July 20, 2012
Feet to the Fire
At a recent meeting one elected official was referring to another
elected body when he said, “I’m going to
hold their feet to the fire. They are going to have to collaborate with us on
some of the issues facing the community.” I had to laugh. First of all, he
has absolutely no authority to hold anyone’s feet to the fire and secondly, he
can’t force another group to play in his sandbox. Really, he just needs to let
it go. Too often believers fall into a similar trap. In our mission to serve
the Lord we often give ourselves more power and authority than we actually
have. Jesus reminds us that sometimes we just need to let it go. “If anyone will not welcome you or listen
to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town.”
(Matt 10:14 NIV)
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1 comment:
Gail;
-----We live in a world of misplaced authority. What would have given this official the power and authority to hold a different group’s feet to the fire, and what right should he have to do it? The simple, short answer is that the law gives the authority, which it hasn‘t given him, so he should not have the right. But is that the good answer? Jesus did tell His disciples to shake the dust from their boots on their way out of a deaf city. But the city’s rejection was in regards to personal belief in who may or may not be a gateway for their relationship to God. It was hardly about matters of public policy, like how many round-abouts does the community need, or like how much more can we tax the community to build them.
-----So power and authority has been given to groups of people throughout history, sometimes large groups and other times just a single person. Then these people have, by an overwhelmingly large rate, plundered, abused, endangered, and failed to serve the people they were empowered to govern. And nobody should hold their feet to the fire? Indeed these types count upon the people just letting it go.
-----There is one scenario in which the elected official should hold the other group’s feet to the fire. If he were truly correct about the issue at hand, then the public needs him to do this. Of course, the law does not empower him to do it. But a higher law would if the community lived within its boundaries and brought it to the table. That would be the law of love and truth. One should always stand for truth while humbly recognizing that he himself is not completely true. One should always impress the folks around him to do the same. Honoring truth is an attitude of generality which should envelop governmental laws of specifics. It is a horizon for gauging the local placement of the right foot effectively in front of the left one. It is what one of the founders of our once great nation meant when saying the Constitution was able to serve only a moral and godly people.
-----But we have failed to uphold this law of generality in our society. We have failed to hold our neighbors’ feet to the fires of truth while philosophers of subtle evils have used every opportunity to not only hold our feet over their fires, but to put our whole body on spits and slowly turn us all over it. Speaking the truth in love for several decades has been replaced as a public norm with enabling whatever self-esteem another pleases himself to have. Not only has the public voice of truth been gagged, but the public in general has been encouraged to ingest Quietess against any ring of truth remaining.
-----The power and authority to hold other’s feet to fires is in the truth as revealed by God. Its effects are subtle but real. Fourteen more people were sent home to the God of truth last night, and fifty others to hospitals, by a mind raised in a culture of “let it go.“ And as one ABC journalist pointed out, this happened only nineteen miles down the road from Columbine. The law of truth may not be as specific as are the laws of government. But I assure you, it is more real. It is time we who know and love the truth begin holding the public’s feet to its fire.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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