October 04, 2012

Whose Teaching

In the area of teaching and leading not all men and women are created equal and class attendance sometimes depends on whether or not our favorite teacher is teaching that week. I found it interesting that some of the Old Testament prophets prophesied during the same period of time, but they didn’t prophesy in the same place or to the same audience. It was probably a really good scheduling decision on God’s part. Can’t you see some folks skipping a prophetic message just because they were waiting to hear the message delivered by their favorite prophet?

1 comment:

Steve Corey said...

Gail;

-----Remember Junior High? It wasn’t like there were popularity tiers because everyone, or even a few more influential ones sat down and designed how adolescent social life was going to work. It worked that way because that is how adolescent psychology works. The funny thing is, if you were to list the reasons So-and-So was popular, they would be pretty much the same reasons as why you liked your best friend. But the real circumstances which made them popular were known by very few.
-----Frankly, though, Elijah and Isaiah and Jeremiah and their likes weren’t very popular. Their attitudes tended against the altars and poles and idols of the people. Their preaching was against the price-tag justice which often develops in a prosperous setting, and against the partying and carousing those who could not afford the price of justice used for diversions from their toils. Jeremiah died in Egypt preaching to those who went there against God’s command. Isaiah was sawn in half, they say. No wonder God caught Elijah up before his demise! The prophets who were actually popular to were the ones who told them the very things which propagated their excesses.
-----This is so human in nature. Even though the prophets had critical information for the people, the people are more into what entertains them. Look at who our culture’s prophets are today: Barbara Striesand, Dustin Hoffman, Ellen Degeneres, Jesse Jackson, etc. I don’t say these are bad people, yet they certainly do not pick up the Word of God and read it for what it says. But they are very entertaining with a knack for presenting the boring in an interesting manner. I envy their skills, especially since the things I most like to think about bores the socks off nearly everyone else.
-----Eventually the dust was kicked to the clouds of the sky by a furious horde from the East. Jerusalem burned, the Temple was plundered, and the king’s eyes were put out after beholding his sons being slain. For seventy years tears were shed at the banks of the Euphrates by the lucky. Otherwise you died pitifully in Egypt or fled off to some other God forsaken place where travelers were treated like criminals. But the next generation returned to Jerusalem with changed hearts. It was they who held Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and such in high regard. Could our culture get so fortunate as to return from the banks of a left-wing, radical, “Euphrates” with a new admiration for John Locke, George Washington, C.S. Lewis, A.W. Tozier and the likes of them? I hope. Vote Republican November 6, not that Republicans are good, but because Republicans are not the dust kicking horde who have sacked this once great culture. It will be our last chance to stop the plundering. Then if November 6 throws out the marauders, think truth and learn love. By only these the Republicans will either straighten up or be thrown out next, returning real prosperity, joy, and dignity for us all, rich and poor, black and white, right and left.

Love you all,
Steve Corey