Motivation Revisited

Note: All scriptures noted in this post are copy/paste in New International Version from Bible Gateway.

I know my last post on this subject seemed like it came in from way out in left field. It is an old subject. I have been mulling over this much more, recently, since the AFA link was sent to me by a member of my church community. Flip Flop Mamma posted about the church (not one kind of denomination, but Christendom at large) needing to be accepting of homosexuals into their assemblies. Go check out her post, she has some great thoughts (even if I don't totally agree with her on all of it). She has a perspective of this that is different than my own. Her post sparked my thoughts and this discussion here.

I have said (in real life) that having the tendency to be attracted to the same sex isn't the sin, it is choosing to live in that lifestyle. All humans can choose a celibate life.

I don't want to argue with others about whether a gay is born that way or nurtured that way. I cannot believe that God CREATES gays, and then tells us that being gay is a SIN. God does not create sin. I think that "disease" is a result of sin. The original fall, the first sin, allows for bad things to happen. I referenced Romans 1:27 in the last post. This time I will post the actual verse and explain a little further.

Romans 1:27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.

This verse says there is a due penalty, a punishment, for having same sex relations. Inferred is that this penalty is physical and earthly, not spiritual and eternal. I believe this is AIDS. Many diseases were classified as "natural causes" when people died, before their causes were discovered and they were given names in modern medical history. I can't imagine that heart-clogging cholesterol is really new. Nor is the common cold, flu, cancer, diabetes, herpes, leprosy or AIDS.

Children are born every day with horrible diseases, and they did nothing wrong to acquire them. No child deserves AIDS, cancer or even asthma. Having diseases is not a sin. It is a punishment. (Don't get all mad yet, keep reading! Plenty of reason to get mad at me later.) In the Bible, some of the punishments God handed out were extended to the 7th or 10th generation down from the sinners. We have to live with the consequences of our actions, both good and bad. Our children sometimes have to live with our consequences. A child living without a parent while a dad or mom is in jail is a child who has consequences without committing sin.

I also will tell you that not all sicknesses are punishment for sin. I do not believe that I get ear infections because I do something that is against God. I don't get them for being a bad person. I get them because water gets trapped in my ears, or because my body reacts badly to cow milk. Allergies and other airborn maladies are not the result of direct sin. The common cold does not float around looking to alight upon the worst sinner it finds.

Sometimes bad things happen to us for good reasons. We may live our entire lives not knowing that reason. The Jews of Jesus' day thought that disease was a result of sin.

John 9:1-3
1 As he (Jesus) went along, he saw a man blind from birth.
2 His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"
3 "Neither this man nor his parents sinned," said Jesus, "but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.

The church should accept homosexuals with open arms. But we can't let them stay in their sin. This is the part that "unchurched" people balk at. They want us to let gays be gay, and preach that being gay is OK, when God's word clearly states it is NOT OK.

The church is full of broken people. A place for the sick, the infirm. Hospital. Not a museum of the greatness of humanity. Christians are not perfect, they are forgiven. This is REHAB, people. The place where we try God's new way, we learn how to live again, with the help of others. This is not the Olympics of Purity. We don't show off how good we are... we rejoice when we make small steps toward our recovery.

The church should also accept murderers, hookers, liars, thieves and the proud. The church should accept me. Should accept you. Should help us fix our brokenness, not condemn the bad job we have done so far. Once we go through that door, we should be helped to become better, become like Christ.

Comment from last time, by Flea: "I think, too, that Paul says it well in I Cor. 5:9-13. I think that's what you are saying. At the same time, I hear you saying that you're calling out the sinners who aren't Christians. Specifically the homosexuals. It's been a struggle for me for awhile, this sin versus the ones Christians are comfortable with, like gluttony." (Bold emphasis mine, not Flea's.)

For the benefit of those who don't know the scriptures like they know their own name, here is the passage to which Flea refers. (Yeah, I had to look it up. I don't know everything. See? Pride, right out the window here.)

I Cor. 5:9-13
9 I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—
10 not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world.
11 But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.
12 What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside?
13 God will judge those outside. "Expel the wicked man from among you."

I agree with Flea that Paul says it best here. In verse 13, that "expel from among you" is an internal instruction; do not let such a man (brother living a lie) stay as a part of your community. I do not want to call out the people who are not part of the church. They are outsiders, and not willingly under the same rules I have accepted. I do want to call to sinners who aren't Christians, not to call them to the mat for their sin, but to offer them the love, peace and forgiveness that God offers freely. The world doesn't often wish to change. They don't see that what they do is against God, and they certainly don't see the eternally damaging results.

I don't want to say that there are no homosexuals in the church, because people are people, and their issues are their own. There are recovering homosexuals in the church. There are recovering dieters, recovering alcoholics. There are divorced people in my congregation, and God hates divorce. I am fat. I have no excuse for it. I make the excuses that I have hormonal issues (which I do, but it should not be my crutch) and I say that I am not good at exercising. But I also concede that I alone have control over what I put in my mouth, and I have not exercised that control. Glutton, just as pointed out.

I have the grace of God. He doesn't want to leave me in this pit of food addiction. God doesn't want to leave me alone any more than He wants Satan to be against Him. Understand this: God even wants to save Satan. Satan has different ideas. Satan fell, by his own willing rebellion against God. He wishes to take as many of us as he can away from God, to hurt God. Satan loves it when we are pitted against one another on the technicalities of our beliefs. When we argue, we are not doing the will of God.

The Amazing part of Grace is that, while God meets us wherever we are, He refuses to leave us there. How can we help but be transformed after being washed by the Creator of everything?

If a homosexual comes to my church, I have no right to call him/her out for the life they are leading. If they come to be added by God, baptized to forgive their sins, then I have nothing to hold against them. That sin is gone, just like my self-loathing is gone, by the grace afforded to any who accept it. However, if they go back to that lifestyle after accepting God's gift of salvation... I suddenly have an obligation to point out what God has to say about it. Not because I want to be the first to point out their faults, but because I want to be the first to help them. I would expect no less from any member of my congregation toward me.


Our first job is to share the good news of Jesus' death, burial and resurrection.


I have had an epiphany, of sorts, over the past two years. I have spoken to people who are being the hands and feet of Jesus, and I have watched how to be a loving person to the broken sinner in the street. It is a special job. I have a firm grip on my own prejudices, and my fear, and my pride. Those little pews help me to be so self-righteous! I want to tell the world about Jesus. The world sees me coming in my naivete', and does their best job to knock me down. I don't want to call out the average Joe in the street, but I don't want the average Joe to call me out, either. It is a continual tug-of-war.

We are not supposed to judge the sins of others. That is God's job. I don't do well at giving up that job. I took it from God, and I am loathe to give it back. I am more likely to share about my new toy (I did buy a camera this weekend.) than I am to say out loud that I want a friend who is not saved to meet my Jesus. That is a fault I am working to change. I am not there yet.

I am still in Rehab.

This Dream Was Played In Technicolor Brilliance

I never sleep well when the weather changes quickly. I can sleep through an ambulance blaring past my window, a lot of neighborhood dogs barking, and any alarm clock ever made. I cannot sleep through wind without rain, a male speaking my name, or a ringing telephone. This morning, rainclouds moved in. I had no sunshine to remind me to get up. I had the soft sounds of "rain on the plain" to keep me in my slumber. This morning, I could not sleep through to the end of my dream. I awoke with a terrible backache. Serves me right for stressing in my sleep, I guess.

Let me set the stage. It was a not yet dark, and kinda stormy night. The "gangstas" were all out, and trouble brewed a palpable haze over the city. My friend was having a birthday. I went to a Wal-Mart to get her a card.

I had gone shopping downtown (anyone who knows me knows that I avoid downtown like the plague, so here we have fiction) to get a birthday card for my friend, and look at gifts, too. It started raining outside, and then inside (great neighborhood, let me tell ya). I had several blocks to walk, and a couple of turns to get back to my car. Here is where the stress builds, the music does the Dunnn-dun-duh that tells you not to go where you are going. I couldn't find my car. I couldn't remember which car I had driven there. I couldn't remember where I parked. I was searching the streets for one silver Chevy Malibu or one silver-blue Honda Fit. Yep, my dreams are at least up to date.

So, for the next three or so imagined hours, I am carrying two bags from my shopping, searching for one of my two cars. I casually stood in a line (I suppose to get into the dance club I was walking past) and ended up walking/riding in a car with three gang members. I was afraid to say much, because they might kill me. We walked or rode past a lot of fights. Viscious children. I watched them steal another car (a trap, but that is because I saw the guy who owned the car waiting for them to take it, so he could call the cops). I refused to ride in that one.

In the end, I remember one really creepy detail, and I am right now copyrighting this dream, so don't get any ideas about using it, OK? And, for My First Nicki Friend in parts East, you may want to stop reading this post now. Trust me. No more. Go back and read another post, find one about the Niecephews. You will regret it if you read further. Just warning you. It creeped me out, and I am the one who imagined it. OK, now that we have that cleared up and Nicki is still reading just for curiosity's sake...

One of the male gang members (There were three, one girl, two guys) tossed a spider at me, to test me. I remember it was dark brown and kinda scary looking. I somehow caught it in the hood of my jacket, and tossed it back at him, with a snide remark. That would have been clever of me. But... he was starting to talk when I flicked the spider, and it went in his mouth. (I will wait while everyone screams, cringes, and generally wonders if I have lost my marbles.) I was too grossed out to finish that thought, even in the dream. Ugh. The next scene is me asking where a park is, because that is near where I knew I parked the car.

This incomplete thought brought to you without commercial interruption by the Mind of Chelf, Nighttime Edition. It is completely fiction, because she would never shop downtown (where there isn't a Wal-Mart handy) and she would never go in the dark to a dangerous area BY HERSELF, and then simply "forget" where her car is. The moral of the story is this: Don't shop last minute for a card. It might get you killed, in dreams and in the real world. You really can never know.

I hear that if you dream your death, you really die. That sounds too scary to suggest to the Mythbusters. I wouldn't want them to try it, because there is really no safe way to test it, and no way to be certain. Who would say that, anyway? Did they (the mysterious "they" everything gets blamed on... and who are "they", really?) get revived from a death-dream to tell us that they dreamed it?

So, there you have it. I have creepy dreams that don't seem to mean much. I have aspirations that are tough and time consuming. I have lots of things I am capable of, but don't know how to start. So, I need to apparently write for some horror film now. I could make money, if I tried. I could write my dreams into horror movies; I could build a purse that actually holds stuff without being too big or heavy to begin with; I could name a few Ty Brand (Should that have the little TM symbol near it? I don't know how to do that with a keyboard.) Beanie Babies. My personal favorite fantasy future jobs are these: I could do voices for cartoon movies, probably with PIXAR/Disney (mostly because it is PIXAR, not because it is Disney); I could proofread for publishing houses back east by telecommuting (first reader has also been suggested to me); I could write.

I am not really awake yet, even half an hour later. I am not a morning person. The fact that I remembered this much of the dream, and communicated it in a mostly coherent fashion is some serious morning mojo I am not used to.

I am off to make something warm to drink. Beware to any little buggie that tries to cross my path today. The adrenaline and fear are still in me.

How was your weekend?

Oh, I Believe In Yesterday, Too, Sir Paul!

Honestly, this was a few days ago, but the joke and the memory will warm my insides for a while.

August 5, Sir Paul McCartney was in my beloved home town. He ate at a restaurant in Bricktown that I (cannot afford) have not tried, and he stayed the night in an historic hotel that I (may never have the pleasure of seeing at all) have only seen in pictures.

We have a local free paper called Oklahoma Gazette. They have a section of odd, political, humorous, or just plain crazy news that happens in or to Oklahoma, called Chicken Fried News. In CFN, they titled this bit "Live and Let Dine". Aren't they clever? While I think they made much ado about nothing, they were not alone. By 4 pm, the local talk radio station I chat over... er... listen to, was bragging about it at every news break. Every ten minutes, I hit the mute button for a few moments. Unfortunately for KTOK, they stayed mute most of the afternoon.

Rumor has it that Sir Paul ate quiche, special ordered from a list in his head that was not on the menu. I suppose when you make enough money to own Bricktown, you can order whatever you wish, no matter what the menu offers. Our chat group discussed this for a few moments. Most of us, while wondering if he would be willing to stand on the top of the shortest building in the area and play a few songs and sign a few autographs, were asking the obvious questions. Was he a jerk or a nice guy? How long would he stay? Why was he in town? How much did he tip the waiter? Important things, wouldn't you agree?

Rumor also has it that the tip will cover said waiter's household expenses for a significant amount of time. I bet he got more for NOT being a stupid crazed fan in front of the new girlfriend. I would certainly expect no less.

I have never been the screaming teen type of starstruck fan. Ask Wes McKenzie. I offered him a Dr. Pepper when a bunch of us were watching a movie one night, and he was slaving away in the radio station on campus at O.C. I bet without my hubby nearby, he doesn't even know who I am. (Ferret and I tried to hide in his apartment once during a tornado, because he was downstairs, and her apartment was upstairs. He may remember that...) But I know that he once sang bass with AVB. My only wish when I came to O.C. was to sit in chapel someday with Rodney Britt on one side of me, and Wes McKenzie on the other, and let the two greatest bass singers I have ever met rattle me out of my chair. I like sitting next to DH in church, because he sings bass too. Bro is a good singer, and he and DH have flanked me, and we had Mac Daddy sitting behind us. Mac Daddy has more projection than DH has, but they both can sing equally low, deep and rattling.

I have always figured that celebrities are people. They just want to be talked to, respected and treated with the dignity us poor folk should give any peasant or king. I don't like to be screamed at, why should they like it? I said on August 5 that I would have expected a big tip from Sir Paul, had I been that wait person. The standard 15-20% plus a little somethin'-somethin' for not being a crazy weird autograph hound.

I have met a few celebs in my short life. You may or may not have heard of Sandy Fries. Yes, it is spelled like French Fries, but pronounced Freeze. Any guesses as to whom he is? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? He is a writer, and he wrote one whole episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation for Will Wheaton. It was called Coming of Age, and it first aired in March of 1988, which makes it now 20 years ago. One of the Directors or Creators came to him and said something short and simple like... "Wesley Crusher is going to Starfleet Academy. Go." What a bundle of inspiration! I met him and got his autograph when he came to Farmington, NM to speak at San Juan College about Creative Writing, back in my early college days in the early 90's.

I have an autographed picture of Mark Lowry. I spoke to him personally, and we shared a laugh. I was working at Glory Be! Christian Books and Gifts in Farmington, and he came to do a concert. My friend Kim P. and I both went. I had met her working for the Hallmark store in the mall, and we became fast friends as sisters in Christ. This was his Mouth In Motion tour, and he sang "Mary Did You Know". He wrote the lyrics! If you ever hear Kenny Rogers and Wynonna Judd sing this one, it will make chills run up and down your spine. Seriously. Stirring and thoughtful song. His opening act was a little girl who had such a powerful voice. Her stage name was JoAnna Rae, and she had the vocal power of Whitney Houston, and the range (that young voice) of Mariah Carey. She was about 9 years old at the time, and so tiny. Mr. Lowry was blown away, as were most of the audience.

I met also at a concert in Farmington, the singer (Insert Memory Card here...). {Edit: Found it! The memory engram was found, and now has been uploaded. His name was Grover Levy.} He was signing CD's well into the night. The package came with a music CD and a DVD Rom of extras. I told him that the second disc did me no good, as I didn't have a computer. He said, "That's OK, I don't either!" He was a teacher, and used some of his students in his songs. He was the most friendly of that concert. Margaret Becker was rude to my brother that day. He had worked his tush off carrying her equipment into the Civic Center, and had helped her crew set it up and later helped to tear it down. The least she could have done was smile, say thanks, and not be offended when someone asked for an autograph. She didn't even stay after the show like the two other acts did, so I never met her. I suppose I didn't miss much.

I once rode on the same plane as John Denver. From Houston to Denver. He was in First Class, and probably in the first seat. I was in the VERY STINKING BACK SEAT of the plane, next to the Flight Attendants' kitchen. I thought I saw him, but was not convinced. Could it have been? Naw. Why would he fly commercial? He has a pilot's license. Well, it WAS John Denver, and he had not died yet while flying his own plane. Such a close brush with greatness. He was my favorite singer, back in the early 80's when he was still being shown in reruns of the Muppet Show, and was still appearing regularly on Sesame Street. The nice attendant and several other passengers were trying to think of his songs, and I came up with more by myself than they did combined. I wasn't really a fan at that time, so that rather surprised me.

Farmington is so out of the way, and kinda small, but it has its share of celebrity rolling through town. I got to see Mr. Former Vice President Dan Quayle while he was campaigning. I was too far past the ropes, and people were getting arrested for trying to do anything more than shake the man's hand. I got pictures from a random lady in the crowd. She got a little closer than me, and offered to take my camera with her. We swapped addresses, and mailed each other copies of our photographs.

DH and I, along with a few friends, saw Ringo Starr and his All Starr Band in concert at Frontier City a few years ago. There were a few people smoking weed a few rows ahead of us, and I came away from there with such a headache! It was my first time to get high. My first, last, ONLY time to get high. That headache didn't go away for almost two days. I don't know why people pay for that feeling. Ugh. Terrible. DH is a HUGE Beatles fan, and Ringo is his favorite. I personally liked Paul best, not only because he is the cute one, but for his long and lifetime marriage to Linda, his work with Wings (also a wife project), and his eagerness to join forces with others for the benefit of a charity.

On August 6, DH and I built a spur-of-the-moment parody of Yesterday. He started by just singing that one word, the most popular word of Paul's most memorable song. Even people who don't really like the Beatles know about the story of Sir Paul singing "Scrambled Eggs". Even if that was not true, we choose to believe the legend, because it makes us feel better. I added something about how he was in town presumably for the funeral of Mr. Murcer (some sports legend I don't know about) because his "friend passed away" and "he didn't eat at Hideaway", which is a local pizza joint that is pretty good... I don't remember it all now, but it was enough to make us laugh. My simple mind at work... you are all so very much in trouble.

Which brings us full circle to last week... and the fact that my obsessed hubby did not know until later that a beloved Beatle was nearby. I am not sure what gizmo or doodad was off, but something was wrong with my world for several moments. I only hope that the fine City of Oklahoma City did not show her petticoats of hick redneck starstruck idiots, but was a lady showing all the refinement she could. I pray that Sir Paul had a fine time here, and was given an extra huge helping of the classical Hospitality this state is known for.