Sunday, March 30, 2014

Who's Right?


Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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    Who's right?

    God knows...and judges...in the end.

    Righteousness, in the meantime, can be approached, more than less, by following Jesus by the book.

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    Obviously, not everyone agrees about righteousness; even when claiming intended allegiance to Jesus by the book.

    The left thinks it's more righteous than the right.

    The right thinks it's more righteous than the left.

    Who's right?

    God knows...and judges...in the end.

    Go back to the last sentence of the previous section.

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    How do we proceed in the meantime if only God knows...and judges...in the end.

    We trust the priesthood of all believers; praying the majority is overwhelming and focused upon and filtered through Jesus by the book.

    I think of it as The Bob Rule.

    Parenthetically, I did not come up with it...which is also obvious; for if I did, I wouldn't have so many of my non-best-selling books in the closet.

    Anyway, here it is: "If everyone disagrees with you, you may be right; but if everyone disagrees with you, you may want to consider they're right and you're wrong.

    Again, God knows...and judges...in the end.

    Buuuuuuut we gotta decide/do somethin' in the meantime.

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    Lest the self-righteous on the left and right lobby too much for themselves, they may wanna read Revelation 22:12.

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Blessings and Love!

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Shortest KD Ever

Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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    I'm convinced our world, America, churches, school districts, families, and...are unraveling because of increasingly reckless disrespect for theocratically ordered authority (scroll down for a reminder of what is meant by theocratic order).

    Solution.

    Authority must be exercised as necessary.

    Problem.

    Our world, America, churches, school districts, families, and...embrace authority as convenient.

    Prospect.

    Slim to...

    Conclusion.

    "Come, Lord Jesus!"

@#$%


Blessings and Love!

Scratching the Surface

of

Authority

(A Brief and Incomplete Guide to Headship in the…)

You’ve seen the bumper sticker: “Question Authority!”

Our culture appears convinced anybody’s word is as good as anybody else’s word on any subject.

Actually, it started in the garden; sooooooo rebelling against authority is in our genes.

That’s why I rebelled when my wife asked if I would come to a Sunday School class that she leads to share my understanding of Biblical submission in marriage.

I responded: “I am reluctant to talk to your class or anybody else’s class about Biblical submission in marriage for two reasons.  First, I need to be in Elder Ev’s Sunday School class because I have so much to learn and he’s an excellent teacher and often mentor for me.  Second, most of today’s gender understandings have been so polluted by American ideologies masquerading as Biblical theologies that it’s like tinkling in the wind.”

Parenthetically, I’m increasingly disinclined to spend precious moments with people who contend with rather than attend to God’s will as personified in Jesus and prescribed in Holy Scripture: “I know that’s what Jesus and the Bible say…but I think…”  I’m old school: “Trust and obey…for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus…but to trust and obey.”  I believe it’s better stewardship to spend time/energy with people who wanna know and love Him by the book than with pretenders, contenders, and anyone else posing fidelity while rebelling against His revelations in Jesus by the book.

Buuuuuuut kinda proving my protesting point, I surrendered to my wife’s continuing insistences in a Proverbs 27:15 kinda way and spent Saturday morning, 8 February 2014, at a “Couples Breakfast” talking about headship in the home, church, government, and…

Repeating I’m just scratching the surface and don’t claim to be comprehensively correct on, uh, anything, here’s a summary of my brief and incomplete guide to headship in the…

Confessions


I’m a man with no interest in acting like a woman; meaning I acknowledge I don’t understand, appreciate, or even consider female sensitivities on too many occasions.

I’m categorically convinced my wife is a much better mother than I could ever be and I’m a much better father than she could ever be; encouraging me to conclude unequivocally that headship/authority in the family, church, government, and so on respects both gender functional diversity and gender value equality in a Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12 kinda way: “Just as there are many parts to our bodies, so it is with Christ’s body.  We are all parts of it, and it takes every one of us to make it complete, for we each have different work to do.  So we belong to each other, and each needs all the others.”

2

Culture

Our culture is antagonistic to Biblical Christianity; again, today’s mantra: “I know that’s what Jesus and the Bible say…but I think…”

When it comes to gender, the marketing techniques/strategies of companies like Progressive Insurance, Southwest, State Farm, Toyota, and Wendy’s seem OCDed about portraying men as emotionally and intellectually inferior to women; accentuating as well as aggravating gender wars, confusion, aversion, and antagonism to Biblical models of headship/authority.

With headship/authority questioned, resisted, and defied in families, churches, government, and all of the rest, our culture is devolving into mobocracy in which decision-making becomes a contest for control rather than a mutually beneficial outcome of divine creation/order and charismata.

Rather than acknowledging divinely created/ordered functional diversity concomitant to divinely created/ordered value equality, we pretend some kinda unBiblical and illogical psychosocial unisexuality for all roles as the only way to respect value equality. 

Buuuuuuut somebody’s gotta decide; noting positive, practical, and productive decision-making requires acknowledging and embracing divine creation/order and charismata.

Exaggerated examples: women are created/ordered and gifted to breastfeed while men are not…Tom Brady and Peyton Manning rather than their right guards call/change plays…sergeants not privates are better suited to direct firefights…Choir directors not Greek scholars should lead musical offerings in worship…Plumbers not beauticians should fix toilets…

The buck’s gotta stop somewhere; and Biblical and psychosocial common sense dictate the best headship/authority is provided by divine creation/order and charismata.

Context

For families, churches, governments, and so on who trust God by the book, here are a few texts for study and meditation that relate directly to headship: Genesis 1:26-27; 2:18-24; Exodus 1:17; Matthew 19:4-6; Acts 5:29; 1 Corinthians 11:1-3; 2 Corinthians 6:14; Ephesians 5:1-2, 22-33; Colossians 3:18-19; Hebrews 13:7; and 1 Peter 2:13-17; 3:1-2, 7-9.

Summary of Biblical Headship


Whether it’s in the home, church, country, or anywhere else, a person’s headship/authority is inextricably linked to God in Jesus as attested in Holy Scripture being the Sovereign and Savior of that person’s life.

Putting it another way, to illustrate, as Jesus by the book is Head of a father/husband’s life, he is head of the family. 

The same Biblical principle is true for church, government, and…

Human headship/authority is only acknowledged/heeded if the designated head/authority submits to the ultimate Head/Authority of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit by the book.
Again, the emphasis for human headship/authority is on the qualifier for that headship/authority: “As Jesus is the Head of…”
3

Knowing God by the book only wants what is best for us, human headship/authority by the book can/must/will be embraced, practiced, and celebrated.

In other words, for example, fathers and husbands are not the heads/authorities of the house by gender but by their submission to God as the Head/Authority of their headship under His Headship: “Thy not my will be done…as a father…as a husband…in my marriage…in my family…in everything that I say and do and even think!”

It goes back to Actsual Christianity: “We must obey God not man!”

When our fathers and husbands and deacons and elders and teachers and preachers and police and presidents and…obey Him, then we must obey them.

As human heads/authorities submit to God as the ultimate Head/Authority, we submit to them.

If not, not!

When any human leader insults, ignores, and defies God by the book, that leader forfeits headship/authority; because only headship/authority in/through/for the ultimate Head/Authority compels submission by the book.

Here’s an exaggerated example of forfeited headship/authority: a father/husband, teacher, preacher, president, or…asks/advises/directs or tries to force us to say/do something/anything that is wrong by the book.

Legitimate headship/authority under the ultimate Head/Authority leads/loves by loving like Him by the book: “Love each other just as much as I have loved you.”

John Piper spells it out for families where Jesus is the ultimate Head of the house: “…the divine calling of a husband to take primary responsibility for Christ-like servant leadership, protection and provision in the home…the divine calling of a wife to honor and affirm her husband’s leadership and help carry it through according to her gifts.”

Mutual submission at His best is to affirm that functional diversity amid value equality.

As Jesus is the Head of a father/husband’s life, that man will exercise headship/authority in the home for the good of all in honor of Him: “The greatest among you will be your servant.”

Again, this principle holds true for all relationships in the home, church, country, and…

As our leaders/heads/authorities submit to God by the book, we submit to them.

Never forget that qualifier: “As Jesus is the Head of…”

Conclusions

While the preceding is God’s way to order, safety, and security in all relationships, those rebellious genes from the garden (aka original sin) against God’s way remain rigidly fixated to what’s not working.

It’s the SOSO rebellion with the SOSO results.

4

Does anyone really think our families, churches, government, and world are not falling apart?

How we are ordering families, churches, government, and so on ain’t workin’; and the definition of insanity is to keep doin’ what ain’t workin’ no how!

Heeeeeeelllllllooooooo! Our way ain’t workin’!

Ray Stedman: “The Bible indicates that any deviation from the divine plan inevitably produces weakness, division, strife, increasing fruitlessness, and, ultimately, death.  The present low state of many churches is testimony to the effects of ignoring, over a long period of time, God’s way of working.”

From cover to cover, the counsel/caution of the Bible is consistently, compellingly, and conclusively clear: “God honors people who honor Him.”

Sooooooo doesn’t it make sense to try God’s way; unless our rebellion/defiance is sooooooo twisted and dark that we’d rather destroy our families, churches, and governments, and world by tryin’ to keep keepin’ on apart from Him?

Let’s go back to God!

Let’s go back to His way of ordering, preserving, protecting, and promoting our families, churches, government, and world.

2 Chronicles 7:14.

His way is sooooooo…divine.

Monday, March 24, 2014

When You Wanna Quit

Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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Scratching the Surface

of

Survival

(A Brief and Incomplete Guide for When You Wanna Quit)

He asked, “Does it ever end?”

He was referring to the disappointments, defeats, disillusionments, tests, trials, temptations, and tribulations of living in an increasingly mean, maddening, and miserable world, country, and…[Gulp!]…even church.

I answered, “No.”

Groote aka Kempis wrote a lot about that way back in the late 14th century (Imitation of Christ): “So long as we live in the world, we cannot be without tribulation and temptation.”

Sadly, “There is no order so holy, nor place so secret, where there be not temptations or adversities.”

Getting back to my friend’s interrogative and my declarative, “When one temptation or tribulation goeth away, another cometh; and we shall ever have something to suffer.”

Pointing to the only way to overcome all of the meanness, madness, and misery to which no one is immune, he counseled, “The beginning of all evil temptations is inconstancy of mind, and small confidence in God.”

Simply, Jesus saves…if we let Him.

Having survived it so far, here’s what I’ve learned about, uh, surviving it:

  1. Intimacy with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is the solid rock foundation that overcomes it.  Jesus punctuated His most famous sermon with that good news (see Matthew 5-7; especially 7:24ff.); echoing the Psalmist: “God inhabits the praises of His people.”  In other words, if we hang out with Him, we won’t get hung up by/on it;

  1. I paid close attention to the course on original sin; and learned to expect next to
nothing from most people because most people aren’t really into Him as evidenced
by their selfishness, control needs, greed, inability to serve unless leading, irascibility, irregularity, and irreconcilability that leave little room for Christlike traits like selflessness, unconditional favor, mercy, reconcilable intentions, redemptive passions, forgiveness, and other, again, Christlike traits;

  1. While expecting next to nothing from most people who don’t even try to overcome
the original sin in their DNA, I expect everything from Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as promised throughout Holy Scripture and summarized by Psalm 62; and

  1. I know my speck-inspecting is limited by my log-wearing.  I must always be ready
and even eager to confess my sins against Him and His, repent from my sins against Him and His, ask forgiveness from Him and His, and pray and try to be/do


better as I receive forgiveness from Him and His.

Simply, Jesus saves…if we let Him.

Survival depends upon God alone.

Yeah, there are some folks who allow Him to use them in saving missions.

They get it/Him.

Praise the Lord!

They are the few who can say with the apostle, “It is no longer I who live but it is Jesus who lives in and through me.”

In short, I have survived it because of my increasing intimacy with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, expecting nothing from most people, expecting everything from Him, and recognizing my own sins against Him and His that encourages my increasing intimacy with Him to survive the world, country, and…[Gulp!]…even church.


Simply, Jesus saves…if we let Him.


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Blessings and Love!


Friday, March 21, 2014

Fasting


Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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Scratching the Surface

of

Fasting

(A Brief and Incomplete Guide to Fasting)

Jesus said, “When you fast…”

He did not say, “If you fast…”

Fasting, abstaining from food/drink/whatever as a spiritual discipline, was a regular part of His life and expected of those who want to get closer to Him.

Moses, David, Elijah, the disciples/apostles, and Jesus Himself fasted.

People who have been closest to Him throughout history have fasted.

So if we want to get closer to Him, we will include fasting in our spiritual disciplines/devotions as one of the ways to get closer to Him.

Admitting I’m only scratching the surface of this spiritual discipline/devotion, I have discovered at least three ways to fast: (1) Normal – abstaining from food/drink/whatever but not water; (2) Absolute – abstaining from food/drink/water/whatever; and (3) Partial – restricting food/drink/water/whatever.

Parenthetically, diabetics and folks taking medications should consult with a MD before fasting.

The method is not as important as the meaning/motive.

The specifics and timing are not remotely as important as the desire/hunger/thirst to do whatever He prescribes to increase intimacy with Him.

Fasting is a spiritual discipline/devotion akin to Hebrews 11:6: “God is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.”

Derek Prince: “If you fast in the right way with the right motives, God will reward you openly.  So if you fail to fast, bear in mind that you are depriving yourself of the reward.”

Simply, when we do what Jesus tells us to do, we move closer to Him.

Fasting aligns our hearts with His.

In How to Fast Successfully, Prince lists seven reasons to fast: (1) to humble one’s self before God; (2) to move closer to God; (3) because it is a tool to better understand Holy Scripture; (4) because God uses our obedience to reveal His will to us; (5) to seek healing; (6) to meet the challenges of life; and (7) to intercede for others.

Others have said fasting honors Him, mourns sins against Him, seeks grace, resists temptations, battles evil, shows repentance, gains revelation, and…
I won’t/can’t limit Him to seven or seven hundred reasons to fast; for my belief bolstered by experience is He is bigger than any of our estimates.

My belief bolstered by experience is He takes obedience through fasting to bless particularly and spectacularly.

It’s like a mentor counseled, “Just do what God tells you to do and He will bless you for it!”

George MacDonald: “Get up, and do something the Master tells you…Instead of asking yourself whether you believe or not, ask yourself whether you have this day done one thing because He said, ‘Do it,’ or once abstained because He said, ‘Do not do it.’  It is simply absurd to say you believe, or even want to believe in Him, if you do not do anything He tells you…Even the smallest step of obedience leads to spiritual growth and knowledge…Whosoever will do the will of God – not understand it, not care about it, not theorize about it, but do it – is a son of God.”

Jesus: “When you fast – practice some appetite-denying discipline to better concentrate on God – don’t make a production out of it…God doesn’t require attention-getting devices.  He won’t overlook what you are doing; He’ll reward you well.”


Less yields more when we fast.

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Blessings and Love!

Tuesday, March 18, 2014

School Board


Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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"Whoever causes a child who believes in Me to stumble,
it would better for that person to have a great millstone
fastened around her or his neck and to be drowned..."

Jesus

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"To preach the Gospel is not just to tell the truth but
to tell the truth in love, and to tell the truth in love
means to tell it with concern not only for the truth
that is being told but with concern also for the
people it is being told to..

The stakes have never been higher."

Frederick Buechner

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    I've been asked to run for District 100's School Board.

    Things must be really bad if I'm being...

    They are.

    Spearheaded by a previous cadre's counsel and insistence fueled by dubious rationale - "You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time.  Not bad odds!" - the high school was divided into two high schools: BHS and BNHS.

    Belvidere's one high school was a continuing encouragement to the citizenry as administrators, teachers, parents, and students worked happily together for academic, athletic, and extra-curricular excellence in the development of future leaders embracing America's highest values.

    As the first decade of division draws to an end, the community increasingly laments what is now understood to be an imprudent to impulsive decision born of suspicious motives; rendering a once positively unified community subject to unseemly divisions, disunity, competition, rivalry, selfishness, pride, and base politics.  What was once renowned as a community of unity with Belvidere High School being among its greatest bonding agents has become a simmering cauldron of suspicion, contention, and unrest.

    Sooooooo I asked some local folks and informed friends around the country, "How can school boards better serve/assist/complement administrators, teachers, parents, and, most consequentially, students?"

    Protecting the identities of respondents against reprisals, what follows are parallel parables concomitant to summary representations with direct quotes from exponentially more folks than have ever read any of my books which is significant if not shocking.

    Annnnnnnd as Harold often said to pewsitting critics who said he was singling 'em out when he preached, "If the shoe fits..."

    In other words, my guess is District 100 ain't much different from yours.

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    Parallel.

    Harold often told miscreants, "If you find the perfect church, don't join it; because it will no longer be perfect if you do!"

    Following his lead, I've said occasionally, "Please do not tell anyone that I'm your pastor; because I don't want anyone to think I've influenced your beliefs and behaviors."

    Representatives.

    "Having lived in this county since I was 5, I have seen District 100 go from being one of the top schools in the area to where we are now - operating in the black and wise financial decisions to wasteful spending and selling a 'snake oil' bill of goods to the public that we need all these new buildings.  We were supposed to be 12K+ in student population by this time; only to be under 8K and dropping.  One school closed.  More on the way?  They put the cart in front of the horse and now want taxpayers to bail them out!  A very arrogant attitude..six figures for a top administrator who does not want to live with us...My tax bill is roughly $5800 with $3800 going to District 100.  And just what am I paying for?  Fancy buildings...high administrative salaries...If more cuts need to me made, why not start with our administrators and teachers who do not want to be here anyway?"

    "After serving on the very first committee to try to get BNHS built, I came away frustrated with elected community leaders than ever before.  A bunch of graphs and pretty pictures were thrown at us to prove we were growing at a substantial rate; but we were not allowed to question those graphs or pretty pictures.  We were told we needed new buildings.  We questioned that.  We couldn't discuss it.  It was a conclusion not a consultation.  We had a superintendent who wanted to build his resume at our cost."

    "I really like our current superintendent.  Unlike his arrogant predecessor, he is highly relational.  We stole him from our immediate neighbors to the north.  But why hasn't our school board held his feet to the fire about interviewing for other jobs when the job here is unfinished?  I like him.  I wish he liked us."

    "Has our school board ever wondered why our superintendent and so many of our best teachers want to leave?  Could it be them?"

    "Our school board does not care about the whole district.  They only care about the schools that their children attend!"

    "Why don't school board members introduce themselves to the teachers?  Why don't they ask the teachers and staff about problems, issues, and successes?  This school board is seen as the enemy; or, at best, inconsequential."

    "Why do we keep trying to re-invent the wheel?  Back to the basics!  Put the child first!"

    "What should be the goal of local school boards?  FREEDOM!  Freedom for teachers to teach!  Freedom for students to learn!  Freedom for the free market to supply educational excellence rather than the government and union and school board conspiring to impose mediocrity (at best) for all!"

    "If you choose to run for the school board, expect the following: (1) every aspect of your life immediately becomes fair game for dirty tricks; (2) every belief you have which does not tow the leftist agenda of teachers unions and government social engineers will be ridiculed, snarked at, and made to seem extreme; (3) if your campaign manages to get traction, they will use every possible method to disqualify you, including going through your trash can to get financial records of your personal correspondence; (4) contributors to your campaign will be harassed, threatened with boycotts, followed, or photographed; and (5) you will receive contributions from seemingly innocuous people who turn out to be abortionists, pedophiles, or worse and that information will be revealed at the 11th hour when you can't explain it away...Do you have the time or stomach to just run to be Don Quixote?  To anchor the debate and force important issues to be put on the table?  Maybe.  But you better give it very long consideration...You love your Lord.  Everybody knows that.  Your Christian faith is marginalized and ridiculed by our government schools.  You are banned...while Muslim worship is extolled, dressing in a burkha is allowed...You better think this over..."

    "One thing that really bothers me is the ease with which 'good Christian' folks can say the Apostles' Creed on Sunday and teach and support the teaching of evolution in public schools...The mere suggestion of Intelligent Design opens a school district to ridicule.  But, then, whoever said the saints were called to be low profile, keeping their heads down?"

    "At my last school district, the school board members who were not working ate lunch frequently in the school cafeterias.  Now that was interesting and a positive thing for administration!  Those who serve on school boards should make themselves more available than just attending sports events and plays.  Typically, there is such animosity between school boards and teachers that it is not healthy for anyone.  In my humble opinion, the school superintendent should have as one of his goals the task of communication between the school board and the teachers and administrators."

    "If you have teachers and administrators who don't want to be in our district and school board members who only care about their own kids, you get a disaster like ours."

    "The first thing is they need to be on the same team and of the same mind and thought moving in the same direction with their mind set on the most important issues to their families and their children and their teachers...Leaders need to know how to bring the whole team together and get the ball across the finish line...A good leader will be humble and still be bold and directed with good wisdom...Never bite off more than you can chew...Remember, people do not care what you know.  They want to know how you care.  When they know you care, they will listen to what you know...Tell the truth."

    The preceding are representative - usque ad nauseam.

@#$%


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    Parallels.

    1.

    I'd often quote Barth on the first day of class whether teaching first year seminarians or doctoral candidates: "It's not a matter of whether one wants to preach.  It's a matter of whether one can preach."  Then I would say the success of the course would be determined by personally discovering if it was best to go to the next level or down the hall to another discipline.  I also learned anyone, including myself, who wants to preach too much should be disqualified immediately for they lack the respect to dread of the responsibility entrusted to them (see two quotes at the top).

    Anyone who wants to be on the school board too much may have a singular axe to grind, selfish ambition to accomplish, or unseemly ego need.

    Anyone who is called to be on the school board will be compelled yet cautious about the whole being equal to the sum of its parts.

    2.

    I was called to be the pastor of one of my particular denomination's largest churches not long after turning 30.  It was a mistake.  I was not emotionally or spiritually prepared for it.  Or as the ecclesiastical gatekeeper who knew he could not dissuade the selecting committee or me from the inevitable mistake shared with me in the unsuccessful attempt to get me to reconsider: "This would be like my 25 year old daughter coming to me with excitement about having found her perfect match for life while saying the boy being 12 could be a problem."

    Though it is an essential character trait for any kind of leadership, caring is not enough to be anything for anyone.

    Caring + competence = effective leadership.

    3.

    I've learned the opposite of love is not hate.  It is selfishness - the indifference to the needs of others because personal wants trump the needs of others.

    When working/serving on any board, organization, corporation, or whatever, only being concerned about yourself and your own favorite people is doomed by dishonored wisdom: "Pride goes before the fall.  God lifts up the humble and brings down the proud."

    Representatives.

    Read those top two quotes by Jesus and Buechner again and again and again and...

@#$%


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    Yeah, I've been asked to run for the school board.

    I've declined emphatically for reasons related to the above and other reasons that, obviously, too many involved in District 100's leadership don't want to get anyway.

    Frankly, and this is gonna be a very salty sprinkling for a very open wound, the leadership of District 100 needs more...

    It's/He's the answer to every question.

    If I have to provide the declarative for that interrogative, we're in more trouble than thought.

    In the meantime, it's O.K. to shoot the messenger.

    I'm used to it/them - vocational hazard.

    It's a natural defensive instinct.

    I don't mind.

    I care more about the responsibilities attached to the adult baptismal promises regarding the children entrusted to us.

    I care more about their future than the feelings of adults who...

    One more word that could really turn all of this around quickly: "If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

    That would signal the maturity that would ignite the probability to recapture the heritage that would...

    Read Revelation 2:5.

@#$%


Blessings and Love!

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

175th


Kopp Disclosure
(John 3:19-21)

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)

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    Do you remember the preacher's little boy from the last KD?

    If not, go to the right column and click on Clerical Error.

    Anyway, that same little boy asked daddy, "How do you write sermons?"

    Answer: "I work on the first half throughout the week and God works on the second half while I'm preaching."

    Little boy to preacher-daddy: "You're much better at writing sermons than God."

@#$%

    I'm reminded of a recent conversation with a peer who said, "My sermons have been really tough lately.  Maybe it's time for a fluff sermon."

    Parenthetically, a fluff sermon is saying nothing but saying it eloquently like you know who. 

    Lots of people like fluff sermons because, well, uh, it doesn't, you know, afflict the comfortable while comforting the afflicted: "I have no idea what he said but he said it so well and I feel sooooooo good about myself because he didn't say I needed to..."

    A friend and mentor says fluff sermons are the antithesis of Isaiah 30:8-11; being no heaven good to anyone while being pretty damn bad for everyone.

    2 Timothy 4 also comes to mind.

    As my friend talked, I thought of Kurt Vonnegut's conclusion to his "sermon" on Palm Sunday 1980 at NYC's St. Clement's Episcopal Church: "This has no doubt been a silly sermon.  I am sure you do not mind.  People don't come for preachments, of course, but to daydream about God.  I thank you for your sweetly faked attention."

    Whoa.

    Anyway, I urged my friend to forget the fluff by contradiction from conviction: "I'll never forget sitting in a preaching class back in 1974.  The class was right after our daily chapel service.  Dr. Macleod, before saying anything else, started, 'When you have the privilege of preaching in Miller Chapel, please have something to say or don't waste everybody's time.'  Uh, I had just preached in chapel a few minutes earlier.  I never forgot that.  I haven't been able to preach a fluff sermon ever since."

    Of course, I've got another chance on Sunday (3/16) when we celebrate the 175th anniversary of Belvidere, Illinois' First Presbyterian Church!

    3 pointless points and a poem.

    Nah.

    Can't do it.

    He didn't make me that way.

    Wish he had.

    Maybe I wouldn't be carrying any debt.

    :)

    So I'm gonna do what B.J. urged me to do when we left seminary, "Give 'em the gospel!"

    Hint.

    What do Exodus 20, Philippians 3, Revelation 1, Miley Cyrus, and Justin Bieber have in common with our 175th?

    Ouch.

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    If you can't make it, you can listen live to the second service at 10:00 a.m. by clicking on www.bnnsradio.com at, uh, 10:00 a.m.

    You can also watch for next week's edition of The Boone County Journal (www.boonecountyjournal.com) for a superbly written column by Lisa Rodgers about our history.  She allowed me to review it before submitting it for publication.  It's/she's, again, superb!

    Or better yet, make some history for Him!

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Blessings and Love!