“It is the way of the world to praise dead saints and to
persecute living ones.”—Nathaniel Howe, found in Uncle John’s in an article
about St Nicholas, about whom we know next to nothing.
A poem about government:
“Government is a Soft Pig.”
Tola son of Puah son of Dodo saved Israel for 23 years
Then Israel, pushing for a more exotic diet, served the gods
of their enemies.
They served cold drinks to Baal and Ashtoreth, which were
left to get lukewarm—like the cold milk left to Santa…"cookies" anyone?
So The LORD sold the servers to Fill-istines
“who that year shattered and crushed them.”
Is it good to be “shattered and crushed”? Apparently.
May be essential for saint formation? Well another reason not to buck
for sainthood, at least not the canon-ized kind…
If I take other people’s gods, I am merely becoming a
servant of these other people; all the more so if their gods are not gods at
all. And do I think in spite of a temporary convenience, that these folks will
be kind to me?
Not at all—I would be treated like Jepthah, not as a native son, but as the son Gilead and a
prostitute, and driven into the ground. “Never
good enough.” So, if you serve other
gods that are only idols, whether mute or made to talk by CGI –well, you only get what your pay for, and as Christ
said,
“They have their reward already.” Or
as Dr Tom Williams used to say:
“You pays yore money and you takes yore chances.”
Of course that depends on the belief in another idol set:
the married couple of Lady Luck, and Chauncey Chance, the patron saints of
gamblers and thieves.
“Anger over sin is one of God’s inherent attributes. It is
an expression of his goodness and his love for what is true and right.” --Donald Stamps
Or as the Black Eyed Peas sing: “you can’t know love if you
don’t know truth.”
(butbutbut… beware of
the man who gets his truth from himself, his colleagues, and his “polis.”---“My
truth, your truth, urban(e) truth. Idols cannot tell the truth because they aren’t
persons at all—at best they are arcane, unnatural abstractions born of human
iron willfulness—people today do not worship idols of stone but worship mere
undifferentiated information and odd ideas
that seem new but are as old as dirt and dressed up in “wedding clothes,” as
the sinful will themselves to believe; at
a huge personal cost which they cannot begin to afford.
The rich nearly always will to do so, regardless of their
party of convenience—because they have the unfortunate( horrible, really)
illusion that, “My will will be done.”
Another not so stray thought; my “idol” was once Jim
Morrison, who famously sang, “They’ve got the guns/ we’ve got the numbers/
gonna win yeah/ we’re takin’ over.” Ah
yes, a prophet indeed!!!
But what happens when we have the guns AND the numbers? What
then? I note that “900 iron chariots,”
and Midianites as numerous as locusts were not enough; and only Israel is left…
“But you have forsaken Me (Judges 10) and served other gods.
So I will no longer save you. Go and cry out to them whom you have chosen.”
But the recurrent forgiveness of Israel is the only reason that Israel and
the Jews are still distinct entities; proof indeed, for those who assume that
God exists, that God hates sin, as He must, but loves the sinner; both Jew and
Gentile. It also shows that God will not
do other than uphold what He is and does, which is Love and Truth, “conmingled
down.” (“When I Survey the Wondrous Cross.”)
No comments:
Post a Comment