"It is no secret...

...what God can do/ what He’s done for others/He’ll do for you.”

Did it over occur to any of us that:

IF YOU TURN THE OTHER CHEEK, YOU HAVE TO LOOK IN A DIFFERENT DIRECTION?

 

Now, while that’s sinking in, I have learned a great deal in the last few days.

There is no secret thing that will not be “published from the housetops.” --according to the only person Who would know. 

Next, it has been my suspicion for some time that, after 3000 page views and not much to show for it, that this blog needs to go into a different direction entirely.

Not to make it “popular,” God forbid; but to be less prideful and more conforming to Him Whom I claim is to be of Supreme Importance—because that’s the reality.

It was Jesus’ command, not suggestion, that a follower of His must not only turn the other cheek—no, there’s so much more

It has occurred to me in the middle of the night that in none of my previous  posts have I actually prayed for my readers, nor for anyone else.

“My house shall be called a House of Prayer.”

Note that while the politics of His time were even worse than ours, and  horrible cruciform injustices the rule rather than the exception, Jesus never favored one force over another.  Even when He said He came mainly for His people the Jews, He was easily intreated by a Gentile woman—several, in fact. He told the woman at the well that it was only important to worship “in Spirit and in Truth,” not whether they should go to Jerusalem or Samaria… and the “Good Samaritan” still is known in many disguises today.

So when it is pointed out that this blog has become too political,  those readers are probably right. But when I am I told I should not pray, I have only One to pray to, and it is up to the listener to decide, “Is it right to obey God, or man?”  So that’s that. (If anything it should be additional incentive to “civil disobedience,” a principle honored more in the breach of it than otherwise. )(What’s good for MLK is not for me--???)

 

Well, there I go again—this is not easy!  To us, who are so used to staking everything on our “group opinions.”  God, help me to:

“When life gives you opposition, make opposition-aid!”

When Jesus says to do good to those who oppose Him and His Father, He does not mean the lesser good of material “goods” unless the person is desperately needy and poor and has not enough of this world’s materials for life.  But for those who are well off, He means to give not things, but prayer. The Indisputably Greater Good, which is the trigger to the type of Love He means.

I think it safe to say that all of us who might read this already have too much of this world’s treasures-and most of us are sensible enough to know that we need to divest ourselves of much of it, even unto, “Sell what you  have and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in Heaven.  Then come and follow Me.”

How unreasonable and shocking! To give away “My Precious” as Gollum called it!  Yet “he is no fool who gives away what he cannot hope to keep,” anyway.

“What I say to you, I say to all: Watch!”   “Could you not watch with Me for one hour?” 

So let me end, and start with this: I have a note on my dashboard which I use for those who do me wrong --as I think at the time, anyway--on the highway, or more often for those who just irritate me; or both (see  recent blog on man in the headlights and my near-death experience) It says:

I PRAY GOD’S ABSOLUTE BEST FOR YOU.

So let that be my prayer for all my readers, past, present, and maybe!  And God grant me grace to follow Jesus more and more, and my own inclinations and negative feelings and critical spirits less and less, preferably not at all.

 

My thanks to those who have given me a wake up call about my  getting off the plane of Jesus and onto   the shaky ground of my own turtle-soapbox. I don’t think turning my tiny temple of the Holy Ghost into a “house of prayer” will be attractive to many, who find prayer either repulsive or annoying, but it extends the blog effect, I might say, well beyond the blogosphere.  Only what is received in Heaven—and most of it will still be in secret I hope and as Jesus also directs us into our prayer closet—is going to be of any importance in the long run.  After all, if the Holy Spirit does not change hearts, they will not be changed no matter what I say or do—because it was always between them-and-THEM, anyway.