I have some fundamental philosophical differences with our veterinarian.  We seem to disagree on my responsibilities as a pet owner.  I have always been a pet owner, and have owned dogs, cats, hamsters, guinea pigs, parakeets, finches, gold fish, beta fish, and a terrapin.  I have always thought of myself as a responsible pet owner.  My pets have always been well fed, well watered, well housed, and current on all their shots.  They have never been mistreated or neglected.  I am, as of this writing, in possession of a 17 year old cat, which we have had since her kitten-hood.  She has visited the vet more than any pet we have ever owned because she developed a severe allergy to even a single flea-bite, and no flea prevention product will completely prevent a single bite.  Also, she needs medication for thyroid trouble – which she gets twice a day, every day. 

            Now, my vet tells me that the cat needs blood-work every two weeks to make sure her blood levels are good – at a cost of $150 a test – hence the philosophical difference.  I believe that it is beyond the call of pet ownership to pay $300 a month to make sure a 17 year old cat had good blood levels.  Especially since this cat is healthy, active, and content.  I am warned that if I want her to stay as healthy as she is now she’ll have to get regular blood work done.  I don’t think it is worth $150 twice a month to make sure a 17 year old cat feels as spry as a 12 year old cat.

            Our real difference is not so much in that I think it costs too much to pay all my cat’s necessary (according to her) medical bills – it is that I think of my cat as a cat.  My veterinarian thinks of my cat as her patient.  The vets I knew growing up spent as much time in people’s barns as they did in their offices.  They understood that a cow is a cow, a horse is a horse, a pig is a pig, a dog is a dog, and a cat (as remarkable as this seems) is a cat.  I’m sure my veterinarian never moonlighted as a farrier (she may not even know what a farrier is), but she is an excellent healer and woman of science who thinks my 17 year-old, six-and-a-half pound feline should get all the tests, treatments, and therapies she can think of to prescribe.

            I believe that people are people and animals are animals.  If one is not willing or able to care for a pet one should not own a pet, certainly, but there are limits.  How many people who need regular blood-work are unable to afford it?  People are more important than animals.  You may, or may not agree with me about the cost of keeping a geriatric cat in fine-tuned health.  But I hope you agree with me that steps we take to care for humans are not necessarily necessary for animals.  I’ve known enough pet owners to guess that many do disagree.  I am not arguing that we neglect our pets.  I am asking that we prioritize people.

            Souls take priority.  Humans have souls, souls given by God, souls that will return to God (Ecclesiastes 12.7).  Jesus died on the cross so that these souls could be saved (John 3.16).  And yet we often treat our pets better than we treat each other – care for our pets more than we care for each other.  I have three questions I want each of us to ask ourselves.

Do I love people more than I love my pets?

Do I spend as much time on the care and feeding of my own soul as I do for my pet’s care and feeding?

Do I spend as much time caring for the souls of others as I do caring for my pet?

You may dismiss this as silliness, but I don’t think it is silly at all. Relationships with pets are simpler than relationships with people, so it is easier to give them our preference – but it isn’t right.  Think of the treasure we spend on them.  “Where our treasure is, there will our hearts be also,” Jesus insists (Matthew 6.21).  The metrics are not illusive.  We can know, if we are honest, where our hearts really are.  Jesus surely knows.  

            It was early December, 1783, before British and Hessian troops turned New York City over to George Washington, and what remained of the Continental Army.  Most of that army had been discharged to go home.  The foreign forces that had occupied the city since early in the war had seen little if any action.  Washington had early on decided not to try to pry the British army loose from the city.  When those Redcoats and Hessians marched down Broadway to the harbor they made a splendid display. Every officer, every infantryman, every horse was exhibiting parade finery.  The Army that marched in behind them did not (could not) make a similar display. They were clothed, and shod, and crisp in their step as they marched in, four abreast. But their clothes and their faces were worn and bare.  One young woman standing along Broadway that day wrote “The British troops leaving us were equipped as if for show, and with their scarlet uniforms and burnished arms made a brilliant display.  The troops that marched in were ill-clad and weather-beaten, and made a forlorn appearance.”  General Washington had a different perspective.  He remembered the shoeless winters of Kip’s Bay, and Valley Forge, and on that December day he commented that the Americans looked “spruce.”*

            Spruce or forlorn, the General and the young lady shared a common perspective as they watched their troops take control of New York that day.  They both looked on those soldiers with pride.  That same young lady continued her comments thus: “[They] made a forlorn display; but then they were our troops, and as I looked at them, and thought of all they had done and suffered for us, my heart and my eyes were full, and I admired and gloried in them the more, because they were weather-beaten and forlorn.”

            Two ways to proceed with this essay would be to discuss how two people can look at the same thing and see something so different. Another would be to observe how two people can see something so different and share the same perception of that thing.  Both, however, are predicated upon the fact that what we see is subjective more than objective. Our eyes take the colors absorbed by the objects in our field of vision and send that information to the brain. The brain takes that information about shapes and colors and assigns labels to what we see – a horse, a uniform, a rifle, a saber.  Then, based upon subjective things – our experience, our station, our disposition -  the brain, in an instant adds on adjectives and values – weather-beaten, forlorn, proud, thankful.

            When Jesus tried to get the Jews to have some perspective on John the Baptist’s ministry (and His own), he asked them: “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? What did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Those who wear soft clothing are in king’s palaces,” (Matthew 11.7-8). Jesus’ question lays bare our perceptions like a laser-scalpel.  We see what we intend to see.  We look at the same, overcast sky and you call it slate grey, while I call it cobalt blue.  Your call it gloomy, while I call it comforting (I like overcast days). But it is the same sky. Regardless of their version of things, Jesus tells them that John the Baptist is a prophet, and that His own kingdom will be greater than anything John the Baptist could experience. There is truth. The truth is Jesus (John 14.6).

            The thing I love about the account above is that whether the troops were described as “spruce,” or “forlorn” the General and the young lady shared the same pride, thankfulness, and full-hearted patriotism upon seeing them march down Broadway. Later, at Fraunces Tavern, Washington would take leave of them with these brief, tear-choked words: “With a heart filled with love and gratitude I now take leave of you. I most devoutly wish that your later days may be as happy and prosperous as your former ones have been glorious and honorable.”**

            The truth is. Our great task is to be better at seeing it, not to be better at arguing our own version of it. Our experiences, as various as they are need not hinder us from arriving at correct conclusions. The best way to see the truth more clearly is to see Jesus more clearly.

            If you remain in my word you are truly my disciples; and you shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free. John 8.31-32

Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to respond to each person.  Colossians4.6

Last Saturday’s shooting of 20 in Tucson, Arizona resulted in the death of 6.  Among the dead were Federal Judge, John M. Roll; 9 year old Christina Taylor Green; and Dorwin Stoddard, our brother in Christ.  Brother Stoddard died shielding his wife, Mavy, from the shooter.  She was shot several times in the leg, but not wounded seriously.  The Stoddards are members of the Mountain Avenue Church of Christ.  If you visit any major newspaper online you can read the biographies of the dead.  You would find that Judge Roll had been threatened before, that Christina Taylor Green had been born on September 11, 2001, and that Brother Stoddard told Mike Nowak, preacher of the Mountain Avenue congregation, that he and Mavy wanted to meet Representative Gifford to tell her she was doing a good job.  I wonder if he got to tell her that before he was shot dead.

Nearly all the television coverage of this event has ignored the stories of its victims.  We are told about Gabby Gifford’s fight to change the vitriolic tone typical of so much political discourse in our nation.  We are told her husband is training to be an astronaut and is scheduled to make the last Space Shuttle flight.  But we are told little else.  Most of the reporting has been about vitriolic speech, and whether it incited a troubled 22 year old man to unload a 30-shot, 9mm clip on an innocent crowd.

I have no notion of what was going on in Jared Loughner’s head.  It is reported that fellow students and neighbors were frightened of him and pegged him as a budding serial killer.  No one was so aware of Ted Bundy, or the BTK killer, though.  I also read that his library included Mein Kampf, The Communist Manifesto, To Kill a Mockingbird, and The Old Man and the Sea– but then again, so does mine.  If we are able to establish some sort of cause-and-effect-chain-of-events which lead to the shooting, what will we have learned?  Whatever warped reasoning produced this action was, by definition, warped – cautionary, perhaps, but not normative.

We don’t need journalists, politicians, or court-appointed psychiatrists to tell us that words have consequences.  Jesus said that hate-speech was violence nearly 2000 years ago (Matthew 5.21-22), and said it would be judged as violence.  His brother James, writing a few decades later insists that we remember our words can “set on fire the course of our lives,” (James 3.6, see 3.1-12).  Proverbs counsels: “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger,” Proverbs 15.2.  We have the blessing of Free Speech in this nation, and it is a blessing.  But the New Testament has issued filters for the speech of a Christian.  We respond to interrogators with “gentleness and reverence,” (I Peter 3.15).  Our words are to be “wholesome,” “edifying,” and “appropriate to need,” or they are not to be spoken at all (Ephesians 4.29). 

That phrase from Ephesians, “appropriate to need,” is paralleled by the phrase “seasoned with salt,” in the Colossians 4 passage cited above.  Our language is described as “salty,” not bland.  Biblical language is anything but bland.  Every human emotion is expressed in it, and every tool of language from imprecation, to pun is used to express these emotions.  But every line of the Bible is written, ultimately, to communicate grace.  “Grace” is the word used in Ephesians 4.29, and Colossians 4.6 as the goal of Christian speech.

Grace is what is lacking in our discourse, our culture, and in personal lives.  How fortunate, then, that Grace is the message we have been given to share.  Let us share it.

            During Jesus time, the people were no strangers to war, oppression, bad economy, threats, fear, disease and concern for their own mortality. Jesus encouraged them to keep their priorities straight and "fight the good fight," striving to be obedient Christians - children of God. The irony of times like that is the potential it brings for unity of the church, the coming together that historically is not there as much during perceived times of comfort and peace. After 911 there was a reported (noticeable) increase of people praying and going back to church where many searched for answers.  People all over the country sought God's word and comfort to get them through those difficult days.  By the end of the following year, many had all but forgotten the crisis, leaving the churches empty, and the cries that once flooded God's ears had gone silent. 

            The dilemma we face these days as Christians begs the question, what type of environment would we choose to live in?  If it were up to us, would we determine that the world should be at peace in our times?  Would that bring us closer to God, or would that produce a relaxed atmosphere toward God with less emphasis on Jesus message and return?  Or would we acknowledge that in times of trouble we would find opportunity to rally around our Lord and use the events to our advantage as Christian soldiers?  Since that decision is not wholly left to us, we are left to embrace the times for what they are; a battle for which we all must come together as never before.  During times of peace and prosperity we can rightly give thanks to God the Father, the provider of means and safety in our lives.  But during times of duress and worry, we can turn to God and to each other with a greater resolve, girding our loins as it were, to not only find comfort in God’s word and in each other, but to put on the full armor of God, and unite as a people of God and make a stand for what Satan surely views as victories. 

            Throughout the Old Testament, God's people would find themselves in terrible predicaments of sin, and experienced the consequences God directed toward them as a result of those sins.  God in his mercy would hear their prayer, often granting answers to those prayers through prophets, kings and other servants of God, as they came together in repentance and prayer.  As peace settled on the land, and with no immediate danger visible, they reverted quickly back to their old ways, and the cycle continued.  We have fought and tarried and worked hard to establish a “promise land” if you will, where we could worship God without fear of persecution, and devote our lives to our families and God’s work.  But today we find ourselves in times of distress and evil that mirrors some of those Old Testament patterns.   God's judgment on the Israelites could span several hundred years. We've only been in a free land that God has provided for us for a little over 200 years. I wonder where we might be in that timeline if judgment where pending?  The lessons we have to learn will sit silently in the pages of the bible if not read, heeded, and shared with those we live and interact with.

            So as you read the paper and as you listen to the news, remember the comfort of our Lord’s words: “Lo, I am with you always,” and, “I am the Alpha and the Omega.”  God is in control but looks to use us as His children to prepare for the battles that lay ahead:  “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand (Eph 6:13); “Pray without ceasing;”  (1 Thess 5:17);  “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father in heaven.”  (Matt 5:16).  We should be using the current events to compel us in uniting ourselves as never before, knowing that harder times are coming.  Matthew 10:28 reminds us to “…not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”  We shouldn't fear any near and present danger as much as we should fear God's wrath that would be inflicted as a result of sitting idly by.  And when you wake tomorrow morning, be thankful for the bed you slept in, and for all the blessing God has provided for you in some measure.  But don’t let the sign of the times preoccupy your mind; look to God in prayer for your role in the real battle before us, not letting Satan take the upper hand in creating fear and chaos in our lives.  Isaiah 52:12 promises, “The Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard.”  If the children of God are afraid and confused, what will those who look to us think?   And always remember what James 1:12 admonishes, “Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.”