Shade Tree Wisdom 10/20/11

          It had cooled down quite a bit as the weatherman said it would, so I was prepared with a jacket, and needed it.  Then I met a lady with her dog, and she was wearing only a short sleeved blouse.  So I said, “No jacket?”  She said, as she hurried along, “I thought the walking would warm me up, and it hasn’t yet.  And it didn’t seem this cold when I left the house.”

          Appearances do deceive.  And the crowd could just be wrong.

          A devotion in Portals of Prayer recently reported that a third grade class had a new class pet, a bunny. One asked, “Is it a boy or a girl”?  And the teacher asked, “How do we find out?”  One bright girl said, “Let’s take a vote.”

          That’s the modern way, isn’t it?  Do what the crowd does.  Go along with popular opinion.  And that may be wrong.  Last night a report said children ages 11 and 12 were engaging in sex.  “Well, they’re all doing it”.

          But there is a moral law that speaks of right and wrong, and that is not taken by vote, rather it is set by God.  This says, “You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed.” Ps. 119,4.

          The Psalm also describes what happens when God is ignored.  “The wicked freely strut about, when what is vile is honored among men”. Psalm 12,8.

          Oh, we have made so much progress in technology.  Today children are mostly “wired”, they text, have facebook pages, are in constant touch, and parents have lost control and no longer seem able or want to, set some standards for living.  And the result shows.

          It shows in letters to the editors or advice columns, in crowded psychiatrist offices, in rampant suicides.  Lord, help us.

          My prayer for us all is that we take this to the Lord, asking for direction, for strength to speak of the ONE solution, the life and death of Jesus Christ for the sins of the world.  May the lord keep us in this faith till He calls us to Himself.

GPD 10/20/11