my Bible Study class

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

About a month ago, our church suspended Sunday School classes for the summer.

A few people in our class, which goes in-depth through a book of the Bible, wanted to continue
through the summer.  (Though one lady's reasoning for it amazed me; it wouldn't be burdensome
to continue Bible study, she said, since you really don't have to spend time reading or studying in
preparation.)

Over the past few weeks, the class has gotten smaller and smaller.  Yesterday it was the teacher,
my wife, and myself.  The teacher told us he was going to be traveling for the next four weeks.
We had a short prayer together, and left.

I don't say it in censure.  There are always people who show up sporadically.  They miss the
blessing (and the purpose) of following straight through, in order, what God says: but it's certainly
better to hear some, than none, of what He says.

Other individuals who are usually in class, and voted to continue it through the summer, have
other understandable reasons they may be absent one week or another.  We live in a rural area,
and the week of the county fair is always one of intense activity for the 4-H members and leaders
in the congregation.  Another friend had family visiting from out of state last weekend.

One couple has young kids; and with no Sunday School class for the kids, it's hard for them to
attend.  (Though to their credit, they have managed to come most Sundays since the church went
to its summer schedule.)  Other people, I'm sure, have other good reasons they may be absent.
It's not my intent to evaluate their reasons.

But at some level and some point, a Bible study can only exist when people desire to hear God's
word and discuss it.  At some point, people must consider that what God says is more important
than anything else in their life.  At some point, we have to believe the Bible is not optional in our
schedule and our priorities.

I'd like to be in a Bible study with people like that.

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

False "Leaders," Falsified Scripture, False Prayer

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Last week, Franklin Graham and 300 other “Christian leaders” declared
a national day of prayer for the current president.  They cited the scriptural
command in I Timothy 2:1-4:

“First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and
thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who
are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all
godliness and dignity. This is good and acceptable in the sight of
God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to
the knowledge of the truth.”

This command to pray is especially relevant regards the current president.
There’s never been a president that we more need to pray will use his God-
given authority to give us “…a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.”

And there’s never been a president that we more need to pray will “…come to
the knowledge of the truth.”

But Franklin Graham didn't urge his followers to pray those scriptural prayers.
His facebook page instead urged Christians to pray for the current president
because “[his] enemies continue to try everything to destroy him, his family,
and the presidency. In the history of our country, no president has been attacked
as he has.”

Undoubtedly the current president made thousands of “enemies” in his life-long
business career…bitter former business-partners, victims of his Trump University
scam, banks who lost billions of dollars on his defaulted loans, unpaid contractors
on his building projects.

But Franklin Graham and the other "Christian leaders" are obviously referencing
the current president’s political “enemies,” and urging Christians to pray God will
uphold the current president against them.

Everyone should read the scripture Franklin Graham cites, and see if it commands
Christians to pray what Graham says we should pray.  Everyone should read to the
end of that passage, where it says our prayers for our rulers should be "without wrath
and dissension” (v. 8)...and decide if praying against the current president's political
"enemies" is in line with scripture's command of prayer in which is no dissension . . . 
one of the "deeds of the flesh" listed in Galatians 5:20, right next to "factions."

In the meantime, all Christians who love God's word, and love the Body of Christ,
should pray fervently that Christians will not be deceived by “leaders” who falsify
scripture to mislead God’s people to destruction.

Amen.

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Fools

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Honest . . . no, let's say real . . . Christians believe the Bible’s word is definitive: that what scripture says a thing is, it absolutely IS.

And scripture says “wisdom” and “foolishness” are moral qualities. In the Bible’s definition, a fool is a person too stupid to understand what is RIGHT: or someone who understands what’s right, but is so stupid they choose to do wrong.

One honest believer of what scripture says to another, the current president is a fool. Take it as mere political rhetoric if you wish: but it's true to scripture's definition.

He’s been a fool since he came on the scene. And since that day, he’s attacked anyone who ever tried to dissuade him from any of his foolish whims. Because, he’s told us many times, he’s a genius, and knows better what’s right for our country than anyone else.

We might be forgiven for thinking a congenital liar doesn’t really believe his own lies.  But the current president shows us every day he really DOES believe that he, and he alone, always knows the right thing to do.

The current president's proud foolishness has greatly destroyed, and is destroying, and left unchecked will further destroy our nation.

But his greatest foolishness is that he doesn’t understand what scripture says is God’s judgement on liars, on fools, and against the self-proud...or is too stupid to care.

Those of us who know and believe scripture might hope that someone would tell the current president he desperately needs to repent: for Jesus' power is sufficient to save even the worst fool-of-sin. Perhaps his great supporter Franklin Graham has attempted to tell him so ? Or has this president somewhere heard the message that Jesus Alone is the Way…and characteristically chosen his OWN way ?

What wisdom then are deluded “Christians” showing, who agree with this president that his way is only and always the right way ?

One believer of scripture's word to another, they are fools.

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Good Judges

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Choosing judges is a continuing controversy in our society.  It shouldn't be for Christians.

God says what judges should be.  He is, after all, The Judge of all things.  How can the right
kind of judge be anything except the kind of Judge God Himself is ?

It works the same as His command to the "kings of men."  The High King of All commands that
human "authorities" rule the same way He does, using the authority He gives them to do good
to those under their authority, and punish evil-doers.  They are, He tells them, and He repeats,
"ministers of God."  Their Master commands all the "kings of men" to act as He does.

It's the same charge Moses told the people he'd given their judges:

"...I charged your judges at that time, saying, ‘Hear the cases between your fellow
countrymen, and judge righteously between a man and his fellow countryman, or
the alien who is with him.  You shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear
the small and the great alike. You shall not fear man, for the judgment is God’s." 
(Deuteronomy 1: 16,17)

The right kind of judge is one who judges the way God judges.  And God tells us how He judges:

"...the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and
awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause
of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving
them food and clothing."  (Deuteronomy 10:17,18).

Everyone can make up their own mind if the people currently ruling our nation have ruled, or show
any intent to rule, the way God rules.  My focus here is the kind of judges they have set over us,
and continually tell us are the right kind of judges for us.

The current rulers have told us "conservative" judges are the right kind of judges: judges, that is,
in their own political image.  Being "conservative" is pretty much their whole criteria and definition
of a good judge.

The Senate hearings for Brett Kavanaugh's appointment to the Supreme Court showed that better
than anything we've ever seen.  Those hearings are supposed to show us if the judicial principles and
"judicial temperament" of a nominee make him or her a good choice for our nation's highest court.

We instead heard Kavanaugh rant against "liberals" who questioned his record and his character: 
especially "liberal" senators whose Constitutional job that was.  But the "conservative" faction which
dominates the Senate deemed Kavanaugh's outrageous partisan anger eminently qualified him for
the highest court in our land.

Kavanaugh will be a good judge, "conservative" Senators certified by their vote, eminently qualified
to make good, true, and just decisions for every person and question that comes before him...even
those his blatant partisanship might deem "liberal" ones.


Right.

But it all comes back to what kind of judge God is: for that is God's standard of a good judge.

It's too obvious to be worth comment that, in both passages of scripture above, God highlights a
good judge's fairness to "the alien" and "the foreigner" among us.  It's hardly necessary to contrast
God's standard with the "conservative" standard: or with "conservatives" current political correctness"
that increasingly defines "good" and "right" as whatever the current president says.

The other quality of a good judge that God highlights in both passages...because it is His Own quality
as Judge...is impartiality.

We've seen, we've all inescapably seen in the travesty of the Kavanaugh hearing, the deep contempt of
"conservatives" for God's command a judge be impartial and truth-full . . . as He Himself is.  Yet somehow
that fundamental perversion of God's command has not dissuaded a large number of "Christians" from
identifying with, and joining with, "conservatives" . . . and adopting their criteria of a good judge.

Even Moses' father-in-law, a pagan priest, advised him to select "...able men who fear God, men of truth,
those who hate dishonest gain; and...let them judge the people at all times..." (Exodus 18:21,22).  And it's

doubtful, in our own time, that even the most militant atheist would propose that a good judge should be
biased, unfair, and dishonest.

But that's a strong belief of many "Christians" in this day.  And the current president successfully appealed
to that belief, and those "Christians," by promising to "appoint conservative judges" (not "good judges" . . .
a criteria for which the current president has little capacity, or respect).  Indeed, such "Christians" always
cite his manic appointment of "conservative" judges as proof of the current president's truthfulness !!  As
if promising to do wrong, and doing wrong, is virtue.

Again...always...God's word to today's American Church is "Repent !!  Repent deeply, and immediately !!"

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Christ The Lord Is Risen Today

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

In his book book Building Social Capital, Muhammad Yunus tells the story of how he got the idea for the
first grameen bank.

After a privileged upbringing in what was then East Pakistan, Yunus was the head of the Economics
department at Chittagong University.  But the nation's economy had crumbled after East Pakistan won
its war for independence, only to be hit by catastrophic flooding.  Famine followed, and starving people
from the countryside flocked to cities to find jobs they hoped would help their families survive.

"I found it increasingly difficult to teach elegant theories of economics in the classroom while a terrible
famine was raging outside," Yunus wrote.  ". . . I felt the emptiness of traditional economic concepts in
the face of crushing hunger and poverty.  I realized I had to be with the distressed people of Jobra, the
neighboring village just outside of Chittagong University, and somehow find something to do for them..."
(p viii)

Talking to the residents of the Jobra shanties, Yunus found them still on the brink of starvation, although
they had found work and were working hard, working long hours.  The problem was that they were all
falling deeper into poverty, because they had to buy tools and materials to produce the bamboo furniture
and woven cloth they sold.

They had been forced to apply to predatory money-lenders who charged exorbitant interest on their loans.
The money-lenders also required borrowers to sell their products only to them . . . and the lenders always
drastically under-priced the people's products.  Borrowers' families had been forced to work, to try to keep
up with their increasing debt to the money-lender...from whom they had to borrow more money for more tools
and materials.

Yunus found entire families working all day long, every day, hopelessly trying to pay their still-increasing debt
to the money-lender.  One woman's family had fallen into economic slavery for an initial loan equivalent to
seven American cents.  When he totaled the debt of the 42 people he had interviewed, Yunus found their
cumulative debt to money-lenders amounted to $27 U.S.

Yunus told his poor friends he would help them get a loan from a bank.  The banks would charge a much more
reasonable interest-rate, he said: and with their continued hard work, they would soon be out of debt, and able
to sell their products at fair market-prices.

But Yunus was wrong.  When he took his poor friends to the banks, none would lend them a cent.  Even when
he, an esteemed academic in the local university, offered to personally guarantee the loan, no bank considered
his friends "credit-worthy" for even the very small sums that would free them from poverty.

"The more time you spend among poor people," Younus later wrote, "the more you become convinced that
poverty is not the result of any incapacity on the part of the poor.  Poverty is not created by poor people.  It is
created by the system we have built, the institutions we have designed, and the concepts we have formulated."
(p. xii)

Yunus finally paid his friends' debts from his own pocket.  And from that experience he began to formulate the
idea for grameen (Bangladeshi for "village") banks, by which the poor could help each other escape from poverty.

The idea for grameen banks has now spread throughout the world, saved millions from economic slavery, and
created millions of jobs.  Yunus and his idea have even been honored with the Nobel Peace Prize.

But reading this story as we prepared to celebrate Christ' resurrection, I was forcibly struck by the thought that
Jesus is the hero of the story.

I doubt Yunus is a Christian.  I don't know if anyone who benefitted from his idea is a Christian.  Doesn't matter.
The idea of grameen banks saved people from poverty and hopelessness: and ideas are spiritual events.  Don't
we really still think in the terms Romans did when they created the word "inspire"...that "into" man's thoughts a
"spirit" is breathed?

What spirit is it that inspires a man to free people enslaved by unrighteousness ?  What spirit inspires a man to
help the poor escape poverty and hopelessness ?  The only spirit like that which exists is the Spirit of Christ.

I don't know if Muhammad Yunus realizes his idea embodies Christ's Spirit.  I'm pretty sure some of my fellow
American Christians, who theoretically believe that Christ rules even in (what they call) the "secular" world, would
also be unable to see that He is the "Hero" of this story.  And there are some American Christians are so enslaved
to the enemy's false political ideas that they would even reject the Spirit's inspiration as "socialism."

Doesn't matter.  For those who have eyes to see, "Christ the Lord is risen today."  In this very day, Jesus is still
alive.  The same as He did 2000 years ago, He continually shows up in places, and ways, and people, where we
would never expect Him.

Hallelujah !!

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Eyes to See

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

In some translations, Jesus often follows His teachings and His miracles with an admonition to "whoever has eyes to see, let him see."  He chides even His disciples in Mark 18:8 that they "...have eyes but fail to see..."

Jesus wants His followers to see.  Some of his followers think that only happens in church, in "Christian" activities, or watching "Christian" movies and listening to "Christian" radio-stations

I've never bought that.  Tribal culturalism is not following Jesus.

I watched Masterpiece Theater’s “Les Miserables” last night.

I've never read the book, and never seen the musical.  I was curious what the story is about.  I was blown away.

For those with eyes to see, it’s a story about repentance, forgiveness, and God’s grace.

The thought occurred that for those with eyes to see, every story is.

For those with eyes to see, that’s what it means that Jesus is Lord.

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/les-miserables-e1/