm in Habakkuk, that had such an effect on that prophet.  It is God saying, don't be afraid of what will happen to the nations.  BUT, it is not all rosy news for Israel...

Zep 3:11  "On that day you shall not be put to shame because of the deeds by which you have rebelled against me; for then I will remove from your midst your proudly exultant ones, and you shall no longer be haughty in my holy mountain. 

Zep 3:12  But I will leave in your midst a people humble and lowly. They shall seek refuge in the name of the LORD, 

Zep 3:13  those who are left in Israel; they shall do no injustice and speak no lies, nor shall there be found in their mouth a deceitful tongue. For they shall graze and lie down, and none shall make them afraid." 

This is describing what the Bible often calls "the remnant"- not ALL of the Jews will make it out of Armageddon alive.  "Your proudly exultant ones" are going to be pruned right with the enemies of Israel.  In looking this passage over, I found that the key to understanding was not in the verse itself but several verses before...

Zep 3:6  "I have cut off nations; their battlements are in ruins; I have laid waste their streets so that no one walks in them; their cities have been made desolate, without a man, without an inhabitant. 

Zep 3:7  I said, 'Surely you will fear me; you will accept correction. Then your dwelling would not be cut off according to all that I have appointed against you.' But all the more they were eager to make all their deeds corrupt. 

Zep 3:8  "Therefore wait for me," declares the LORD, "for the day when I rise up to seize the prey. For my decision is to gather nations, to assemble kingdoms, to pour out upon them my indignation, all my burning anger; for in the fire of my jealousy all the earth shall be consumed. 

What I boldened here is the change of dealing with Israel that God is about to institute after the death of Josiah.  With all the judgment that God had already unleashed on them, Israel should have gotten the picture.  But instead, they just got worse.

And God then put them on the shelf- where they remain today.  When they reject Josiah's reforms, it is God's last straw, and He puts them on the shelf "for the day".  Which means, it will be AFTER Armageddon that God will return to a personal relationship with Israel.  That doesn't mean He's not going to be involved in their fate ( or else, the Babylonians, the Romans, or Hitler would have surely exterminated them), but He's not going to move through them Spiritually as He had.  They might return to service, to outward obedience, and individuals will still turn to Him, but they will not be that which He works His will in the world.  And for 2,600 years, they have waited.  But He has a plan for them, when the "stiff necked and hard of heart" are at last weeded out:

Zep 3:9  "For at that time I will change the speech of the peoples to a pure speech, that all of them may call upon the name of the LORD and serve him with one accord. 

Zep 3:10  From beyond the rivers of Cush my worshipers, the daughter of my dispersed ones, shall bring my offering. 

Being on the shelf doesn't necessarily seem like a bad thing when you are in it.  You just go through life with the crowd, doing what they do, counting on some memory of faith to raise your self-esteem.  But if you have TRULY been God's, every day adds a layer of build-up, of uncleanness you feel in your soul and may not understand why.  And if you are like me, about the time you figure out you've got to change, God will bring a "power washer" into the picture to clean you off.  And you'll be wishing that you just stayed clean in the first place.  I've gotten a few blasts over the years, and it isn't fun when it happens.  

Zephaniah teaches us, in application, how much better we will feel after the washing.  Habakkuk tells us just how bad the "power washing" can be.  And for Israel, sadly, the greatest "Turbo Wash" of all awaits.

Doggie pictures

Friday was actually a good day to walk, and I got to go to the woods!

There I go!

Cool... and pretty!

I gotta get me a drink...

Daddy was gonna sit on that... but it was fungied all over.

Darn it, no water here!

Fine.  Grrr...

I think deers slept here...

I found the wooly worm!  Daddy says we'll have a real winter, but not a terrible one.

Swallow taking a break

Hmm... the big rock hill is all gone!

The rest of the weekend was hot and muggy... all I got was bark park trips...

Real exciting stuff here, Dad...

Monday was going to be more of the same... but I INSISTED  we take a real walk.....

Daddy said, "Hoffa burial plot"....

He also said his dad used to set these on fire in his hickory tree...

Water's down... muggy, buggy, and the color is fading...

Those were colorful...

So I got real smart.  I remembered where the old footbridge crossing was!  I'll just trick daddy into coming down and I'll get a quick drink...

Dafuq... there's NO water!

Crap- now he wants me to go on across- I just shot half my walk up the butt...

D-d-d-d-d That's all folks!

Sunday Message- going out...

It had been a few months since I had entered the Corner Pocket Pub, just down the street.  The last time, to my shame, I was a drunk.  I won't go into it, but it was probably one of my top ten lowest points.  Friday, I re- entered.  I had a couple beers, played pool, acted like a human being.  I had learned that lesson.  But was it the whole lesson?

Stay tuned, I'm not exactly preaching temperance here.  The real lesson came that night as I listened to the radio and a preacher asked if, when we invite Jesus into our hearts, our intent is to put Him " in a little room in the back" and tell Him to only come out on Sunday.  I realized quickly, that is not MY problem.  Like everything else when it comes to my perception of OUR relationship- mine and Christ's- I had to "flip it".

My problem was that, while I gave Him "the run of the house", I often went OUT alone, telling Him, "stay right here, I'll be back in a bit."

As I type this, I haven't really looked into all the ramifications of this.  Whenever I come to one of these personal epiphanies, I need time for the meaning of the lesson to sink in.  So as I listened to Pastor Fish this Sunday morning, I began to think about reaching out with an entirely different lesson- but in the midst of this lesson, Pastor Steve got me to flip something else.

You see, he was in the section of First Corinthians where Paul was defending himself against various charges the Corinthian church had thrown at him- and one there was that I never understood in the right way.


1Co 9:6  Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working for a living? 
1Co 9:7  Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard without eating any of its fruit? Or who tends a flock without getting some of the milk? 
1Co 9:8  Do I say these things on human authority? Does not the Law say the same? 
1Co 9:9  For it is written in the Law of Moses, "You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain." Is it for oxen that God is concerned? 
1Co 9:10  Does he not speak entirely for our sake? It was written for our sake, because the plowman should plow in hope and the thresher thresh in hope of sharing in the crop. 
1Co 9:11  If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? 
1Co 9:12  If others share this rightful claim on you, do not we even more? Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ. 
1Co 9:13  Do you not know that those who are employed in the temple service get their food from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in the sacrificial offerings? 
1Co 9:14  In the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel. 
1Co 9:15  But I have made no use of any of these rights, nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision. For I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of my ground for boasting. 

So I always wondered, why were the Corinthians busting Paul's chops for taking a living from the Gospel?  Did they look at preachers as parasites, blowing out hot air to make a buck?  Even after His testimony LED them to salvation?  For certainly, if you look at today's world, that's the first thing that you were aiming at.

But Pastor Steve explained that there were lots of itinerant philosophers in Greece back then, using philosophy-as-entertainment as a way of life.  And you made that living in one of four ways:

1- You were good enough at it people would pay to listen- and so you charged admission.

2- You had someone wealthy who became your patron, either because they agreed with you wholeheartedly, or as an investment;

3- You went begging, like the buskers who show off their skill for donations;

4- You had "a daytime job", like Paul and Barnabas, who worked for tentmakers.

So it wasn't that the church was accusing Paul of being a parasite- they were wondering, since only the "lowest on the food chain" speakers had to work for a living, why was Paul?  Their question wasn't an accusation, but a COMPLIMENT.  "Gee Paul, there are a lot of us who would PAY to listen, or support you.  Why do you work?"

His answer, "For I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of my ground for boasting. "  And here again you have to flip the story.  Because, he wasn't boasting in his ability- if he were, we would have accepted nothing but the highest fees, the greatest patrons.  Kinda like our retired politicians, right, Bill, George?

His boast was that Christ took a no one- the worst of sinners- and made him a someone, but only in Christ.  He was driven to the extreme to be a servant of all for Christ's sake.  And he was also explaining that this did not mean that others- like James, Peter, or John- couldn't make their livings by support, it was just that he chose NOT to.

He humbled himself for Christ.  How unlike me, who tells Jesus He isn't good enough to "come out with me."

I am becoming better at this, not to boast.  Because I know it was only through an act of obedience that I began to improve, my own little "tentmaking" moment.  But it brings me to mind the old WWJD wristbands.  It makes me wonder how many people who wore them did so to show membership in a club- and how many did it as a tangible reminder to "invite Jesus out with them".  How many people go to a physical church to "tick off the weekly box" and not to worship and show obedience.  How many of my prayers are "part of the job" and how many are genuine communication.  Yes, I have become better over the last few months.

But I still need to flip the keys to Jesus and say, "C'mon, we're going out."