Ezekiel – Chapter 34

Now that the kids are in school (I just saw Jessica off to her first day of middle school. Yikes.), I’m going to try to get back into more regular morning QTs between Jessica getting on the bus and me going to work.
Ezekiel 34:1-6 – A warning to those who would be shepherds: God takes this role seriously. You are to take care of his people. Your position is not one of prestige, power and privilege. You are God’s servant. You can hear the disappointment and hurt in God’s voice in verse 6:

My sheep were scattered; they wandered over all the mountains and on every high hill. My sheep were scattered over all the face of the earth, with none to search or seek for them.

Ezekiel 34:11-16 – God will do what the shepherds have failed to do – he with gather them, reuse them and feed them. But notice the end of verse 16 (emphasis mine):

I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, and the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them in justice.

Not only does God stand against the shepherd who grew fat while the sheep were neglected, he stands against the fat sheep who took more than their fair share. This is continued in Ezekiel 34:17-24. A scary principal for those of us in a wealthy nation.
Ezekiel 34:23 – “And I will set up over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he shall feed them: he shall feed them and be their shepherd.” The promise of Jesus. Take note, Jesus the shepherd. Protector. Provider. Caretaker. Not the picture I see in mind usually. I see Jesus the task master. The disciple.
Ezekiel 34:30 – “And they shall know that I am the Lord their God …” A recurring theme in Ezekiel, “they shall know”. But there are two ways, in tension with one another, that the people will know that He is God. One, through is judgement, wrath and power displayed. Two, as seen here, through his provision and compassion.
Ezekiel 34:31 – “And you are my sheep, human sheep of my pasture, and I am your God, declares the Lord God.”” Cool.

Happy Lefties Day

Greg KB alerted me that today is International Lefthanders Day. Never heard of it? Me neither, but it’s been celebrated since 1976, according to Wikipedia:

August 13 is designated International Lefthanders Day by Lefthanders International. It was first observed 13 August 1976. As its name suggests, it is meant to promote awareness of the inconveniences facing left-handers in a predominantly right-handed world.

So, this is for Audrey, my youngest at 8, who’s a lefty and her great grandma Liz who is as well. Happy Lefthanders Day!

Eight Year Old Logic

While the girls were at camp last week, Maria bought each of them 2 disposable cameras to use during the week. They all loved the idea.
At camp, Jessica pretty much forgot about them, Emily burned through hers quickly (and got a third from Mom) and Audrey snapped away during the various activities.
Then, with both cameras, she threw them away.
“I thought I was supposed to, you said they’re disposable!” she protested.
Hard to argue with that …
The mental picture of her glibly snapping pictures (In my mind she’s skipping too. If you knew Audrey, you’d understand) and then casually tossing the camera still makes me laugh.

“The Central Purpose of a Fellowship”

Marty Wooten, a one time ICOC teacher and bigwig, has recently joined Kip’s LA church. I found it surprising and a little disappointing, but it may be a good thing after all. Marty may be the balance that Kip needs. Marty seems more thoughtful and introspective while Kip is zealous and impulsive. Maybe, as Marty has acknowledged, they can help balance each other out with each’s weaknesses being complimented be the other’s strength.
But that’s not the point of this post. What I wanted to write about was something he wrote in his part 2 of why he’s joined Kip’s church:

If the central purpose of a fellowship is to impact the world for Christ, then unity is an absolute necessity for success (John 17); unity within an individual church and between a larger fellowship of churches must take place.

He’s making a point that Kip makes a lot in this article. Churches need relationships with other churches if we are to be about our main mission, seeking and saving the lost. I don’t take issue with relationships between churches being needed and good (he speaks of it in a way that I can better accept than what Kip usually says). My concern is with the premise that leads to the conclusion:

If the central purpose of a fellowship is to impact the world for Christ

Maybe I’m a heretic, but is that really the central purpose of a fellowship? Certainly it is one of the purposes of a fellowship, and even an important one, but “the central purpose”? I don’t think so.
I’m not sure how I’d word it (help me out here), but Jesus told us that loving God and loving others were most important (in that order). Sharing the gospel and evangelism (what he’s getting at if you read the article) are part of doing that (never mind the high minded wording of ‘impacting the world’), but not all of it. Certainly, seeking and saving are not our central purpose, but part of it.
Isn’t this one of the things that got the ICOC in trouble? We assumed Jesus’ mission (seek and save the lost) was to be our mission. If that is true, then that will lead us to a lot of things. Door knocking, jumping in front of folks on the street to invite them to church, over emphasis on stats and growth and an unhealthy church to church interdependence.
I think the primary mission of the church is simply to love. Love God passionately, love each other deeply and love everyone else as we do ourselves. If we do, we will reach out to other churches, we will evangelize, and do so cooperatively and we will serve and care for those in need. We will be a light in the darkness, whether that darkness is sin, sickness or poverty.
What do you think?

Reading Email on your TV …

… is hard to do. The text is fuzzy and too small. And I can’t surf and watch Letterman at the same time.
I guess it’s time fro a big screen plasma, eh? 😀
My laptop screen is still out, so I plugged it in to my TV so I can still sit in my recliner rather than in the uncomfortable desk chair where the PC monitor is. I’ve got a special cable that connects my laptop to my surround sound receiver so I can play MP3’s on my stereo. I can watch YouTube on the TV with it too, and now check my email and surf the web. The resolution on my 10 year old 27″ TV isn’t that good, though.
I’m beginning to think that the desk is a better idea.

Good Guys 2007

This year’s Good Guys show was a week later than past years. That was a good thing because it usually conflicts with my Dad’s yearly Barbershop convention, so he hasn’t been able to go.
This year he was able to join me and we had a great time. We spent about 8 hours on our feet July 14th on concrete and asphalt at the fairgrounds looking at over 6,000 pre-1973 hot rods, customs and street rods. It was worth every minute and the aches and pains later. The Columbus event has grown into the largest Good Guys show in the nation. Chip Foose was here, as was Boyd Coddington, although we didn’t see either. Too many cool cars to see.
Dad has pretty much the same reaction I did the first year I went. He kept saying something like ‘Wow, this is so cool.’ It’s amazing and overwhelming at the same time. I tried to get him to buy a nice 1965 Baraccuda Formula S that was similar to a car he had when I was growing up. OK, the color, engine, interior and transmission were all different. It was the same year model, though. He wasn’t biting though.
As is my custom, you can view the gallery of pictures (over 200 this year) in the Salguod Gallery. Someday I’ll get a link to that up here.

Ezekiel – Chapter 32-33

Ezekiel 32:2 – At first it doesnt sound like much to merit all the destruction told in the following verses. But thinking about it, it sounds like Egypt’s downfall is pride. It considers itself great and goes about meddling in things as a result, making a mess.
Ezekiel 32:18-32 – There seems to be genuine sadness in God’s words as he recounts all these uncircumcised nations brought down. It’s comforting to see God mourn over those who missed the mark and paid for it.
Ezekiel 33:1-6 – It is the calling of some to be a watchman and to sound the trumpet when the sword is coming. The people cannot escape danger if they are not warned. I think in some ways we are all called to be watchmen. We all are to keep our eyes and ears open to see if there is danger on the path that the church is taking and to speak up – sound the trumpet – when and if we see it. While we all must be aware, very few are called to be full time watchmen. It’s easy to think that that is our role, to keep watch. But rather than watchmen we become policemen, making sure everyone is kept in line.
We will see things in our church and in people that require the response and warning of the watchman. It takes discernment to know when to speak and when to keep quiet.
Ezekiel 33:1-9 – Didn’t God already give Ezekiel this speech once? I wonder why He repeated it. Do you suppose that he was slipping in his duties, that he needed a little reminder? I’d like to think so.
Ezekiel 33:10-16 – Here God lays out repentance and falling. He warns both the righteous to not feel content in their position and the wicked to not feel trapped by their sin. The wicked can rise from it, but so can the righteous fall. Neither position is permanent.

The Trivialities

For those who care (Mom 😀 ), here’s what I’ve been filling my time with:
My laptop screen went all crazy horizontal lines on me so I spent a couple of days taking it apart and putting it back together to re-seat the ribbon cable and then, when that didn’t help, searching eBay for parts. The new screen assy arrived earlier this week, but was not the resolution it was advertised to be. The seller’s on vacation, so I wait until next week to resolve that.
Maria and the girls are in PA, near Philly, at church camp so I’m a bachelor for the week. It’s been great having all my time to myself, but I’m ready for them to be back. I heard Cheryl Crow’s Soak Up the Sun on the radio yesterday and immediately saw Audrey grinning and singing along. It was her favorite song back when it was pretty popular. I was ready for them to be home then. They’re having a ball, except perhaps for Maria, who spent 2 hours on Sunday cleaning greasy pans from cooking 67 chickens for dinner. More on that when they get home, maybe.
I spent last weekend cleaning and waxing the Mazda. Been wanting to do that for a while, so I took advantage of the solitude. That’s about 3 hours of tar removal & cleaning, and another 3-4 hours of waxing and polishing. My arms were sore on Monday.
I hope to get some T’bird projects done too. I’ve spent a good amount of time just driving it last weekend. It got a new battery on Monday and I put it up on stands Thursday to begin the front suspension rebuild it needs.
Been working on my long threatened new blog layout. It’s coming along, but still has a ways to go. Maybe in a few weeks. 😀
Movable Type 4 is out in beta and I’ve been following the developments there. You can try it out your self for free by visiting movabletype4.org where there’s an open, fully functional demo version set up. The MT community has been invigorated by it. It seems that several of my earlier rants have been addressed (not sure if I had any influence on that, but it matters not) and there’s real life being poured back into MT.
Dad and I went to the Good Guys show a couple of weeks ago. It was fun to have him along, usually he’s out of town. I’m working on the photos so I can get the gallery together.

I’m Still Around

It’s been a while, I thought I should post, well, something. I’ve not been a very good blogger of late. 😛
I’ve been busy with things other than posting of late. I just don’t have anything on my mind, so I fill my schedule with other things. Actually, the truth is closer to I’ve had big things on my mind that I’ve been avoiding an not knowing how to post about them, I’ve shrunk back into other minutiae.
I’ve had thoughts of posting on some stuff, but not many. There are several, many actually, blog posts that I’ve been meaning to link to as well. Maybe later.
I’ve spent the last couple of years chasing answers on big questions:

  • What is church?
  • What about Kip?
  • What about the UP?
  • What about discipling?
  • etc.

Throughout all of that, and intertwined with it, is the big questions of What is Christianity? and Who are Christians? After all these years, I’m still not quite sure how to treat or think of those outside my historic Restoration Movement circle. I once knew exactly what to think. “If you’re not for us your against us.’ summed it up. Judgemental, condescending and harsh are other words for it.
Yet in my retreat from those ways, I feel as though I’ve lost something. It seems most folks who claim the name ‘Christian’ take it at face value when others do as well. I learned not to do that from the ICOC, but to look for some sort of evidence. Actually, we would assume that you weren’t until you passed all our tests. Clearly, many who claim the name aren’t, but it’s not my job to say who, but I simply can’t just take it at face value when someone claims the name of Christ. Judgement is not good, but discernment is. But what does that look like?
So, where I am now is that I’ve come to grips with the fact that I just can’t know all these answers. It’s not my job to draw lines in the sand or build walls. I’ve come to terms with that truth. I don’t think I’ve emotionally let go of it quite yet, but I’m there intellectually.
What I haven’t come to terms with or figured out is what am I supposed to actually do. Thousands and thousands claim Christ and I know some of them and meet some more all the time. Some are clearly in the wrong, either misinformed or in denial. I’m most certainly one of them as well. What do I do about it? I can’t in good conscience sit on my hands (although I have been) and yet I’m not sure it’s my place to speak. Who am I, imperfect and wrong as anyone, to say anything?
My response has been to slowly back away and sit down in the corner and watch. The questions still swirl in my head, but no answers are forthcoming. So I fill my time with the trivialities of life and ignore the nagging uncertainties.

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