Illogical to a world gone mad

My youngest son and I went to the Inc. 500 conference in Washington D.C. last week and had a really great time; it was intellectually stimulating and fascinating to listen to all of the tremendous speakers espouse their various ideas on business. I had been invited there as a result of the performance of our company in making Inc’s. prestigious list of high performing privately held companies. We ran into the CEO of Inc. at an event one night and spoke with him for some length of time.

He and I became personally acquainted last year when I responded to one of his company’s advertisements for this very event and his ad was plugging former President Bill Clinton as its keynote speaker. I offered a little of my perverse humor by responding to his e-mail solicitation as follows: “Bill Clinton makes me gag!” He personally responded with a long dissertation on how Bill Clinton would offer some diversity to the event and he had after all become President of the most powerful nation on earth and so forth and so on, and he felt that if I attended this event that I would enjoy it.

I did not attend that one due to my tough schedule, but did correspond back and forth to the CEO as time went on and we became friends and somewhat to my surprise he subscribed to Words for the Day and became a frequent reader. When we met the other night he mentioned that he was still a loyal reader of WFTD and then he looked at me and stated, “You know that I do not agree with everything you say, don’t you?” He had stepped forward a bit, getting close to my face and looked at me in a semi-defiant manner and “eyed me”; I suppose to gauge whether or not I would be shocked at this idea that someone would not agree with everything I say, and to monitor how I would react to it. I smiled and stated, “Of course I would have expected nothing less”. (After all this man lives in one of those blue states, New York and actually lives in New York City.)

I left unsaid, but I have no doubt that he understands, that I do not agree with everything he states either; and in particular inviting Bill Clinton to speak at a convention for entrepreneurs, but nonetheless, I did not let that deter me in the slightest and was at the event and enjoying myself immensely and having a great time talking with this very intelligent man about a wide variety of issues including politics and the worsening economy.

I was talking to my son later about this and mentioned that in many countries if you disagree with someone about anything, it means you must go to war with them and try to kill them. The great thing about America is that we can disagree about things without killing each other, or starting a war, and in fact can become good friends in spite of our differing opinions. When you think about it God loves this diversity. He created it! He created every one of us uniquely different, and as He always does, did so intentionally. Just imagine how boring that it would it be if we were all carbon copies of each other and thought identically. Jesus Christ said we should love one another. He did not put qualifiers in there like: “provided someone is a Republican or Democrat, or that someone must be either black, white, yellow, or brown, or that they must agree with us on immigration, welfare, or taxes, or that they be a Southern Baptist, Methodist, or Roman Catholic. He did not ordain that we all should think alike; in fact if He had wanted that scenario, He would not have created us in the fashion that He did.

I am flying to Anchorage Alaska next week to be the keynote speaker for an organization that caters to the homeless community. Many of those for whom they care are alcoholics and drug abusers, street beggars, welfare mamas, papas, and yes even a few young able bodied persons too lazy to work and other folks considered to be societal pariahs. My trip is fourteen hours from Tallahassee and fourteen hours back the next day and is a very expensive flight for which I am personally picking up the tab. I am right in the middle of moving in and getting settled at my new home and I have a million things that I need to do. Deer season just opened and I am going to miss part of it. I do not even know the people that I am going up there to try and help, nor do I agree with their lifestyle. I have no logical reason to have a burden for these people, but to tell you the truth it breaks my heart to think of their misery and I just want to be a small part of helping them in any way that I can.

Being a Christian is not about being logical, it is about Jesus Christ and His love for ALL of mankind. The love of Jesus Christ is not logical to a world of fleshly sin. We can get along with people with whom we disagree, and we can help those whose lifestyles are despicable to us, and we can offer a merciful helping hand to a complete stranger, or an entire nation of complete strangers because Jesus Christ lives inside us. When we belong to Him, we are not of the world and do we belong to it; we just are passing through on our way to a perfect society where there is no hatred or violence or prejudice. In God’s society, (heaven), there is no room for anything short of love.

Do you want to live in a place where your neighbor might be a different color or race? Have a different education, or perhaps no education? Live next to someone who is a homeless indigent? An immigrant? A Democrat? (Right next door!) Learn to be tolerant.

Jesus is merciful, kind, loving, and forgiving, and according to the Bible we should emulate Him in every way.

Phil. 2:5
Your attitude should be the same as that of
Jesus Christ