Following a week of personal sinus/throat infection and a computer seemingly afflicted with some sort of... perhaps empathetic response? Anway...
First the bad news. While we have never sought to be a self-anointed egghead, we are occasionally reminded of our Lord's observation that in many instances, "the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light" (Luke 16:8). Or, to paraphrase Paul's rather sardonic diagnosis of the Corinthian church's problem regarding a particular situation: "Some of you aren't always the brightest around" (I Cor. 1:26).
All of which came to mind, once again, in noting yet another shallow, flippant example of "witness." "BODY PIERCING saved my life" it read, accompanied by the picture of a crucified hand. Why the searching soul, or for that matter, any one of maturity, should be drawn to such expression of the juvenile and jejune quite escapes me.
Ah, the good news! We are repeatedly impressed with a developing sense of oneness among the truly committed - increasingly accompanied by the awareness of intensifying threat and confusion in the world at large. God is beginning, I believe, to bring the Body of Christ together in both love for one another and conscious awareness of need for one another. It is all a part of divine purpose.
Burl Ratzsch
