Editor: Richard (Dick) Innes
Published by: ACTS International
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Vol. 7 – No. 5005 December 10, 2005
Thought for the week: "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for a government of any other." – John Adams, Second President of the United States
In 1845, the ill-fated "Franklin Expedition" sailed from England to find a passage across the Arctic Ocean.
The crew loaded their two sailing ships with a lot of things they didn't need: a 1,200-volume library, fine china, crystal goblets, and sterling silverware for each officer with his initials engraved on the handles. Amazingly, each ship took only a 12-day supply of coal for their auxiliary steam engines.
The ships became trapped in vast frozen plains of ice. After several months, Lord Franklin died. The men decided to trek to safety in small groups, but none of them survived. One story is especially heartbreaking. Two officers pulled a large sled more than 65 miles across the treacherous ice. When rescuers found their bodies, they discovered that the sled was filled with table silver.
Those men contributed to their own demise by carrying what they didn't need. But don't we sometimes do the same? Don't we drag baggage through life that we don't need? Evil thoughts that hinder us. Bad habits that drag us down. Grudges that we don't let go.
Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks... Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler's campaign for suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.
In his book, Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis addressed the inclination to say nice things about Jesus, but to stop short of calling him God.
He wrote, "I am here trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: 'I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God.' That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things that Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with a man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any of that patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. Nor did he intend to."
– C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, MacMillan, 1943,
p. 55-56.
According to a survey of parents, 93 percent want schools to teach basic values like honesty and respect. The problem is that schools are left to contend with the seven percent who disagree. And in an enterprise that seeks to avoid conflict and find consensus, that small minority may often dictate policy.
Too often, aggressive objectors bully administrators into quick surrender with the threat of contentious and prolonged opposition. This has created a tyranny of the minority. The way it works is that five percent make so much noise they seem like 25 percent and when it comes to a decision, they're treated as if they were 55 percent.
I strongly support the right of all people to speak their minds and a corollary duty of administrators to listen to and consider what everyone has to say. My concern is that we seem to have elevated the right to be heard into a right to win. We seem to be turning the basic democratic principle "the majority rules" upside down, so that "the minority controls." That's not how democracy is supposed to work.
Of course, the will of the majority never should be allowed to trample the basic human rights of a minority. But I'm not talking about persecution or discrimination. I'm talking about how we deal with disagreements.
Just as we must always guard against oppressive majorities, we must guard against dictatorial minority philosophies. That means we need leaders who have the moral courage to stand up to those who would thwart the will of the majority with demands, protests and backdoor politicking.
We also need more people who are willing to lose and subject their personal preferences to the will of the majority. Democracy requires respect from both sides.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
"But he [Jesus] answered and said, 'It is written, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God"'" (Matthew 4:4).
You may have heard how some years ago Bishop Fulton Sheen was scheduled to speak at the Town Hall in an unfamiliar city. He decided to walk and on the way got lost. He saw some boys so asked them the way to City Hall.
"What are you going to do there?" asked one of the boys.
"I’m going to give a lecture," replied the bishop.
"About what?"
"On how to get to heaven. Would you care to come along?"
"Are you kidding?" said the boy, "You don’t even know how to get to Town Hall!"
Wherever we’re going, it helps to know the way ... especially if we want to get through life successfully and go to heaven. Clear directions are available. They’re all in the Bible. For help see the article, "Passport to Heaven" at: http://tinyurl.com/dm472
Suggested prayer: "Dear God, help me to be sure I know the way to heaven and please give me opportunities to tell others how to get there too. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus’ name, amen."
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