Gentlemen,
I have been meaning for quite some time to write this, but haven't got around to it until now. Following the timely exhortation by our brother Mark (aka: the neo-confederate in the corner), in which he urged us to "Serve the Lord and glorify him in all that you do today and tomorrow and forever seek his freedom," I thought it was a good time to remind ourselves of a few things we've talked about before.
The desire to glorify God should be a universal pursuit for the Christian man. There should be no area of our lives that we are afraid to show to people, and although we all have secret sins, there are things that we should be able to avoid without much trouble. Now, I must say that I enjoy giggling at and sometimes deleting some of the material that gets posted. But after comments today by both blog members and frequent visitors, I have realized that I don't want any of the non-Christians I know to see this page because it would either a) disgust them, or b) be so familiar to them that they are unable to see any difference between my worldview and theirs. This is a problem.
Proverbs 19:1 (KJV) says, "Better is the poor man who walks in integrity, than he that is perverse in his lips, and is a fool."
John Wayne said, "Talk low, talk slow, and don't talk too much."
If we are serious about any of the things we say we believe on a regular basis, we have to act as if we mean them at all times. In most cultures, an honorable man is one whose word is in perfect harmony with his actions, someone who speaks or acts with two faces is either dishonorable or simply shameless, a category that in the Bible is identified with the fool.
There may be places where men in the presence of other Christian men can talk in Christian liberty about things that they would not normally talk about, but a public web site is not one of those places. Further, any attempt to justify vulgarity by appealing to Christian liberty is at least wrongheaded, probably just stupid. Any attempt to justify vulgarity by appealing to secular arguments is even worse. Paul teaches that forcing someone to contradict their conscience is one of the most serious things we can do, and therefore even if some things are technically permitted, we have the responsibility to refrain.
This doesn't mean that this needs to be an "uplifting" place, but in my view it at least needs to be a place I can check without looking over my shoulder at who is watching. Edgy, rude, and even crude can be ok, but vulgarity and foolishness is another thing entirely, and we know it when we see it (an example of crude but appropriate: in posting this I removed a picture of two rather well-endowed hot dog roasters, which I think were appropriate, only I didn't think this post could really be taken seriously next to two wiener men. I invite its reposting in the future).
So, that's the sermon inaugurating more than a year of our blog. Here's to the next.
Offense to none, love to all, obedience to One.
Taking this role entirely too seriously, I remain,
Ed.
20 comments:
your sermon is understood and appreciated.
May it be so...we are the guilty men.
Do ya'll think Jesus really looked like that with two little angels hoovering next to him on the cross. I do. I think he was white and had little cherubim following him everywhere. Every time people looked at him they were like. "Aww, how sweet! What a sweet guy and I love those little angels of his! They are so cute!"
P.S. I'm sorry for writing this! but I had to. It was calling to me.
I'm sure it looked this way, what do you mean? I'm sure that onlookers also took the time to arrange themselves in perfect geometric symmetry beneath the cross...stupid Raphael.
Very much appreciated Bob. I can stay a member of the blog now. And I along with everyone I hope, will be careful of the content of the comments posted.
I'd like to introduce a no senseless cursing policy for blog members to vote on. If you need to curse to get your point across great, but make sure you really meant to use that language and aren't just dropping f-bombs for the fun of it and bc you don't think your mother would ever read this blog.
Gentlemen, it is good to see these recent discussions along with accountability and sharpening by fellow brothers. It has encouraged me as well to turn my back on the two-faced man. I love and miss you all like a redneck misses fishing in December.
In Christ,
Chris Jackson
Another suggestion to piggy back on Bobe's. Can we maybe cut back on the number of cut and pasted "funny" pictures and videos from the internet. I originally joined this blog so that I could stay in touch with my dear brothers, not to see what each of them found funny on the internet that day.
I'm hoping this blog can be used more to keep each other up to date on their lives, as well as sound discussion of religion, politics, sports, etc as long as it is personally affecting, rather than a cut-and-paste of the internet.
I, obviously, vote yes on the senseless cursing ammendment.
I wish there was a way to put links in the comments, since I think that would be a much better place to put links to videos, etc, that are funny but that I could see myself on youtube every day. Does anybody know how to put links into the comments? It may, as wild ass said, be my "dinky-doo" Mac, but I think the videos are slowing down the posting speed.
This is the best I can come up with.
www.cutigers.com
However if you click on it, it wont work. I guess you'll have to cut and paste it into your browers.
Flying below the radar
Sweet. You have to use HTML tags to get it to work.
Fast Food Nation
sweet...
read here for how to do it.
Actually you don't even have to use HTML tags to do it. There is a link button you can Click on that will do it for you in the Create a Post area. All you have to do is write something, Select the text you want to use for the link, click the link button and then a box will pop up. In the box just type the html site you would like to use.
Having said this. I agree that we have been a little out of control with the funny posts however eliminatin them is not really neccessary. I think limiting them is better. We can make links for the videos for the queery little mac computers sakes. But I think funny posts here and there can be fun and won't keep anyone from posting what they would like as well. I do believe that we have to be a little more sensitive to everyone on here because we all have something we would like to add to the blog. But I think it would be good to make an unspoken rule that to much of one thing can be boring, annoying, etc. The thing I like about all the different posts is that it keeps everyone conversing like we are doing now. I think that is the point. When situations arise that allow us to post something in our life that we'd like to share I think those will be more than welcomed. But making a T-total rule is a little legalistic and dumb. but we should be tempered and moderate in our posts for sure. I am the most guilty of that and will try to subdue my desires to post everything funny I find on the internet.
True... I don't think anybody would want to totally ban well endowed hot dog roasters, do you? I think we were basically calling for exactly what you described.
I was asking how to hyperlink within a comment, not a post. I think you have to do that with html tags...
AAHH! true! I see now! Yeah, I just read how to link the comments. That's pretty cool.
I'm sorry.
Bob, I read Fast Food Nation. Although, I don't really care how sad the animals get when they are about to be killed. It was a good read.
Obviously, I haven't read the Bible.
Can we ban Christmas too? I don't like receiving or giving presents.
we could ban christmas, although I'm not sure we have jurisdiction...check on that will you Hiney?
CHRISEOUS STUPELENDOUS JACKSONION. A saint and comrade from afar. How I love thee, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. That's it.
James, no more games. I can't play forever, so I give up...
not...I win.
One word, Joey. Conquered. Now I win again.
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