Author Topic: Cash back?  (Read 3088 times)

David Buchanan

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 2
    • View Profile
Cash back?
« on: December 04, 2006, 02:34:08 PM »
I made it! Hello all.

I'm sending my Christmas cards out. As always, I buy 'em blank and write my own. Here's this years.

His blessings,

david


There is something comforting and right about perseverance. Few in this world possess it. Fewer, still, practice it. The wonderful thing about love is its ability to blind us... to bind us... to overlook the red-flags, the warnings, the faults, the sin in another. Our Father's inability to look at us as sinful creatures is more likened to those hearing the squeal of tires and turning away, with the knowledge of an ensuing crash. Love enables Him to pick us up after the impact, knowing we will fall back into the same rut and crash again.
 
 
"The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Often attributed to Samuel Johnson during the 16th century; though he did write, "Hell is paved with good intentions." Many repeat this adage with biblical flair, but it steers us contrary to the direction Jesus displayed during His walk on earth. Our walk on this plane should be one following those footsteps. Yet, we live our lives in relation to the situations we are faced; following a compass of situational ethics. Job's wife commented of his afflictions. "His wife said to him, "Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and die!" He replied, "You are talking like a foolish woman [The Hebrew word rendered foolish denotes moral deficiency]. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" In all this, Job did not sin in what he said." (Job 2:9-10). Job's wife can be viewed as a harsh, Godless woman, but one should consider Job's choice in a mate. In doing so, the implication may be that she was viewing the suffering of one she loved, and wanted an end to it. "The situation looks grim, Job. Curse God. I know that in doing so, He will surly hasten your death... ending your suffering." The end would be cessation of pain, and waking up in Paradise. Job would have to do contrary to what he believed (cursing God), but he would no longer be suffering; a classic case of "the end justifying the means". But he stayed the course, doing what he believed... even at the cost of continued suffering. His heart, and intentions, spoke louder than the situation. God visited His children, sending His Son, because they had become adept at situational ethics, of bending the Law and moving around it by not following its spirit. "If your Christianity has not cost you anything, you might want to check your membership card." The walk to Him is counter to the current of this world... and the life lived in it. God views into our hearts, knowing our intent. It is WHY we do a thing that matters. Those are deemed "good intentions", and contrary to the axiom, that road leads heavenward towards salvation.
 
Why is it that Jesus spoke of one new commandment replacing all of the Ten (i.e. "The Golden Rule")?
 
Whatever you wish that men would do to you, do so to them. Matthew 7.12
 
"Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" Jesus said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets." Matthew 22.36-40
 
Do what is right, always... and the rest will work out in accordance to that intent. Always follow your conscience, which is guided by the principles given and lived by Jesus.
 
What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father's glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done. " Matthew 16:26-27
 
And my favorite in terms of "walking-the-walk" (i.e. the cost of following : the membership card):
 
Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. Matthew 16:24-25
 
What's in your wallet?
 
David