GOD’S FIELD REPRESENTATIVE

In 325 AD The Nicene Council was called by Emperor Constantine of the Roman Empire in order to summarize the chief articles of the Christian faith at that time. The Nicene Creed, for all intents and purposes, legitimized the basic criteria of the Christian faith and the inspired scriptures of our Holy Bible!

Down through the Middle Ages the Catholic Church used intermediaries between our God and the Christians who followed the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Most of the ordinary people could not read nor write and were left to the mercy of these intermediaries. The sins and immoral acts committed by the church leaders for century after century is legendary!

God surely does work in a strange and mysterious way. There is no way that the invention of the Gutenberg press around 1450 AD and the Reformation by Martin Luther in 1520 was coincidental. The Reformation to be successful required the populace to have access to the availability of the inspired scriptures of the Holy Bible. God was beginning to educate and to work directly with His people!

After the Reformation, Christianity spread like wild fire. Then the leaders of the new Protestant Church began to vie for positions of power. The new church split into numerous denominations and the leaders began to add many man made rules in order to consolidate their power and prestige.

The new denominations up until the present time have been preaching the Father and the Son and forgetting to place the proper emphasis upon the Holy Spirit thus depriving many new believers with the understanding and the reliability that the Holy Spirit would always be there for them.

As the new millennium approaches I find that the laity is finding that God’s "Field Representative" is fast becoming the most authoritative, effective and the most reliable source available. They are beginning to respect their own special divine gift; their own intellect. They are inquiring as Christians, if we are not potentially the best God has to offer; then who is?

God has in the last half of this century provided a new tool of communications just as powerful as the Gutenberg press. The computer and the worldwide net! With instantaneous communications and with the revelations of our faith with the promised Comforter we will now be able to share our God with the entire world. One on one!

Just imagine a group of sincere Christians, maybe ten to twelve people, communicating with a like group some where on the other side of this world; discussing within a chat room our shared faith, our problems and our love for another.

It is ironic that Christ’s Church could possibly return to its origin of inception. Small groups without intermediaries loving their God simply, honestly and truly; devoid of ego’s tainted gloss. These groups could possibly be multiplied by a thousand fold in the very near future!

What changes could this process possibly have on the modern day business-church complexes that exist in most of the denominations?

The rest is truly commentary!

This guy Murphy doesn’t have a thing on me. I too, have a law. I call it Barney’s Law of Institutionality! It is; that all institutions sooner or later become separate entities unto themselves and will eventually begin to perpetuate their own image, thereby forgetting the intended purpose for their existence!

Have the modern day institutions of the Protestant Church forgot their intended purpose? It would seem so!

The ministry of Jesus Christ, lasting a few short years changed history as no other single event ever has.

Fortunately, His ministry is part of our recorded history in the form of the Holy Bible! Any believer that can read the basic language in which it is written will have little problem understanding the scriptures, especially those member of the laity that utilize and commune with "God’s Representative," the Holy Spirit!

The men that worked with Jesus and recorded his ministry were ordinary people like the laity in most congregations. They had a mission and they really knew their intended purpose. I have yet to find a PhD among them!

Nearly two thousand years hence and I am astonished when I realize what the modern day and manmade religious bunch of Sunday hucksters, led by the Reverend Verbal Word has done to the basic and simple plea of Christ’s ministry; we should love our God with all our heart, soul and mind and that we should love our neighbor as ourselves. In a nutshell that is the message!

Is it necessary that we have all these over educated doctors of theology talk down to us from lofty pulpits with all the pomp and pageantry? Jesus wore a simple robe and sandals!

Our national sins and immortality have permeated many of our churches to the core. These over zealous liberal conformists remind me of hypocritical parasites. It seems that their main objective is set up a series of churches that permits them to grow and prosper, while sustaining a comfortable lifestyle by the efforts of what they believe to be an inferior people!

A large portion of our mainline liberal churches require a PHD or a DD doctorate, or what have you, with authorship of a best seller like "Permissible Sins" in order to get to be the Senior Pastor, head honcho for re-imagining all sorts of ungodly behavior!

I do not claim to be a prophet or know what God has in mind. I do know however, that these liberal churches of tolerance and inclusion that refuses to call the sins of abortion, adultery and other lustful conduct a sin is not a part of the ministry of Jesus Christ!

The pastors that do not understand and cease to commune with "God’s Field Representative" will wake up one Sunday morning and find their congregations have moved on to more fertile ground. One by one, they slip out with their Christian friends that have found their way closer to the origin of inception of their Savior’s church . . . . back to God with their talents and their tithes!

Who can tell, they may enjoy the humbling experience and the sharing of their Christian faith, with an old time foot washing to the tune of that great old hymn "Nearer My God To Thee!"

But this I do know! God will take care of his people. His "Field Representative" advised me this afternoon. But, we must also do our part, for surely life is a joint venture with our Creator!

JIG SAW PUZZLE

Reaching back for magic moments in this metered thing called time,
Shouting loudly in my silence like a gesturing, comic mime.
Searching for some token substance, proof that life is not a sham,
I find a jig sawed puzzled picture, revealing who and what I am!

I watch the pieces come together, lest they vanish and escape,
Realizing in my saddest moment, they forever keep their shape!
They will fit within the puzzle, taking form to frame a face,
Reflecting life just as I live it; no one else can take my place!

I can’t undo past deeds of folly pieced within the jig saw frame,
Reflecting evil, veiling goodness, in the portrait with my name.
Facing utter degradation with an ego to replete,
I find the pieces of the puzzle, and the portrait, incomplete!

In my hour of condemnation, like the thief upon the cross,
I find that things of utter beauty can be found in wasteful dross.
We have the chance to change the future; it’s been the option all the while,
And with the remaining jig saw pieces, I can make that portrait smile!