Is it dark to expose the unfruitful works of darkness?
Is it dark to expose these works to light?
This is what I believe I'm doing with my previous posts, however error-prone those
attempts might be.
Does anyone else see the fault in dismissing David Duke for his racist past and not
doing the same to Robert Byrd?
I don't know David Duke, neither do I know Robert Byrd, but I refuse to dismiss one
because he espouses conservative views while respecting the other because he espouses
liberal ones.
Either we dismiss them both for their pasts or we judge them both based on the fruit
they are bearing today. Consistency in our judgments, our fruit-picking, is a must.
Is David Duke, if Christ has shined on him, capable of repentance? Or does he have to
become a liberal like Robert Byrd before others judge him to be worthy?
If David Duke's fruit today, and this requires judgment by those around him, is still
as stinky as it was years ago when he wore a white hood, then it is our duty to expose
him. And then pray for him.
The same standard ought to apply to Robert Byrd. Does it?
I simply want to know why Mr. Duke is seen as a villain while Robert Byrd is seen as a
saint.
This I believe has much to do with the text, where everything exposed to the light
becomes visible, including the hypocrisy of those who judge under the guise of any
standard not revealed by the light of Christ.
Rick in Va
There is a contrast between the darkness and the light. And the last verse lets us know
that it is Christ who brings the light in which the believers dwell. And if we are in the
light we want to do what is good and right and true. And we want to please God; we want to
glorify God. In my tradition (Presbyterian), the catechist question is "What is the
chief end of man?" Answer: To Glorify God and enjoy him forever. When we are in God,
truly, we want to please God and it feels good to do the right thing not because people
praise us, but because that is our honest response to Christ's wonderful sacrifice to us -
his death for our life. What beautiful words these are "Sleeper, awake! Rise from the
dead, and Christ will shine on you." That is talking about sin, most certainly, but I
have done two funerals in the last five days so it is about victory over the physical
death too. Oh, Thank you, Lord!! Jennifer in Mississippi
Pastor Eddie Grigsby of Pikeville, KY (credit where it is due) used a wonderful
illustration in a sermon at Presbytery this week. Grandfather asked grand daughters what
they wanted for Christmas. They told him they wanted the world. After some discussion he
understood they wanted a globe. Being a typical grandfather he went right out and bought
one. Wrapped it in tissue paper and under the tree it went. Of course, it is pretty easy
to guess what is in this tissue paper so all during the wait the girls would gather under
the tree and discuss their wrapped gift. On Christmas morning they tore open the paper and
they were clearly disappointed. He asked why and they told him they wanted one that
glowed. Knowing they meant a lighted globe, and being the good grandfather, he set out the
next day to find a lighted globe. Store after store and no globe. Finally he found one and
brought it to the girls. When asked by his daughter what he had learned from his
experience he said, "well a globe with a light is a lot more expensive". Indeed
it is. There is often a cost to being the light Christ would have us be. gm in KY.
One of the most powerful sermons in John Wesley's 44 is the one Charles preached on
"Awake Thou That Sleepest"! In a pregnant utterance he states concerning the
"sleeper"..."and yea tho hell is moved from beneath to meet thee...and yea
tho the flames of hell burn thee, thou knowest it not". What a remarkable and
futuristic revelation that we may now experience the present tense of the verb
"burn" and yet the ingredient of hell is that we are insensitive and/or
unconscious of our condition to the degree that we do not know or feel the pain. The
present tense experience of being burned by the flames of hell and Knowing it not
certainly suggest the destructive aspects of the "unconscious" even more so than
Freud. It is not unlike Kierkegaard's perception of "despair" as that condition
of using the crteative relational capacity to choose to "disrelate" such that we
commit ourselves to an unconscious dying that does not as in real reath bring us to an end
but rather the Death State of Being/Becoming is unending and goes meaninglessly on and
on...as if we are "paralyzed force"..frozen in the unending ending...frozen in a
dying that is endless...a "Sickness Unto Death". Oh! what wonder and mystery
there is in the resurrection from the dead...the new birth in Christ where death no longer
has dominion over us! I suggest from the framework of Dodd, Bultmann, and others, that
"realized eschatology" has as much relevance for understanding hell as it does
heaven when these constructs interprete the existential/existentiell state of our daily
lives in its movemant from past to future in our process/journey of
Being/Becoming....PaideiaSCO in LA swampland.. [in appreciation for the faith vision of
Charles Wesley to deal with "hell" in a more sensible manner than almost anyone
I have read. No wonder he gave birth to the beautiful words/hymn..."I want a
principle within of watchful Godly fear, a sensibility to sin, a pain to feel it
near".]
