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THE NORTHERN KENTUCKY SEARCHER VOLUME 7, NUMBER 9, MARCH 4, 2007 THINGS I DON’T KNOW
Last week a new program debuted on television called, “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?” Based upon that program I would have to say “NO” I am not smarter than a fifth grader. I know I studied that stuff in school, but I sure didn’t remember it. Watching that show got me to thinking. There are a lot of things that I just don’t know and I thought that I would share some of what I don’t know with you. I don’t know why it is so difficult for those of us who are members of the Body of Christ to give each other the absolute benefit of the doubt until all the evidence has been weighed and says otherwise. I don’t know why members of the church said both the meanest and the most loving things ever said to me. Something’s wrong there. I don’t know why it is so hard to apply the same standards of judgment to myself that I seem to apply to other people. I don’t know why it is so difficult to embrace, accept, and understand Paul’s point from Romans 2:21, “You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself?” I don’t know why it is so hard to motivate some folks to obey the gospel; and I don’t know why it is so hard to get some who have obeyed to be faithful in something as simple as attendance. After 30 years of trying you’d think that I would know the answer to those last two, but I don’t. I HAVE QUESTIONS I envy the faithful of old who spoke directly to You. I have questions: why do You say what You say and do what You do? They wondered the same, even as they uttered words to laud; But then who is man to ever truly understand God?
Why do you seek to give, always to give; When You watch how man acts and see how he lives? When merely mentioning You is enough to slam a door, You desire to bless wayward man more and more.
Why do You wait to finish the temporal, man and the earth, As You witness man’s apathy and spiritual dearth; As You observe man scorning You without a hint of fear, And the same goes on without change year after year?
Why have You entrusted such a task to Christians, often so weak-- Who at times turn back from You unto the world once more to seek-- Whose lights fade and flicker, sometimes seeming so small-- Who, instead of valiantly drawing sword, slink away, stumble, and fall.
Why don’t You destroy as we bite and devour one another, When we look in scorn and hatred upon our spiritual brother? When we gossip and lie, despising our brother’s visage, The very same brother who is made in Your image?
Of course the answer is found in Your book. Anyone can learn it if they’ll take the time to look, “For God so loved the world…” You have extended Your hand; And though I know this is the answer, I just can’t understand.
Sometimes I despise myself, with my weakness and fear; But because You love, You are always there to lend an ear. I cry sometimes with Peter, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man!” But without You I have no foundation; a house cannot stand on sand.
Help me to be better in the future than I have been in the past; As I continue to grow, quicken my spirit and hold me fast. The grave no longer holds any fear for I will see You after I die; Let “I serve One who has overcome the world” forever be my cry!
Adam Litmer
THE SIN OF DOING NOTHING
He made no mistakes, took no wrong roads He never fumbled the ball. He never went down neath the weight of the load; He simply did nothing at all.
He lost no hard fights in defense of the right; He never bled with his back to the wall He never felt faint in his climb to the light; He simply did nothing at all.
So death came nigh, for life slipped by And he feared for the judgment hall When they asked him why, he said with a sigh, I simply did nothing at all.
So God will pardon your blunders, my friend, Or regard with pity your fall. But the one big sin that surely means hell Is simply to do nothing at all.
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