Thursday, January 15, 2009

To my friends and foes

To all my friends and foes,

but, unknown to them my foes are often my friends, see
A Prose Poem: Beloved Enemies .

Thinking of all of those names you have been using, I thought I should tell you, if you think my heart has been hardened like Pharaoh's, you should ignore me, hanging out on Pharaoh's door step is uncomfortable to say the least. It might leave you swamped by some revengeful gathered sea.

For those of you who think I am a wolf in sheep's clothing you should run like crazy. Wolves have very large teeth for tearing. In one dark story they took out a whole wedding party.
Listening to Scripture while Wolves are howling .

For those of you who think I keep a sloppy blog deleting capriciously, well each one of us, individually, obeys or falls before our Lord. It is his righteousness, not ours after all. Speaking of ...

A better place for you to be is in the care of the Lion of Judea. Whose roar is friendly to the repentant sinner. And after all it is only him with whom we have to do. Calvin quotes Ambrose on Jesus "He is our mouth by which we speak to the Father; our eye by which we see the Father; our right hand by which we offer ourselves to the Father. Save by his intercession neither we nor any saints have any intercourse with God."

So if you are seeking some kind of resting place, some kind of safe shelter, some haven out of a storm, some perfect clarity about truth, I can only point you in His direction. And, if your tone becomes too malevolent, still, I can only point you to Him, as I, for the sake of all, I am sorry, delete you.

I like to think of C.S. Lewis's description of those we meet on our journey, not of faith, but of life, for sadly some are not walking in faith. But the description:

"It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendship, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people.

....And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner--no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. ..."

So please, do not come here if you are unhappy here, and can only hear the howl of a wolf, or the silent stoniness of a Pharaoh. But do run with great speed to Jesus Christ.

11 comments:

Dave Moody said...

You rock, Vi.

your friend,
dm

Anonymous said...

Does this mean you now want to be nice and play fair? Or is it just a revised version of the old prayer,

"'God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this so and so..."

Jodie
Los Angeles, CA

Unknown said...

God bless you, Jodie, for you cannot see the hand of friendship reached out to you for your own hands of anger are covering your eyes!

Viola has said nothing about herself in this posting. She simply has offered to her readers that if they choose to see her only through anger and hostility that they may be better served not to rest here.

I am sorry that you choose to continue your hostility and hope you will eventually find your peace.

Again, God bless you in your journey.

Andrea
Sacramento, CA

Unknown said...

oops.. that is:

Andrea Hightower
Sacramento, CA

Jodie said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Viola Larson said...

My posting was not about making peace no matter what anyone says. My posting insisted that if you want something good and righteous go to Jesus. But if you just want to be malevolent toward others this is not the place to be. And as you know one of the rules of my blog is leave your full real name.

Viola Larson
Sacramento, Ca

Alan said...

It is your blog after all. I've Dungeon Mastered enough to know that when you're in charge you make the rules. If they don't want to play no one is making them.

I' with Dave Moody and it's not Rock like in Rock Hard but as in very cool. Thanks for you continued insight.

Alan Wilkerson
Portland OR.

Viola Larson said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Viola Larson said...

Oh dear,
I just called you fiends instead of friends, I will try that over.

Dave, Andrea and Alan,
You are great friends. And one of you is a great daughter. Now I wonder who that would be? :)

Debbie said...

Viola, that was a beautiful posting. And for those who don't understand it, I can only think of the Black Dwarves in C.S. Lewis's Last Battle. They were in the most beautiful country imaginable, but they thought they were in a small, dark, dirty stable, and they refused to see the light and the love outside their own group, preferring instead to keep to themselves.

Amen, come Lord Jesus, and open their hearts and pour your love on them!

Debbie Berkley
Bellevue, WA

Viola Larson said...

Amen, Debbie