"O keep my soul, and deliver me: let me not be ashamed; for I put my trust in thee.
21. Let integrity and uprightness preserve me; for I wait on thee." David saw the possibility that he could do something that would make him ashamed. I don't know if this was before or after Bathsheba, but it is something for us to consider. To bring shame on ourselves we do not need to do something as blatant as David's adultery with Bathsheba. For example, we can bring shame on ourselves by what we say to people. I have seen Christians bring shame on themselves (ruin their witness) by saying ugly things to waiters and waitresses - and that on Sunday after church services. We need to watch what we say and do in private and in public. How can we do this? By putting our trust in the Lord. David depended on the Lord to help to keep him from being an embarrassment. There were two things that he saw that could "preserve" him - integrity and uprightness. Integrity is what we are when no one else is around. (This is probably not an "Amen" but an "Oh me.") We need to remember that God sees everything we do and hears everything we say; therefore, we need to watch our thoughts and intentions when we are alone. We need to be true to the better part of ourselves at all times, especially when we are alone and have no one else to answer to but to God and ourselves. Uprightness is what we are in public, what people see us do and hear us say. If we want uprightness we need to have integrity. It will be easier not to bring shame on ourselves if we practice what we preach in private. Our public behavior will sometimes reveal our private sins, no matter how hard we try not to let them show. In other words, we need to keep our hearts right with God, ourselves and others. We need to be aware of these two verses, because the public behavior of Christians is keeping people away from the kingdom. We don't mean to, but we bring shame on ourselves and on our faith. I am certainly not being self-righteous here, because I have to watch myself, and my temper, when I encounter some problem with people who work in public places. I am glad when I leave and did not say the ugly things that I wanted to say. We need to all be careful about our integrity and uprightness if we are to be witnesses to the world about Jesus Christ. Don't you agree? Bro. Joe
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When someone does something for me, I want to give them thanks for what they did. It is a breach in ettiquette if we do not. This certainly applies to all of the men and women who gave their lives to defend the freedoms that we hold so dear. We also do not want to forget those who will be maimed for the rest of their lives because of their sacrifice for us. I see those young men and women who have lost arms and legs, etc., and I do not want to forget what they did for me. Every time I see the "Wounded Warrior" ad, I am almost brought to tears to think about the struggles these young people will have for the rest of their lives because they defended my freedoms.
I was one of those fortunate sailors who served in the Navy from 1956-1960. You might recognize those years as president Eisenhower's last four years in office. No one knew the terrors of war more than he, and he kept us out of war. Because of the communists, we were always on alert, but I never had to lay my life on the line in battle. This makes me even more grateful for those gave life or limb in service to their country. I just read something on an Email that caught my attention. It stated that we think of those who gave life and limb for us as old, but, as the article stated, most of those we remember were young. They were taken away from their families in the prime of life. When my Uncle James (James Cooper) was killed in Italy in WWII, I was so young that I don't remember a lot about it. I just remember that Uncle James was at home and was dressed like a soldier, then he was gone. We never saw him again. He was my mother's youngest brother and he was a character. Every year at about this time, I think of him, and a lump comes in my throat, because he never got to live the American dream. He, and millions of others, did not get to live the American dream so that you and I could live it. Let us never forget them!!!!!! Bro. Joe There are many reasons why I believe that the Bible is true, but one of the main reasons is that the Bible is honest about it's so-called "heroes." It does not hide the flaws of all of the great men of the Bible. For example, we are told that Abraham, the father of Jews and Christians, went into Egypt out of God's will and lied to Pharoh about Sarah. (Altough technically she was his half-sister.) Moses, who, according the Bible, was one of the most humble of men and was entrusted with the care of the Hebrew children, was a murderer and a fugitive from justice. He wasn't allowed into Canaan because he disobeyed God in the matter of striking the rock instead of speaking to it. He was also given to tempter tantrums. When he came down from Mount Sinai with the ten commandments, he "broke" all ten of them by throwing them to the ground when he saw the folly of the Israelites. Who is more of a hero in the Bible than David? He was the one who saved the Israeli army by slaying the giant, Goliath. Goliath was nine feet tall, and David was just a boy, but David took him on and defeated him. David was God's anointed king of Israel, and was called "a man after God's own heart," yet we are told about his adulterous relationship with Bathsheba. As we move to the New Testament, we will observe that the only person there above reproach was Jesus. We are told that "He was tempted in all points, like as we are, yet without sin." The same cannot be said for the followers of Jesus. I guess the greatest example is Simon Peter. He was the one who always spoke up and, quite often, "stuck his foot in his mouth." At the
transfiguration, he blabbed out: "Let's build three tabernacles, one for you (Jesus) and one for Moses and one for Elijah." (not an exact quote) This was ignored as the stupid statement that it was. It was not a sin, but showed Peter's tendency to speak without thinking. This was not Peter's only fault. He bragged about how he would protect Jesus, then when confronted at his trial, denied Him three times. He was called "the Rock" by Jesus, yet didn't always act like "the Rock." He went on to greatness, but not before we are made to realize that he was a flawed human being. What is the lesson for us? We all have our flaws. We are all "sinners saved by grace." Not a one of us is good by the Bible's standards, yet as flawed as we are, God still uses us. Being a flawed human being is no excuse for not trusting Jesus as our savior, and for not serving Him. All of us are saved by His grace, and we serve in His grace. I consider myself a prime example of that. Bro. Joe "When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?"
Is there any Christian, or anyone with common sense, who would say that the foundations of our society are not being destroyed? This is not a political statement, but a moral statement. For example, I just heard on TV that the ACLU is still trying to keep prayer out of all of the Armed Services, and that they are making headway on it. Who would have predicted that we would come to this place? It started in 1963 when prayer was banned in schools. (Actually, you can't ban prayer, because we can pray anytime we want to - just not always in public.) Public prayer in our society has almost become a thing of the past. Then look at the decline of moral values in our society. We have never been a perfect society. There has been sin in the world since Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. In history, we read about societies that sunk to great moral lows, and literally destroyed themselves. (The Roman Empire comes to mind.) The argument is not that there has never been a decline in morality, but that we have not learned from history. We see advertisements on TV that would have been pornography a few years ago. The same could be said of scenes on some TV programs and in movies. It is almost as if all hell has broken loose. Satan has to be pleased. If you are reading this, you probably agree with me. If you don't -- WAKE UP! But there is an answer to the question: "When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?" The answer is in the ensuing verses in the eleventh Psalm: Vs. 4 "The Lord is in His holy temple, the Lord is on His heavenly throne. He observes the sons of men; His eyes examines them." There is more, but this verse will suffice to prove my point. "What can the righteous do?" First, they can remember that there is a God in heaven, and all of the atheists in the world cannot kill Him - no matter how hard they try. Second, they can remember that this God is not unaware of what is going on in the world. We are reminded that "He observes the sons of men; his eyes examine them." Third, they can put their faith in the Lord and He will save them, and deliver them from "this present evil age." Fourth, they can remember that the Lord will finally judge all of the activities of people in the world. God is not blind. He is not deaf and He is not dead. What the righteous can do is depend on God, and know that it will all end like He wants it to. They can also live in God's will, witness to the world about His saving power and set an example of love and joy. Bro. Joe I don't think that this is exactly the way the question was posed on Linked In, but it is close. I failed to put a comment on Linked In, so I will comment on the question here. Having just finished reading Ecclesiastes and having read the first four chapters of Song of Songs, I can say that the Bible can be hard to understand, especially for new Christians. For what it's worth, my advice to new Christians has been to read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and get Jesus down real good, then read Hebrews to get the New Testament perspective on the Old Testament. I think, for example, that Leviticus would be very difficult for a new Christian to understand without having the New Testament perspective. However, we need to remember that the Lord provided a good resource to help all Christians understand the Bible - namely, the Holy Spirit. I've been reading the Bible for over fifty years, and I have read it through numerous times, at least once a year for the last thirty or so years, and without the Spirit's guidance the Bible would still be a mystery to me. I am one of those narrow-minded Christians who believes that a person who does not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, cannot understand the Bible. Why? Because they do not have the Holy Spirit to help them. Years ago, I read that one of Madilyn Murray Ohair's sons read the Bible through in one night and rejected it outright. In the first place, if he read it through in one night, he could not have understood it. In the second place, if he started reading the Bible from the perspective of an atheist, he had already rejected the Bible before he read one word of it. That's why there are so many misunderstandings among the unbelieving populace about us. They do not understand why we put so much emphasis on the Bible, and take its word over the almighty "popular opinions." If you didn't know Jesus, you would be puzzled too. As Paul wrote to the Corinthian Church: "The man (or woman) without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned." (1Corinthians 2:14, NIV) That answers the question about why the Bible is hard to understand for an unbeliever. A believer, even a new one, has the Holy Spirit to help him or her understand the Bible. No one will ever understand all of the Bible, but everyone who believes can understand what they need to understand under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Bro. Joe "The just man walks in his integrity...."
I have been retired for some time now and am not tempted to fill anyone else's shoes. Back in 1987 when I was called to be the Director of Missions of the Tucker Baptist Association, someone said to me about my predecessor Lester Turley,: "You have some tough shoes to fill." My answer was: "I will have enough trouble trying to fill my own shoes without trying to fill Brother Lester's shoes." It is a lesson that I have learned over my years in the ministry from 1960 to today. This lesson came home to me when I was a student at Southeastern Seminary in Wake Forest, NC in the late sixties and early seventies. I found some old tapes in the library of the "Baptist Hour" sermons of Dr. George W. Truett. I had heard a lot about Dr. Truett, and, truth be told, had probably preached some of his sermons, but I had never actually heard him. I went to the library every day for weeks and listened to Dr. Truett's sermons. One night I had a dream that I was preaching in a large church. I sounded just like Dr. Truett. I walked around the pulpit and looked down at my feet and I was bare-footed. What I gleaned from this dream was that I might as well not try to fill Dr. Truett's shoes. Whether that was what I was supposed to glean from that dream or not, it has been helpful to me over the years. You see, Dr. Truett's shoes had already been filled by him. What God wanted, and still wants from me, is to do His will for my life and follow His leadership in doing it. What about you? You are a unique creation of God. There might be people who are similar to you, but no one else is exactly like you. You were born to be what God wanted you to be. It is your responsibility to find out what that is and do it. When you have found the niche that He has for you, then do what you can do, or what God wills you to do. Being human, you will make mistakes, as I certainly have, and you will not always follow His will, but , all things being equal, you will do what you can do under His leadership. In God's universe, there are no other shoes for you to fill but your own. Just make sure that the shoes fit and that you wear them well. Bro. Joe Proverbs 12:16 - "A fool shows his annoyance at once, but a prudent man overlooks an insult." 13:3 - "He who guards his lips guards his life, but he who speaks rashly comes to ruin." 15:1 - "A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." 15:28 - "The heart of the righteous weighs its answers, but the mouth of the wicked gushes evil."
I never thought of myself as "playing the fool," but in my younger days I did it a lot. Why? Because I used to always retaliate when I thought I had been insulted or belittled in some way. By "younger days," I do not mean in my teens, but after I was a grown man. This means that I did some retaliation as a pastor, which is really, really stupid. I mellowed as time went on, because I realized that my sharp tongue was not getting me anywhere. Eventually, I learned how to overlook things people said and not take it to heart. When we retaliate instead of overlooking things that people say, we always speak rashly. This means that what we say is something that we should not have said. Another lesson I learned as time went on, was that "a gentle (soft) answer turns away wrath. " It not only makes a difference in what we say in response to what people say to us, but in how we say it as well. That was a valuable lesson for me to learn, because "a harsh word stirs up anger." If we really want to have good relationships with people be careful how we say what we say to them. (Not good grammar, but I hope you get my point.) If someone waits on me at a restaurant, for example, their demeanor and attitude makes a difference to me. I like to give nice tips, but it is easier when the server talks gently, and acts like he or she enjoys waiting on people. I try to remember this in my own relationships. A great lesson that I've learned is to think before I speak. "But the mouth of the wicked gushes evil," means that when we speak without thinking, we say the wrong thing. An "evil" word does not have to be an ugly word, it can be a word that hurts instead of helps. I like for people to think before they speak to me; therefore, I have learned that I should do the same. I'm glad I learned these lessons from Proverbs, and I hope that you will learned these lessons as well. Bro. Joe If people want to demean others when they disagree with them on an issue, they accuse them of some sort of phobia. ("Homophobia" is an example.) I think that I have discovered a new phobia, which I will call "Christophobia" or "Jesusophobia." Have you noticed that people can talk about a generic god, or in our case God, and get by with it? One might even be able to mention allah without raising the ire of the politically correct. But when the name of Jesus is mentioned, all of "the bad place" breaks loose. How dare we mention that Name in polite society? Don't we know that when we talk about Jesus we are revealing that we are a bunch of "hicks from the sticks" who need to be reeducated? I am told that chaplains in the service can no longer pray in the name of Jesus. If they can't do that, then who(m) do they pray through? It is, after all, Jesus who is at the right hand of the Father interceding for us. It is almost as if the name of Jesus will bring some sort of harm to the world, and that if His name is mentioned, some child might be misled and go down the path to whatever it is the name of Jesus is supposed to lead to.
Along with "Christophobia" there is also "Crossophobia." A cross standing in a public place is a "no no." I mean atheists are really after getting crosses removed from any public place. It just makes me wonder what harm a cross in a public cemetery will cause for atheists? (It reminds me that a cross is used to stave off vampires. I'm just saying.) In passing, let us not forget "Bibleophobia." A Bible in a public school classroom will cause all kinds of bad things to happen. Then there is "Ten Commandmentsophobia." God forbid that the bedrock of Judeo-Christian law be allowed to be viewed in a public place. What is interesting to me is that those who call all of this unconstitutional could care less about the constitution in many other situations. (I'm just saying.) I'm sure there are other "phobias" that I could mention, but these should suffice. Bro. Joe I finished reading Job this morning. Looking back over the book, I realize that God works in our lives in mysterious ways and does not feel a need to explain to us what has happened. Job was living what we used to call "the life of Riley."Then one day everything is gone - all of his children, all of his cattle, his reputation and the respect of his wife. His wife looks at the whole thing and says, "Why don't you just curse God and die?" Now, that is a loving thing to say. Then his three best friends visit him and spend the whole time ragging on him about what he had done wrong. A young man Elihu rags on him further. All the while, Job is sitting there in all of his misery, wondering what in the word has happened? We know what happened, but Job, his wife, his three friends and his young friend never learned what happened. They all had their assumptions, but they were all wrong. They stated a lot of truths that would have been appropriate in some cases, but not in this case. Job made an assumption, for lack of a better explanation, that God was picking on him for no reason at all. He was terribly upset with God. God comes to Job in the middle of a storm and does not explain to Job what happened, but takes him to task for questioning His sovereignty, and blaming Him for all of His troubles when Satan was the main culprit. Job was vindicated in the end, but he had lessons to learn just as his critics did. We know that Job's trials were not for his sins, but because he was faithful. What I think, for what it's worth, is that Job, though a good man, had become smug in his faith. Perhaps, he had gotten to a point that he thought he was above all of the other troubles of mankind. In His talk with Job, God explained to him that he was not God. Job's lesson was that he could suffer like all other people, and that he needed to recognize that God was the reason for his great life and not Job himself. In our suffering, we do not need to blame God for our troubles, but have faith in Him and know that He works all of the times in our lives for our good. We do not need to blame God when we need Him the most. We might never know why we are suffering, but we can be assured that God is aware and that he is working it out for our good - which Job eventually discovered.
Bro. Joe I don't have a particular text for the theme, "It's all about me," but it is certainly condemned in scripture. What we know about Jesus from the gospels would help us know it is wrong. I thought about this while reading Job. His friends thought it was all about them, and bless his heart Job had some it himself. I did not count the personal pronouns in chapters 30-31 of Job, but there a pile of them. I can see the "all about me" syndrome in everyday life. I see it in politics, in churches, in businesses and, surprize, surprize - in myself. It is difficult for us to not think it is all about "me." We are all, after all, "me's." (So much for my grammatical skills.) This attitude is inevitable, but it is not right. It is something that we Christians need to fight tooth and nail, and when we see it in ourselves, we should pray and get it out of our systems. Allow me to give you an example the "all about me" lifestyle. I have seen people in churches get mad about something that they did not like. Instead of acting like Christians and trying the solve the problem, they just gave up on church altogether. What they were saying was: "The kingdom of God can just go on without me." I know that the church is not the entire kingdom of God, but it is the closest thing to it that you will find on this earth. If "I" am so important that the kingdom of God can go to the devil, then "I" need to repent in sackcloth and ashes.What if Jesus thought this way? He would never have gone to the cross. You could say that Jesus thought it was "all about us," because He died for us. Take my word for it, it is not easy to overcome the emphasis on "me," but we need to be aware of it everyday and guard against it. During this year of illness, I've had to guard against putting all of the emphasis on me, especially during the most critical months. Thank God that I was aware of it and didn't act on all of the time. It is a struggle to overcome ourselves, but it is a struggle worth engaging in. Until we are at least aware of it, and fighting it, we cannot live authentic Christian lives.
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