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Getting Emotional About the Gospel

5/31/2018

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Gal. 3:1   You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly exhibited as crucified! 2 The only thing I want to learn from you is this: Did you receive the Spirit by doing the works of the law or by believing what you heard? 3 Are you so foolish? Having started with the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh? 4 Did you experience so much for nothing?—if it really was for nothing. 5 Well then, does God supply you with the Spirit and work miracles among you by your doing the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard?

Observation:

Throughout this letter we experience the passion of Paul. These were his spiritual children and someone has led them astray. Just as loving parents may become emotional when their children wander off and end up engaging in destructive behavior, so Paul cries out to the Galatians. His heart is broken because he knows what is at stake. The good news of the resurrected Lord had brought these children freedom, but now they were willing to throw all that away because of false teachers. He was grief stricken!

Application:

Voices today are encouraging us to believe that pretty much “anything goes.” Let people believe whatever they want and they will be happy! But the Gospel invitation is one to a transformed and eternal life with the Father. Do we really not care if people miss out on that opportunity?

Again, if we were thinking about our own family members, I would think that we would want them to be a part of what Jesus has to offer! Although, I have been around people who have told me that they have never even considered praying for the salvation of their own children. Really? Have we become so complacent that we no longer have any burden for those who don’t know Christ?

Paul is pretty riled up in this passage of Scripture because the faith of the Galatians is extremely important to him. Our love and concern for others ought to result is us becoming emotional about the gospel as well. At the root of Paul’s emotion was his own personal encounter with Jesus Christ. He had fallen deeply in love with the one who had set him free. He had experienced love, grace and transformation and he wanted others to have the same experience. If we are not emotional about the gospel, then I wonder where we are in our own walk with Christ.

When Jesus gets ahold of us and consumes our lives, then we have a burning passion for him, and for others to know him. Paul becomes an example for us. We are to be emotional about the gospel, having a deep desire for all to be saved! We should be defensive when others try to corrupt peoples’ thoughts, or show them a different gospel. Righteous indignation is sometimes a good thing and should be exercised at the right moment.

Prayer:

Lord, may my passion for you be reflected in my concern for others. Amen.

This post was written by Rev Carla Sunberg.  You can find her original post here:  reflectingtheimage.blogspot.com/2018/05/whens-last-time-you-got-emotional-about.html



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Why Won't God Fix My Porn Problem?

5/30/2018

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You’ve tried everything to deal with your porn struggle. You’ve read all the right books, listened to the podcasts, maybe even talked to a counselor. You studied passages in the Bible about freedom from sin and prayed God would remove it from you.  There may have been times it seemed like you were winning. You would go days, or even weeks without looking. This gave you confidence and renewed your hope. It even made you feel closer to God.

But then it happened. Out of the blue you were blindsided by a wave of temptation and a collapse that set you back further than you were before. It’s been hard enough to deal with the personal disappointment in yourself. What has been hardest of all is the disappointment with God. Why did he let this happen to you? You were doing so well, reading your Bible more than ever, praying with great confidence. Now, it’s like he doesn’t even exist.

As a counselor for 35 years I have heard this story more times than I can count. It’s been my own story. Likely it’s yours also. Why doesn’t God seem to help us when we ask? Why do our prayers for victory go seemingly unanswered? Here are five answers to consider when you find yourself questioning God’s timing.

Never Doubt in the Dark What God Has Revealed in the Light

I’m not sure who made up this phrase, but it has been a good reminder to me over the years when prayers go unanswered and God seems far away. It wasn’t always this way. Even a little bit of historical reflection brings back earlier days when God did answer prayer and when God did seem close by. So, which is true? During seasons of isolation it’s easy to tell ourselves, “God has never been there for me. He never hears my prayer. How do I really know his promises are true?” But we didn’t think that way before. This is why we must never doubt in the dark what God has revealed in the light.

Practically speaking, one way to deal with “dark-doubt” is to make sure we keep track of God’s blessings in the “light.” I have come to see journaling as an essential part of recovery for my clients. The best is a prayer journal that recounts both the blessings and disappointments. It doesn’t have to be long. Entries don’t have to be eloquent. But a journal can be a good way to remember God’s faithfulness in the past, especially when he seems far away in the present.

Remember God’s Timetable Is Always Different From Ours

Brace yourself for a hard truth, but one you will have heard before. It’s mentioned many times in the Bible, particularly when God’s people are struggling with “delays” of prayer. 2 Peter 3:9 says, “God is not slow to fulfill his promises as others are…” This is a true statement, but it doesn’t necessarily make us feel any better. Even though Peter said just before this: “for with the Lord a thousand years are like a day.” It may be so for God, but what about us? We can’t wait a thousand years for our answer!

So, it is interesting what Peter said after this, “The Lord is not slow to keep his promises as some are slow but is patient with us, not willing that any should perish” (3:9). Yes, God’s timetable for answers to your pleading prayers is different from yours. And while it seems to you like the urgency of your struggle demands an immediate change, God’s eternal perspective and his infinite character say otherwise. It’s hard for us to believe. But the Bible is unmistakable in the truth: God is good. And all things in our lives are working together for his good purpose to be accomplished—in his timing, not ours (Romans 8:28,29).

Admit and Confess Your Real Feelings to God

So, we (reluctantly) admit that God’s timing is not ours and (reluctantly) submit to it. “Okay, God. You obviously have a plan I can’t figure out. But I still don’t like it!” Is that bad? I find in my work with suffering Christians who are dealing with disappointments and failures that they at some point have to deal with their anger at God. Some are aware of how unanswered prayers have left them disappointed with God, feeling like he is not fulfilling his promises, leaving them hurt and even angry. But very few want to admit that. It may be crystal clear to others how angry they are. But they refuse to admit it.

I am thinking of specific ways some of my clients have acted out their anger—even while refusing to acknowledge it exists. One of the most common is their personal devotions. They stop reading the Bible at some point, maybe stop praying. The excuse is they don’t have time. But the reality is, they are seeking revenge on a God who seems to have abandoned them. In other cases, they begin acting out in church—perhaps sitting in the back row instead of where they used to be up front. Maybe they refuse to sing the hymns. Or they just stop going altogether.

All these are serious problems. But the best solution is to admit and confess their real feelings to God, instead of pretending all is well. As a specialist in clergy counseling this is particularly challenging for those in professional ministry or church leadership. They too often feel angry at God. They too are reluctant to admit it.

Notice, however I not only said, “admit” but also “confess.” What probably keeps a lot of us from venting our anger at God is the implicit understanding that God is God! It’s reasonable to be a bit fearful of shaking our fists at the Sovereign of the universe. But God is actually big enough to handle our emotions. That doesn’t mean we can continue in our anger for along time, however. That’s why I said “admit” it. It’s not right to be angry at God. It isn’t right not to trust his goodness and his timing. But we can confess our anger and doubt and then we are on a better footing to really know his heart.

Consider Recalibrating Your Recovery

A fourth answer is that maybe the problem is not with God but with your recovery plan. I’m a firm believer in accountability partners, especially when dealing with some kind of sexual struggle. However, not all accountability relationships are effective. While we may assume that God is letting us down in our struggle, maybe what’s really going on is a dysfunctional accountability relationship. This is what I mean by recalibrating your recovery.

I have a different take on accountability relationships than many counselors and will just mention it here. But I suspect God designed accountability to focus on those with authority over us, perhaps more than our peers or best friends. I’m not opposed to being accountable to peers or friends, but my experience tells me those are not the best ones primarily because they have limited consequences when we fail. The examples of accountability relationships in the Bible typically involve submitting to those in positions of authority. If you are struggling in a stalled recovery, perhaps God is not the one who let you down. Maybe it’s your accountability relationship.

Realize There May Be a Bigger Picture at Play

Mental health professionals are familiar with the term “cognitive reframing.” I won’t take time to explain it if you have never heard it before. You can look it up online if you’re interested. But simply it means to see a new meaning for something by focusing on a different point of view. This “point of view” is the “frame” in “cognitive reframing.” For us that means we need to see God’s bigger purpose and plan—need to try and view our suffering and circumstances from his eternal perspective rather than our own.

Many years ago I heard a wonderful illustration of this process and I’ll close with it. Imagine you are a rock climber, perilously hanging from a rope, standing on some jagged outcroppings, but unable to see more than a few feet above your head. It is very easy to wonder if you’ll ever get to the top. In fact, it’s tempting to doubt you’ll ever be safe again. But let’s say you are blest to have a friend waiting for you at the summit. He has climbed this rock successfully and knows every handhold and crag. And let’s also say that friend and you are in radio contact. At this very moment, the friend can see you even though you can’t see him. He assures you through the radio that you are almost at the top. You have only a few feet to go. And then, you’ll be home free.

Is it possible that this is what is happening in your life right now? You feel like you’ll never be free. You imagine the worst things happening. But God is your “best friend” and he’s at the summit, having already climbed it successfully. He is speaking (through his word): “You are almost at the top! Don’t worry, there are only a few feet to go.”

This post was written by Rev Jim Rose of Covenant Eyes.  You can find his original post here:  www.covenanteyes.com/2018/05/24/why-doesnt-god-help-me-overcome-porn-for-good/



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Is Porn the Pink Elephant in the Church?

5/28/2018

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Okay, this one is bizarre. The following is a music video by Phil Joel (formerly of the Newsboys). It’s his music video for the song, “Pink Elephant.”

What does this song have to do with pornography?

Phil and his wife Heather explain that the Pink Elephant is really just a goofy way of looking at the sins that so easily clutter up our lives, the sins that we become comfortable with, the sins that end up owning us in the end. Certain sins are like “elephants in the room”: the big, obtrusive, awkward things that no one is talking about. The inspiration for “shine a light on big ole pink elephant” is found in 1 John 1:5-10, where we are told that we should live our lives exposed by the light, confessing our sins to God and others, and watching as He purifies us.

If porn is your pink elephant, the sin that has made itself at home in your life, bring it out into the light. Confess it. If need be, confess it over and over as it continues to seek control in your life. Get it out into the open. Be bold and boast in your weaknesses before others.

For the original post by Luke Gilkerson of Covenant Eyes, go here:  www.covenanteyes.com/2009/03/02/pink-elephants-and-porn/

​
There is a pink elephant
That came into town
And this big old pink elephant's
Been hanging around
For so long

He's crept up dark avenues
And into the houses
He's sitting in living rooms
Breaking the couches

Shine the light on
The big old pink elephant
Shine the light on
He's no friend of ours

Such a sweetly sick taste
He is the gift that keeps taking
And the promises he makes
Are the quick fixes
That keep breaking

And it's awkward
And it's strange
And he won't seem to go away
And we all know
That he's here
And it's time he disappeared

Shine the light on
The big old pink elephant
Shine the light on
He's no friend of ours
Shine the light
On the big old pink elephant

Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh (x2)


Shine the light on
The pretty big pink elephant
Shine the light on
He's no friend of ours
Shine the light
On the big old pink elephant
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Porn and the Elephant

5/28/2018

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Recently, some front-line workers who fight against pornography addictions have noticed how some unique factors, which are seemingly disconnected from porn, have helped contribute to successfully quitting porn.

Two people stand out. The first is Jay Stringer, a licensed mental health counselor, ordained minister, and frequent Covenant Eyes blog contributor. In his years of counseling men and women for unwanted sexual behaviors, including pornography use, he started noticing trends among his patients, linking certain childhood traumas or certain life states to certain types of pornography. He recently commissioned a large-scale study of porn users which largely confirmed his own personal findings.

While the results of Stringer’s study are still being evaluated, he did tell a group of Covenant Eyes employees that one big recurring factor in porn use was a sense of purposelessness. Porn users often see themselves as failures, they have unmet needs, they feel guilty and overwhelmed. They’re frequently stuck in dead-end jobs without hope of upward mobility. In short, they didn’t know who they were or where they were going in life, and that drove them to porn to soothe themselves.

Meanwhile, Alexander Rhodes, founder and manager of the online recovery organization NoFap, noticed a related trend. By studying data gathered informally from NoFap’s users, he found that those who were most successful in abstaining from porn included other activities—sports, hobbies, etc.—as part of their recovery process.

The Elephant Exercise
A simple exercise will demonstrate why this works. Take a moment to look at this picture of an elephant. Study its features for a minute or two, until you can close your eyes and envision it.

Now take out your phone and set a timer for two minutes. In these two minutes, I want you to do one thing: don’t think about the elephant.

Don’t think about it.
Don’t think about its long trunk, its tusks, its ears, its saggy skin.
Don’t ask yourself whether it lives in a zoo, or if it has any family.
Don’t think about the elephant.
For two whole minutes, don’t think about the elephant.
Were you successful?
If the answer was no, why not? If the answer was yes, why?

Chances are good, if you had trouble not thinking about the elephant, it’s because you were fixating on the task. Maybe you even repeated the phrase “Don’t think about the elephant” to yourself multiple times.

But if you were successful, it’s probably because you didn’t think about the task much at all. Maybe you were thinking about your dinner plans, or a movie you recently saw. Maybe you even started out thinking about the elephant, but then allowed your train of thought to wander to other zoo animals.

Finding Freedom by Changing Our Focus
​Often, when we decide to quit porn we fixate on it, making it harder for ourselves to resist. We may believe that mentally thinking, “No, don’t go there! Don’t click that,” will help us resist the temptation, and in the heat of the moment, it may help. But in the end, when we focus all of our willpower on NOT doing something, it ironically makes it harder to resist that thing… and at the same time it makes it harder to resist other temptations as well.

This was confirmed in research conducted by social psychologist Daniel Wegner in the 1980s. He asked one group of participants not to think of a white bear for five minutes, and ring a bell if they did, then to think about white bears for another five minutes, again ringing the bell when they thought about it. He then compared the results to a group of participants who were only asked to think about the white bear. Lea Wineman explains,

“At that point, the participants thought of a white bear even more often than a different group of participants, who had been told from the beginning to think of white bears. The results suggested that suppressing the thought for the first five minutes caused it to “rebound” even more prominently into the participants’ minds later.”

So where does this leave us?

Rather than simply not thinking about pornography anymore, the better option is to think about something else instead.

The emphasis there is “think about something else.” Aristotle once postulated that “Nature abhors a vacuum.” It’s true of human nature as well. It’s not possible to simply think of nothing, and if we’re not proactive about choosing what to think about instead, we may actually wind up thinking about worse things.

Jesus illustrates this in a parable in Matthew 12:43-45:

“When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none. Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.”

Jesus’ focus is on the evil spirit… but what’s the man’s role in all of this? Notice that the house is empty when the spirit returns to it. It’s as if the man kicked a terrible roommate out of his apartment, but he never took the roommate’s name off the lease or changed the locks. He never filled the emptied room. And the man went on a business trip and didn’t leave a house sitter, and when he came home the roommate had returned and had added seven of his freeloading friends to the lease.

Many people treat pornography similarly. They quit cold-turkey for a while, but they never find something to fill the void left by porn, and they eventually either return to porn or turn to a different vice. One person even told us he saved his marriage after he successfully quit porn, only to lose it in the end because, as he told us, “I never replaced porn with something else.”

If we want to find lasting freedom from pornography, simply quitting porn won’t be enough. We need to find community, and change our environment (not just the paint on the wall, but things like what we have on in the background for noise), and train ourselves to new habits.

This pos was written by Lisa Eldred of Covenant Eyes.  You can find the original post here:  www.covenanteyes.com/2018/04/06/porn-and-the-elephant/


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An Observation and a Question

5/27/2018

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Well, after traveling for a million miles, I have never seen a she-monkey on a passenger train with a paint pot and a lipstick and a looking glass, painting her mouth red, Do you suppose that we will ever get to the place where the monkeys will claim kin to us?

Robinson, Reuben A. (Bud). The Collected Works of 'Uncle Bud' Robinson (Kindle Locations 4461-4463). Jawbone Digital. Kindle Edition. 
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Our Substitute

5/26/2018

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A story is told, during our Civil War, a number of Southerners were arrested by a general of the Union Army, commanding a district in one of the border states, who tried them by court marital, under the general charge of killing Union soldiers by shooting them from the bushes as they passed in small detachments through the country.

They were all found guilty, and sentenced to be shot.  After the sentence, the general allowed them to draw lots, and selected a few in this way for execution.  Those selected by the fatal lot were scheduled to be shot the next morning.  Tried, condemned, and waiting the execution of penalty, their condition was a sad one.

Among the number thus waiting in despair was a middle-aged man, a man of family, who was in deep distress at the fate which awaited him.  During the evening a young man, a neighbor of the condemned, and who had himself been of the number arrested, but had escaped the fatal lot, came in and made the astonishing proposal to this man that he would take his place and die in his stead.  He said, "I have no family to mourn my loss.  I trust I am prepared to die; and I am willing, for the sake of your family, to die for you.  The general says he will consent to the change, and accept my death in place of yours as satisfactory to the law."  

The generous offer was accepted by the surprised and overcome man, and the substitute remained under the guard until the morning came.  With the morning the young man was lead out upon the parade ground with his fellow prisoners.  A company of soldiers with loaded guns, faced them, and at the command, "Fire!" he fell, dying voluntarily for another.

Major Whittle, page 25 in ​​One Thousand Evangelistic Illustrations, edited by Webb, A. (1924).  New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers
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Uncle Buddy:  The Moth-Eaten Garment (part 6, final)

5/25/2018

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Though a man may be ever so sorry that he got drunk and went to jail, may feel keenly his disgrace, and may feel he has brought a dark shadow over his home, his wife, and little ones, as long as carnality remains in his heart he is liable to go on a drunk at almost any time. Being ashamed of the fact that he got drunk never removes the desire for strong drink.

We have known a man to take the chills and fever, as they used to call it, and take medicine and break up the chills; and for some two or three weeks he would apparently go on without any chills at all. But you could tell by looking at the man that he still had malaria in his system; and as long as that fearful disease was there, any little change in the weather would cause the chills to return and often much harder that at the beginning. What the man really needs is to be treated, not for the chills, but for the fearful disease we call malaria, and given constitutional treatment and have the poison removed from his system, and the chills and fever will never return.

And it is just so with sin. As long as sin is left in the system, anything that may take place or anything that happens -- a cold snap or too much heat, or for the dry weather to hold on too long, or for the rain to come at the time when the fellow wasn't looking for it -- may actually cause the "old man" to get up in a man and cause him to have a spell and grit his teeth and pull his hair. One week he swears the dry weather is going to ruin his crop; the next week he swears the rain is ruining it.

I remember a brother of mine once. As he and I were walking through the cornfield, the corn was needing rain, and he said if it didn't rain in a week he would make ten bushels of corn to the acre, but we walked on and he growled and complained of the dry weather. By the time he got to the middle of the field he said emphatically if it didn't rain in three days he wouldn't make five bushels of corn to the acre. By the time we got to the back side of the field he was gritting his teeth and pulling his hair and swearing violently and almost cursing God, and he declared that if it didn't rain in fifteen minutes he wouldn't make seed corn. Anybody can see that that was the fruits of carnality.

Just as many have thought that to jail a man would cure him of drunkenness or to tie his hands would cure him of theft, others have thought that the trouble could be removed by what they call "growing in the different graces." They call it "growing in the graces and developing the good that is in man." In fact, they claim he always had a spark of divinity in him, and that all that is needed is to fan it a little and he would finally bloom out into a walking saint by trying to develop the good that is in him and trying to hold down the bad that is in him.

We have all found out that growing carnality out of the heart is never God's plan. It has been declared by men who are in authority that there is no way to cultivate a thistle and transform it into a rose. In fact, the more you cultivate a thistle, the larger it grows, the more seed it produces, the more dangerous it becomes, and the more fearful it looks. Growing will never change the character of the thistle. Neither will it change the character of anything else. The more the hog is cultivated and the larger he grows, the more hog you have. You cannot cultivate the goat and change him into a sheep. A big goat is as far from being a sheep as a little goat.

To talk about transforming sinners into Christians by good behavior is one of the impossibilities of life; and the longer a sinner grows in sin, the more sinful he becomes. The only way that a sinner can grow in grace is to grow in disgrace. Development won't change the human heart, and there is no use in talking about growing in grace anyway until we get into grace. You can't ride on a train until you get aboard the train. You can't swim in water until you get into the water. This makes me feel that much that is being done nowadays to improve the human family is mere child's play. But God's plan is to strike at the very root of the matter, and through the precious blood of Christ, our Heavenly Father has made provisions whereby we can be cleansed from all sin.

But someone may say, "Don't we get rid of sin when we are converted?" If they mean the sins we have committed, we answer, "Yes," but if they mean the innate, inborn, inbred depravity that caused us to commit sin, we answer, "No." For the Book said, Ye are "babes in Christ," and "yet carnal." We must not forget that there lies in the human breast something farther back than the sins which we have committed. God has not only planned to get rid of our wrong doing, but God's method is to straighten up our wrong being, because there is something within man that cannot be forgiven, but must be cleansed.

I might give you a plain, practical illustration that came under my own observation. A mother told her little boy one day that the hall had been freshly painted, and he must not get against the wall or he would get paint all over himself. He promised faithfully he would not. So the mother went about her work, and a few hours later she found that the boy had paint all over his clothes. There was a falsehood in the boy and an act of disobedience. Now we all know the mother could forgive her boy for the falsehood and for the disobedience, and she did lovingly, and yet the paint was all over his clothes. So the boy had to have forgiveness for the thing he had done that was wrong, and then the clothes had to be cleansed. The pardon he received did not remove the paint from his clothes; that was another work of grace.

Thank God, He will forgive our sins, blot them out of His book of remembrance, remember them against us no more forever! But bless His name, He will also go farther back and deeper down than pardon! He will go back to the root of the matter and slay the root and seed of inbred sin. This is the only sure cure for that moth that we have been telling you about. The carnal mind doesn't have to be held down like a jack-in-the-box, and when we move the latch he will jump out every time. But if the thing is killed so dead that the life is taken out of it, that little moth of sin will never ruin another spiritual garment. This destruction of sin must take place in this world, for we read that nothing unholy or unclean or that defileth or maketh a lie or worketh abomination can enter into heaven (Rev. 21:27). Remember how Jesus said, "Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also" (Matt. 6:20-21).

Thank the Lord, there is no moth in heaven. The climate is so pure that moths cannot enter there, and I can. Amen! For such a climate and for such a country and for such a home, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ" (Eph. 1:3).

​Amen!
 
Robinson, Reuben A. (Bud). The Collected Works of 'Uncle Bud' Robinson (Kindle Locations 3865-4067). Jawbone Digital. Kindle Edition.
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Uncle Buddy:  The Moth-Eaten Garment (part 5)

5/24/2018

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So it is today with men and sin. For all the past ages men have been trying the various remedies for sin and, like the remedies for the moth, so far they have all failed.

One remedy for sin, men have told us, was for us to put up a stiff fight against the inclinations to wrongdoing and by so doing we would get rid of the thing, and would come off more than conquerors. Others have said that all we need to get rid of sin is to be well born, well fed, and well educated; to rise up in our own power and make men of ourselves and down the sin.

We heard of a father who had a son that was given to taking things that didn't belong to him, and of course the father wanted to cure the son of the awful disease of sin, so the old man tied the boy's hands behind him in order to cure him of theft. Another fellow was always getting drunk and the city authorities said that he had to be cured of drunkenness, so they locked him up in jail. By so doing they hoped to cure him of the drink habit, believing that the jail was the remedy for drunkenness. The father that tied the boy's hands to cure him of stealing did not seem to realize that the poor boy had stolen these goods with his heart and not with his hands. Back behind the hands was the boy's will power, and back behind the will power was that dark, black, muddy, murky, mysterious, unbelievable, unthinkable, unexplainable something that the scientists call heredity and that the theologians call depravity, that the Bible calls carnality.  

When two poor old sinners get drunk and have a fight and are arrested and brought to trial, and pay out as much for a fine as they will make in a month of hard labor, when they undertake to explain the thing, they call it deviltry, and this is the thing that causes a man to get drunk or to steal. For who has not seen men by the hundred who really wanted to do right and did their best to use their will power but that peculiar thing that we call the carnal self was so uncontrolled that the poor man would go down in spite of his will power?

So it is something away back in the man's life that must be touched by Divinity, and lifted out and removed, before the poor man can be set right and even do what he feels that he ought to do.

I have known preachers who rejected holiness and the second work of grace and called holiness people "second-blessingists"; and yet in their own pulpits in trying to make the people do right and come across and do good, I have known them to even lose their temper and almost go into a rage, and at the same time before they would leave the pulpit deny the remedy for worldliness in the heart of a believer.

​For as long as carnality is there, the man is going with the world, and the only hope in the world to get the world out of a man is to get him sanctified wholly and filled with the Holy Ghost. The man who is filled with the Holy Ghost will not have to be put in jail to keep him from getting drunk, and the man filled with the Holy Ghost will not have to have his hands tied to keep him from stealing. The only hope of the drunkard or the thief is first in the birth of the Spirit, and second in the baptism with the Holy Ghost and fire. This is the only remedy. This will make an honest man out of a rascal and a sober man out of a drunkard. The nature of man must be cleansed and purified. I suppose that the physician would call it constitutional treatment; that is, the remedy must go deeper than the surface. Men have tried to improve themselves by what they call "good resolutions," by "turning over a new leaf," by "rising up" as they call it, and "asserting their manhood." 

Robinson, Reuben A. (Bud). The Collected Works of 'Uncle Bud' Robinson. Jawbone Digital. Kindle Edition. 
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Uncle Buddy:  The Moth-Eaten Garment (part 4)

5/23/2018

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We next notice that the moth works the greatest havoc on
garments that are not in use. It is the furs and flannels and woolen garments that are put away in summer storage awaiting the return of the winter that suffer the most from the ravages of the moth. The garments that we wear every day don't seem to attract him.

This also true in regard to sin. Sin seems to make but little or no inroads into that soul that is busy working for Jesus with the love of God shed abroad in his heart and life hid with Christ in God. But just think of that idle soul that is always a part to sin. It will "remain forever true that Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do." It has often been said that "an idle brain is the devil's workshop."

I have noticed that a young man or woman with nothing to do but lie around town or loaf on the street corners, wasting time, soon becomes vicious and sinful, unmanly and unwomanly. The most of the dark, black, murky, muddy, mysterious, unbelievable, unthinkable, and unknowable schemes that have been pulled off in the last quarter of a century --ninety-nine out of a hundred of them -- have been planned by a crop of idlers and street loafers; so it still remains true that our idle days are Satan's busy days. Idleness is simply an inlet to temptation, but the Christian who is busy in the Master's service, trying to rescue the perishing and lifting up the fallen, cheering the sad-hearted, strengthening the weak, and comforting the lonely, won't be troubled much with sin's alluring bait.

Next, the moth is no respecter of persons; it spares neither the rich nor the poor, the high nor the low,the learned nor the ignorant, the black nor the white, red, brown, nor yellow, the philosopher nor the fool. It exempts no one from its work of destruction. The rich with their expensive furs and costly woolen wear and the poor with their cheaper and coarser wear are alike subject to its attacks.

This is also true of sin. It is everywhere doing its hellish work of destruction among the children of men. Go into our jails or penitentiaries and you will see there the classes that have been touched by sin. There you will see men of wealth, businessmen, senators, congressmen, lawyers, doctors, preachers, and great statesmen, men of talent, culture, and refinement; but through sin their lives have been blackened and there they are dragging out an existence with soiled and dishonored names, behind prison bars. These men with such wonderful opportunities before them probably had imagined that the little sins they first committed could never destroy them. Oh, they had seen others who had been wrecked, but they said that with their brilliant minds, wealth, and social standing sin could never put them down. 

But just as truly as the little moth has destroyed the best garments in the home, sin has destroyed the brightest minds of our nation. As the moth eats the fiber and destroys the garments, so sin has worked its deadly fangs into their very hearts and lives, and now they are dying by the inch and their names are a hiss and a byword where they used to be honored and respected by everyone.

We next notice some of the remedies for the cure of this little insect we callthe moth. It is needless to say that the remedies are many and of various kinds. Some ladies have used the red cedar chest; others have packed their clothes in newspapers, believing that the moth won't bother clothes that are packed, thinking that a moth can't live where printer's ink is found. Others have used tobacco, they say, with good effect. Still others have used the mothballs,
but the smell of the mothball was almost as bad as the moths themselves, and the smell of tobacco was worse. Others have used what they call tar paper, but the yellow spot was so hard to get off the blankets that at last they had to abandon even the tar paper; for after several years of hot water and good soap the yellow tar spots were still there.

We have heard of many other remedies. I suppose there have been scores and scores of remedies used to try to dislocate and drive out and destroy this troublesome little insect that we call the moth. But after all the remedies that man can conceive of and all the remedies that women have applied to destroy the moth, we still have this deadly little insect. Its deadly work is still going on in its destruction of the garments of the poor people of the earth.

Robinson, Reuben A. (Bud). The Collected Works of 'Uncle Bud' Robinson. Jawbone Digital. Kindle Edition. 


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Uncle Buddy:  The Moth-Eaten Garment (part 3)

5/22/2018

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Picture
It was a very small thing when the cow of Mrs. O'Leary kicked over that little kerosene lamp, but it started a fire that in forty-eight hours had swept over a strip of Chicago four miles long and one mile wide, destroyed 17,450 homes and millions of dollars' worth of property, and left multiplied thousands of people homeless. The Apostle James says, "Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!" See Jas. 3:5, and that will give you some light on the fearfulness of the Chicago disaster.

The first wrong act of your life may seem to you to be a very small thing, but, beloved, it may cost you your soul; and others may be influenced by your act and so it may mean their destruction also.

We next notice that the moth works noiselessly and secretly. If it came into our house with some great demonstration, or would herald its approach by the bugle sound, we might be on our guard. But instead it steals in secretly and unperceived and proceeds with its destructive work. It is even so with sin. What an awful destruction it has worked in a secret way!

I read a little story one day of some shepherds who were watching their flocks and they discovered an eagle and watched it soar from the crag. It flew majestically far up into the sky, but by and by it became unsteady in its motions and began to waver in its flight. At length one wing drooped and then the other. The poor bird struggled vainly for a moment and then fell swiftly to the ground. The shepherds sought the fallen bird to see what was the cause of that fearful fall from such heights in the blue sky and, behold, they found a little serpent had fastened itself upon this eagle while it rested upon the crag. The eagle did not know the serpent was there, but the dangerous little reptile had fastened himself upon that game bird, and gnawed through the feathers; and while the proud monarch was sweeping through the air, the serpent's fangs were thrust into the flesh, and the eagle came reeling down into the dust.

This illustrates the story of many human lives. How many of the most brilliant minds we have seen start out with such splendid promise and it seemed they were going to soar to the heights of fame and honor;but they would finally begin to stagger and reel and fight and struggle, and eagle-like they would finally fall! The fact is, some secret sin, like the little moth, had crept in almost unaware, eating its way to the heart, and at last the proud life lies soiled and dishonored in the dust. We need to be ever on the watch against these treacherous and insidious perils; these little secret sins which, unperceived, work death to the soul.

We next notice that the moth works from the inside out. It will creep in among the woolen garments and there will lay its eggs, which after a little while will hatch out. Then the little worms are there in the warp and woof of the cloth and they feed upon its fiber. Or to make it still plainer, they draw their life from the life of the cloth, and in a short time there is no life left in the cloth; it lies before you now, a moth-eaten garment. How much like the hidden sin in the heart and life of man! It is not long until this little worm changes into the regular moth, but by the time it becomes a chrysalis and then emerges into the full-grown moth, the garment is completely spoiled and wrecked and useless to man.  

What a life-size picture of sin is this! As truly as the moth will destroythe beautiful garment, so sin will destroy the most beautiful life; and sin, like the moth, begins on the inside and works toward the outside. Sin can do no harm until it finds a lodging in the heart. Now you will remember the words of Jesus and St. Paul when they both spoke of that deadly thing we call sin. Jesus said, "For ... out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts" (Mark7:21).

And then He gave that fearful picture in the seventh chapter of St. Mark's Gospel. But all of those fearful things that He spoke of He says are just the outcroppings of sin in the inward life. If you will let sin get once lodged in the heart, it will eat its way to the outward life.

Did you ever think that Satan could do nothing with our first parents until he gained access to
their hearts by means of an outward sin? Once the hearts were entered, disobedience soon followed. Seeing therefore how important it is to guard this little channel to the heart, the wise man said, "Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life" (Prov.4:23). He also said in Prov. 23:7, "As he thinketh in his heart, so is he." 


Robinson, Reuben A. (Bud). The Collected Works of 'Uncle Bud' Robinson. Jawbone Digital. Kindle Edition. 

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