The Rural Way

I heard today that the little town that we go to church in has some videos of some of the events. So this evening I googled it up and low and behold they sure do! And I even found on where I’m in it. Of coarse I’m in the far backround and am on the far left standing on the street side holding a bag for a young girl that’s collecting parade candy. And more surprising is that there’s a whole bunch more videos in the category from the different things that go on around there, including last years Memorial Day observance at the community grave yard.

Ye Have Done Unto Me

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:

And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:

And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:

For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:

Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?

When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?

Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:

I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.

Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?

Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.

And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.

This is the subject I will attempt to preach about in the very near future at our little country church if all goes well. If not and I freeze up while trying to deliver it, its happened to the best of em! I, as most Christians probably didn’t take this verse all to seriously, I always kinda knew it, but in all reality never lived it at all. The last few years I was more worried about spreading the Word, but it hit me like a ton of bricks the other day, what good is spreading the Word if a person ain’t living the Word? And I will testify, in light of these verses, I am not living the Word, simple as that. It seems I’m much more into this modern American, or Western society than I ever dreamed. And I don’t like it!

What good does anything do if a person is living the modern me, me way, living a perfectly normal life of modern Christianity, and in the end find out that it was an utter failure? In this culture, and in the church, it is basically me, me and that’s about it. By the church I mean what the mainstream is preaching. In just about every church though there are the Matthew twenty five Christians that do live the way Jesus wants us to live. A person can;t tell it by their clothes or jobs or anything like that. And they probably can’t tell it by their preaching and things like that. In fact its the most unnoticed thing in the Christian walk. Its a lonely ministry where there is no glory at all many times on this earth. In fact there’s more than likely allot of sacrifice and very little recognition, even from other church folks.

Keeping to the subject of the old circuit riders, which I enjoy doing, one of the most overlooked things about them in this day and age was the fact that they did so much one on one work with every kind of folk they came across. They helped the old and crippled, the slow of mind, they had patience with them. Recognizing that these were the future rulers in heaven just like the Bible says. And the Bible does say that! The poor, the helpless, the scoffed at. The ones society doesn’t take the time to glance at, those shunned by their own families. Yes, this was a very large part of the old circuit riders ministry. Nowadays we like to think that setting the world on fire with the Gospel is what they did. Well, in fact they did, by example! I’ve been pondering this allot lately, very much, and true Christianity is not represented all to well by the modern American “industrialized” churches. By that I mean there’s all sorts of groups nowadays. You have prophetic groups, repentance groups, prayer groups and the list goes on. This is a rather modern development because the way I read my Bible, the local church was what one could call a full service church. All the gifts flowed in the local  church. But man, in his wisdom has industrialized the church, molding it into mans industrial image of himself and in my humble opinion its a far cry from Biblical Christianity.  In fact much of these movements I would call a down right abomination. There, that should make me popular with the folks who pull the strings.

I had a vision a while back, clear as a bell about these movement, no matter how well intentioned they are, this vision showed me a reality that stunned me. It was at a Civil War field hospital and it was under a tree where they were amputating arms and legs and what not from the badly wounded soldiers. The soldiers were the local church bodies and the deceiver had himself an old rusty saw and was cutting the arms and legs off, throwing them on a pile to the side. They were flopping around useless, kept on flopping too, and the badly wounded soldiers were in severe pain and sometimes didn’t even survive. The flopping arms and legs were the modern movements, cut off from the church bodies and they were trying to do what they figured they should do, feeling they could do a better job than when they were connected to the bodies, but ended up a rotting mess in the end. These movements had very little interest in the church body, they felt the were a more efficient way to minister the Gospel, sometimes their small bits and pieces Gospels. But the bodies that were so badly damaged became almost useless if they even survived at all. The lucky bodies that barely even survived ended up begging on the street corners.

Nowadays we have folks chasing the gifts of the Spirit, wanting the power, but denying the reason the power is given. The power will still flow, but many, many with the gifts are heading to eternal damnation because of ignoring the reason for the gifts. One of the main reasons for the gifts is so we can do what is required of true believers as stated in the verses above. The Bible says to judge these folks by their fruit and I must testify there’s very, very little fruit being produced, not because of bum luck but because so many are chasing the gift and not the reason for the gift. And I’m looking at myself in all of this and don’t like what I see and it has me in a rage.

The average person walking the walk and talking the talk can and will produce more fruit than the majority of church pastors today do in their own churches. Boy, am I ever out on a limb tonight! But its true and in reality no one could even dare deny it. And if it ever comes to the point where the church would implement a program, (I hate that word but I have a mind blank and can’t come up with another one right now), a program somewhat like the circuit riders of old one of the most critical things to burn into their hearts is the desire to walk the walk as in Matthew 24. This would be the living and walking Gospel and nothing, and I mean nothing could stop it from spreading everywhere. It was extremely successful in years gone by and basically fell apart because of the influx of humanism in the higher ups of the church. On the bottom level, out in the countryside it was so successful that it will forever be remembered by multitudes of folks now and into the future.

I hope to continue this very soon.

A Fourth to Remember!

Sunday is coming to a close around here and I’m a bit sweated up this evening. Warm outside and inside cause I never got around to putting the air conditioner in yet. Might have to put it on the work list for this coming week. Getting dry around here, but got a ways to go to equal the last couple of years as far as that goes here. Any rain at all will push us much farther ahead then the last two years. I’m believing for a good year in that department. And Sunday evening also means that the weekend is coming to a close. Pretty good one too. Had us a time on the evening of the Fourth and had another time at services today. We didn’t get home till almost 2:30 in the afternoon. What can I say, we linger! This year on the Fourth I was working making more and more hay and a thought came to me while raking hay in a deep meadow. Robert Sheffey was born on that day in 1820. Now Robert Sheffey was the circuit riding preacher that I read about in that wonderful book Jan sent our way and this week that same wonderful book will be heading down to Alabama to good friend Brad. Now there’s all sorts of ministries out there and I know I could never fit in very well in most of them. When I received the book from Jan I was thunderstruck to say the least! This was it! This was what I was looking for and I knew at that moment everything had fallen into place for me. Finally!

What was his ministry like? basically it had a little of just about everything and I mean everything! But the true simplicity of it is what shook me and still does. He had a simple love for Jesus and a love for the fact that Jesus saved a hell bound sinner like himself and brought him into the Kingdom. Simple, eh! To be flat out truthful, what else is there? And with that comes another simple fact, he loved his neighbor like Jesus loves them. Sounds like I’m teaching Children’s Church here, but sometimes a person can cut through allot of manure and really get simple and to the point without all the man made wisdom that we saddle on everything faith wise. The church remembers the great preachers, the ones that drew the crowds, but in a grave yard in the western part of Virginia the grave of Robert Sheffey is one of the most visited spots in that part of the state yet today. Why is that I was thinking? How come a circuit rider’s grave can draw so many thousands a year and when a person looks up anything about him there’s nothing on the websites that have the old giants of the faith on them. There’s really no recorded sermons that I know of or anything like that. Nothing at all of that order that I can come across. But today, generations later the people from the countless families that he ministered to, many generations later still come to pay their respects to the man that brought Christ to so many, many families. A humble man. If anyone ever had reason to complain about the church, he did. But he very seldom openly complained. He was disturbed about the church in the late 1800s becoming so humanistic, so materialistic, but right to the very end he carried the gospel with love. And near the very end when he could barely walk or see anymore they set him by the road in a chair and folks would stop and visit with him as the were driving by in their wagons or riding their horses. Right to the end he spread the Word of God.

The other evening, on the Fourth, it became clear to me, (finally), which way to go. I discussed it with the people that one should discuss things of this nature and was truly ready for complete rejection. Truly I was. It wouldn’t have matter to much I guess if I was rejected or laughed out. I promised myself I wouldn’t let that stop me. I’d still be absolutely faithful to our little church no matter what would come about with this. But I prayed that folks would understand where I was coming from with this and sure did kinda hope I wouldn’t be laughed out. But to my utter surprise it was accepted with agreement and with full backing. I know the lord has really been drawing me in that direction the way I’d be so happy writing about farmer/preachers and writing about circuit riders and things like that, but to see this calling being accepted as not something out of the far side has me over come with a satisfaction and joy that’s hard to describe!

The last few weeks I’ve been trying to sort this out, well actually the last few months. Its been hard to write because of it. I’d stay silent, I suppose because of that fear just about everyone has at one level or another of rejection. But we’re past the first hurdle now, with blessings from our little church that I appreciate more than words can describe. Funny, it all came together finally on the Fourth, on Sheffey’s birthday. I have a feeling from now on every Fourth of July will be remembered for all of this as the years pass on. I’m not trying to set the world on fire, more than likely would have a rough time doing that, but a person “can” do what Sheffey did! Anyone with a love for Christ! I pray that as time goes on I can write about all of this as it progresses and takes form. Finally! Oh Lord, am I happy, but yet humbled with all of this! From church to farm, from nice church services to junk yard dogs, don’t make a hill of beans difference, the Word will be carried, the “Good News” from place to place. Whether its only one person or a church full. When the crops are in or the crops have been harvested it will be time to go out and bring in the real harvest!