The Sin of Pride

Pride – without, within,

 

                Takes as many people

 

To hell

 

                As any sin. 

 

– eab, 11/26/09

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RICHES TO RAGS

We like the rags to riches tale:

Boy meets gal, poor girl meets male.

One once as low as he could be,

Finds gold coins, a pearl by the sea.

Poor-to-rich-myths never get stale.

 

But what about riches to rags?

One loses comforts and finds snags.

You like to thing that direction?

How does that fit your perfection?

Rich men – bums, once cute women – hags.

 

Christmas ‘fore “all was said and done,”

Is about the rich to rags One,

He became poor, a peasant Man.

He, who at His call angles ran,

Found no place to lay His head – none.

 

Christ had seen wealth beyond man’s mind,

Heard tunes no symphony can find,

Left such splendor, left it all.

God, Triune, gave and felt “the call”  

To our world, so cold, so unkind.

 

Why?  Why was Christ willing to switch?

Become poor – that we might be rich?

Came to set the sinners fully free,

By dying on that middle tree,

Agony.  Pain.  “Dead” muscles twitch.  

 

His loss was mankind’s greatest gain.

Sinner friend, He died not in vain.

Wealthy, then poor, Christ lives today.

Providing poorest men a way,

To lose his sin in Christ’s blood stain.

          – eab, 11/30/06

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Ida Lilliard Reed – birth, Nov. 30, 1865

I belong to the King, I’m a child of His love,

I shall dwell in His palace so fair;

For He tells of its bliss in yon heaven above,

And His children its splendors shall share.

 

Refrain:

I belong to the King, I’m a child of His love,

And He never forsaketh His own;

He will call me some day to His palace above,

I shall dwell by His glorified throne.

 

I belong to the King, and He loves me I know,

For His mercy and kindness, so free,

Are unceasingly mine, wheresoever I go,

And my refuge unfailing is He.

 

 I belong to the King, and His promise is sure,

That we all shall be gathered at last

In His kingdom above, by life’s waters so pure,

When this life with its trials is past.

 

 

Ida Lilliard Reed was born this date, 11/30/1865, near Ar­den, Bar­bour Co., West Virginia.  It is reported that she penned some 2,000 hymns in her life­time – probably her best known today being, “I Belong to the King” (1896).  Reed died 7/8/1951, at Ar­den, West Virginia.

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Which will you have?

Start taking the Spirit

 

                out of “spiritual” (s–p–i…)

 

and what is left is “ritual.” 

 

– eab, 11/10/09

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$4000

We have a mountain in front of us

Four thousand dollars high.

But thou dost own every fleck of gold,

Beneath the sunset sky.

 

We have a problem in front of us

Four thousand dollars long.

But every creature on the globe,

To You, it doth belong.

 

We have a mountain in front of us

Four thousand dollars wide.

But You have promised to guide us

And be ever at our side.   [1]

                – eab, 11/29/78 

 

 

---

[1] And God supplied this need, Praise His Name.

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C S (Clive Staples) Lewis – birth, Nov. 29, 1898

Now another point.  There is one bit of advice given

to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews

in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian

teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern

economic system has completely disobeyed.  All

these people told us not to lend money at interest:

and lending money at interest—what we call

investment—is the basis of our whole system…I

should not have been honest if I had not told you

that three great civilizations had agreed…in

condemning the very thing on which we have based

our whole life. 

                   – C S Lewis, Mere Christianity (NY: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1952), 80.

C S (Clive Staples) Lewis was born this date, 11/29/1898, at Belfast, Ireland.  He eventually became a Christian (Church of England).  He was a scholar, a writer, and a professor at both Oxford (1924-54) and Cambridge (1954-63).  His writings have become “modern classics” Screwtape Letters (1942), Miracles (1947), Mere Christianity (1952).  And even his allegorical The Chronicles of Narnia (1950-1956) are classics to multitudes of children.  Lewis died 11/22/1963 but most Americans were so taken up by another death we did not notice the passing of one of the greatest modern writers.

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The main facts

 

                of the books of Acts are

 

Man can be

 

                Human and Holy.

               

– eab, 11/17/09

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ENJOY – BUT THIS IS NOT ALL

Enjoy the bright crispness of a late fall,

Enjoy the high goose with its wild call,

Enjoy the stallion far from his stall,

But never think this earth is all.

 

Enjoy the moon, off-white dimpled ball,

Enjoy the big horn, Alaskan Dall,

Enjoy the forested, deciduous hall,

But never think this earth is all.

 

Enjoy the stone-faced canyon wall,

Enjoy the sequoia, unbelievably tall,

Enjoy the blossoms large or small,

But never think this earth is all.

                – eab, 11/26/08

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Jeremiah Eames Rankin – death, Nov. 28, 1904

God be with you till we meet again;
By His counsels guide, uphold you,
With His sheep securely fold you;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

Refrain

Till we meet, till we meet,
Till we meet at Jesus’ feet;
Till we meet, till we meet,

God be with you till we meet again.

God be with you till we meet again;
Neath His wings protecting hide you;
Daily manna still provide you;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

God be with you till we meet again;
With the oil of joy anoint you;
Sacred ministries appoint you;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

God be with you till we meet again;
When life’s perils thick confound you;
Put His arms unfailing round you;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

God be with you till we meet again;
Of His promises remind you;
For life’s upper garner bind you;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

God be with you till we meet again;
Sicknesses and sorrows taking,
Never leaving or forsaking;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

God be with you till we meet again;
Keep love’s banner floating o’er you,
Strike death’s threatening wave before you;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

God be with you till we meet again;
Ended when for you earth’s story,
Israel’s chariot sweep to glory;
God be with you till we meet again.

 

Jeremiah Eames Rankin died this date, 11/28/1904, at Cleveland, Ohio.  He was a  Congregationalist who wrote “God Be With You Till We Meet Again.”  He pastored in Potsdam, New York, St. Albans, Vermont, Lowell, Massachusetts, Charlestown, Massachusetts, Washington, D.C., and Orange, New Jersey.  Rankin also was a professor of homiletics and pastoral theology (1878-’84) and from 1889 til his death was president of Howard University.  He was born 1/2/1828, at Thornton, New Hampshire.

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Danger – for – us

The most dangerous part of a Road? 

 

                Left of center.

 

The most dangerous part of a Living?

 

                 Left of center.

– eab, 11/11/09

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