Tuesday, August 16, 2011

This Is What I'm Talking


I heard this author today on the radio and I thought this is what I'm talking about.
I'm reading Jubilee Trail. The heroine, Garnet, goes to a dying man, who has helped her along the Santa Fe Trail and later to birth her baby, care for her in recovery. It comes out he was a trained doctor in the Army, but was too drunk one night to assist wounded in an Indian attack on a fort. She brings along a Bible. After they talk awhile, not much because he is dying, she asks him if he would like her to read something from the Bible. He choses the Shepherd's psalm, 23. After, they are conversing and he asks if she reckons if God will have him. He's been talking to God, you know, but not praying. He didn't know any special prayers. She thinks God will accept him. I do, too.
I guess that is why I feel strongly against Jesus being moved from the public square. Or as I used to say, how can we have anything to rebel against, if church going is lost? But back in the 1840's during the setting of this book, religion was in the foreground. People had some idea of Jesus. If we don't have the Bible, how could we comfort a dying friend? How can you know to talk to God, if you've never heard the Bible?
As Rick Richardson in this interview says, the Holy Spirit leads all into truth. We have our stories to tell about our relationship with Jesus. That's all it is. Is He the best thing in my life? Is that relationship the source of my joy? Do I show the story of His love?

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