THERE WILL BE SCOFFERS
My friend Jordan shared this with me.
"The thing that has haunted me through the years is in the process of my own growth; I thought I had to register with other people the fact that I had grown by telling them in a laughing way about what I once believed. 'I believed this, I once believed that.' And I had to belittle the path which I had taken. I had to sort of be superior to all those teachers who taught me things that I don't believe anymore. 'There will be scoffers.' Of course we grow. But who is the person who would drive by junior high school and say, 'Phooey.'" F. Craddock
I
think it was a brave thing for Craddock to say. Coming from such an
accomplished man it has added impact. It's good that a mature man such
as Craddock can and will reveal his sadness and enable us, perhaps, to
see ourselves in our own smugness that we might, in the name of the
patient Lord Jesus, decisively be done with it.
It’s ugly at any
time but when preachers and teachers who are given the privilege to
exalt the Lord Jesus engage in it, and perhaps especially in the pulpit
or behind the lectern, it’s ugliness is more apparent. The sneer seems
even more pronounced then, the curled lip seems to contort the mouth
even more and the jeering laugh is crow-like. Imagine hearing it in slow
motion, the way movies sometime present the jeering laugh of some
verbal clod.
Now, in my brilliance I know better, than my
fathers and mothers in the faith and my new understanding has done what?
It has set me free to verbally humiliate some of those who now sit and
listen to my scorn? That’s what my “freedom” and newly found wisdom does
for me? Somewhere beyond the limits of our physical eyes I can easily
imagine the Lord Jesus coming into the room, sitting down beside those
who are now being mocked, putting his arm across their shoulders, warmly
greet them and then look intently at the thief in the pulpit or behind
the lectern who is working at stealing their self-respect.
We do this to our own and treat others with respect? SEE THIS