Is it God’s will? Our will? His will or their will?
I enjoy my church.
It’s The Bridge at Palma Sola Bay.
I will continue to enjoy it unless I do something dumb enough that they would ban me.
I’m competing with myself for that award so, I know the bar is high!
I once told my pastor, after he was so inspired by the worship team’s music that he danced right out onto stage early, that I loved his sermon and his energy, but I had yet to eat enough mushrooms as to accidentally find myself up there dancing.
He chuckled playfully. Probably unsure of whether to nervously encourage my own energy or suggest I not eat mushrooms.
It’s a real possibility.
Not me eating the mushrooms, my wife and children would never stand for that, but the music being so inspiring that you dance your way onto the stage.
Reality was, I’d simply been reading a book on mushrooms, and I have a tendency to become what I read, temporarily.
Currently, I’ve been reading through the NLT Bible, which I suggest everyone try — and make sure it is the NLT because it is written to where a normal (if I’m normal) person can read it like a novel.
It’s not written all archaic, or Yoda-like. So, if you can read this article with some pleasure, you can probably read the NLT with almost as much.
That was a pat on my own back if you missed it.
Go away ego.
Anyhow, I am up to the book of Judges, and I am unsure whether I am just trying to get everything off of my chest that I feel about judging, before I finish reading it, or if I’ve actually learned something from what I’ve read so far.
Truth is, there has been a whole lot of judging going on in my life lately, and I have found it to be quite interventional. Is that a word?
What I mean is, it is kind of ghostly. No.
Weird.
No.
Well, have you ever felt like a song was about to come on the radio and then it does? Or been thinking of your wife, then she calls?
My wife calls all the time:)
That was also a pat on my own back;) Well hey, I think of her all the time!
Heck, maybe I need one as bad as you guys do sometimes!
Point is, I come across this book Judges right when all this judgement is upon me and my family.
Coincidental? I’m not gonna say it’s a God thing because, hey, isn’t everything?
Anyhow, I recently had a conversation with a loved one about how being hateful to bad people is not our place.
“Is it our place to stand at the window of the death chamber and throw curses at the man about to be permanently punished by electrocution?”
No.
It would be an inspiring painting to see and wonder which person is more disgusting?
But in the end, my answer would be
a soft neither.
They are both just learning. Students and teachers.
It would be shocking for you to hear me say that both would be beautiful.
Sometimes, we wish we could just produce a random number generator to decide men’s ultimate fates.
Did you know the switch has been pulled and the person has lived, just to be put to another longer jolt?
An executioner’s job is the hardest and heaviest of all humanity. And it hides in other jobs, too.
Policemen, Judges, Doctors, Paramedics, Nurses, family members…
What’s the difference between killing someone and letting them die? Whether it’s accidentally, for their own good, or in vain?
I read a few interviews on death row executioners.
I am no professional, but I’m finding that everyone involved in things share the same connections and thoughts.
One of the executioners went as far as to say that he would always suggest to the condemned men to take their last chance to repent, and that he would pray right alongside them because it may just be his last chance as well.
Really, even if a man does repent, find God on death row, and sit down on that chair…
Does the man himself feel that he deserves to die?
Does the family?
Does the executioner?
Does God?
Recently there was a post online that said,
“You cannot connect to God without loving humanity.”
-Erwin Raphael Mcmanus
I found that an astounding statement. Then, the next girl pointed out that you could not love humanity without being connected to God.
Sometimes, I think our judgement temporarily severs that connection.
What if there were a forensic lie detector built into the handles of the lethal injection table? And the man’s final question was,
“Do you deserve to die?”
That is really eerie, right?
Then what if a random number generator ran through the choices of death or life in prison —
I don’t know, I’m not a professional anything, just a philosopher I guess.
Hope that doesn’t get me in trouble!
Just read your bible, Jay.
You obviously need the book of Judges under your belt!
If you’re inspired, connect with me over here.
If you’re curious, leave me your email here.
If you like any of this stuff… buy me a coffee over here!
Wanna collaborate? Connect with me over a cup of coffee…
but not here.
That would just be weird.
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Jay Horne is an author and publisher out of Bradenton, Florida. He is a husband and father of four.
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