Flight Paths

We are continuing our progress through the psalms and came across the phrase “for thy name’s sake” in number 79:  Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name; deliver us and forgive our sins for thy name’s sake. 

            The whole psalm bases its appeal on the fact that God is the one being scorned when His people are defeated by the nations.  The psalmist certainly had it right—those people who had slipped so far into idolatry and all its vile and attendant practices could not possibly think that God would save them based upon how faithful and righteous they had been.  The only possibility of salvation was to throw themselves on the mercies of their God, to remind Him that it was a personal affront to Him when His people were conquered. 

            The nations have come into your inheritance…your holy temple they have defiled…the dead bodies of your servants have they given to the birds of the heavens for food…render sevenfold into the laps of our neighbors the taunts wherewith they have taunted you.  And in keeping with that, the psalmist then asks for forgiveness, not for the people’s sake, but for God’s name’s sake.

            I looked up that phrase and found it several more times in the collection.  What was God asked to do “for His name’s sake?”  Pardon sins, 25:11; lead in paths of righteousness, 23:3; preserve life, 143:11; lead and guide, 31:3; deal on my behalf and deliver, 109:21.  Herein lies a lesson we need—all these things, including pardon and deliverance, God does, not because we deserve them, but because of Who He is.  We have nothing to bargain with any more than those fickle people of old.  We, too, have sinned against a loving Father, often in a rebellious and disrespectful way.  We may not bow down to an idol, but we love the world as much as they did, follow its example as if we fear to be different from it, and let it seep into our minds to the point we no longer even recognize sin.

            I hear too many brethren in the midst of a trial ask God, “Why, when I have tried so hard to be faithful for so long?”  We just don’t get it.  One sin will damn a soul.  It forever makes us unworthy to be in the presence of God.  It breaks our covenant with Him as surely as a broken contract today.   God is Holy, He is righteous, He cannot tolerate sin.  But lucky for us, God is love, too, and because of Who He is, we have hope.

            When the trials come, when the fear mounts and the sorrow overwhelms, this is what we say to Him:  We know we do not deserve it.  We know you are far above us and our frail existence.  Please show the world your essence.  Please help us and comfort us and deliver us, not for our sakes, but for your name’s sake.  Otherwise we don’t have a leg to stand on, and we know it.

"I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins. Isaiah 43:25

"For my name's sake I defer my anger, for the sake of my praise I restrain it for you, that I may not cut you off. Isaiah 48:9

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ--by grace you have been saved-- and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Ephesians 2:4-7.


Dene Ward

Hide not your face from me in the day of my distress: Incline your ear unto me; In the day when I call answer me speedily. Psalm 102:2.

            I don’t know how many times I have said that to God, or at least something similar.  “Now, God. Please take care of this now!”  Yet another sentence in the same prayer was probably something like, “Please be patient with me, I’m really trying.”  Avenge me of my adversaries immediately, but don’t avenge my sins for Yourself until I have had time to repent—a self-serving double standard if there ever was one.

            God does not operate on my timetable.  He does not operate on yours.  Because He inhabits eternity (Isa 57:15) He sees and knows when the time is right.  He is not limited by living only in the present.

            Can you explain the fact that God did not send Nathan to David for about a year after his sin with Bathsheba?  Uriah was dead, David had married Bathsheba, and the child they made together had been born.  Perhaps God knew it would take that long for David to be receptive to Nathan.  Perhaps He knew that holding his small son in his hands would make David’s heart softer.  Who knows why, but that is the way God chose to do it, while in a similar circumstance the Corinthian church was commanded to withdraw from an adulterous brother the next time they met together.

            As for us, sometimes we cannot know why God allows things to happen when and as they do.  I can often see later on that things turned out better than if they had happened on my schedule instead of God’s, but nearly as often I cannot.  I am left to wonder.  The good that has been accomplished may not become evident until I am dead and gone.  I simply must trust that God knows best.

            Patience in the Bible is not about waiting quietly.  The patience of Job was noisy indeed.  Patience in the Bible is about endurance, about keeping on till the end, about being steadfast even when you don’t understand, and about trusting God’s timetable when your own makes a lot more sense to you. 

            Think of Noah who built that ark waiting for God’s promised flood for 120 years.  I wonder what his neighbors were saying after just one year, or how much they sneered after ten, much less 120.  Think about Abraham, who received a promise that was not fulfilled in his lifetime, or for a thousand years afterward.  Think about Sarah and Elizabeth, women who wanted children more than anything else, but did not receive them until old age had made it seem impossible.  For a Being who inhabits eternity, “impossible” does not apply, and time is immaterial.  Remember them and wait on the Lord.  He will save you, in His way, and in His time.

I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living!  Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the LORD!  Psalm 27:13,14

Dene Ward


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 NOTE:  There is a facebook page called "Flight Paths" where you will find quick links, as well as announcements about new books and speaking engagements, and tips for using this blog.  All you have to do is "like" the page.

            At the end of every gardening year I always end up with extra plum tomatoes and nothing to do with them.  My pantry is full of canned tomatoes, tomato sauce, and even tomato jam.  So what else is there?  Now that I have a grandson who is a manic dipper of anything he can pick up in his chubby little fingers, I had a sudden epiphany.  “Ketchup!” I said to myself.  “Make the boy some ketchup.”

            So I found an easy recipe—not a quick one by any means, but once you get past the initial chopping and measuring stage, all you do is stir once in awhile for a couple of hours. 

            I did not want to put a lot of energy into something I had never tried, so I made a small batch.  I filled a five quart Dutch oven halfway with chopped plum tomatoes, onions and peppers, sugar, vinegar, and spices, and put them on to cook.  About two and a half hours later I poured up one generous cup of ketchup.  It was definitely the best ketchup I had ever tasted, and plenty for Keith and I who take a year to go through a 32 oz bottle, but it was not going to do for a ketchup fanatic, and it certainly wasn’t worth the work.  Now that I know the recipe is good, though, I will fill two of those pots to the brim and in about the same amount of time have something a little more worthwhile.

            And that is our problem when it comes to converting the world.  We only fill one pot half full and then wonder why we got such a small return.  Then we become discouraged, or worse, decide that God’s way doesn’t work any more and then we really get into trouble, going places and doing things we have no authority for, denigrating God in the process.

            We see the 3000 baptized on Pentecost and say, what’s wrong?  Why can’t we do that?  Let’s do a little math.  Most scholars estimate the population of Jerusalem during a feast day at 1 million or more.  Three thousand out of one million is not that much.  In fact, it’s the same as 300 out of 100,000, or 30 out of 10,000 or 3 out of 1000.  That’s less than one third of one percent, or, to be silly about it, it’s a short one-third of a person for every hundred. 

            Stop being so negative.  Stop allowing sheer numbers without perspective to discourage you.  This is a Biblical principle.  The road is narrow.  Only a few will find it.  We just have to make sure that their inability to find it wasn’t our fault.  And we have to remember above all, that it isn’t God’s fault either.  It is not the fault of His methods.  It is not the fault of His plan.   We certainly cannot improve on the ways of the Almighty.  What we can do is implement them.  Fill as many pots as you have with tomatoes.  If you want a 3000 day, then cook a million.  Most of us can’t do that, but we can cook a hundred in a lifetime surely.  And if all you get is one cup of ketchup, that’s wonderful.  In fact, it’s better than Pentecost.  You did not fail by any means.  You did your part, and, even better, you did it God’s way.

For seeing that in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom knew not God, it was God's good pleasure through the foolishness of the preaching to save them that believe. Seeing that Jews ask for signs, and Greeks seek after wisdom: but we preach Christ crucified, unto Jews a stumblingblock, and unto Gentiles foolishness; but unto them that are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. 1 Corinthians 1:21-25

Dene Ward

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 NOTE:  There is a facebook page called "Flight Paths" where you will find quick links, as well as announcements about new books and speaking engagements, and tips for using this blog.  All you have to do is "like" the page.

            We have had a cat more often than not in the past twenty years.  All of them were pretty good about doing their work, as most barn cats are—it comes naturally to them to keep the rodents out of the feed sacks.  But because they are outdoor cats, they do not have quite the same affinity for human contact as house cats.  In fact, it seems that the less they have to do with us, the better they do their job.

            So when it comes time to take this sort of cat to the vet for its shots and check-ups, the process is a real adventure.  I remember once, when we put the cat in a box we had carefully aerated, drove 20 miles to the vet, opened the box and there was no cat.  We drove back home and found her sitting on the steps, licking her paws, and looking at us with a look of disdain.  “Where have you been?” she seemed to be saying with a smirk.  We still don’t know how she got out.  Her name was Jezebel.  Maybe that explains it.

            When we got Jasper we invested in a carrier.  The first time I used it, I discovered that this was still not going to be easy.  I sat on the porch and called him.  He inched his way forward and I just held out my hand until he finally relaxed and let me pet him.  After a minute or so, I picked him up and tried to put him in the crate. Immediately, all four sets of claws sprang out and grasped the edges of the opening.  It looked like a cartoon as I tried pushing him in while he hung on to the doorframe for dear life.  No way was this cat going in there willingly.

            Then I got smart, I thought, and put some food in the carrier.  Jasper smelled it immediately, and stuck his head inside.  I waited patiently as more and more of him disappeared into the box, then quickly shut the door; but somehow in that tiny space, he managed to turn around and slip out before I could get the clasp fastened. 

            By then, he was getting suspicious.  He was too leery to even come near me, so I waited a bit.  About a half hour later I grabbed a towel and laid it on the porch floor next to me.  By then, he was feeling generous again and sauntered up to me for a scratch.  After a few minutes, he lay next to me on the towel.  With a quick motion, I flipped the towel over his whole body and dumped him unceremoniously into the upended carrier,  The little bit of time it took for him to get his claws out of the towel gave me enough time to shut the door without him escaping.  Finally we went to the vet.

            Wouldn’t you know it, when we got to the vet, he wouldn’t come out of the carrier?  The vet had to dump him out.  And when she was finished with him and let him go, he scrambled back in as fast as he could.  Little stinker.

            In spite of his unwillingness to go to the vet, it kept him healthy.  The shots still worked, even though he really didn’t want them.  It doesn’t work that way with righteousness.  You can do things that look like righteousness all day long, but if you are doing them from a bad heart, they won’t do a thing for your soul.

            We seem to have a mistaken idea about the Old Law, that all they had to do were “right things,” and that their hearts did not matter.  Yet over and over you find instances where the heart most certainly did matter.  Take from among you an offering unto Jehovah; whosoever is of a willing heart, let him bring it, Ex 35:5.  That is just one example among many.

            Doesn’t it mean more to you that Lord offered himself for us willingly?  No one takes [my life] away from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. John 10:18.  How much would it mean in terms of love if he had done it because he was forced to? 

            That is how God looks at us too.  How much more does it mean to you when your child brings you a wildflower he picked in the field “just because” than when he sends that expensive arrangement on Mother’s Day, a day when the world practically forces it on him?  A buttercup on a Tuesday is far superior to a dozen roses the second Sunday in May.

            God will not force us to obey him, much less love him.  He has never accepted the letter of the law without the heart.

 

And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches all hearts and understands every plan and thought.  If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever, 1 Chron 28:9.

Dene Ward
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            We made a mistake this past summer.  We planted climbing roses at either end of a fifteen foot long trellis, and then planted morning glories along it as well.  To fill up the blank spot in the middle, we told ourselves.  But as the summer progressed those morning glory vines wound their way not only up the trellis but across to the new rose canes and completely covered them.  They shaded the leaves from the already filtered sun in that area of the yard and even hid the few blooms the roses managed to put out.

            Enough, we decided, and Keith clipped the smothering vines one morning.  They were wound so tightly, I had to wait for them to begin to wilt before I could remove them without damaging the rose vines.  Do you know what happened?  For five days those clipped and wilted vines put on new blooms and not just a few.

            Finally on the fifth day, I grabbed some heavy duty scissors and began cutting and carefully unwinding them.  After a half hour of cautious work and quite a few bloody thorn-pricks, nearly all the morning glories were lying in a pile along the bottom of the trellis and I discovered more rose vines than I ever imagined trailing along nearly the entire fifteen feet of trellis.  I gathered the morning glories in an armful and tossed them out in the brushy field.

            The next morning we came out to look at the roses.  New red leaves grew on nearly every end, with half a dozen new buds.  Finally we can breathe, they seemed to be screaming at us.  Then we walked over to the field and out there in the thick grass lay those dead morning glory vines—with brand new purple, blue, pink, and magenta blooms on them!  The next morning we saw more new morning glory blooms.  It had been a week since they were cut and they had lain in the sub-tropical summer sun without even any rain. Yet there they were, putting on new blooms still, even though their vines were wilted and brown. 

            By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he had witness borne to him that he was righteous, God bearing witness in respect of his gifts: and through it he being dead yet speaks, Heb 11:4.

            How many hundreds of names do we know from the pages of Scripture?  Though they are long dead, their examples still speak to us and help us along our path. 

           Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily besets us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Heb 12:1.

            That great cloud of witnesses continues to speak as we read about their lives, as we study them in Bible classes and hear them spoken of in sermons.  We give our children great Bible heroes to pattern their lives after, and well we should.  But what is true of them is true of us as well.

            After we are gone, our deeds will continue to speak, maybe not to as many as those in the pages of Scripture, but to everyone who knew us.  What will they see in the field after we are gone?  Will we leave nothing but a wilted vine, or will colorful blooms still dot the ground?  Will the deeds we do continue to inspire others, or will our useless lives stand as an example not to follow?  Will people talk about us with words of blessing or will others need to come along and undo the damage we left behind?

            Think about my morning glories today.  Someday your stem will be snipped, too.  What will be left behind for others to see?

Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us, Titus 2:7,8.

Dene Ward

            The torn plastic label from a 2-liter bottle, several scraps of both black and white plastic trash bags, the label from a jug of pesticide, the plastic top to a convenience store 44-oz cup, the corner of a corrugated cardboard box, a cracked, black plastic nursery pot, a Wal-Mart bag, a ramen noodle wrapper, a Hershey bar wrapper, a Tootsie Roll wrapper, a Starburst wrapper, a Rice Krispies cereal bar wrapper, a sunflower seed wrapper, six hunks of white batting from some sort of cushion, a Fritos bag, a Subway sandwich bag, a paper Wendy’s hamburger wrap, a Krispy Kreme carton, three Little Debbie oatmeal pie wrappers, an empty gallon bleach jug, a used napkin, the Styrofoam from a raw meat package, and a piece of a used disposable diaper.

            All that is what I picked up on the west side of our property one morning last week, blown over the fence from the neighbors’ since my last pick-up two weeks before.  You would think their place would look a little better after losing all that, but it didn’t even make a dent.  I have mentioned them before.  These folks must believe that life comes with a built-in maid service.  If it does, theirs needs to be fired.  Whatever it is they believe, they don’t believe they have the responsibility to clean up their own messes.

            As much as we like to think we are so much better than that, we often are not.  We may not litter the landscape with fast food wrappers and everyday rubbish, but we often leave spiritual and emotional messes in our wake.  Broken trust, tattered relationships, bitter disappointments and battered feelings can mark our paths when sin affects our lives.  A few unguarded words can hurt instead of heal.   A self-centered attitude can trample a heavy heart.  Self-righteousness, because of its exaggerated sense of absolutes and conviction in its own virtue, can mercilessly beat a weak soul into giving up the fight.

            My neighbors never seem to notice the mess they leave, the cumulative effect of dropping whatever is in hand simply because that is the convenient way to take care of it.  I am even worse when, in my headlong rush to please myself or pass judgment, I fail to take the time to stop and look behind.  The pieces of souls marking my path should wake me up.  They are far more damning than a whole dumpster full of Twinkie wrappers.

 What unto me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says Jehovah: I have had enough of the burnt-offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. When you come to appear before me, who has required this at your hand, to trample my courts? Wash yourself, make yourself clean; put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil;  learn to do well; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow… Turn to your God: keep kindness and justice, and wait for your God continually... If you had known what this means, I desire mercy, and not sacrifice, you would not have condemned the guiltless. Isa 1:11,12,16,17; Hos 12:6; Matt 12:7.

 

Dene Ward

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            We are a self-centered and selfish culture.  If you think that has not found its way into the church, you are wrong.  If you think it hasn’t found its way into your own heart, you are probably wrong again.  Have these words ever left your mouth?  “No one came to see me when I was sick/injured/in the hospital?”  There is your evidence right there.

            God meant for us to minister to others every day and in every circumstance of life.  Too often, if we see our lives as a ministry at all, we see it as periods of service broken up by periods when we cannot serve—for example, when we are ill.  In other words, when things don’t come easily, when things are not perfect, we are “on break” or “out to lunch.” 

            If anyone had an excuse for taking a break, it was Paul while he was in prison.  Yet he tells the Philippians that he was fulfilling his mission to preach the gospel, “this grace,” even while imprisoned, Phil 1:5-7.  God recently taught us this lesson of perpetual ministry in a way we will not soon forget.

            Keith had major surgery in May that kept him in the hospital five days.  In fact, it kept me in with him since I can more easily communicate with this deaf spouse of 40 years than anyone else can, and I took care of many basic nursing chores too.  

            We have always made it a point to treat service people as people, not personal slaves or furniture.  Many waitresses have told us they remember us from earlier visits precisely because of that.  We tried to do the same with the hospital medical staff.  We didn’t complain; we didn’t make demands; we took care of our own needs as often as possible, and said please and thank you when we had to ask for something.  We never really thought about that—it’s just something we do because the Lord would have us treat everyone kindly and with respect.

            One night one of the nurses took me aside and asked about our “religion.”  “There’s something different about you,” she said, and gave me an opening to talk with her about the Lord and our church family. 

            Another night one of the nurses stayed in our room talking to us far longer than she needed in order to accomplish her task.  Finally she said with a sigh, “I need to go check on the others, but I’ll be back to talk more when I can.”

            Yet another day, one of the nurses who had been with us for three days was leaving for four days off, and knew that she wouldn’t see us again.  She made a point to come say good-bye. 

            While we were there we handed out tracts and blog cards.  We wrote down church addresses and website addresses.  We gave out email addresses.  Although we had taken those things with us “just in case,” I was shocked at how many we were able to give out, at how many people wanted to talk.  We thought we needed their care, but God showed us how to give it right back.

            What is happening in your life right now?  Don’t assume that you cannot serve when you are physically indisposed.  Don’t hang an “out to lunch” sign on your life because you have too much going on right now to pay attention to anyone else.  What did Jesus do while he was hanging on the cross?  How many did he minister to?  His mother, a thief, the very men who drove the nails, and all of us as he died for our sins.

            Jesus expects us to live as he did, thinking of others’ needs first.  If you have done it long enough, it comes without thought, even in turbulent times, painful times, sorrowful times.  The trick is to do it while things are good.  Do it in the grocery store.  Do it on the freeway.  Do it at school and work and when you speak to your neighbor.  It must become natural in order to come automatically in trying circumstances.  Any difficulty you have, especially when things are easy, is a telling factor—it shows how little you have been working on it.

            Service, first, last, always--and regardless of circumstances—that is the motto of a true disciple of Christ.

I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ, Philippians 1:12-13.

To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak, Ephesians 6:18-20.

Dene Ward

In the country you deal with insects on a regular basis, especially the flying kind.  Living in the middle of cow pastures, chicken and pig farms, with road kill scattered every couple hundred feet down the rural highway, you don’t even want to think about what that fly might have last sat on as it heads straight for the cookies cooling on your countertop.

            We found a remedy for this problem many years ago when Keith preached a gospel meeting in a small Arkansas town.  It sat right in the middle of rice country where they could have sold mosquitoes by the ton if there had been a market for them.  As we ate our breakfasts in the restaurant of the motel the church had put us up in, we saw three or four small wooden ledges in various places around the room, a foot below the ceiling.  A small white box on each of them puffed every fifteen minutes.  Finally we asked one of the waitresses and she told us they were automatic insecticide sprayers, and yes, they did work.

            So when we got home we bought one.  It is rigged to spray once every thirty minutes for the twelve hours of daylight, and it works like a charm.  No more gnats hovering in clouds around the lamps or buzzing our eyes, and no more flies wandering the kitchen looking for tasty landing strips. 

            Though it is not silent, we never even hear this thing spraying any longer.  We are so used to it that it is just a part of the surroundings.  When we suddenly start seeing gnats or flies again, we know it has either run out of spray or the battery is dead.  Right now I do not remember the last time I heard it spray, but I know it must be working because I do not have any problem with bugs swarming this monitor.

            I am afraid we get the same way with God’s blessings.  Which ones do you notice?  Just the big ones, the ones that you especially prayed about yesterday or last week?  Does that mean you have not received any today at all?  Of course not; it just means that you are so used to all the daily blessings you receive that you no longer even recognize them. 

            When someone tells me to quit complaining and count my blessings, it usually makes me angry.  Maybe that is because I must shamefully admit that I have reached the point of the Pharisees, who seemed to think that they earned their blessings.  If anything bad happens, God has let me down.  I have been so good and faithful, why did this problem happen to me?  When the truth of the matter is, I have sinned too, so why not me?  In fact, why do I receive any blessings at all because I don’t deserve a single one?  I have forgotten just how bad sin is, and so I minimize it and maximize my goodness, which Isaiah tells me is no more than “filthy rags,” when compared to the holiness of God (64:6).

            Because it is so plentiful and so “automatic,” I never even notice the good that God sends my way on a daily basis, and gripe and complain because He does not send more or does not send the specific good I want the most as quickly as I want it.  If someone looked at a gift I gave him and complained because it was not the brand he wanted or he didn’t like the color, I would probably never give him anything else ever again.  Think about that for a moment.

            It may be trite, but make a list today of all the blessings you take for granted.  God sprays them around profligately and we never even notice. 

Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped,  And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return: the LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD. In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly, Job 1:20-22.

 

Dene Ward

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You know that fellow who pulled out in front of you yesterday like he didn’t see you?  Maybe he didn’t.  In Florida it is legal to drive if one eye can be corrected to 20/40 and the other 20/200, or both at 20/70.  There came a point before my last surgery when I quit driving for awhile, not because I was no longer legal, but because I no longer felt safe.  It’s one thing to value your independence enough to risk your own life; it’s another to risk someone else’s.

            There are times in my life as a Christian that I must make a similar choice.  The world may have a list of things they think a Christian should or shouldn’t do which are not actually spelled out in the scriptures.  I may have brothers and sisters in the Lord with the same mistaken ideas.  In an ideal world, we are all packaged in bubble wrap—nothing anyone else does effects us.  Unfortunately, since Adam and Eve were banned from Eden, the world is no longer ideal.

            The Lord never meant for the weak to rule the church, which is what happens when we allow every little “that offends me” to determine the actions of the church.  For some reason those people only read half of Romans 14:3:  “Let not he who eats [meats sacrificed to idols] set at nought him who does not,” while ignoring, “and let not he who does not, judge him who does, for God has received him.”  “Offend” in the older versions means “sin.”  Anyone who uses “I’m offended” to get his way must, by definition of the word agree that first, he is sinning, and second, he is a weaker brother according to that passage,   Maybe I am being cynical, but it seems to me a lot of people would complain a whole lot less if someone pointed that out to them.

            If we all simply refrained from taking part in things we are not comfortable with instead of raising a ruckus every time, the church would, in fact, come much closer to the ideal community Christ gave his life for.  Don’t you think that Simon the Zealot and Matthew the publican, two ideologically polar opposites, still had some fundamental differences even after three years of serving the Lord?  Yet they put them aside to try and save the world.  The problem is that we think our likes and dislikes are more important than the Divine mission we were given by God.

            Like those two martyred apostles, I must occasionally make the decision to give up my rights for the sake of someone’s soul.  No, I cannot worry about the busybodies who observe my life through a telescope just looking to find a flaw.  No matter how hard I try, they will eventually succeed in their task.  And no, we must not allow the mission of the church to be set aside for the stubborn few.  But the question is, what about the good and honest hearts that I personally may affect for the worst?  Driving down my chosen course may be lawful, but is it safe to those around me?  A good question to consider as we go through the day.

And when they came to Capernaum, those who received the half-shekel came to Peter and said, Doesn’t your teacher pay the half-shekel?  He said, Yes.  And when he came into the house, Jesus spoke first to him saying, What do you think, Simon?  The kings of the earth, from whom do they receive toll or tribute, from their sons or from strangers?  And when he said, From strangers, Jesus said to him, Therefore the sons are free.  But lest we cause them to stumble, go to the sea and cast a hook, and take up the fish that first comes up; and when you open his mouth you shall find a shekel.  Take that and give unto them for me and you, Luke 17:24-27.

 

Dene Ward

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