| View Blog
|
| American snake-gods fill wallets
|
|
|
brother warne was the elder of elders in the church where i met the Lord. well, i should say "met the Lord," because i had already done so on my own terms, which, sadly for the rich evangelists, is the way Scripture suggests it will be done at this point of history. it is sad to think, but there are still those who think that other humans are the way to God. Jesus was the only human necessary other than you, yourself. some folks need the reassurance that someone else has been there first, i suppose. God doesn't seem to mind when someone else gives the invitation. however it happens, there i was in the coolest church i knew of with the coolest people i knew of hanging out on a blanket on the floor. Christian hippies. Jesus people. a strange brew of barefoot believers who came out of the hippy culture and thought God needed coolness in His church. it was a fun time for me.
one day i was hanging with brother warne and his lovely wife lucille at our library, "The Dove's Nest." i loved his stories, and he had been alive at the beginning of the country, so he knew a lot of answers to questions that many Christians make up answers to. by-the-way, flash forward a number of decades and i have found another person who doesn't fake answers. Pastor Don is a font of info. answers, i have discovered, are there. they are slightly hidden from the eye often so God can take the responsibility for when we learn truth and what we learn.
this particular day, i asked brother warne where to "find God." i knew the standard answers. this is my Father's world. God is omnipresent. yeah, yeah. but Moses saw an actual person, or at least His back-parts. adam got to walk with God, so i wanted to know where, if anywhere, that presence presented itself in today's world. brother warne was a deliberate talker when answering questions, so he thought for a minute. then he said, "you can start by going where God's work is being done." i asked what he was talking about and he said, "go where people are being fed. go where people are being clothed. go where families are being healed." i said, "okay, so Christian food banks, Christian free stores for clothes, like that?" carefully, he said, "did i say 'Christian'?" i allowed that i added that part. he said, "sometimes Christians get sold on themselves. try a free store where they are doing it because people have needs, and not to open the door to sharing the Gospel. sometimes God is more obvious where He isn't being marketed."
in America where anywhere there is cable or satellite you can get 24-hour Christian programming, it is difficult not to get into "i'm more Christian than you" contests. "we have Christian CD's on in our house all day." "oh, well we listen to 'come alive' programming because the music is live." honey, God can bless a recording. Mahalia Jackson's records are going to lead me into worship much more quickly than "jim-bob's Gospel quartet and all night oil change" live. whatever. at least jim-bob is a-singin'. to give without advertising like Jesus suggested, sometimes you can just give and shut up. "don't thank me, thank the Lord," is sometimes a brag. when someone i have never heard of gets up and the first thing they say is, "don't think highly of me. bless God, this is all His doing," i tend to not think about them at all. you are being humble before you have any reason to be. i have known the Lord long enough to not mistake Him for you, thank you. Peter would walk down to 7-11 and when his shadow fell on folks, they got healed. yet his "books" in the New Testament have other things in them than, "oh, don't mistake my shadow for God. don't thank my shadow, thank the Lord." puh-leez.
"Christian hate" excuses do not exist. white cults that say God is partial to whites are the stupidest humans on earth. i have no one in mind, but they have three of the same letters as initials. black cults that say God hates me because white people used to have slaves are the second stupidest people on the planet. i am thinking of a retired and senile preacher of a presidential hopeful. damning America from the pulpit slaps the Face of God. those of us with a social conscience don't need the damning, and those who do no guilt are going to use hate speak as an excuse to write off Christians and sometimes their God. the idiots who blamed 9/11 on American sinners merely charged themselves with that crime since supposedly their preaching would be what changed those sinning hearts to something acceptable. they didn't preach well enough. saddam had nothing to do with 9/11. we just killed him, and his nation. 9/11 wasn't satan. it was people. satan was cheerleading. have you ever noticed that when TV preachers blame "sin" for tragedy, it sounds like a screaming, "I told you so!"
the Gospel that Jesus gave us, the Gospel of Scripture, is not a Gospel of self. i have nothing against rich Christians. but i have something against a Gospel of riches. the teaching of sowing and reaping seems to me to be a spiritual one. the parable of the sower seems to me to be talking about sowing truth. you may interpret it to be about money and even get rich off of it, but we are charged with taking the Gospel into all the world, and your wealth message won't work in countries that have a lower total worth than your personal savings. they simply won't believe you. because you are lying. the gospel of wealth is like the gospel of handling serpents and the gospel of speaking in tongues. look: God can make you wealthy and God can make you survive a snake-bite and God can give you a prayer language. but the minute you make those hoops that people must jump through, you are in the happy land of heresy. poverty is not a curse. starving is a curse. illness and no funds to get medical help is a curse. children with one set of clothes is a curse. preachers saying from the pulpit that poverty is a curse are as destructive as preachers who curse groups because of race, sexuality or choice of music.
sometimes you gotta look at the big picture to understand the parts that need closer scrutiny. America calls itself a Christian land. that may be. but we are also a "Christian myth" land. there are well over a thousand snake-handling churches in appalachia. without the wealth gospel, "Christian TV" would lose half their programming. forsake condemnation. become encouragers. love the unlovable. live the message and quit using Jesus as an excuse. i guarantee your church will double in size by Christmas. i'm just sayin'. |
|
Posted by AllThingsBuck on 2008-05-05 06:58:13 | Rating: | Views: 58
|
| |
|
|
| Blog Comments
|
|
|
|
|
Well I just read your blog but I just wanted to you know I really don't know what to make of it so I will neiter agree or disagree. Of corse there have plenty of people to work the words of God for their own purposes. A lot of these "wealth gospel churches" use this money for starving people or to get the word out to other countries with missionaries or Christian tv. We are to get the Word out to every part of the world. The Bible speaks clearly of 10% tithing. Anything more than that is an offering. You can give it or not it's up to you. Tithing is only about money. You can tithe the first part of your day or the first part of you food. Don't be too quick to say you have it all figured out. I believe it I have done it and it does come back to you.
|
|
Posted by anotherdaze
on 2008-05-05 09:06:01
|
|
|
|
|
Meant to say Tithing isn't just about money. Typo! Sorry.
|
|
Posted by anotherdaze
on 2008-05-05 09:08:19
|
|
|
|
|
|
