December 28, 2008

Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSiRSvXBu00

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We are pastors in the same franchise.

He leans one way and I lean another; meaning we rarely vote together on anything dealing with Biblical faith and morality.

He sent a "Motorcycle Mania" 2009 calendar to me for Christmas with a note: "I hope this helps until you get a chrome pony."

I wept.

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We live in ghettoes of homogeneity; and it's very comfortable.

Bikers, golfers, athletes, Rotarians, Kiwanians, and the like are glued together by common interests overcoming segregating idiosyncrasies.

While the tie that binds is even stronger in the Church, many churches go about their more than His business in devilish ways; obsessing over the incidentals and enabling discriminating distances so alien to why He came, died, rose, and reigns.

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If I am weary of holier-than-Thou-and-thee-hyper-theologies which divide and dissipate energies, emotions, and resources to advance the Kingdom, I cannot begin to fathom His pain after loving us to death.

Increasingly, I cannot bear reading Matthew 23:37-39.

I am convinced churches are ghettoes of homogeneity which insult His reconciling sacrifices: enfleshment and crucifixion.

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One of my favorite things about Christianity as patterned in Jesus and prescribed in the Bible is its inclusiveness with no allowances for favoritism by color, class, culture, or holier-than-Thou-and-thee-hyper-theologies.

I like the Church being easier to join than most fraternities, sororities, clubs, and other "exclusive" sociopoliticoreligio, uh, organizations.

All you gotta do to get tight with Him and His is love Him and love like Him.

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You can be right about everything; but if you're wrong about Jesus, you're in a heap of trouble.

You can be wrong about everything; but if you're right about Jesus, you're gonna overcome life's damnable homogeneities and wake up to a life even better than this one can ever be after the last breath.

It's the difference between the homogeneous bastardizations of Christianity and the rainbow-colored heterogeneity of the faithful.

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Paul and Silas were pretty simple about it.

They were asked, "What must I do to be saved?"

They answered, "Believe in Jesus and you'll be saved."

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Luther said, "Good works don't make a person good; but a good person does good works."

Calvin talked about showing the signs of being saved.

In other words, if you're headed to heaven, you behave more heavenly than hellishly.

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How do you live more heavenly than hellishly?

While it will come as a surprise to our holier-than-Thou-and-thee-hyper-theologians who write volumes on belief and behavior consistent with belief, I don't know anybody who can improve on Matthew 5-7; and my guess is there's enough for us in there to keep us busy now until then.

Whenever anyone asks what to believe and how to behave as a believer, I tell 'em to get a Bible with the words of Jesus in red letters; and then read 'em, meditate on 'em, memorize 'em, and pray and labor to imitate 'em.

I don't know of a more clear, concise, comprehensive, and compelling course on Christianity.

In fact, and I know I'll catch, uh, hell for saying this, anybody who says it's more complicated than that is full of, uh, her/himself.

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I didn't get a chrome pony for Christmas.

I got something much better.

A friend of Jesus reminded me of our friendship through Him; and with so many segregating temptations, my hope in Biblical Christianity's peace, unity, and purity was refreshed.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FMq0iDX1yE

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Blessings and Love!