It Ain't My Brother Nor My Sister...

Perhaps neither supernovas, planetary conjunctions, nor even supernatural phenomena explain the appearance of the star:

Writing about the sign in the sky above our house the other day (it was Tuesday) reminded me of an old joke:

Without fail, Old Reprobate Joe, a sinful degenerate, faithfully attended church every Sunday.

Without fail, every Sunday in his sermon the preacher tried to convince Old Reprobate Joe to repent and turn to Christ.

Without fail every Sunday at the end of the service Old Reprobate Joe would shake the preacher’s hand and say, “You sure told ‘em today,Preacher”.

The old sinner let the words of the sermon flow right over his head. He always assumed the message was for somebody else.

He always said, “You sure told ‘em today, Preacher”.

Finally, one deep winter Sunday came which snow locked the whole town. The preacher struggled through hip-deep snowdrifts to the church where he found only one other person had made to through the blizzard, Old Reprobate Joe.

To his congregation of one, the preacher delivered his most powerful evangelistic message urging repentance and faith.

At the end of the service Old Joe met him at the church door, shook his hand and said, “Preacher, if they’da been here, you would’da sure told ‘em today”.

When I wrote about the planetary conjunction Monday, I cited the examples of Balaam, the man whose eyes were open, and the last page in my Bible. I thought to myself, People, my readers, really need to know about these Scriptures.

Then yesterday, I decided to read over these same passages for my self again and I saw that like Old Reprobate Joe, I was letting the message flow over my head to apply to somebody else.

Yes, Balaam’s ass, though dead, yet speaketh—to John Cowart.

The old camp song came to mind:

It ain’t my brother nor my sister,
But it’s me, O Lord
Standing in the need of prayer.

I’ve run into this same problem again and again. Back in the days when I taught an adult Bible class, in preparing the lessons, I’d be tempted to apply Scripture to the needs I perceived in class members; I’d have to continually reign myself in from judging others and see what the Scripture said to me.

This seems to be a common trait among religious people. We tend to have a clear view of what other people ought to do. We tend to say how much the other guy should drink, or smoke. What tv programs or movies he should watch. Whether or not she should have an abortion. Whether his hands should be folded to pray or raised in the air. Whether he should vote for this candidate or that. Whether he should serve in the military or be a conscientious objector.

And what about that mote speck in his eye?

I can get that out. I have a chainsaw.

Yes, it’s easy for me to apply the message to somebody else.

But I often forget the one essential question: Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do.

Me.

Not him. Not her.

Me.

If Scripture does not teach me first, how can I apply it to others?

Leaving that subject…

Recently I’ve been hammering out a work schedule and time line—without much success. I just don’t know what, if anything, to do next.

I wonder if I should continue to write at all.

On one hand, my lack of success tells me, “If you keep doing the same thing you’ve been doing, you’ll keep getting the same thing you’ve been getting”.

On the other hand, thinking about perseverance tells me, “Winners never quit and quitters never win… He that puts his hand to the plowshare and turns back…”

Ginny tells me that I go through this dilemma every time I move from writing one book to another; she says it’s part of my own creative process. But I forget that every time. The pain seems always new as though I’d never felt it before.

I loose sight of the essential question—Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?

While I struggle with this problem, I fill my workdays with rote clerical chores; I’m transcribing an old hand-written diary into the computer. Typing is not my forte. I can’t read the script and I can’t type and I get frustrated—Don’t they have little people to do this sort of rote clerical work?

Oh.

Sorry.

I forgot.

I am a little people.

But at least I’m doing something. I’m moving. Sluggish, but I am moving.

And here come Christmas in Florida: