Recently I watched a handful of adults maneuver to exclude a colleague
from their focus group. Their tactics included moving a name plate to another
location, tightening their circle of chairs so there was no room for anyone to
join and turning their backs toward the one they wanted to ostracize. The
writer of Hebrews reminds us that we too can be guilty of not maturing. “In fact, though by this time you ought to
be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word
all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who
lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about
righteousness.”
(Hebrews 5:12-13 NIV)
2 comments:
It is really sad when you see this at an evangelism conference.
Grace and peace.
Gail;
-----These guys were quite crafty, but obviously not stealthy. I can imagine a few situations where we wouldn’t want someone in our group and should really not have to have them, either. We can get emotionally strung out on certain aspects of love which will tie up the mind with frivolous and trivial meanings and principles to the point that the fundamental and critical ones get lost. For example, the Presbyterian hierarchy is sure the time has come for gays not only to join our focus groups (churches) but to lead them as ministers and elders. Uh!! Closer to home in many, many more hearts, women elders and preachers are becoming common in spite of Scriptures setting up barricades and warning signs against it and yelling cautious words of wisdom concerning it. I heard a teacher in Sunday School surmise that Hell is not a place or even a separate existence, it is only a state of being in heaven wherein there will be no contact with others. Oh! Goody, goody gumdrops! God’s wrath is like time-out, man! Affection and empathetic compassion are frivolities and trivialities underlying God’s wrath working the destruction of evil for the perfection of good. It’s kind of a rule of thumb I like to remember.
-----Affection and compassion are frivolous and trivial? Really?? Yes, relatively. I try to farm affection and compassion in the soils of my heart. I know their magnitude. So I had affection and compassion for Timothy McVeigh. At his lowest level he was an individual with feelings, concerns, issues, and interests like the rest of us. I had affection and compassion for Ted Bundy, even though he murdered my good friend’s sister. But what they did called for the death penalty not just by man’s law, but also by God’s law (Gen 9:6). My affection and compassion for them did not forbid my agreement with and joint call for their execution. My affection and compassion became frivolous and trivial to cleansing the ground of their murders, but not lost and gone to that. Yes, I have compassion for gays and I sympathize with the feminine frame of mind, but God’s Word sets principles beside and around which affection, compassion, sympathy, etc. stand without obfuscation. Elsewhere, in some other issue, these frivolities become the principle and a different principle becomes a frivolity.
-----Our focus groups are vital, because the thinking and feeling passed around in them are constructive to thoughts and feelings then passed around in the world. Although we can not be possessive about the church’s thoughts and feelings, we must be scripturally guarded about them. A clear and real expression of Jesus Christ is critical for people’s inclination to even give Him a second thought. Since expression is a thing of principle and attitudes, it is important to prevent relative frivolity from mucking up the points of imperatives without relegating frivolity to unimportance.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
Post a Comment